QP: Facile questions about the deficit

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While the prime minister was in town and in his office, he was not available for QP on Wednesday as is his usual practice, as he was instead speaking virtually at the Summit for Democracy, before he and his deputy whisked off to a photo op. That’s right—the day after Budget Day, and the finance minister was also absent from the Chamber. Pierre Poilievre led off in French, and both gave several falsehoods about deficits and inflation before complaining there was no path to balance in the budget. Randy Boissonnault pointed out the measures to help, and that this was a budget about hope. Poilievre listed four things that Chrystia Freeland said last year that he deemed false (to varying degrees of veracity), and wondered how anyone could trust anything this government says. Boissonnault listed the declining deficit and low debt-servicing charges. Poilievre returned to French to complain the government has “lost control” of finances, and this time François-Philippe Champagne said that it was the Conservatives who were disconnected because the government did the three things that Canadians were asking of them. Poilievre switched back to English to worry about people living in their parents’ basement while the country “goes broke.” (It’s not going broke). This time Karina Gould got up to decry that the Conservatives had already declared they were going to vote against things like the grocery rebate and supports for families. Poilievre denounced the budget as “tax and squander,” and once again, Gould reiterated the things the Conservatives were voting against.

Yves-François Blanchet led for the Bloc, and he listed measures that were not green, and wanted an admission that money was going to oil companies. Steven Guilbeault said that this was not the case, and quoted the David Suzuki Foundation’s praise. Blanchet complained the budget was anti-Quebec because it meddles in provincial jurisdiction on things like dental care, but Guilbeault just kept reading praise for the budget.

Jagmeet Singh rose for the NDP, patted himself on the back for the things in the budget he liked, and said that if the government needs more ideas, they can tackle the housing crisis. Ahmed Hussen recited the elements of the National Housing Strategy that he trots out. Singh repeated his backpatting in French, and this time, Irek Kusmierczyk read their plans about reforming EI, and that it is on the way.

Round two, and Poilievre got up accuse the prime minster of fleeing yesterday instead of answering question on public safety and demanded the government reverse their measures to date, and accused the prime minister of unleashing chaos on the streets with “catch and release” policies—which is an outrageous lie (Lametti: We are working with provinces on bail reform; Holland: You are launching personal attacks while advocating policies that failed in the States), Raquel Dancho listed murders in recent days and blamed the government (Mendicino: Drop the rhetoric and work together), and Pierre Paul-Hus repeated the same in French (Lametti: You are distorting what Bill C-5 does, and it doesn’t give house arrest for serious crime, while addressing systemic racism in the system).

Gabriel Ste-Marie demanded that Quebec be able to withdraw from the dental care programme with full compensation (Duclos: This programme will help millions of people), and accused the budget continuing oil subsidies (Rodriguez: You only nag and complain, and try to pick fights).

Jasraj Hallan accused the government of fuelling inflation (Boissonnault: We are going to continue to deliver for Canadians; Holland: This is a pattern of incendiary language and personal attacks), and Gérard Deltell wailed about the deficit and the rise in carbon prices (Boissonnault: We are meeting the challenge of Canadians with grocery rebates, health care spending, and laying out the future of the economy; Champagne: We listened to Canadians).

Singh got back up to complain about housing costs and demanded the federal government build more homes (Hussen: Yay our Housing Accelerator Fund), and demanded EI reform immediately (Kusmierczyk: Usual script about the commitment to modernise the system).

Round three saw questions on carbon prices (Gould: If you cared about the cost of food, you would support our budget and it’s grocery rebate; St-Onge: You only care about austerity while we are there for Canadians), on the deficit (Boissonnault: The deficit continues to decrease in the face of economic headwinds), the military plans to source airplanes from Boeing and not Bombardier (Champagne: We have always been there for aerospace), the interim Ethics Commissioner being the sister-in-law of Dominic LeBlanc (Holland: This is a career public servant who is the number two in the office), importing baby formula with no domestic production capacity (Duclos: We have made flexible regulations for imports), selling fisheries quotas (Murray: We have an announcement coming soon), comments Rob Oliphant made around Iranian-Canadians’ demands around the IRGC (Oliphant: We are standing against Iran even if we have different strategies), that there be strings attached to union jobs for investment tax credits (Boissonnault: The top credits go to those with labour participation), and the disability supports not in the budget (Kusmierczyk: We are waiting for the benefit bill to pass the Senate, and there is consultation money in the budget).

Overall, it was not a great day for the discourse of the nation, starting from the usual facile and wrong talking points about the deficit—no, it’s not actually fuelling inflation, and this is not burdening you children and grandchildren. Deficits don’t work like that. Unfortunately, this kind of nonsense is so embedded in the national consciousness that it’s really hard to break out of, or even call out. Even worse, however, were the absolutely lurid questions about a recent spate of murders, mostly knife crimes, nation-wide, and trying to blame the prime minister for them. The causes of crime are complex, and we are getting a picture in media that some of these perpetrators are people who were utterly failed by the system. Screaming that they’re not being locked up forever means that we’re not solving any of the problems, and provinces in particular bear a bigger share of the burden, both for their services failing these people, and in the administration of justice. Poilievre’s demands here are both theatre, and are only going to make things worse going forward.

Meanwhile, the Speaker is apparently asleep in his chair, because he not only didn’t seem to hear Poilievre calling out the prime minister’s absence, Jasraj Hallen repeatedly referring to the finance minister as the “minister of inflation” or calling the NDP “gullible,” nor did he understand the complaint from the NDP about Poilievre using the term “savage” in his lurid questions on crime. When these issues were brought up as points of order after QP, he said he would need to check the tape on the issues raised, when he should have been attentive to them as they happened and called them out at that point. Coming back a day or two later doesn’t actually call out bad behaviour, and he should be more attentive to this kind of thing, rather than just trying to be everyone’s friend.

Sartorially speaking, snaps go out to Jeremy Patzer for a dark blue suit over a white shirt and a blue and white checked tie, and to Jennifer O’Connell for a white jacket without lapels over a black dress. Style citations go out to Karina Gould for a dark grey dress that would have been just fine if it didn’t have off-white puffy sleeves attached, and to Scott Reid for a bistre brown jacket over a beige waistcoat, light blue shirt, red tie, and light grey slacks. Dishonourable mention goes out to Monique Pauzé for a dark yellow jacket over a black top and slacks. Special mention goes Simon-Pierre Savard-Tremblay for a black spotted tie that was so wide I suspect it was a scarf masquerading as a tie.