Ottawa Journal by David Tilson MP — House of Commons gets back to work

January 27, 2017 · 0 Comments

tilson The Spring Sitting of the House of Commons gets underway this coming Monday (Jan. 30) and the Trudeau government finds itself faced with a whole host of problems, most of which are of their own creation.
At the top of the list of important items to be dealt with is the Budget, which we expect some time in February or March. In their first year in office, the Liberals have spent your tax dollars at a ferocious rate, blowing past their estimated deficit figure of $10 billion by a factor of three. We are now poised to be permanently in debt to the tune of $1.5 trillion by 2050 if we continue at the rate the Liberals are going. Our Conservative government left Trudeau with balanced books. Slightly more than a year later, he’s decimated the federal balance sheet.
Next up is job creation. In their first year in office, the Liberals have seen a net loss of 30,000 full time jobs. It’s time to get on with implementing policies that will create well-paying, full-time jobs in Canada. With the incoming Trump administration, the timing is excellent to get rolling on the Keystone XL pipeline. The government must also defend NAFTA and the millions of jobs in Canada that depend on it.
We will likely see the details of Prime Minister’s plan to impose a job-killing carbon tax on Canadians starting in 2018. Combine that with Premier Wynne’s similar plan, and you will have significant economic pain being inflicted in Ontario — something that we in Dufferin-Caledon definitely do not need.
As I wrote previously, the Prime Minister is also facing some serious ethical issues, both for himself as well as with some of his Ministers. The Prime Minister is now under investigation by both the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner as well as the Official Languages Commissioner. On the latter, the Prime Minister answered in French a question asked in English by a woman from Sherbrooke, Quebec. The question was about the lack of mental health service availability in English in that part of the province. The Official Languages Commissioner received a number of complaints and is investigating.
There are open questions remaining for the upcoming session in the House. Is the Prime Minister going ahead with electoral reform? His Democratic Institutions Minister did such a disastrous job over the past year, she got shuffled out of her position. Speaking of the recent Cabinet shuffle, the former Status of Women Minister spent $1.1 million to renovate her office. That went over so well with her boss that she got a promotion to Employment, Workforce Development and Labour. This is not the kind of fiscal irresponsibility Canadians need right now, nor should it be rewarded with promotions.
There will be lots of questions waiting for the Prime Minister and his government when the House resumes Monday. My colleagues and I in the Official Opposition will be there, holding this government to account.