QUESTION PERIOD — Finance
Fiscal Management
November 6, 2025
My question is for the government leader.
Government leader, yesterday, we had Beatrice up in the gallery. You were asking a question about the kind of world she’s going to inherit, but you forgot to mention that the debt that has been piled onto that generation is going to take years to dig out of.
Yesterday, you also tried to defend your government’s abysmal fiscal record by cherry-picking the only rosy metric available — the net debt-to-GDP ratio — but the International Monetary Fund’s, or IMF’s, latest fiscal analysis tells a much different story. Canada’s gross debt-to-GDP ratio is the fifth largest amongst the G7 at a staggering 113.9%. Our total debt ranks seventh highest among the IMF’s 32 advanced economies, and Canadian households now carry the highest debt levels in the G7. None of these figures even include the debt offloading to the provinces to sustain our universal health care system.
Leader, will you stop hiding behind selective statistics and admit that this government’s fiscal management makes former prime minister Justin Trudeau look like a fiscal budget hawk?
I don’t need to hide behind anything, because I think that the government is very proud of the budget tabled yesterday. Let me quote the Prime Minister on the debt.
He has said that the debt burden as a share of GDP is lower now than it was when the Conservative government was in power — I think it’s six times less — all while the new government is investing in Canada and protecting transfers to the provinces for health care, education and social services. This is looking toward the future.
Seventy-five percent of the budget measures are for sovereignty to protect our borders, our communities and our way of life. The balance, 25%, is for affordability and middle-class tax cuts.
This budget invests in Canada at twice the rate of any budget during this millennium. There is no way we have to hide behind anything about the budget we tabled yesterday.
Government leader, I will quote former prime minister Justin Trudeau at the election debate in 2015: “Canada has the lowest debt-to-GDP ratio in the world and the most balanced GDP ratio in the world.” That’s the former Liberal prime minister giving Prime Minister Harper the credit for that.
Second of all, let’s point out that, when it’s all said and done, over the last 10 years we have had food banks at record levels, and we have had young people dreaming about buying a house while youth unemployment is hitting record levels.
Will your government continue to cherry-pick statistics to try to make a point or will you acknowledge what we all know — we’re drowning in debt?
Well, if we were drowning in debt, we would already be drowned because of the Conservative government, because it was seven times worse than what it is right now.
As far as affordability is concerned, let me talk to you about Automated Federal Benefits, the National School Food Program and Personal Support Workers Tax Credit benefits. Build Canada Homes is providing $1 billion for transitioning from homelessness and for people in need.
