Jonathan Wilkinson’s report card leaves out harsh economic truths: Stephen Curran

As the dad of two school-aged children, I know firsthand that students don’t get to write their own report cards. There is a very good reason for this too: report cards are meant to be an honest reflection of progress––what is going well and even more importantly, what isn’t. That’s why it struck me as odd to see Jonathan Wilkinson writing a report card on his own term in office, written by none other than himself.

In his ‘report card,’ Minister Wilkinson states one of his principal areas of focus has been economic growth. He touts commitments to global pacts and funding for various initiatives but misses, arguably, the most important thing when it comes to economic growth: numbers. It is obvious why Minister Wilkinson chose to leave economic data out of his self-report: the numbers are bad, really bad.

Publicly-available data from the OECD found that Canada’s per capita GDP (i.e. the economic output of our country, on a per person basis) kept pace with the rest of the OECD until 2015. Then, over the past decade, we have witnessed a sharp decline in this economic metric – which is the clearest measure of Canadians’ economic standard of living. Canada ranks third from last in average per capita GDP growth since 2015. Furthermore, the OECD estimates that Canada will have the lowest levels of per capita GDP growth from now until 2060! Fundamentally this means that Canadians have become poorer under this Liberal government and will continue to get poorer for the next two generations.

The root cause of this decline? Weak investment in physical and human capital per worker, resulting in low or negative growth in labour productivity. This is something Minister Wilkinson is directly responsible for. In November of 2024, Minister Wilkinson announced that the Liberal government would cap the carbon emissions of Canada’s oil and gas sector, putting Canadian industry at a competitive disadvantage. A report by Deloitte found that this cap will cost Canada’s GDP 1%, nearly 113,000 Canadian jobs will vanish, and it will result in a 1.3% reduction in tax revenues by 2030.

These are revenues that Canadians rely on to fund essential infrastructure and services. All of this, while global carbon emissions continue to rise. Canada has the third largest supply of oil, the fifth largest supply of natural gas, and significant deposits of uranium, potash, and other critical minerals. By all measures, we should be the richest country on earth. Instead, Canada is witnessing decreasing productivity, declining investment and economic instability arising from the threat of tariffs from the United States. It’s time to take a new approach. It’s time for change.

Stephen Curran is the Federal Conservative candidate for North Vancouver-Capilano.