Christopher Liew: The Liberals and Conservatives are promising savings, but would you feel them in your wallet?

Christopher Liew is a CFP®, CFA Charterholder and former financial advisor. He writes personal finance tips for thousands of daily Canadian readers at Blueprint Financial.

From housing and groceries to fuel and taxes, the high cost of living has been at the forefront of most voters’ minds. Both Mark Carney and Pierre Poilievre have proposed strategies to help those struggling to make ends meet.

While both candidates share similar goals, each has a different idea of how best to achieve them. The Liberals’ plan focuses on targeted government intervention, while the Conservatives’ plan is centred around broad tax cuts and deregulation.

Below, I’ll outline Carney’s and Poilievre’s approaches to improving affordability and discuss just how realistic these promises are.

The current state of inflation

The rate of inflation has cooled significantly since the peaks we saw in 2022, and the current inflation rate rests at 2.3 per cent.

Despite this, most people are still paying significantly more for everyday living expenses than they were just a few years ago, and wages haven’t been able to keep up.

The recent GST/HST sales tax break between December 2024 and February 2025 temporarily helped to offset some consumer costs. However, concerns over tariffs have increased concerns over further affordability and living cost issues moving into the rest of the year.

Housing affordability: comparing plans

Carney has proposed the creation of an entirely new government agency, Build Canada Homes. Through the agency, he plans to offer:

● $25 billion in financing for prefabricated housing

● $10 billion in low-cost loans for other affordable housing projects

● $1 billion to support modular housing manufacturers

He also promises to eliminate the GST on new homes under $1 million for first-time buyers, cut development fees by half for multi-unit housing, and revive a 1970s-era tax credit to incentivize rental construction.

Poilievre, on the other hand, is proposing a more market-driven approach. He wants to remove barriers to new construction and penalize underperforming municipalities.

His plan would tie federal infrastructure funding to strict housing targets, rewarding cities to increase homebuilding by at least 15% per year. Cities that exceed targets would get bonuses, and cities that fall short would see funding withheld.

Additionally, Poilievre has pledged to remove the GST on new homes up to $1.3 million for all buyers (not just first-timers like Carney’s plan entails). He also wants to sell off unused federal land and buildings to be used for more affordable housing developments.

Food and grocery prices

Food inflation just made the largest jump in 50 years, and people aren’t happy as their hard-earned dollars bring home less food.

The Liberals are blaming some of the high food prices on a lack of competition in the grocery sector. The Liberals say one root of the problem is a lack of competition in the grocery sector.

To fix this, Carney plans to open up the market by attracting new players and strengthening the powers of the Competition Bureau to crack down on price-fixing and monopolistic behaviour.

Poilievre argues that government policies, taxes, and regulations are among the main factors driving up the cost of food. The Conservatives blame the federal carbon tax for raising transportation costs throughout the food supply chain.

Poilievre has promised to eliminate the carbon tax entirely, including on fuel used by farmers and truckers. He also wants to reduce interprovincial trade barriers and simplify federal rules to lower operational costs for food producers and transporters.

Fuel and energy costs

Although he plans to keep the industrial carbon tax in place for larger polluters, Carney has officially removed the consumer federal carbon tax, as it’s become divisive and costly for consumers.

In its place, he plans to introduce incentives such as rebates and tax credits for electric vehicles, home retrofits, and heat pumps.

Poilievre plans to “axe the carbon tax” entirely, for both industrial players and consumers. While the Liberals reduced the consumer carbon price to zero on April 1, 2025, Poilievre argues that Canadians aren’t in the clear. He claims the Liberals will bring the tax back after the election and points to the ongoing industrial carbon price and Clean Fuel Standard as costs that continue to drive up prices on gas, diesel, and heating. His platform leans heavily on increasing domestic energy production as a path to both lower prices and greater energy independence.

While Carney’s plan retains carbon pricing for large emitters and focuses on green incentives, Poilievre promises a full rollback of what he calls “punishing taxes on working Canadians.”

How realistic are the promises?

In my opinion, the Liberals are aiming to fix the causes of rising prices with government spending and regulation changes. The Conservatives want to make things cheaper by cutting taxes and reducing regulations.

Not all promises come with clear timelines or fully explained trade-offs, though. Ideally, both plans could serve to make daily life more affordable. Realistically, though, these savings would happen slowly over time. Although there may be money saved at the end of the year, the average taxpayer probably won’t notice a huge difference on a day-to-day basis.