Barrie's Conservative MPs are voicing their displeasure with the Liberal government’s 2023 budget because they believe it will only harm Canadians.
The federal government tabled its 2023-24 budget on Tuesday, which will cost $490.5 billion, including public debt charges, with $8.3 billion in new program spending. The projected deficit is $40.1 billion, which is greater than the $30.6-billion deficit for this coming fiscal year that was forecast in November's fiscal update.
Barrie-Innisfil MP John Brassard called the budget “extremely concerning,” adding he doesn't feel the federal government is considering the needs of all Canadians.
“At a time when so many people in Barrie-Innisfil and all across the country are suffering with spiking prices for food and an out-of-control housing market, the NDP-Liberal government has announced additional billions in new spending that will fuel inflation and hurt beleaguered Canadian families and seniors,” Brassard said in a release.
Over the next five years, the government expects to spend $59.5 billion more than before. Nearly half of that will go to increase health transfers to the provinces and territories, and further expand the national dental-care program the Liberals are creating as part of their deal with the NDP.
Dental care is expected to cost more than $13 billion over the next five years, which is around $7 billion more than what the government said it would cost when it was introduced in last year's budget. It's now expected to cost $4.4 billion per year to keep it going beyond that.
The dental plan was a sticking point for the NDP when the party started a coalition with the Liberals at the last election.
Brassard believes the budget will hurt families and cost working Canadians more. He says it will continue “a dangerous pattern of deficits, tax increases and catering to the extreme inflationary demands of the NDP to keep the coalition in place.”
Meanwhile, Barrie-Springwater-Oro-Medonte MP Doug Shipley said that the federal government has caused inflationary spending.
“Groceries and food have skyrocketed, one in five Canadians are skipping meals, and more and more people are using food banks,” Shipley said Wednesday afternoon. “The Liberals have brought a grocery rebate, but that's a temporary solution that won’t help anybody.
"We need to get food prices down immediately," he added.
The 2023 budget proposes to introduce a one-time grocery rebate, providing $2.5 billion in targeted inflation relief for 11 million low- and modest-income Canadians and families. The rebate will provide eligible couples who have two children with up to an extra $467, while single Canadians without children will get up to an extra $234, and seniors with an extra $225 on average.
Shipley says he wants to see many changes with the federal government, but has long been calling for the carbon tax to be scrapped.
“It's not an environmental plan, it's a tax plan and it's costing Canadians more and more,” he said. “We’re constantly getting calls and emails about the cost of home heating, gas bills, groceries. It's all going up and a lot of it can be traced to the carbon tax.”
— With files from Canadian Press
