As advance polling entered the third day on April 20, the Conservatives pledged to eliminate the “inflation tax” while the NDP said it will introduce laws to prevent “price gouging” at grocery stores. The Liberals held a rally in the Ottawa-riding of Nepean and reiterated that the upcoming April 28 election is a critical moment for Canadians.
Speaking at a campaign stop in Surrey, B.C., on Sunday, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he would axe what he calls the “inflation tax” by ending Liberal overspending, specifically noting that his party will cut the annual federal budget for consultants by $10 billion a year.
“Ten billion dollars less for high-priced consultants means $10 billion less inflation means $10 billion more affordable life for Canadians,” the Tory leader told reporters.
The move is part of the broader plan to end the “out-of-control inflationary spending” by the Liberal government in the past decade and to “bring home affordable prices and food for all Canadians,” he said.
The Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) reported in 2023 that federal spending on consultants had continued to rise in recent years. In January this year, the PBO reported that Ottawa spent $18.6 billion on professional and special services in fiscal year 2022–23, with the largest spendings in categories such as engineering and architectural services, business services, information services, health and welfare services, and management consulting.
Poilievre said “overspending” by the Liberal government has driven up taxes as well as food and housing costs.
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“Inflation is what happens when governments spend money they don’t have, so they just print the cash. More money bidding on a fixed supply of goods equals higher prices for everything,” he said.
Statistics Canada on April 15 reported that even though the country’s annual inflation in March slowed to 2.3 percent, food prices jumped by 3.2 percent and alcoholic beverages by 2.4 percent on an annual basis.
Besides capping spending, Poilievre pledged he would get rid of the Impact Assessment Act, previously known as Bill C-69, which gave Ottawa the power to evaluate major natural resource infrastructure projects like pipelines and new mines.
“We will unleash our economy by removing anti-development laws, red tape, and destructive taxes to add a half a trillion dollars of extra economic growth over the next five years,” he said. His proposals will generate an extra $70 billion in tax revenue, “without higher taxes, but instead using higher growth,” he added.
The amount, Poilievre said, was a number calculated by Philip Cross, a former chief economic analyst at Statistics Canada, and Dr. Tim Sargent, a former associate deputy minister at Finance Canada.
Poilievre also took aim at the Liberals’ costed platform, announced by leader Mark Carney on April 19, which proposes $129.2 billion in new spending over the next four years.
“A fourth Liberal government would bring in a quarter trillion dollars of additional debt. That’s inflationary debt that will drive up the cost of food, housing, and everything else you buy,” the Conservative leader said.
Carney’s platform forecasts adding some $225 billion to the federal debt over the same four-year period. The Liberal leader had defended the proposal during his platform announcement, saying it is “not a normal fall update, budget lockup.”
“We are in the middle of the biggest crisis of our lifetimes, and this is a plan that meets that moment in a way that is very prudent with people’s hard-earned tax dollars, but bold in terms of where this country can go,” Carney said while at a campaign stop in Whitby, Ontario, on April 19.
Carney commented that the Liberal government had been “spending too much” previously and promised he would bring down the growth of federal spending from 9 percent to 2 percent.
‘Most Consequential’
On Sunday afternoon, April 20, Carney held a rally in his own riding, Nepean, which is adjacent to Poilievre’s Carleton riding in Ottawa.
In line with remarks made at previous campaign stops, the Liberal leader framed the upcoming election as a critical moment for Canada’s future, repeating one of his key lines—that “we’re in a crisis” because Canada’s “old relationship [with the United States] is over,” due to the tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump.
“This is the most consequential vote of our lifetimes,” Carney told supporters. “We need a leader who can stand up to [Trump].”
At one point during the rally, Carney touted his achievements as prime minister, such as ending the federal consumer carbon tax, scrapping the capital gains tax hike, eliminating the GST on homes up to $1 million for first-time homebuyers, and removing all federal internal trade barriers by July 1 in order to move toward free trade within Canada.
Carney’s campaign on the same day issued a news release criticizing Poilievre for not yet having released the Conservatives Party’s costed platform, also accusing the Tory leader of “hiding $140 billion in cuts.”
A day earlier, speaking at a campaign event in Richmond, B.C., on April 19, Poilievre said the Conservatives have already rolled out 95 percent of their platform, including the costing, throughout their campaign. He said the “final document will soon be available.”
Poilievre has a press conference scheduled on Monday morning, April 21.
‘Price Gouging’
NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh was in Victoria, B.C., on Sunday, where he promised to put “emergency price caps” on food essentials and to legislate protections against what his party views as “unjustified markups on Canadian goods” that constitute “price gouging.”
“If you’re raising prices on Canadian goods when the producers haven’t changed a thing—that’s not inflation. That’s gouging,” Singh said in a statement on April 20. “We’re going to stop it. And if the grocers won’t play fair, we’ll legislate.”
Singh’s plan also includes a mandatory “Grocery Code of Conduct,” which his party said will “hold big retailers accountable and ensure workers aren’t penalized.”
The NDP will also impose a “windfall tax on grocery profits,” among the changes that the party said will be included in the first federal budget after the election if the NDP is elected to form government.
Chandra Philip contributed to this report.
