Bill C-47 (Historical)

Sustaining Canada's Economic Recovery Act

A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures

Part 1 of this enactment implements a number of income tax measures proposed in the March 4, 2010 Budget. In particular it
(a) allows for the sharing of the Canada Child Tax Benefit, the Universal Child Care Benefit and the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax credit for eligible shared custody parents;
(b) allows Registered Retirement Savings Plan proceeds to be transferred to a Registered Disability Savings Plan on a tax-deferred basis;
(c) implements disbursement quota reform for registered charities;
(d) better targets the tax incentives in place for employee stock options;
(e) expands the availability of accelerated capital cost allowance for clean energy generation;
(f) adjusts the capital cost allowance rate for television set-top boxes to better reflect the useful life of these assets;
(g) clarifies the definition of a principal-business corporation for the purposes of the rules relating to Canadian Renewable and Conservation Expenses;
(h) introduces amendments that are consequential to the introduction in 2011 of new International Financial Reporting Standards by the Accounting Standards Board; and
(i) amends the Canada Pension Plan, the Employment Insurance Act and the Income Tax Act to provide legislative authority for the Canada Revenue Agency to issue online notices if the taxpayer so requests.
Part 1 also implements income tax measures that were previously announced regarding:
(a) rules to facilitate the implementation of Employee Life and Health Trusts, released in draft form on February 26, 2010;
(b) indexing of the working income tax benefit announced in the 2009 Budget;
(c) technical changes concerning TFSAs announced on October 16, 2009; and
(d) an amendment to the rules regarding labour sponsored venture capital corporations that are consequential to the introduction of TFSAs.
Part 2 amends the Air Travellers Security Charge Act, the Excise Act, 2001, the Excise Tax Act and the New Harmonized Value-added Tax System Regulations to provide legislative authority for the Canada Revenue Agency to issue online notices if the taxpayer so requests.
Part 2 also amends the Air Travellers Security Charge Act, the Excise Act, the Excise Act, 2001, the Excise Tax Act, the Brewery Departmental Regulations and the Brewery Regulations to allow certain small remitters to file and remit semi-annually rather than monthly.
Finally, Part 2 amends the Air Travellers Security Charge Act and the Excise Tax Act to extend the protection from civil liability claims that is already provided under the Income Tax Act and other federal statutes to agents of the Crown who collect the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax and the air travellers security charge in intended compliance with their statutory obligations.
Part 3 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to facilitate the sharing of taxes under Part I.01 and Part X.5 of the Income Tax Act with provinces and territories.
Part 4 amends the Bank Act and the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act to require that banks belong to an approved external complaints body and to authorize the Governor in Council to prescribe the approval requirement for that body. The amendments also assign the responsibility for managing the approval process and supervising the approved external complaints bodies to the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada.
Part 5 amends the Canada Disability Savings Act to allow a 10-year carry forward of Canada Disability Savings Grant and Canada Disability Savings Bond entitlements.
Part 6 amends section 11.1 of the Customs Act to exempt from the User Fees Act fees that are charged for expedited border clearance programs and that are coordinated with international partners.
Part 7 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to implement the total transfer protection for 2010-11, to set out the treatment of the one-time transfer protection payment under the fiscal stabilization program, update legislative references made in the fiscal stabilization provisions and give greater clarity to the calculation of the fiscal stabilization payment.
Part 8 amends the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions Act. In particular, the Act is amended to
(a) harmonize the assessment of costs associated with the administration of the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985 with the regime in place for the assessment of costs associated with the administration of laws governing financial institutions; and
(b) allow the Superintendent to remit assessments, interim assessments and penalties and to write off certain debts.
Part 9 amends the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985. In particular, the Act is amended to
(a) authorize the Minister of Finance to enter into an agreement with the provinces respecting pension plans that are subject to the pension legislation of more than one jurisdiction;
(b) authorize the Minister of Finance to designate an entity for the purposes of receiving, holding and disbursing the pension benefit credit of any person who cannot be located;
(c) permit information to be provided in electronic form, including information provided by the administrator of a pension plan to members or to the Superintendent;
(d) allow the administrator of a pension plan to offer investment options with respect to accounts maintained in respect of a defined contribution provision or accounts maintained for additional voluntary contributions;
(e) provide rules regarding negotiated contribution plans;
(f) require consent of a member’s spouse or common-law partner before the transfer of the member’s pension benefit credit to a retirement savings plan; and
(g) authorize the Superintendent to direct the administrator of a pension plan that is subject to the pension legislation of more than one jurisdiction to establish a separate pension plan for certain members, former members and survivors.

Sustaining Canada's Economic Recovery Act

[Jean-Pierre Blackburn, Conservative, Jonquière—Alma, QC]

moved that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, it is always a nice lead-in when someone thanks farmers. As a farmer of 35 years, I would like to echo that as we do go into this weekend of thanksgiving. I wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving weekend with their families.

Back to the order of the day, I do want to take this opportunity to begin debate on Bill C-47, sustaining Canada's economic recovery act. This bill represents a key component of Canada's economic action plan, including many important measures from budget 2010.

This is a key piece of economic legislation that demonstrates our Conservative government's continued focus on the economy, as well as our strong determination and commitment to help sustain Canada's economic recovery. It is a recovery clearly supported by our economic action plan, with real support for families, consumers, businesses and taxpayers. We heard last week that nearly 23,000 job-creating projects across Canada, supported under the plan, are currently under way or already completed. The continued implementation of the economic action plan through economic legislation such as sustaining Canada's economic recovery act will help ensure Canada meets the ongoing global economic challenges head on.

Indeed, Canada has met the recent global economic storm with an aggressive and effective response that has served as a model for other countries to follow.

Bank of Montreal deputy chief economist Doug Porter has declared that Canada has had “arguably one of the most successful stimulus programs in the industrialized world.

We likely will not hear that from the opposition, unfortunately. We also will not hear the opposition acknowledge that Canada has been performing relatively well compared with all other industrialized countries. The opposition seemingly only wants to talk down Canada's economy at every opportunity.

However, let us look at the facts. Canada is the only G7 country to have virtually recouped economic output and private domestic activity lost since the start of the recession. Canada is the only G7 country to have posted significant positive job growth since the summer of 2009, in fact creating almost 430,000 net new jobs since July 2009.

Canada's total government net debt to GDP ratio is projected to remain the lowest by far in the G7. What is more, according to the IMF and the OECD, Canada is expected to be the fastest growing economy in the G7 over the 2010-11 period. Again, the opposition might not want to admit it, but this is the reality. Canada is in a relatively solid and enviable economic position compared with other industrialized countries. If the opposition does not want to take my word for it, which I am assuming it may not, it should listen to independent observers both at home and abroad. Let me read only a sample of the commentary that has appeared in recent months.

TD economist Craig Alexander stated, “The pace of Canada's economic revival stands out in the world”.

The Conference Board of Canada economist Glen Hodgson declared, “Canada is in a much stronger fiscal position than almost every other industrialized country”.

A Victoria Times Colonist editorial proclaimed:

The truth is that far from needing a lecture on financial management or sound public policy, Canada should be delivering one.... [T]he facts are plain. Our handling of the economic downturn has been an example for the world.

The Toronto Star, not normally known as a fan of our Conservative government, stated as well:

Canada has come through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression remarkably well--better than any other industrialized nation in the world.

Internationally, Canada has been held up as a model of strong economic leadership to follow.

The BBC said:

As Americans and Europeans face deficits and drastic government cuts, Canada's economy is recovering from only a mild recession.... The Canadians, it seems, have answers for even the toughest puzzles.... [I]n this economy, we all want to be Canadian.

The Los Angeles Times remarked:

[O]n such critical issues as the deficit, unemployment, immigration and prospering in the global economy, Canada seems to be outperforming the United States. And in doing so, it is offering examples of successful strategies that Americans might consider.... Canada's financial house is tidy and secure.

The OECD recently commented:

I think Canada looks good -- it shines, actually. Canada could even be considered a safe haven.

All that said, we cannot be complacent or smug. Uncertainty remains. Beyond our borders, the global economic recovery is far from secure. This is especially true in the United States, which is, of course, our largest trading partner, where grave economic challenges persist.

At home too many Canadians are still looking for work. Without a doubt, the economy must remain our priority. Canadians expect nothing less. That is why our Conservative government is focused on the economy above all. We are demonstrating this commitment by working to fully implement Canada's economic action plan.

We are demonstrating it through this, the sustaining Canada's economic recovery act, an act that would help Canadian families get ahead by, for instance, indexing the working income tax benefit, as well as by further strengthening federally regulated pension plans and allowing a 10-year carry forward for registered disability savings plan grants and bonds.

It is an act that would help cut red tape for taxpayers by allowing them to request online notices from the Canada Revenue Agency, registered charities with disbursement quota reform and job-creating small businesses by allowing them to file their taxes semi-annually instead of monthly.

It is an act that would help protect consumers by improving the complaint process when dealing with banks and the financial services industry.

It is an act that would close down tax loopholes by better targeting tax incentives for employee stock options and addressing aggressive tax planning related to tax-free savings accounts.

It is an act that would promote clean energy with an accelerated capital cost allowance for clean energy generation.

In the time remaining, I would like to take a few moments to further highlight a few of the positive steps in this act that I alluded to a few moments ago.

First, I would like to spotlight the improvements we are making to the working income tax benefit, locally referred to as WITB.

Often low-income Canadians who want to enter the workforce face substantial disincentives through reduced benefits and increased taxes. To help low-income Canadians who want to work, our Conservative government introduced the WITB as an incentive to make work pay.

WITB has been successful, making work more rewarding for approximately 1.5 million low-income Canadians annually. Last year, we made WITB more generous by effectively doubling the support provided by it. Building on that action, the sustaining Canada's economic recovery act would ensure that WITB amounts would continue to be indexed to inflation on an annualized basis.

I note that WITB's introduction and recent expansions have been widely praised. For instance, the Caledon Institute of Social Policy called it an “important...addition to Canadian social policy...helping welfare recipients get over the welfare wall, and supplementing the earnings of the working poor”.

Even the Liberal Party's current finance critic, the member for Kings—Hants, has lauded our Conservative government's action. He stated:

The working income tax benefit...has helped many working families and increasing it further will contribute even more significantly to helping make work pay.

Second, I want to highlight how, in this act, we are making the registered disability savings plan, RDSP, even better for Canadians with disabilities and their families.

We know that Canadians with disabilities make significant contributions to our communities, and that is something we always look to support. Since 2006, our Conservative government has taken several important actions to that effect, including the creation of the RDSP. The RDSP helps parents and family members provide long-term financial security for severely disabled children.

The sustaining Canada's economic recovery act includes two proposals to improve the RDSP.

The first improvement to the RDSP, to which I alluded before, proposes to allow a 10-year carry-forward of the Canada disability savings grant and the Canada disability savings bond entitlement in an RDSP. This measure gives families even more flexibility, recognizing that families of children with disabilities may not be able to contribute on a regular basis to their plans.

The second improvement proposes to allow an individual who has passed on to have his or her RRSP or RRIF proceeds transferred, on a tax-free basis, to an RDSP of an eligible dependant child or grandchild.

These improvements have been well received by Canadians with disabilities and their families since we announced them in budget 2010.

Bank of Montreal Financial Group's Tina Di Vito noted that it was:

...a fantastic measure that will benefit people with disabilities and give their parents and grandparents peace of mind. ...the benefit will be huge. This will allow more people with disabilities to get the care they need. ...Canada is leading the world in showing how smart policy can help provide financial security and independence for people with disabilities.

Third, I want to look at how the disbursement quota reform in this bill will better allow registered charities to concentrate on helping Canadians in need rather than dealing with red tape.

All Canadians recognize the invaluable role that charities play in communities right across this country. Since 2006, our government has taken steps to support charities and the great work they do. For instance, we have exempted capital gains on tax associated with the donation of publicly listed securities to public charities and private foundations.

We are now proposing to build on this with significant reforms to the disbursement quota for charities. The quota, which has not been significantly modernized in three decades, has become outdated and imposes costly administrative complexity and unnecessary red tape on charities. This has only served to take their time and resources away from their charitable activities. That is why we are proposing to eliminate all the outdated disbursement quota requirements except, justly, those related to the requirement to disburse a minimum amount of investments and other assets not used directly in the charity's operations each year.

Reaction to this move has been overwhelmingly positive, underlining its importance to Canada's charities.

The Community Foundations of Canada, representing nearly 200 community foundations, applauded it and said:

...a win-win situation—it has a dramatic impact on communities, making it easier for charities to serve people in need.... We applaud the government's decision to reform the disbursement quota policy.

I quote Imagine Canada:

...extremely pleased that the federal government has responded positively to our concerns about the disbursement quota. [It]...added layers of red tape and reduced flexibility in responding to the needs of Canadians and communities.

Finally, the Salvation Army expressed its support by saying:

...removal of the quota will provide The Salvation Army, one of Canada's largest charities, with increased flexibility.... [It]...will allow us to better respond to the needs of the people we serve in 400 communities across Canada.

Fourth, I want to briefly highlight a step we are taking in this bill to clamp down on a tax loophole related to the tax-free savings account, or TFSA. Since our Conservative government introduced the TFSA in 2008, it has proven exceedingly popular and has been called the single most important personal savings vehicle since the introduction of the RRSP.

The landmark TFSA, the first of its kind in Canadian history, has allowed Canadians to watch their savings grow tax-free, but late in 2009 concerns regarding the use of TFSAs in tax planning schemes were raised regarding inappropriate transactions and the deliberate use of over-contributions providing investments and non-qualified investments by a small group of Canadians to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.

Accordingly, we are addressing these serious concerns regarding the abuse of TFSAs and have closed these tax loopholes. This strong action to ensure Canadians pay their fair share of taxes has been loudly and widely applauded.

Tax experts, like Jamie Golombek, have underlined:

For the average everyday Canadian who is putting $5,000 a year into a TFSA account, these changes will be of absolutely no interest. It is a group of highly sophisticated traders and investors who are exploiting the rules. ...this is targeting those people making enormous amounts of over-contribution.

These are only four important steps of many in the sustaining Canada's economic recovery act that illustrate its importance and how it will help Canadian families and Canada's economy in the years ahead.

Clearly this act, as a key component in implementing Canada's economic action plan, would help keep our economy moving in the right direction. The act would help protect our economy against the ongoing global economic turmoil during this fragile period and keep Canada's economic advantage. As such, this legislation deserves the support of this entire Parliament.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened very carefully to my friend, the parliamentary secretary.

He talked about how much better off we are than most industrialized countries. He talked about how we have come out of the crisis quite well. He used different quotes, but he did not quote the average Canadian.

Today according to the OECD, average Canadians have among the highest debt per capita, almost $41,000. When we compare that with some countries that are in grave difficulty, like Greece for example, we find their debt per household is just over $30,000. Let us figure that out.

The member talked about tax savings accounts and all the government has done, and that is fine when the average Canadian has money to save. However, to come out of this debt, average Canadians have borrowed to survive.

What would the member say to all those Canadians who are so far in debt and who have indebted their future and their children's future? Where do they go from there? What would he say to them?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Scarborough Centre for that very interesting question.

What do I say to that? I say to my constituents and to all Canadians, thank goodness we do not have a Liberal government right now or we would be in a mess.

Personal debt, household debt, is certainly troubling. There is no doubt about it. However, for an average family of four it would be $3,000 a year higher if the Liberals had their way, perhaps more.

What I am saying is that we have reduced taxes for an average family of four by $3,000. That hon. member seems concerned about household debt. That would add $3,000 to that family's debt, a sizeable amount of money.

The most important thing that I think this hon. member has missed is the fact that we have created jobs. Many of those people would not be working if it were not for our economic action plan. There have been 430,000 net new jobs since July 2009.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think what is very concerning for our party is the perception that the government is trying to portray itself as prudent at a time of recession, when it is blowing $17 billion on stealth fighters and $1 billion-plus mostly on pork barrel projects in the industry minister's riding, and it has chosen to build prisons.

In my riding of Timmins—James Bay, in Englehart, Matachewan and Kirkland Lake I meet seniors all the time who cannot afford to heat their houses. They have no other houses to go to if they cannot afford to heat theirs, because there is no plan for senior housing. They are being told that their guaranteed income supplement is only worth $1.55 a month. That is not even a Tim Hortons medium sized double-double.

Yet the government just recently announced a plan to spend between $2 billion and $10 billion on prisons, and the latest is that it is going to be $155 million to build 576 cells. That is $270,000 per prison cell, not counting what it is going to spend on prison guards and housing them. It is $270,000 on prison cells when senior citizens in my riding have no place to go.

Why is the government choosing to go with the politics of fear and wasteful spending over working to help alleviate the situation for senior citizens in northern Canada?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the question the hon. member poses is about protecting seniors. That is exactly what we are doing, protecting seniors against criminals, protecting all Canadians against criminals.

Every Canadian has the right to walk down a street, be it day or night, and feel safe.

If it were up to the NDP, we would have as many criminals on the street as we do ordinary Canadians. That is not fair. We have hard-working Canadians who expect the government to show leadership and that is what we are showing. We are providing support for these individuals all across the country.

It seems to be upsetting my colleague across the floor that we are actually trying to protect Canadians both physically and financially.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I think it is an important point of order. The member for Crowfoot says he thinks it is outrageous that the government be asked to build any kind of seniors housing. That is what he said, and I want that in Hansard record.

[Kevin Sorenson, Conservative, Crowfoot, AB]

Mr. Speaker, on the same point of order, that is certainly not what I suggested.

What I did suggest to the minister, as the member was heckling away, is that we do not believe it is the federal government's role to build everyone a house in this country.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

Order. If the member for Crowfoot and the member for Timmins—James Bay want to carry on this conversation they are free to do so, but at the moment the hon. member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor is rising on a question.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, if it gets any more exciting than that, we will have to start doing pay-per-view on CPAC.

I want to tone it down just a tad, if we could. The parliamentary secretary started off his speech by saying the opposition will not acknowledge the fact that we have one of the strongest economies. I will acknowledge that as long as he acknowledges the fact that the heavy lifting was done before 2006.

Let us put that aside for a while, that being said. I would like to get to the details of some of the provisions that pertain to this as it comes back to one particular issue dear to my heart, which would be pensions.

Not a lot has been raised about pensions in the past little while, only for the sake of many pensions that have been stranded through the system, but there is also another element of pensions that we are not considering. That is the people who are currently working as transient workers across the spectrum, meaning from eastern Canada travelling to western Canada. It is hard for them to start these pension plans that are embedded within a certain company.

Did the government consider doing something similar to a supplemental plan to the Canada pension plan in order for people to take it upon themselves to invest in their own pensions as a direct contribution method, nationally?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for a very interesting and great question. I would remind him that actually since 2006 we paid down almost $40 billion in debt. That is why we were in the financial situation in this country that we could afford to go into a short-term deficit.

However going back to the pensions issue, it is a good question because it was addressed in the finance ministers' meeting in Charlottetown in the spring, which put forward an idea about what we are referring to as multi-employer plans that would actually encompass those individuals that the hon. member speaks of, so that different companies in different industries could actually be part of a larger fund to be able to provide a pension fund for their employees.

It is a good question. We are working on it and we will have a report back from the officials at the December finance ministers' meeting.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

The hon. member for Alfred-Pellan has time to ask a brief question.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance said that the government is protecting seniors against criminals.

Can he tell me if the government is protecting seniors against poverty? Government programs such as the guaranteed income supplement do not even provide enough money for these seniors to live above the low-income level or poverty line.

I would like to hear what he thinks about the current government's significant and serious shortcomings in this area.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I have to reject the premise that we have done nothing for seniors. In fact, looking at all Canadians, since we have come to government we have taken nearly 950,000, just short of one million, Canadians completely off the tax roll, so they do not have to go through the process of paying taxes or are able to claim them back. That helps all Canadians. Less taxes leaves more money in their pockets for the issues that they deal with every day.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Bill C-47, the implementation act for budget 2010. When I speak to people in my riding of Kings—Hants in Nova Scotia or to Canadians from coast to coast to coast, they tell me they are worried. They are worried because they do not know how they are going to make ends meet. They have a mortgage to pay and they are barely able to make payments now. They are afraid of what is going to happen as interest rates rise. They are struggling to save for their retirement. Many of the people I speak with tell me they are struggling with the costs of higher education for their children.

At the same time, many of them are part of a sandwich generation, where they are not only helping take care of children but are also taking care of loved ones, elderly parents who are sick and need their time and their care. These Canadians are looking for a government to help them get through this, to partner with them, but the Conservative government has not been there for them.

Budget 2010 failed to address the challenges that ordinary Canadians are facing. It is a continuation of the Conservatives' borrow and spend policies, out of control spending, out of touch with ordinary Canadians, the borrow and spend policies that are doing nothing to create jobs, improve Canada's competitiveness, or strengthen our long-term economic prospects and opportunities.

In July, the economy actually shrank. Even more troubling, the numbers were down in the construction industries during the height of the traditional Canadian construction season. Why is this? Simply put, the Conservative government's infrastructure program on budget 2010 has not achieved what it could have achieved. It has not been working for ordinary Canadians.

Under the Conservatives' watch, decisions on these projects have been slow. All too often these decisions have been driven by politics, not economics. Under budget 2010, we have seen funding go to floating gazebos, a portable dance floor, a wine therapy centre, a glass canopy over a private business's swimming pool. This is a waste of tax dollars. This is not the type of investment that will make Canada more competitive in the global economy of tomorrow.

Meanwhile, legitimate projects have been delayed, and in some cases, refused. Communities across Canada are worried that they will be left with a bill for projects that are not done by the March 31 deadline. We are asking for the government to be flexible on that. The Parliamentary Budget Officer recently estimated that between 25% and 50% of the projects will not be completed by March 31.

What I am talking about is not a new stimulus program or new funding required. It is simply for the Government of Canada to meet its commitments and promises already made under the existing pool of stimulus funds. What I am talking about is the need for the government to honour its promises to its provincial, municipal and community partners. People cannot swim in an 80% completed swimming pool. People cannot cross a 75% completed bridge, and people should not flush their toilets into a 90% completed sewage system, even in Halifax. So we are asking the Government of Canada for some flexibility to ensure that local governments and community groups are not left on the hook for incomplete projects because there have been delays due to federal red tape and inevitable delays due to the Canadian winter.

The communication agreements for these deals with municipal and community partners are almost laughably long. The Conservative government has been more preoccupied with tracking the advertising signs for each project and trying to locate these signs even with GPS than making sure that each project was on track and actually creating jobs. It has been more interested, in fact, in counting signs than in counting workers.

The Conservatives have tripled the budget for advertising to $130 million. They have a sign fetish. Tens of millions have been spent on signs for the stimulus package. There is a sign on McNabs Island in Halifax. Nobody goes to McNabs Island, but there was a project there and there is a sign. One could say it is the loneliest erection in Canada. But what has been the result of the Conservative stimulus package?

The fact is that construction numbers are down. Unemployment figures are actually quite high nationally, at 8%, which is two points higher than when the government took office. Youth unemployment is almost 17%. But those numbers do not tell the full story. In Canada, 200,000 full-time jobs have been lost. We are losing full-time jobs and they are being replaced by part-time work. So when the Conservatives talk about a recovery, what they are really talking about is a weak statistical recovery with a continued deep human recession.

Last year, Canada saw its first trade deficit in 30 years. That is troubling, because we are a small, open economy that depends on external trade for our wealth. To be buying more than we are selling is ominous for the long term.

Consumer confidence in Canada has dropped in each of the last four months. That reflects the fact that private and household debt in Canada is at a record high of $1.4 trillion. Each Canadian owes an average of $42,000 in terms of personal debt. As my colleague said earlier, this is worse than almost any other advanced OECD country. As interest rates nudge higher, Canadians are justifiably worried about how they will make ends meet and pay the bills.

It would seem that the Conservatives have run out of ideas. Either that or their ideology is preventing them from developing ideas, or perhaps they just do not believe in government. I have heard the discussion earlier on the tax-free savings account, which was developed under the Liberal government and implemented by this Conservative government. The WITB was introduced by a Liberal government and further developed by the Conservative government. We could say the Conservative government is a government of sound and original ideas, but unfortunately, its sound ideas are not original and its original ideas are not sound. One of those original ideas was to eliminate the long form census so that Canadians would not have to go to prison and languish away in Canadian penitentiaries on long form census issues, but I digress.

The fact is that Conservatives have failed to protect jobs with their stimulus. They have failed to protect jobs today, and more importantly, they have failed to create the jobs of tomorrow. What we have gone through and are going through is not an ordinary recession. What we are going through is a global economic restructuring. That is why it is important that Canada in its infrastructure investments not simply recover to where we were before the recession. That is not good enough, because the rest of the world has gone somewhere else. Wayne Gretzky, that great Canadian economist, once said that we have to skate to where the puck is going. That is what the rest of the world has done. Other countries have gone to where the global economic trends are going. They have focused on green investments. They have focused on scientific investment, on research and development, on modernizing the energy grid, on modernizing energy production and transmission, on investing in clean energy technologies so that they are competitive in the emerging global, carbon-constrained economy. Our competitors have focused their investments on science, technology and the green economy because they know that is where the jobs of tomorrow will be.

The Globe and Mail had a few things to say about the Conservative stimulus package. They called the Conservative stimulus package “a squandered opportunity”, and said:

[T]o throw billions into a hodge-podge of boondoggles and call it world-beating economic policy is a bit of a stretch

The Globe went further:

[T]oo much of the stimulus appears to have wound up feeding local egos, and wallets, without leaving an enduring economic mark.

Finally, it concludes that the stimulus package's legacy:

may be a swelling deficit that crowds out spending on the kind of infrastructure the country really needs.

A squandered opportunity indeed, in fact the Mandarin word for “opportunity” is the same as the Mandarin word for “crisis”. Other countries, our competitors, were careful not to waste a good crisis. South Korea invested 79% of its stimulus package in green technologies, creating 1.8 million green jobs of the future. China invested $218 billion of its stimulus funds toward clean environmental technologies. On a per capita basis, the U.S. put 14 times more money into green and clean energy investments than Canada, modernizing grid and building new energy production.

A more strategic approach in Canada could have been to help build Canadian competitiveness, a more energy-efficient Canadian economy, and a Canadian economy with a lower carbon footprint.

What could this have meant in terms of jobs? We could have created the jobs of tomorrow in this emerging green economy. Properly targeted, we could have greened the Government of Canada buildings, over seven million square metres of office space, creating green construction jobs across Canada. Properly targeted, we could have done more to help Canadians green their homes and to help Canadian companies green their companies and factories, which would have meant that after this recession, those Canadian companies would have been more profitable. Their bottom lines would have been bigger. They would have paid more business taxes because they would have been making more money. They would have employed more Canadians. Those Canadian households would have had more money at the end of the month to live on and to pay for their children's education. Any investment in reducing the energy consumption of a government, of its citizens and of its companies pays endless dividends for generations, notwithstanding the importance to the environment.

There was a real opportunity for us to have a game-changer here. This was a massive stimulus package and I fear it missed the mark and we will not know the degree to which it missed the mark until we see where other countries go in the next 10 to 20 years.

The 2010 budget provided no real vision.

A couple of weeks ago, the finance minister delivered a speech before the Canadian Club of Ottawa. Instead of offering an economic vision for the country, the minister debased both himself and his role as a minister of the crown by launching into a long partisan rant about the opposition. He was trying to distract Canadians from his bad economic record of waste and mismanagement, and he was trying to distract Canadians from the fact that the biggest spending, biggest deficit finance minister in Canadian history also lacks an economic plan for the future. He has a bad record and no plan for the future. He has no vision, no ideas to address the real concerns of Canadians. Canadians across the country were justifiably offended.

The National Post described it as “overcooked rhetoric”.

The Calgary Herald said:

Wave after wave of pointless and misleading provocation gushed from his podium before a Canadian Club audience which, except for the Conservative cheerleaders among them, appeared unimpressed by his fear-and-loathing diatribe. Eyes were openly rolling, whispers were exchanged under furrowed brows, groans could be heard when [the finance minister's] script soared over-the-top, which was often.

The Canadian Press said:

The attack before a Canadian Club audience, which lasted the better part of a 20-minutes, was received with stony silence by those in attendance.

Even L. Ian MacDonald of the Montreal Gazette described it as:

A clip and paste job directly from the Prime Minister's Office by the dark side of the Langevin Block

He went on to say:

Even Conservatives in the room were staring at their shoes in embarrassment

Finally, Don Martin of the National Post said:

How a government, which has emptied the public purse far into the future, ratcheted up the deficit to historic highs and bloated the bureaucracy to unprecedented size can stand for re-election as a conservative-friendly government is beyond me.

I knew those guys were not that progressive socially, and now I find out they are not even conservative economically. That is indeed unfortunate.

The fact is that the Conservatives inherited a $13 billion surplus from the Liberals, but the borrow and spend Conservative government increased program spending in its first three years of office by 18%. They spent the cupboard bare even before the downturn. In fact, they actually put the country into deficit before the downturn.

What are the borrow and spend Conservatives now spending hard-earned Canadian tax dollars on? They are spending $16 billion on fighter jets, without a fair tendering process; and $10 billion to $13 billion on U.S.-style mega-prisons despite the fact that crime rates are going down. Of course, we need those to lock up those unreported criminals who have been doing unreported crimes.

The Conservatives spent $1.3 billion for a 72 hour photo-op at the G20 and G8 summits that included $1 million for a fake lake; $300,000 for a gazebo and bathrooms that were 20 kilometres away from the summit site, so I hope they bought some Depends; $400,000 for bug spray and sunscreen; over $300,000 for luxury furniture; $14,000 for glow sticks; and millions on high-end hotels. If it were not so wasteful, we could find this funny. If Canadians were not working so hard to pay their taxes, they would probably find some humour in this. But it is tragic for Canadians who are barely getting by.

In budget 2010, the Conservatives are borrowing $6 billion to pay for corporate tax cuts during a time of deficit. We cannot afford these tax cuts. The Liberal government did cut corporate taxes and personal taxes, the biggest tax cuts in Canadian history, but it was during times of surplus. It is fundamentally different economics to borrow money today to pay for tax cuts than it was to actually provide tax cuts during times of economic surplus.

Last week, the Minister of Finance missed another deficit target. Forecasters are now expecting that the deficit will go even higher. Canadians have to wonder what they got for that $54 billion deficit. Has it protected the jobs of today? No, it has not. Unemployment is two points higher than when the Conservative government took power.

Has it created the jobs of tomorrow? No, it has not. Other governments around the world have invested in creating the jobs of tomorrow and positioning themselves to compete in the sciences focusing on the green jobs of the future.

What do Canadians have to show for this wasteful, visionless spending frenzy? They have fake lakes, floating gazebos and thousands upon thousands of advertising signs. The Conservative borrow and spend policies do not reflect the priorities of Canadians. A Liberal government would cancel the Conservatives' planned tax cut for Canada's largest corporations. We would do this to reduce the deficit and to invest in Canadian families.

Yesterday, our Liberal leader announced our family care plan. It is our plan to stand with Canadian families by helping family caregivers with the cost of caring for sick and aging loved ones at home. It includes a six-month family care EI benefit which would be similar to the EI parental leave benefit. It would allow more Canadians to care for gravely ill family members at home without having to quit their job. It would also include a family care tax benefit that is modelled on the child tax benefit. For low and middle income family caregivers who provide essential care to a family member at home, this would help ease their financial burden.

Those are the kinds of policies and the type of leadership that Canadians are looking for. This is the kind of compassion that Canadian families who are struggling to survive need.

Canada's Conservative government has been more focused on this week's polls than on the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. Today I have focused mainly on the Conservatives' fiscal and trade deficits but the most troubling deficit has been the Conservatives' leadership and vision deficit.

These are challenging times and it is during challenging and difficult times that countries and businesses need smart, visionary leadership. As the Conservative ministers go into the cabinet room, they may pause for a moment and look over the door where there is a biblical quotation that reads, “Where there is no vision, the people perish”.

The nature and severity of the challenges faced by Canadians today in this global economic restructuring are so serious and so important that without real leadership a lot of the aspirations of Canadians for their themselves, their families and their futures will perish with the lack of vision they are getting from the Conservative government.

We often hear the Prime Minister use the excuse that we have a minority Parliament and that is why we cannot really get things done. I would remind the Prime Minister and the Conservatives that it does not need to be this way. Minority Parliaments have worked in the past. The Pearson minorities in the 1960s led to the Canada pension plan, medicare and bilingualism. The Pearson minorities were productive because the parties worked together to make things happen. There was co-operation, collaboration and respect.

The word “respect” is critically important because respect for Parliament means there is respect for the people who chose this Parliament. For the Prime Minister to say that he cannot get anything done, that he cannot have any big ideas and that he cannot really implement his plans for the country because of a minority Parliament is a cop-out. It shows a lack of respect for Parliament or a lack of understanding of Parliament.

If we are going to make this Parliament successful, we need to all work together and try to address this and ensure there is respect for this Parliament. We can get things done but it will take vision and ideas. The Liberal Party of Canada is offering Canadians compassion, vision and ideas and the real leadership it needs for the 21st century.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the member's speech. He tried to prepare me in advance so that I might be interested in his comments.

However, I find it a little rich that a representative of a party, which voted wholeheartedly for the budget that offered nothing for energy savings and the environment, is criticizing that very budget. I will be watching very carefully how this member votes on this budget update.

I am glad the member mentioned that it was reprehensible that this budget cut all the programs for renewable energy and energy retrofits. With seniors suffering in this country and their energy bills mounting, I would have expected that this budget would have reversed that.

We heard some interesting news from the Alberta energy minister, Mr. Liepert, who said that he thinks carbon sequestration is not the answer. He said that it would be far too expensive and probably would not work, even though billions of federal and provincial taxpayer dollars have gone into.

Will the member respond accordingly with his vote on this budget?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I remember last September when the hon. member propped up the government at a time when it was not convenient for the NDP to have an election.

I know the hon. member has a history of environmental activism, which is why I cannot understand how she could have campaigned against putting a price on carbon in the last election. She knows that is one of the reasons that the environmental community across Canada has abandoned the NDP. She should also explain to the environmental community members why--

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I feel that it is necessary to clarify the record. At no time have I ever campaigned, nor have I ever spoken against, putting a price on carbon.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the fact is that the NDP had a national campaign last time against a carbon tax that would have made a positive difference.

The NDP most recently came out with an astoundingly bad environmental idea to cut the taxes on home heating fuel instead of helping seniors and low income Canadians replace their energy inefficient furnaces to save them some real money and the environment. The NDP chose a cheap tax gimmick similar to the kinds of tax gimmicks the Conservatives chose.

Instead of actually helping senior citizens and low income Canadians cut their energy consumption for decades, for generations, they chose a cheap political tax gimmick more like what I would expect from the Conservatives. Those members are playing politics and that is why the environment--

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

Order, please. The hon. member for Huron--Bruce.

[Ben Lobb, Conservative, Huron—Bruce, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member made many comments about green energy and the green economy. I have two specific questions for him.

Does the member and his party support federal dollars for offshore wind energy projects that may be located on our Great Lakes?

Also, does the member support the green energy act that the Liberal Party of Ontario has implemented in the province in which I reside?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I think Ontario has positioned itself to be one of the most competitive long-term economies in Canada in terms of green energy, feed-in tariff approaches, as well as investment in clean energy, but more important, providing the fiscal and economic levers for Ontario's businesses, communities and citizens to participate in the green economy.

Do I support Ontario's direction in terms of its green energy policy? Yes, I do. In the short term, some of these things can cost money but, in the long term, they are real investments in the next generation of economy.

In terms of investing in wind or other alternative energy projects, generally, yes, I support those kinds of investments. However, I do think that some of the greatest areas for Canada are in the areas of clean conventional energy. For instance, in terms of biomass, if we look at the agricultural and forestry sectors and the capacity for them to become significant players in green energy, I think it is important and it is real.

I also happen to think there is still potential to invest in carbon capture and storage. In fact, if we look at the research of what the U.S. and the Chinese are putting in it, the opportunity is real in those areas as well.

In 20 years, 80% of the world's energy will still come from hydro carbon, so we not only need to invest in alternatives but we also need to cleanup conventional energy.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I completely agree with our hon. colleague who said that it would have been interesting if the government's economic action plan had focused more on moving toward a green economy. But that was not the case; in fact, quite the opposite.

I heard our Liberal Party colleague talk about the importance of taking care of our seniors. Yet when I was first elected to this place in 2004, the Liberal Party was in power and we were calling for an increase in the guaranteed income supplement, as well as reimbursements to many seniors cheated out of their guaranteed income supplement for a number of years. Nothing happened. Instead, the Liberal Party at the time plundered the employment insurance fund, stealing from the unemployed, and that has continued under the Conservatives.

Last week we voted on Bill C-306. Unfortunately, most Liberals voted against the bill. With all due respect to the member, whom I know well, I have to wonder why he is talking about social measures. The closer they get to power, the more they seem to adopt the Conservatives' ideology when it comes to social programs.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for that question.

Frankly, it is very important for governments to strike a balance between social investment and fiscal responsibility.

First of all, the Liberal government did a great deal to reduce and eliminate the deficit. Also, it invested considerably to help seniors. At the same time, it negotiated agreements with all the provinces and territories for child care, for instance. In fact, the Quebec model has been very effective.

I agree completely with the hon. member. It is important to make investments to help our seniors. That is exactly what the future Liberal government will do. It will make the investments we indicated in our announcement yesterday. We announced a very extensive program for seniors.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I have two comments.

First, the member wonders why the Conservatives have no vision when they go through the cabinet room and there is a saying above the door related to vision. The reason is that they do not have all their cabinet meetings in that cabinet room, only some of them, because they are hiding from the press. All governments have.

In fact, we did an access to information to find out where the rooms were in which they had met and they refused to answer. They said that it was for security. It is kind of laughable that we all meet in public every day here, every MP, but that it would be a security concern if a subset of those had met in past meetings. That shows how secretive the government is.

My second comment is related to the announcement yesterday. It really helps rural Canadians to have care at home because sometimes they are hours away from institutions and are not be able to visit family members or take them for medical tests. A lot of costs are involved. This is a tremendous program that has been praised across the country and it is particularly helpful for people in rural and northern communities.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member represents a riding with a lot of rural and small town constituents, similar to my riding, and the fact is that access for rural Canadians to medical care for seniors is extremely important. For rural Canadians who have sick or critically ill relatives, it is absolutely essential that we make these kinds of investments, particularly with issues such as Alzheimer's, dementia and some of the other health issues that are only going to grow with the shifting demographic.

We need to make these plans for the future. It is good social policy and very important economic policy.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, to begin, I would like to congratulate my Liberal Party colleague who is now leaving the chamber, but who has been appointed official opposition finance critic. I would like to congratulate him on that appointment. He is joining us on the Standing Committee on Finance.

The Standing Committee on Finance is very important since that is where we will try to see what is in Bill C-47. It is actually somewhat discouraging. As one of my old employers said, it looks a little messy. This Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, is like a dish of spaghetti or a bowl of chowder. There are some measures from the budget— and I will talk about them in a moment—and there are measures concerning personal income tax, charitable organizations, business taxes and energy production companies. These are areas where it has been decided it is time to implement certain measures. In the standing committee, we look at those measures and we try to refine them and clarify them. At the same time, the government is taking the opportunity to bring up old business, if I may put it that way.

There are no specific clauses, but other measures have been mixed in relating to personal income taxes or to businesses. So we have to look back in time to clarify some of those things. There are also other measures that are completely unexpected and surprising, things we have never seen. We do not know where they come from. That is how things work in this kind of bill. There are measures relating to individuals, businesses and governments. So if I may put it that way, what we have is a dog's breakfast of a stew or a bowl of spaghetti with all kinds of things thrown in.

So let us try to sort it out. Obviously, the Bloc Québécois voted against the budget as a whole. Do we need to explain why? Because we realized that all of this government’s economic policies since 2006 have been focused on the needs of Ontario and Alberta. The budget has a limited capacity, and when all the credits and budget measures are aimed at regions other than Quebec, we wonder what is left for Quebec.

We voted against the budget because we saw it contained nothing for forestry, for example. There were lots of things for the auto industry and the oil industry, but nothing much for forestry or aerospace. We could find almost nothing for the environment, and zero, zilch, nada for culture. They do not care about that. And also, coming from a very urban riding in the extreme south of Montreal, I can see that there are needs in terms of social housing and homelessness. For example, we can see that in Canada, in Quebec and in Montreal, women are hit the hardest by poverty.

So there was nothing in this budget. How is it that we can say there was nothing in this budget in terms of what we are experiencing, what we are seeing? Because every year, and I did this last year, we go on a pre-budget tour. We go out and see people. We go out and meet with groups, whether they be community groups, workers, employers or organizations. We go and see everyone and we consider and analyze their expectations.

Last year, during the parliamentary lockout decreed by the Prime Minister, I travelled throughout Quebec. I had just been elected and I visited the whole province. I am going to do the same thing again this year. In the Bloc Québécois, we have made up our minds that we are going to try and seek out, rediscover, and revisit every person and every region, and even go to a place that I was, sadly, unable to visit last year.

As the saying goes, a fault confessed is half redressed. I must admit that last year we ran out of time to visit Abitibi-Témiscamingue. I shall therefore take this opportunity, in this very important speech, to announce to the House that the Bloc Québécois’ pre-budget consultations will begin on October 27, 28 and 29. I will obviously be welcomed as only my colleague from this House, the member for Abitibi—Témiscamingue, knows how. I will go and visit him in Rouyn Noranda. It will be a real pleasure to do so. Side by side, we can sharpen our pencils and take up our pens, and our Crayolas if need be, and do the sums right.

There are some positive things about the bill we have before us. There are a few strokes of genius in it. And yes, that does happen. It would seem to confirm the high quality of the officials in the Department of Finance of Canada. I used to be an official in the Quebec finance ministry, and I could see there were some particularly worthwhile people there, too. Therefore, we are likely to pass—rather, we are going to pass—a certain number of things. For example, in the area of benefits for children, the Conservative government has finally got its head around something that families face and has been a social reality in Quebec and throughout Canada for some time, and that is that divorce sometimes—alas, often—happens. Children spend one week at their father's home and the next at their mother's. The tax system was unable to keep up with this. In any event, apparently the tax credits for benefit repayments can be split between the mother's tax return and the father's. We cannot oppose that. And that is why the Bloc Québécois, with the rigour for which it is legend, will continue to support this measure. It is precisely why we will vote in favour of this bill, so that it can be referred to the Standing Committee on Finance for consideration and, hopefully, further improvement.

The bill also includes another measure concerning registered retirement savings plans and registered disability savings plans. Again, it is a bit late, but better late than never. The bill allows the proceeds of an RRSP of a deceased person to be transferred to the registered disability savings plan of a family member. We are also voting in favour of that fine measure.

The bill also addresses the administrative burden on charities. In my riding of Hochelaga, there are a tremendous number of charities. Why? Because there is tremendous need and because these people and small businesses are worn out. They are limited by administrative obstacles and unbelievable administrative work. Sometimes some completely ridiculous things happen. For example, one requirement was that 80% of donations received in a year needed to be spent immediately. They wonder if it is possible to save for the coming years, accumulate some of the donations received during the year and keep them in reserve to build up to a larger operation the following year. That option will now be available. Again, even though this measure came later rather than sooner, at least it came.

However, these measures do not go far enough. For example, there is still the matter of the tax-free savings accounts and the $5,000 ceiling. It was said that any interest, capital gains or dividends earned on that $5,000 in capital would not be taxable.

Three years later, they realized that some shrewd people were depositing much more than $5,000. Those people had to pay a small penalty, but given that the interest, capital gains and dividends were tax free, it was much smaller than the financial gain. So, they woke up and decided to put a stop to this practice.

Last year, the Bloc Québécois made some very important recommendations regarding wealthy people who have TFSAs. We suggested to the government that the wealthy be taxed at a much higher rate. We proposed that taxpayers with taxable income of between $150,000 and $250,000 pay a 2% surtax. That was what we recommended and continue to call for. In addition, we recommended a 3% surtax for those fortunate enough to have taxable income of more than $250,000. Naturally, the government, with its Conservative policies, rejected our recommendations.

At the same time, we asked for special taxation of the huge bonuses paid to people who sometimes earn a lot of money in a year, not because of the particular circumstances of their professional life, but because they get an enormous bonus from their company. These people find themselves with a few million dollars in their pockets, and we wondered why they were not paying more taxes.

The Bloc Québécois continues to call for these changes, but the Conservative government is not budging. Why are we recommending this? Yesterday, at the Standing Committee on Finance, we discussed the fact that people are worried, and with good reason, about the deficit and debt. People wonder where the money will come from to pay down the deficit, which we would like to do. People wonder where that money will come from. It is called tax room. Is there tax room somewhere? The answer is yes. It is to be found among those who earn more than $150,000 per year. It is to be found among those who earn more than $250,000. There is surely a great deal of tax room among those who receive a huge one-time bonus or performance pay.

We also pointed out a certain number of choices that have been made. For example, over the next 20 years, $490 billion will be injected into the army. That amounts to more than one Olympic stadium for every member of Parliament, in other words, one stadium for every member of the House of Commons and every senator in the Senate. I know. The Olympic stadium is in my own riding of Hochelaga. Just imagine an Olympic stadium in every riding in Canada, not to mention all the additional seats in the Senate. There would even be some money left over. All that is going to arms.

Could we not do something other than this kind of nonsense?

The bill has a number of particularly intriguing things in it. For example, we certainly did not expect the government to confer new powers on the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions in its proposal on the pension plans of companies that go bankrupt. The Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions of Canada would have a certain number of discretionary powers over pension funds. That is fine for funds under the federal system, but it is not okay for those that are managed under provincial systems.

Quebec and Ontario have their own pension fund management systems. We believe that the federal government has no business interfering with them. Is that surprising? Unfortunately not. I rise regularly in regard to the Autorité des marchés financiers in Quebec, which does a very good job together with all of the provincial securities commissions. There is a Canadian body—the Canadian Securities Administrators—which represents Canada on the international level. Then there is the International Organization of Securities Commissions. Just last week there was a conference in India. Who represented the Canadian Securities Administrators? The president of the Autorité des marchés financiers in Quebec and his colleague from the Ontario Securities Commission. That exists. These people did not go there to talk platitudes. They were discussing systemic risks. These are intelligent people who are dedicated to their jobs, but they are not under the federal thumb. That is why he is trying to take us there.

The bill is silent on a number of issues, such as Hydro-Québec. There is nothing on the $250 million that was lost to Quebec because of an administrative discrepancy between Hydro-Québec and Hydro One. Once again they are changing the equalization formula without any prior notice to the provinces. We are obviously against that.

There is nothing about relations concerning all the other issues. The government owes us $2.2 billion for harmonizing the GST and the QST 19 years ago. The government refuses to tax the rich and to abolish the tax havens used by the banks. It refuses to include some points, when we know that it could do things differently.

I invoked Standing Order 31, as we say, and spoke about the vote we had on the firearms registry. The vote was said to be close, but that was not at all the case. It was 153 to 151, but that was not close, because it was not the regions against the cities. How did Quebec members from the Bloc, Liberal Party, NDP and Conservative Party vote? They voted 83% in favour of maintaining the firearms registry and 17% against. In the rest of Canada, 61% of Liberal, Conservative and NDP members voted to abolish the firearms registry. This shows that there are two societies.

Back to the budget. If they want to establish an industrial policy for the oil and automotive industries, abolish the firearms registry, favour the rich and steal from the employment insurance fund, they can go right ahead. That does not reflect our values. That is why I returned to politics. We are here to draw attention to these differences and to say that we want to be good friends and good neighbours, but that it is too bad—we are leaving.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to respond to the hon. member's last comments. He is always talking about “us” and “them”. There is always this discourse about exclusion and differences, as though it were impossible to be different, yet equal. He always seems to want things to be mutually exclusive, suggesting that Canadians outside of Quebec think one way, while people in Quebec think another way. Yet we share many values, goals and ideals.

I wonder if my hon. colleague thinks that a federalist Quebecker like me is less of a Quebecker than he is.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would very much like the hon. member for Honoré-Mercier to join us. He is one of us; he lives in Quebec. He is just as much of a Quebecker as I am, and as those across the floor are.

It is in the Bloc Québécois' nature to include everyone, even the hon. member for Bourassa. I understand he is not here today, since he is replacing Cammalleri tonight. He wants to be everywhere. The hon. member for Honoré-Mercier is included in “us”. I say “us”—royal or not—and “them” to distinguish us from the rest of Canada. I respect this country, which is one of the greatest countries in the world, but I cannot identify with it. In order to have the right to be different, I say yes to Quebec. We both have beards, which makes us different from most men in Quebec. We are no less Quebecois than any other Quebeckers because we have facial hair. I want to be very clear: the hon. member is just as much of a Quebecker as I am.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to come back to the spirit of the bill, but I will first congratulate my colleague from Hochelaga for his fine presentation, which clearly expressed Quebec's interests, objectives and priorities.

Part 7 of the bill concerns federal-provincial fiscal arrangements and the total transfer protection. Does my colleague not think that compensation for the sales tax harmonization could have been included in this part of the bill, given that we have been talking about it for a number of years?The government says it will not negotiate in public—and I agree on that—but we could have had the tiniest hint of negotiations toward an agreement like that with Ontario and the other provinces.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague, with whom I work very effectively on the Standing Committee on Finance.

In terms of tax transfers, I said earlier that this bill is like a chowder, a stew, a dog's breakfast or a bowl of spaghetti. These tax transfers could have been included in the bill. The Government of Quebec, which I respect, and our colleague, Quebec's finance minister, say that Quebec is owed $2.2 billion. If I were him, I would add “for the last 19 years”. What is the current value of the $2.2 billion that we have been owed for 19 years?

With the modest interest rates over these past 19 years, it would now be worth over $5 billion, or the same amount that the Canadian government will transfer to Ontario and British Columbia, which harmonized their sales taxes. Those two levels of government had productive discussions. The governments of Ontario and British Columbia have acted responsibly. They are exercising their jurisdiction, just like the Quebec government, but they will receive $5 billion. I would have thought that Quebec would have been offered at least a hint of a solution, even just the amount it has been owed for 19 years. If the government were honest, it would also pay the accrued interest, which, in this case, is more than the capital.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, first, would the member address the situation on what I believe was his tacit approval of the bill and the vote to follow. He then described it as a tangled mess, a spaghetti fashion which I think was the terminology he used? I fail to see how he will untangle this mess. What appeals to him the most that would allow him and his party to vote for it?

Second, with regard to the EI solvency issue, the board has been created and $5 billion has been set aside to put solvency within the way employment insurance is handled. The actuaries, many experts and many papers have stated that in order for this to be solvent, it has to be at $15 billion. Perhaps some of his amendments could deal with the EI as well as the idea of pensions. Could the hon. member comment on that as well?

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in order to propose amendments, the bill needs to be studied in committee. Therefore, we must voted in favour of it. I do not know what he wants; does he want me to vote for or against it?

Yes, it is like a bowl of spaghetti. The Bloc Québécois is thorough and when we look at something, we are not narrow-minded. We do not vote against a bill because it was introduced by the Conservatives or the Liberals. If a bill is good for Quebec and deserves further analysis, we vote for it. And I would like to invite him to come to the Standing Committee on Finance to study this bill.

I hope that the Liberals will also stand up and all be present in the House if they want to vote against it. As for employment insurance, I believe that the Liberals have nothing to learn from the Conservatives when it comes to shoplifting.

[Marc Lemay, Bloc, Abitibi—Témiscamingue, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to be brief. I have seldom heard my colleague talk at the Standing Committee on Finance. I sit on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights and the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development, so unfortunately I have not had the opportunity to hear a speech as brilliant as the one he just gave. I will be pleased to welcome him to Abitibi-Témiscamingue on October 18, with all due honours.

That said, I have a question for my colleague. I have not heard that there is anything about employment insurance in Bill C-47. Did the government forget to dip into the employment insurance fund, or is there a more devious way of doing so? How is the government going to go about it?

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very sorry I did not visit my colleague's riding last fall. I have never had the chance to sit on the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights or the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development, but I probably will one day.

There is nothing about employment insurance in the bill. The budget does allow the government to continue plundering the fund. We introduced a bill last week that would improve employment insurance and give better support to workers who lose their jobs and need employment insurance. Obviously, we voted for this bill, just as some of the Liberals did. Others, including the Liberal leader, did not know whether to vote for or against the bill.

If we had the power to make all our own laws and control all our own tax revenue, we could give the workers of Quebec an employment insurance plan tailor-made for Quebec. That plan would probably be different from Canada's employment insurance plan. That is okay. Canadians are entitled to their own plan, and so are we.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I too am pleased to speak to Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures.

The New Democratic Party does not support the budget policy of the Conservative government. Although we agree with the Bloc that this is bad budget policy, as surprising as this may seem, we are going to vote against it because we are against it.

If I understood my Bloc colleague’s comments correctly, he is going to vote for the bill because he is against it. I have not yet grasped all the nuances of his assertion, but if I understood it properly, it is because it is like spaghetti. That is his word, not mine. I imagine he does not know which end of the spaghetti to start at. We see it as a bitter pill, and we will not allow the Conservatives to force their bitter pills down our throats. This comes straight out of the budget policy they have been forcing on us for five years.

Governing means setting priorities. If we take an example from this very day, the FADOQ network was present was in Parliament today. Liberal, Bloc and New Democrat members tabled petitions signed by thousands of people calling on us to start looking after the seniors in our country.

What is the Conservative government’s priority? It has found $12 billion for fighter planes, and it has given the poorest seniors, who are receiving the Guaranteed Income Supplement, a $1.50 increase. That is the Conservative government’s priority.

The NDP opposes the budgetary policies of the Conservative government, so it is no surprise that we are going to be voting against Bill C-47 which is there to put into force the budget the government brought in last year.

The Conservatives are finishing their fifth year in power this fall.

[An hon. member]

Hear, hear!

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is worth bearing in mind the reasons that we now have, and we will see if they applaud this part, the highest deficit in the history of Canada. I do not hear any applause; I was just checking. They broke the previous Conservative record for the highest deficit in the history of Canada. I am waiting for the applause; it is not there.

How did we get there? It is because of some of the things in this budget bill.

For example, after the Liberals stole $50 billion from the employment insurance account, transferred it over into general revenue and made that money disappear so it would not be there when the workers needed it when the grave crisis hit in the fall of 2008, the Conservatives in this budget bill, now that the money is gone, are just putting double locks on the door.

Let us look at that, because a lot of people when they hear that will say, “What does it really matter? It was government money before; it was in the EI account. Who cares if Paul Martin and his gang of merry men transferred it over to general revenue? We cannot really say that was stealing money. It was all government money before and it is still government money now”. But there is a big difference.

The money that was put into the employment insurance account was put in by every single company and by every single worker. Why is that important? Since the Conservatives arrived, they have been destabilizing the erstwhile balanced economy that we had in this country, that we had built up with painstaking work since the second world war: a strong primary sector with timber and mining, and a strong secondary transformation manufacturing sector, and of course more and more, an important service sector in this country.

When I say they have tilted it, they have skewed that formerly balanced economy, what they have done is this. They have created the fiscal space to hand over $60 billion in tax decreases to Canada's wealthiest corporations. The argument on the other side often comes back that it is not just to the wealthiest corporations, that all corporations got those tax reductions.

That is a false argument. If a company, especially in mining, forestry or manufacturing, in those areas was not making a profit, of course it did not pay any taxes. If it was losing money and it did not pay taxes. How could it profit from a reduction in taxes? It did not.

Who got the money? Companies like Encana, those that are piling up the poison goo behind the world's longest dikes near the tar sands.

Let us look at what is happening in Europe right now with one dike holding back the poison from one aluminum factory, maybe one one-thousandth the volume of what is behind the longest dikes in the world at the tar sands. Imagine what is going to happen inevitably the day they break, because we have never internalized the cost of the tar sands. As they have their phenomenal profits the reduction in taxes goes to them as more windfall. Hundreds of millions of dollars go to just one company like Encana since these tax reductions have come into place.

How does that connect with the employment insurance account? Easy. Every company, whether it was losing money or making money, was paying into the EI account. That money was brought into general revenue to create the fiscal room to accord those tax reductions for the richest companies. In effect, that money of the workers in those companies that were losing money in manufacturing in Quebec and Ontario in particular, was being paid over to the people in the tar sands and to Canada's chartered banks. That is what the Conservatives' policy has been all about.

Look at the chartered banks with $15 billion in profits for the first nine months of this year, but we should not worry as they are planning to share it with each other. They are going to give themselves $7.5 billion in executive bonuses for the first nine months of this year. You heard that right, Mr. Speaker. That is what the Canadian banks are doing. The government continues to sit on its hands and wants to give them further tax reductions.

Now, every time we hear the Liberals with their new-found conviction that these tax reductions are a bad idea, we should remind the Liberals that they have voted every step of the way for the $60 billion in tax reductions for Canada's richest corporations.

We should remind the Liberals that they voted on the last budget to scrap the Navigable Waters Protection Act. They voted with the Conservatives to remove a woman's right to equal pay for work of equal value. I know that sounds surprising, but that is what the Conservatives put in the prior budget bill. At that time the Liberals actually stood up and voted with them as the Conservatives were scrapping the environmental assessment program and policies and practices in Canada that were competent, that existed. It is a little different this time. The Liberals are doing the snake walk toward the back of the room and they are hiding behind the curtains. They do not even have the courage anymore to say they are backing the Conservatives. They simply absent themselves in sufficiently large numbers to allow the Conservatives' budgets to pass.

The effect of all of this has been to produce the greatest budgetary deficit in Canadian history because when the incredible crisis hit in the fall of 2008, the cupboard was bare with regard to employment insurance. The NDP was there, thank goodness, in the summer of 2009 to demand that the government increase the money available for EI and we got over $1 billion of that added to what was there. My colleague from Acadie—Bathurst in New Brunswick worked so hard on that file. The leader of the NDP had meetings with the Prime Minister to make sure that the money was there in the toughest times for workers.

Now we are looking at the perfecting of what the Liberals put in place in terms of robbing the employment insurance account. It was a bit rich a couple of weeks ago to hear the Prime Minister accuse the Liberals of having emptied the EI account. All we have to do is read what is in Bill C-47 to realize that now that the Conservatives have taken the money out and closed the door, they are locking the door. They are perfecting the theft that was indeed perpetrated by the Liberals, but the Conservatives are the ones who are completing the job.

There is no way for the Conservatives to avoid that any more than the Conservatives can hide from the HST, the new sales tax that is being added. There are seniors in places like Timmins and Sudbury right now who are realizing that they are going to pay $50, $70 or $80 a month more, stretched out over the whole year, for their heating. What the Conservatives do not understand is that when people are on a fixed income, they do not have another $80 a month. Yet the Conservative government here in Ottawa with the McGuinty Liberals in Toronto are foisting that tax increase on our poor seniors, especially in the northern areas who are going to pay it as heating oil prices go up as this new tax comes into force.

That is one of the reasons the NDP is proposing that we remove those taxes immediately.

It is also one of the reasons that we look at what the government is doing. It has money for the military. It has tens of billions for military equipment, but it does not have a penny for seniors.

To govern is to establish priorities. The Conservatives have been clear in their priorities. Take care of the banks. Take care of the oil companies. Do not internalize the costs of the tar sands. Let them sell oil artificially low, bringing in an artificially high number of U.S. dollars, pushing our Canadian dollar ever higher and making it increasingly difficult, with the high Canadian dollar, to export our goods, setting up a vicious circle of job losses, especially in the industrial heartland of Ontario and Quebec.

Before the current crisis hit in the fall of 2008, according to Statistics Canada, we had already bled off 300,000 jobs in the manufacturing sector, in those provinces in particular. How did that happen? The policy of allowing the blind, unlimited, uncontrolled, and environmentally dangerous exploitation of the tar sands brought in a large influx of U.S. dollars and pushed the Canadian dollar ever higher. Not only was the government giving them the tax breaks out of the money that had been put aside by those manufacturing firms, it was killing them as it continued to apply those policies.

As for the internalization of costs of the tar sands, it is a simple proposition. It is one of the basic tenets of sustainable development. If someone said that he or she had a factory that was producing widgets for a price far lower than that of other companies, people would want to visit the factory and see why they were doing so well. They would notice that they were pushing a lot of stuff out the back door. They would want to see what they were up to. But the owners would keep putting them off. In this case, people pushed and went to the back door, and they realized that the owners were taking all the garbage from their factory and putting it into the river in the back. They found that this was not the real price of the widgets, because the owners had not been paying the normal cost for disposal of the waste from the factory.

That is exactly what we are doing with the tar sands. We are bequeathing to future generations a $60-billion debt for next year, and, at the same time, we are bequeathing them the obligation to clean up the mess from the tar sands, which is one of the principal causes of the destabilization of our economy.

Do not get me wrong. Anyone who has looked at the economics realizes that, long-term, the tar sands can and will be one of the sources of wealth in this country. If exploited correctly, in a manner that is environmentally, economically, and socially responsible, according to the principles of sustainable develpment, the tar sands can be a source of wealth.

However, what we are doing now is the antithesis of sustainable development. We are behaving like a third world country. We are exploiting the tar sands too rapidly. The Americans have asked us to put in too many pipelines too fast, pipelines with names like Trailbreaker and Southern Lights. These are the pipelines that are being put in. Under the North American Free Trade Agreement, the application of the proportionality rule means that we could not even reduce what we are sending to the Americans through these new pipelines, unless we reduce proportionally the same amount that we are getting from them.

Therefore we continue this unbridled exploitation of the tar sands, but we have never internalized the costs. We have never paid for the garbage we are putting out there, either in greenhouse gas emissions or in what is being held behind those dikes, namely, seas of unimaginable and unnameable poison. This is not being taken care of.

If we had at least said, “From now on, you are going to develop the tar sands, paying the full cost, so that you do not leave it all on the backs of future generations”, it would have been sustainable. But we are not doing that. We are leaving it to future generations. We are skewing the balanced economy by killing off the manufacturing sector, because of the high dollar, which is directly related to this policy of the Conservative government.

Bill C-47 is to a large extent a reflection of the Conservative government's tendency to make sure that the military, the oil companies, and the banks are taken care of first and foremost. Meanwhile, seniors are left in the lurch, with new taxes on their heating oil. The government is betraying its essential nature. It is not there for Canadians. It is not there for people. It is there for the institutions, the powerful ones that put it in power and want it to stay there.

That is a difference in policy. That is a difference in priority. But at least it is clear. What is not clear is why members of the Bloc say they are against it, but will vote for it. What is not clear is why the Liberals talk against the tax decreases for the richest corporations when we know that they voted for them every step of the way. It was a shocker to a lot of people in environmental groups to see the Liberals vote with the Conservatives to scrap the Navigable Waters Protection Act, a century-old piece of legislation that was a model of sustainable development and way ahead of its time.

This year the Conservatives are scrapping the process of environmental assessment in Canada. The Conservatives would never get away with it unless the Liberals were complicit. How are the Liberals complicit? They take enough of their people behind the curtains at every vote on the budget to assure that it is passed.

The most disturbing departure from wise social policy is their removal of a woman's right to equal pay for work of equal value, something that has always been considered a tenet in our society. The Conservatives provided steep fines for any union that would defend a woman's right to equal pay for work of equal value, and the Liberals voted with them.

I am trying to find a synonym, because there are limits to what we can say in Parliament, to describe what the Liberals did when they voted to remove a woman's right to equal pay for work of equal value. This is contrary to what they say they represent, but they could have voted against it, preserving this important right.

Soon thereafter, the Liberals presented a private member's bill that is so far down the list it has no chance of ever being adopted. Here we have an example of speaking out of both sides of the mouth. The Liberals vote with the Conservatives to remove a woman's right to pay equity, to equal pay for work of equal value. Then, when they get caught, they table a private member's bill that they point to as proof of their support for pay equity. When it counted, when they could actually have done something about it, they were not there. But when it comes to presenting a private member's bill that will produce no effect, because it will never be adopted, they are there to position themselves.

That is what the Liberals have always been about in this country, positioning themselves. They have a leader whose writings were the source of consolation for the George Bush White House on the use of torture. They termed it “enhanced interrogation techniques”. What came out of George Bush's mouth a couple of weeks later? Enhanced interrogation techniques. Who gave him that terminology? The illustrious professor from Harvard who is now the head of the Liberal Party of Canada. He is the same person. He is not somebody else with the same name. He is the same guy who wrote in the New York Times that Canadians were a bunch of wusses for not getting involved in this great war that they were planning in Iraq.

That is the Liberal Party. The Liberals are always positioning themselves and posing as people who believe, as their name would tend to suggest, in liberty, in liberalism, in a vision of openness, but every time it counts, they vote with the Conservatives to take away the rights of citizens, to decrease the taxes of the richest corporations.

What it comes down to is that every time the Liberals had an opportunity to do something real to stand up for rights and preserve the balanced economy we had built up since the Second World War, they were absent, or even worse, they voted with the Conservatives.

More recently, they have adopted the clever trick of taking turns hiding behind the curtains. We see this, for example, every time a bill is brought forward to prevent the use of scabs in labour relations. Those on the extreme right wing of the Liberals—always the same ones—rise and vote against social legislation to prevent the use of strikebreakers. That is the sad reality of the Liberal Party these days. It is a good thing that as we see the right wing crumbling in Quebec, the right wing is crumbling in the Liberal Party, and the only social democratic party in Canada, the New Democratic Party, is still here to speak for the people, to talk about social, economic and environmental equity.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, my question has more to do with the parliamentary secretary or the government than it does with this member's speech. This morning the parliamentary secretary talked about TFSA and the situation the government has found itself in with people making over-contributions. The government is stopping the over-contributions.

The question I have is, what is the government doing about tax havens? We recently discovered that last year 100 people were putting money in tax havens in Liechtenstein, and 1,800 were putting money in Swiss tax havens.

What effort is the government making to recover some of this money? Has it recovered any money at all?

I would also like to know the state of arrears in income tax and GST. Do businesses owe millions or billions of outstanding GST and taxes that are not being collected?

What is the amount of the overdue accounts that finance is dealing with, and what efforts are being made to collect from those accounts and from tax havens?

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, the numbers are mind-boggling.

The OECD estimates that $6 trillion is held in OPEC jurisdictions around the world. The Tax Justice Network in Great Britain calculates it at closer to $10 trillion. Canada is losing tens of billions of dollars as a result of people hiding their money offshore.

I am happy to announce that my colleague from the Bloc, the member for Hochelaga, made a proposition in the finance committee that we should start hearing from people like Donald J. Johnston, the former head of the OECD. The Conservatives added that they wanted to hear from the OECD itself.

Always ready with a helpful suggestion, we had it adopted that we bring in Michael Wilson, a former Conservative finance minister. Michael Wilson is an interesting name to see. Everyone is talking about the HSBC scandal right now. But in the UBS scandal, which was when people started to realize how widespread all this was, there was an allegation that there was an identical practice going on here in Canada with UBS. Who was the spokesman for UBS in Canada? Michael Wilson.

We are going to have the pleasure of speaking with MIchael Wilson in the finance committee. We want to make sure that when Canadians are looking at a $60-billion deficit everything has been done to collect taxes owing. When we make the simple algorithmic calculation of how many people it takes to do the collecting and how much it brings in, it is disturbing to see that the Conservatives are firing 200 tax collectors who could have been bringing in that money and working on it.

The only country in the OECD to have worked backwards in having people take money out of the country into OPEC jurisdictions is Canada. Which government did that? The Conservative government. Two budgets ago, it actually made it easier for Canadian companies to take money out of the country and leave it in tax-free jurisdictions, the better to bring it back.

When we look at what was done with the income trusts of Canada's richest families, allowing them to take it all offshore and bring it back untaxed, we realize that for too many years what gets decided in this House in respect of taxation has been heavily skewed in favour of the richest. And it always falls on the backs of average Canadians.

Only a few bucks a year can actually be saved with a TFSA. The fact that the government is closing a so-called loophole there shows that once again that, whenever it has to do with the average Canadian, the government is more than willing to act immediately. I am not saying the loophole did not have to be closed, by the way. It is appropriate to do it, because it was aggressive tax planning. It was slipshod public administration. They had made bad calculations, and they did not realize that it was actually going to be cheaper to pay the penalty and over-subscribe.

The government's priority, as usual, is to take care of the richest in our society and let the average Joe pay the price.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the government's tough approach to white collar crime has not achieved much of a result over the last few years.

The United States has successfully prosecuted and imprisoned 1,200 white collar criminals, whereas in Canada I believe there were two convictions, both against the same person. Since the government is going to spend $9 billion developing new prisons, it seems like a bit of overkill for that one white collar criminal who has been put in jail.

Certainly, the whole government is dealing with a case of misplaced priorities on a massive scale. I would like to ask the member for his comments.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, since most of the policies of the Conservatives are based on conservative urban legend, it is easy to understand how they can come up with billions for prisons for unreported crime.

The member may remember the press conference with the Minister of Public Safety. He said that there were actually lots of criminals out there. But when asked to prove what he had just said, he said he could not because so many of the crimes were unreported. When asked how he would know the crimes were committed if they were unreported, he said that there must be lots of studies on this. Then he turned beet red and left the press conference. End of story.

It is part of Conservative branding, but their branding is being done with public money. Canada does not need billions of dollars' worth of new prisons. We had a good prison farm program where people could get back to work, learn the value of a day's work, and apply it as part of their rehabilitation.

The Conservatives do not believe in rehabilitation. They want to position themselves as being opposed to rehabilitation, which brings us back to a similar situation in the United States. There is a high rate of recidivism in the United States, because people feel they should go all the way if they are facing stiff time. The Conservatives are bringing us to that.

To stick with one of the themes of our interventions this morning, Canada had a balanced approach. Yes, real time for real crime. Yes, severe mistakes need to be punished. If we want to get people back into society, we have to invest to make sure they do not go back to prison.

The only policy left for the Conservatives is to build prisons for people who commit imaginary crimes for ideological purposes. It is insulting to see the government spending billions of dollars on prisons, almost $10 billion, when we look at how little they are spending on real things. We see seniors having to pay extra for home heating oil in northern Ontario, and being given $1.50 extra on their guaranteed income supplement. It is insulting to see billions of dollars going toward prisons and more than $10 billion for fighter aircraft that were bought without even a public tender process that might have allowed us to get the best bang for our buck.

That is the Conservatives. It is sheer hypocrisy. They talk a good game on public administration. But then they scrap the census to make sure they do not have the information to administer social and other programs correctly. They are always tipping their hand.

For ideological reasons, the Conservatives are poisoning the possibility of good public administration. They simply do not believe in government. They do not believe in applying social and other programs for the public good. They would rather destroy the source of information and have press conferences where they evoke imaginary unreported crime to justify a decision that had already been made, a decision that was totally unjustifiable.

[Brent Rathgeber, Conservative, Edmonton—St. Albert, AB]

Madam Speaker, I am always interested to hear my friends in the NDP bemoan the closure of the prison farms.

I am curious about whether the hon. member can site a single example of an individual released from prison being employed in the agricultural industry. Would he not admit that most people released from prison end up in cities where farm husbandry skills are of limited value?

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, if I wanted to invent such people, I could not have done any better, homoconservatensis. These members stand up and pour out of a series of non sequiturs.

The prison farm program taught the value of a day's work, the value of working as part of a team. For a lot of people who had never been able to integrate into society, we provided them with rails that would guide them back into society through productive work.

I cannot believe the ignorance displayed in the question: to say that they did not learn animal husbandry. Enough said. Let that member get back to the barn.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the hon. member for Kings—Hants for sharing his time with me during this debate on Bill C-47.

This bill gave the Minister of Finance a golden opportunity to present new ideas, better management practices and a true vision for Canada's future. Instead, this bill is a simple administrative process that does not offer any hope when so many Canadian families are having a hard time making ends meet.

Canada's economy shrank because this borrow-and-spend government has failed to stimulate substantial economic growth. The Conservatives refuse to attack the real economic challenges Canadian families are facing, including record-high household debt, the exorbitant cost of post-secondary education and home care, and the insecurity of pension plans for those still working, not to mention the loss of 150,000 full-time jobs.

Statistics Canada indicated that our gross domestic product dropped by 0.1% in July, which translates into an overall contraction of the Canadian economy, while the unemployment rate in our country is 1.9% higher today than it was during the last election.

After a decade of surplus budgets under Liberal governments, the Conservatives put Canada into a deficit even before the recession by increasing government spending by 18% in their first three budgets. Their current record deficit of $54 billion is expected to get worse.

The Conservatives' wasteful and rather irresponsible spending is the primary reason this record $54 billion deficit is getting worse.

The Prime Minister's solution seems to be to borrow $20 billion more to offer a tax break to the most profitable businesses—a gift we can hardly afford to give—while ignoring the needs of Canadian families who are in utter distress.

How have things improved for Canadians since 2006? Have these billions of borrowed dollars really helped restore Canadian families' sense of confidence in the future?

During the last election campaign, this government promised Canadians that it would never go into deficit. Since then, its road map has been littered with waste that keeps piling up.

Here are a few figures that provide a snapshot of out-of-control spending: a record $130 million on shameless self-aggrandizing publicity; $1.3 billion for a 72-hour photo shoot at the G8 and G20 summits, money that was used to buy anything and everything from a fake lake to light sticks; $10 billion to $13 billion on U.S.-style mega-prisons where all those “unspecified criminals” will be sent—the ones who will never be brought to justice—and this at a time when the crime rate is going down; $16 billion for a botched agreement to purchase stealth fighter jets involving an untendered contract with no guarantee of jobs for the Canadian industry; and $6 billion in yearly tax breaks for the country's most profitable companies, a tax cut well beyond our means.

Can anyone deny that this frenzy of waste demonstrates that this government has absolutely no sense of the very real financial concerns of middle-class families that are having an increasingly tough time making ends meet?

Canadians expect their government to use public funds responsibly to provide the services they need to improve their quality of life. I understand that it is difficult to strike a balance between spending and saving in the midst of the current economic uncertainty, but that is what an effective and compassionate government must do.

Bill C-47 is the latest in a long line of opportunities this government has botched.

A look at part I of the bill—which is at the beginning—and at the Universal Child Care Benefit Act, is enough to convince anyone.

What a flagrant example of a missed opportunity. This is the kind of inaction that shows us the extent to which Conservative values fly in the face of good public policy.

The purpose of the proposed amendment in this clause of the bill is to divide the already meagre $100 benefit given to parents with shared custody, with the result being that each one will receive $50. May I remind the House that this benefit is also taxed at year's end?

The government had an opportunity to raise this amount to a level that would really have helped Canadian families absorb the cost of child care. Instead, it chose to split it further, thereby forcing families into a Solomon-style dilemma.

The fact of the matter is that this $100 child care benefit is just one drop in an ocean of ever-increasing expenses weighing our families down. Depending on where you live, the cost of child care can range from $200 to over $1,000 per month.

On average, one month's child care fees in Ontario's Chatham region total $826, while a similar child care service in Winnipeg, Manitoba, costs $395. I should point out here that the provincial government capped fees in that province.

The cheapest city on the list as far as child care is concerned is Montreal, where average fees total $205, but let us not forget that this amount is based on a law that caps the cost of child care at $7 a day in Quebec. In Quebec’s case, the province had to intervene in order to make the cost of child care affordable for all families.

Here are the average costs in other cities across Canada: Regina, $415; Fredericton, $420; Saint John, $430; Yellowknife, $605; London, $640; Kitchener, $650; Toronto, $800; and here, in Ottawa, $860.

We must not forget that those are averages, and that in many cases, the costs are much higher. Let us not kid ourselves: there are certainly cheaper places, but as with anything else, you get what you pay for.

With this bill, the government had a chance to increase the amount of the child care benefit, but it did not do so. Instead, it spent $130 million on brightly coloured signs and flashy ads. That $130 million could have funded over 21,000 full-time day care spaces for a whole year to help struggling Canadian families, including many single parents who need to provide day care for their children.

The government had a choice: spend money on flashy billboards, or offer real support to families that are struggling with child care issues. We now see this government's fundamentally mean-spirited priorities. It is disappointing to say the least.

Another clearly missed target in the bill is the complete and utter dismissal of the real and urgent problems affecting the Champlain Bridge, the most travelled bridge in the country and an essential link between Montreal, the South Shore, the Eastern Townships and, lest we forget, the United States.

The Conservative government chose a band-aid solution by investing $212 million over 10 years to repair the bridge structure. Unfortunately, when I looked into how that money has been spent up until now, I discovered that, as with most other projects undertaken through the Conservative government's economic action plan, the money does not seem to be there.

The Federal Bridge Corporation Limited had planned on spending nearly $14 million in the first year on “urgent” repairs. But the first year is over, and the corporation does not appear to have spent even $10 million. If the bridge needs urgent repairs, why is the money being sent over in dribs and drabs?

When I wrote to the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in April 2009 to ask about the possibility of repairing the bridge in a way that would allow light rail transport or other forms of public transportation, he replied with the following:

First, I would clarify that provincial, territorial and municipal governments are responsible for the planning and operation of Canada's various public transportation networks. The Government of Canada does not intervene in the planning, management and operation of these networks.

That may be so, but when they are on a bridge managed by a federal corporation, the federal government has to take action.

Allocating money is helpful only if that money is actually spent on the projects for which it was allocated. I suppose the Conservatives have become so good at public relations that they think all investments end at their communications unit.

Who is blocking this important funding? It is obvious that the Conservative government is washing its hands of the Champlain bridge and no longer wants to talk about how the work is progressing. I just learned that a vital study on the future of the bridge or a secondary route is still being held up. Consortium BCDE was awarded a $1.397 million contract in late September 2009 to study the feasibility of building a new bridge in the Champlain bridge corridor. The study was supposed to have been completed in 12 months, but now its completion date has been postponed to December 2010.

I was very eager to see the results of this study so that we would finally have a real plan, a real vision for the future of this vital route over the river. Patch jobs are not the answer, as anyone who takes the Champlain bridge regularly knows. The completion of the study has been postponed for three months. Can anyone assure us that there will not be any more delays?

In its annual report for 2008-2009, The Jacques Cartier and Champlain Bridges Incorporated promised in its objective 8 to “carry out a feasibility study to construct a new bridge along the Champlain Bridge corridor” and said it anticipated awarding the contract for the study in July 2009. The Jacques Cartier and Champlain Bridges Incorporated awarded the contract two months late, and now it seems we will have to wait three more months for the results. The people on the south shore of Montreal are fed up with the delays with their bridge. I am disappointed to see that it does not seem to be a priority for The Jacques Cartier and Champlain Bridges Incorporated and even less so for the Conservative government.

A real penchant, though, for finding the silver lining in every cloud led me to examine the bill from stem to stern in the hope of finding a hidden gem. I came across part 4 of the bill, which deals with changes to the Bank Act. When I saw this short section, which is near the end of Bill C-47, I was eager to see whether the Minister of Finance had kept his word and included the changes I had suggested in the House.

On October 7, 2009, I introduced a private member's bill, Bill C-457, which made some important changes to the Insurance Business (Banks and Bank Holding Companies) Regulations to ensure that insurance brokers in small and medium-sized firms benefited from a standardization of the rules of the game. Ironically, on the same day I introduced this bill, the Minister of Finance stated that the government intended to prohibit Canadian banks from using the Internet to promote and sell insurance on their websites. This measure was in one of the four parts of my bill. I saw in it a sign that the government had reacted because I introduced my private member’s bill.

I therefore wrote to the Minister of Finance on October 19, 2009, asking him to support my bill so that the regulations could be changed once and for all.

The minister finally replied to my letter on July 29, 2010. I do not wish to dwell on the length of time it took for the minister to reply, but nine months seems excessive, particularly since he stated, on October 7, 2009, that not only would he write to the banks about putting an end to their practice of selling insurance on their websites, but also that his government would adopt a law to that effect.

In his letter of July 29, 2010, the minister advised me that “draft regulations” would soon be pre-published in the Canada Gazette to address the issue of banks using the Internet to promote and sell insurance. We are still waiting for those draft regulations. I had hoped to find these changes in Bill C-47, but, unfortunately, I have been disappointed as they have not been included.

Since the minister did nothing more than offer lip service and make a few verbal threats, the banks have already responded by trying to promote insurance on cell phones and personal digital assistants, or PDAs.

My bill expands the prohibitions against banks selling insurance. It would prohibit banks in Canada from promoting insurance products in their branches and neighbourhoods, or on websites, ATMs, cell phones and PDAs.

Once again, Bill C-47 provided an opportunity to deal with this and other pressing matters. The Conservatives are good at making promises they do not intend to keep, and we are left, once again, trying to squeeze water from a stone.

As I mentioned at the beginning of my speech, this bill is purely administrative. It does not contain a single substantive measure, much less an innovative one.

This was yet another wasted opportunity, another example of the laissez-faire approach adopted by the government which, time and time again, has shown that it is not interested in governing.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Madam Speaker, in preparation for the 2010 budget, the Bloc Québécois did a pre-budget consultation tour in which 317 organizations participated.

We had the opportunity to speak with the main players in Quebec's development across the entire province. We gathered and studied all of the proposals, which we then submitted to the Conservative government. The Bloc Québécois's budget suggestions were consistent with the expectations of Quebeckers, and if the government had implemented them, they would have ensured that Quebec came out of the crisis prosperous, sustainable and green.

Unfortunately, the government missed the opportunity to properly address Quebec's economic, social, environmental and financial needs. They have shown once again that, as far as Canada is concerned, it is as though Quebec does not exist. The Conservatives, backed by the Liberals, established policies geared to the needs of Ontario and Alberta, to Quebec's disadvantage. Despite all of the wonderful Conservative promises made in 2006 about taking a new approach with Quebec, the Conservative budget has not met needs of Quebec's economy.

Whether we are talking about the forestry or aerospace sectors, the environment or culture, Quebeckers' priorities have been completely ignored.

For example, the automobile industry, concentrated in Ontario, received $9.7 billion whereas the forestry industry, which is so vital for Quebec's regions, received only $170 million.

When it comes to the environment, which for all intents and purposes was ignored in the budget, the Conservative government put $1 billion towards developing nuclear power, which benefits Ontario, Alberta and oil companies. Do we need to repeat that they already enjoy generous tax benefits?

In addition, no new funding was announced for the cultural sector, which is essential to the development of the Quebec nation and its economy.

What I find the most upsetting in this budget is that it ignores the need to improve employment insurance and the guaranteed income supplement, which is currently keeping our seniors in poverty. It also ignores the need to deal with the issues of social housing and homelessness.

The Bloc Québécois voted against the budget because it was unfair for Quebec, but does not object ideologically to all the measures resulting from it. We would rather look at the merit of each measure included in this bill during discussions in the Standing Committee on Finance and then support those that will help Quebeckers and those that we previously proposed.

The Bloc Québécois is in favour of a number of initiatives in this bill. We must admit that some are acceptable, including measures to improve sharing child tax benefits. The government agrees to pay half to each of two parents who have joint custody. The bill also lightens the tax burden on beneficiaries of a registered disability savings plan, a plan designed to ensure the financial security of children with severe disabilities. It also reduces the administrative burden on charities and some small businesses, and it tightens the rules on the TFSA to prevent tax avoidance. What is more, companies will stop benefiting from double deductions for stock options.

That is where the good side of the current bill ends. The Bloc Québécois has many reservations about this bill. It confirms the Conservative government's desire to spare rich taxpayers at all cost and have the workers and the middle class paying off the deficit.

We also see that the government will continue to treat stock options like capital gains for ordinary taxpayers. The Bloc Québécois deplores the fact that only half the income derived from stock options is subject to federal tax.

The Conservative government could show fairness to the workers and collect $1 billion in tax by cutting off this gift.

Businesses are not being asked to pay their fair share to increase government revenue, except that they have to make source deductions to ensure that employees with stock options pay their taxes.

This bill also attests to the Conservative government's inertia with respect to the environment and the fight against greenhouse gases. Only one environmental measure is included; it encourages the production of clean energy.

The government is ignoring the Bloc Québécois' urgent calls concerning equalization payments and increased transfers for education and social programs. It is also disregarding our recommendations on income security for retirees.

I would like to go into greater detail about some of the measures in the bill that the Bloc Québécois wants to improve in committee.

First, I want to address the measures regarding income tax on charities, as included in part 1. The government proposes changing the rules on sums that have to be spent on charitable activities by repealing the rule on charitable spending, changing the rules on capital accumulation, and strengthening the rules against tax avoidance.

The Bloc Québécois believes it is vital that charitable organizations be able to focus on their activities, rather than on fundraising. Accordingly, we supported the campaign to eliminate the capital gains tax on donations of publicly listed securities and private equity holdings to charities.

The proposed measures could reduce the amount of administrative red tape that charities have to deal with. However, the issue of funding these organizations remains largely ignored by this government. The survival of these organizations is especially important given that the government has slashed spending on social services.

When it comes to international aid, we cannot help but be concerned by the major withdrawal and the politics of fear imposed on NGOs by this government. This withdrawal is particularly apparent in the case of organizations whose positions do not correspond to the government's viewpoints.

In budget 2010, the federal government announced its plans to cap expenditures for development assistance, thereby confirming that it would not make the effort needed to achieve its target of 0.7% of GDP.

The Bloc Québécois recognizes the important role of charitable organizations in Quebec society and around the world. Child care centres, volunteer organizations, regional recycling depots and NGOs working in international aid all need predictable, long-term funding in order to fulfill their respective mandates.

Prior to budget 2010, the Bloc Québécois demanded that the federal government stop extending certain programs on a temporary basis and stop being so secretive about its intentions regarding the funding of organizations. In doing so, the government creates uncertainty among the most vulnerable, our community groups and the charitable organizations that help them.

The Bloc Québécois is also calling on the federal government to implement a realistic plan to achieve the UN target of 0.7% of GDP for international assistance as quickly as possible. If the federal government does not increase its budget for development assistance, it will greatly impede the vital work that is being done by charitable organizations in the developing world.

Last month, I had the opportunity to participate in a parliamentary mission to two of the poorest countries in Africa—Benin and Burkina Faso. Parliamentarians in these countries told us that they appreciate the quality of Canadian aid. However, they expressed serious misgivings about Canada's recent decision to no longer consider them to be priority countries since they are not included in the new list of countries that are a priority for our international aid. That is the result of the government's disengagement.

Part 3 of the bill deals with measures pertaining to federal-provincial fiscal arrangements. The purpose of these piecemeal arrangements, made at the behest of the federal government, is to facilitate tax sharing by Canada and Quebec.

The Bloc Québécois believes that it is high time to come up with a vigorous mechanism ensuring that Quebec receives all taxes paid in the province. For that reason, we are asking the federal government to initiate talks with the Government of Quebec in order to create a single tax return in Quebec, on the basis of an agreement similar to that for the GST, for all taxes paid by Quebeckers.

Since 1991, the Government of Quebec has collected the goods and services tax for the federal government, which compensates it for this service. The Bloc Québécois believes that Quebec should collect all income tax. Not only would corporations and individuals save considerable sums every year, but the reduced cost of tax collection would lead to recurring savings that, in turn, would lower pressure on public finances. Maintaining two separate structures for tax administration forces Quebeckers to pay very high administrative costs. The introduction of a single tax return by the Government of Quebec would save hundreds of millions of dollars by reducing duplication.

Part 7 of the bill, which also deals with federal-provincial fiscal arrangements, addresses total transfers, including equalization payments. The Quebec government is the loser with this bill, as it was with the 2010 budget, because the Conservatives have maintained their decision to unilaterally cap equalization payments.

Since the equalization envelope is now capped, the total amount of equalization will be calculated in line with economic growth, which will mean Quebec will lose several billion dollars over the coming years. Moreover, during this period, Quebec’s share may decline. If Ontario’s relative wealth drops in relation to Quebec’s, Ontario will receive a bigger piece of the pie while Quebec’s piece will get smaller.

There is nothing in this bill about the formula affecting a segment of Hydro-Quebec’s revenue either, which deprives the Quebec government of $250 million.

Lastly, there is nothing planned with regard to education and social program transfers. The Bloc Québécois is calling for a substantial increase in investments in these programs to return to the 1994-95 indexed level. Such an increase would mean that Quebec would receive $800 million more annually for the funding of its social programs.

The government is flatly refusing Quebec’s urgent calls for an increase in federal transfer payments, in particular in education. The growth in health and education transfers will be compromised as of 2014-15 since the Federal Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act does not allow for any further growth in these transfers beyond 2014.

Furthermore, there is no compensation resulting from the harmonization of Quebec’s sales tax under Bill C-47. Even though Quebec has been unanimously calling on the government to provide financial compensation of $2.2 billion for the harmonization of its sales tax, this has been denied. And yet, total compensation of $6.8 billion was allocated to Ontario, British Columbia and three Atlantic provinces.

As far as the main transfer payments to Quebec are concerned, the federal government must reverse its decision to unilaterally modify the equalization formula, thereby ensuring Quebec receives the money to which it is entitled. The federal government must do away with the equalization cap and treat Quebec’s water resources fairly when calculating equalization.

Furthermore, the federal government must increase the Canada Social Transfer. The Bloc Québécois is calling for a substantial increase in investments in these programs in order to return to the 1994-1995 indexed level.

Bill C-47, like the 2010 budget, completely disregards the economic situation Quebeckers find themselves in.

Unfortunately, it is clear that the Conservatives continue to fail to make this an opportunity for Quebec. The 2010 budget implementation bill includes several positive initiatives, but it is clearly not a harbinger of any fundamental change in direction on the part of the Conservatives.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague mentioned several issues, a mixed bag of all kinds of things, from the forestry sector to the auto sector to EI. However, I would like to ask him specifically about pensions and how we can help. I know he has many workers in his riding who, similar to mine, are currently living on pensions that are in jeopardy. They were called defined benefit pensions. However, because they are unable to recoup a lot of the costs when they wind up, they are not valued the same as they were before. Could he comment on that?

I also want to talk about equalization. Being from Newfoundland and Labrador, we are in a blessed position now where we do not take equalization because we are considered to be a have province, according to the per capita formula. Right now Quebec receives money from the equalization program, of which it wants more. If he truly believes Quebec will become the independent nation he hopes it will be, what will that do to average citizens of Quebec once the province achieves that independence? Will it chose to raise taxes or cut services?

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.

Equalization, which he brought up, refers to the government's redistribution of wealth. Under the principle of equalization, the have provinces give part of their wealth to the have-not provinces. The purpose of this policy is to balance wealth. There are calculations that have to be done and checked each year to ensure that they are accurate.

My colleague made reference to Quebec independence or sovereignty in his question. I think that if Quebec became a sovereign nation, there would be no more talk about equalization. There would be no more discussions about the amount of money a given province should receive. When a nation is proud of itself, its skills and its wealth, it can govern itself by keeping all its own tax revenue instead of giving half to another government that does not necessarily redistribute it according to the same priorities.

I talked about how a quarter of the taxes paid by Quebeckers had been used to help the auto industry. Quebeckers wound up subsidizing Ontario's auto industry. We never opposed that because it is important to Canada's overall economy, but it has to be said that Quebec is contributing to all of Canada's spending and wealth.

If Quebec became independent, we feel that by keeping all our own tax revenue instead of redistributing it to suit the majority of Canadians—who never have the same priorities as Quebec—we could strike a budget that would meet the needs of Quebeckers.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Madam Speaker, given the comments the member has made on the bill, what do his constituents say about the priorities of the federal government, which would benefit the residents of his province? The federal and provincial governments say all the time that they do not want to be like the United States and have to hand pick and designate the technologies that we choose, that they want to leave it to the market and corporations to choose what to invest in for the future.

The International Energy Agency said very clearly two years ago that the way out of the economic recession and the climate crisis was for governments to make major investments in stimulating the new green economy. The government has chosen to put all its eggs in one basket, carbon capture sequestration. We now hear it is highly questionable whether it can work at all or is affordable.

What do his residents say about where we should put the money? Do they support the idea of perhaps putting more money into furthering our renewable energy and retrofit sectors for homes and small businesses?

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for her excellent question. When the people of Quebec talk to the Bloc Québécois, we realize that the priorities set by the current government in no way respect their desires and goals. The public needs more direct assistance in terms of social funding, like that provided to seniors, and the current government is ignoring that.

For some years now the Bloc has been introducing a bill in the House that would improve the guaranteed income supplement and it has always been rejected. The Conservatives rejected it, alleging that it would cost too much. Yet, they spend billions of dollars on weapons and fighter jets. Money does not seem to be a problem for the government when it comes to that. The public can make these comparisons right now. People are starting to understand that the government, far off in Ottawa, is not really looking after them.

There is also the issue of social housing, which is inadequate in my own riding of Laval, in Quebec. That is likely the case in many regions of Canada. There is a serious need for social housing in this country. The current government is not responding to this need and is not allocating this money for the public good.

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have a question for my colleague, who has just admitted that the province of Quebec is poor, because it does not have the money it needs to develop. I would like him to explain what the government did when it increased equalization payments and Quebec received over $8 billion.

How could he, his party or his colleagues in Quebec generate that kind of wealth in Quebec? They have never been able to provide any explanation for that. I would like him to explain how they could.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Madam Speaker, I am hesitant in thanking the member opposite for his question. Saying that equalization shows that Quebec is poor compared to the rest of Canada is not an admission of weakness on the part of Quebec. It is an admission of how poorly things work in the Canadian majority, when it creates poor provinces. Quebec is not poor because it lacks wealth and skills, but because Quebeckers do not see an adequate return on the money that they invest in the government.

Earlier I compared the automotive industry, which received billions of dollars in subsidies, to the Canadian forestry industry, which is so important to Quebec, even in the riding of the member opposite. This country does not help the forestry industry. Then it is surprised when calculations show that Quebec is in need of equalization payments to keep up with the Canadian average. Quebec wants out of that situation. We are tired of being poor in a supposedly rich country. We want to conserve our own wealth and use it for our own development, so that we can be proud of our country.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak to Bill C-47, which is part of the budget process of the government.

It is no secret that at this time in the history of Canada we are facing a particularly difficult time. Things are changing very rapidly. We are not out of the recession and people are looking for help. The middle class and the very disadvantaged are looking for help.

Ultimately budgets, including this one, are about choices. Governments make choices, they put them in budgets and eventually they get judged on those choices. It is useful when discussing anything to do with the economy of the country to know what Canadians are thinking about the economy, their own position and the lives of their family.

I want to share a few facts with the House.

From RBC Economics: Today the typical Canadian family must devote 49% of its income to own a standard two-storey home while mortgage rates are at their lowest point. That means people on average are spending half of their income to own their home, and they know if interest rates go up that will only go higher.

From the BMO Financial Group: 64% of parents worry they will not be able to afford the rising cost of post-secondary education. I am sure CASA and CFS would echo that.

From the Canadian Medical Association: 80% of Canadians fear that the quality of their health care will decline over the next three years.

From the Canadian Cancer Society: Canadian families are concerned about the cost of caring for a terminally-ill loved one, which is currently $1,000 a month, excluding the loss of income from taking time off work to provide care. I will come back to this later.

From the Canadian Institute of Actuaries: 72% of pre-retired Canadians worry about maintaining a reasonable standard of living in retirement and maintaining a reasonable quality of life.

From RBC Economics: 58% of Canadians are concerned with their current level of debt, averaging $41,470 per person, which is the worst among 20 advanced countries in the OECD.

From the Canadian Payments Association: 59% of Canadians believe they would be in financial difficulty if their paycheque were delayed by a week. Think about that. More than half of all Canadians worry that they would be in financial difficulty if their paycheque were delayed by one week.

This is a country with a lot of people who are very concerned.

I want to share a statistic that was brought to parliamentarians last week, I think, by the Association of Canadian Community Colleges, ACCC. This is something that really outlines the challenge that faces this nation and why we need a bold and responsible government that can address this challenge.

Today 44% of Canadians do not participate in the labour force. That includes children, seniors and the unemployed. That 44% will rise to 57% by 2026 and 61% by 2031. In 20 years, 61% of the people in Canada will not be in the labour market.

This is a very telling statistic, which outlines the challenge that faces Canada right now and the absolute need for us to take advantage of the human resource potential of all Canadians. We must do whatever we can as a Parliament, and the government must do what it can to ensure all Canadians have an opportunity to reach the level of education and skills attainment that they should have. The problem is that the recession that is still lingering in Canada has disproportionately affected a group of people.

A dear friend of mine, the Hon. D. Scott McNutt who passed away just recently, used to have a saying that “A rising tide lifts all boats”, the idea being, in this case, that if an economy gets better everybody benefits. The fact is that not all boats are raised equally, and the poor and the disadvantaged are disproportionately hurt.

We heard this last year from the Citizens for Public Justice, who released a report indicating that during the recession the poverty rate in Canada increased significantly. In fact, the poverty rate in Canada had gone down over the previous couple of decades, particularly among seniors, although there were still many single women who were living in poverty. The poverty rates had gone down due to a decent economy and the fact that we brought in measures like the child tax benefit, guaranteed income supplement and things like that.

However from 2007 to 2009, poverty rates increased from 9.2% to 11.7% in Canada, according to the Citizens for Public Justice and their partner, World Vision. Child poverty went from 9.5% to 12%.

Those are pretty sobering statistics. They are not saying that the most in need in Canada suffered proportionately; they are saying they suffered disproportionately, that they got less than anybody else.

HungerCount, the report of Canada's food banks, last November indicated that the usage of food banks in Canada went up by 18%. That is pretty staggering.

A couple of weeks ago I had a chance to speak to Feed Nova Scotia in my own province, and they are talking about similar statistics. Their annual report says:

Forty thousand Nova Scotians are hungry each month—mothers, fathers, grandparents and, perhaps saddest of all, children and youth. Hunger knows no barriers. It's in every community across our province and its impact is truly profound.

Hunger is going up in this country, and it is going up at a very concerning rate.

Social assistance caseloads for those 900,000 more Canadians who are living in poverty went up.

Food prices went up 5%, and in fact in basic dietary staples over the last couple of years, those things that everybody needs, prices have gone up 10%.

Average household debt is up 5.7%.

Bankruptcies are up 36%.

We do not have the social infrastructure to deal with this, and we particularly did not have the investments from the government at a time of stimulus that we needed. In fact, many economists can validate the fact that the best form of economic stimulus is to give it to people who need it the most, the unemployed, the people who are marginalized, because they actually spend the money. They get it and they spend the money. If there is one thing I would think all Canadians would want to do it is to help those who are most in need.

The good news on the poverty side is that people are getting active on this front. There is a national mobilization. We had the social forum organized by campaign 2000. We had the 20th anniversary, the unfortunate anniversary, of Parliament saying we would eliminate child poverty by 2000.

Parliament adopted a new motion and hopefully we will do better.

There is a private member's bill from the member for Sault Ste. Marie on anti-poverty. Most notably we have six provinces and a territory that have anti-poverty strategies.

The problem is that the government is not addressing these needs. It is not addressing these needs at all. We have seen that in a number of ways. In the stimulus budget of 2009, those measures that were permanent, things like tax cuts, did not really help people with the lowest incomes. It helped people like the members of this House and myself who make $150,000 and more. There is an economic argument for doing that, and I do not dispute that. However I think we would all agree that those who are making $30,000 and less should have gotten more out of a budget for stimulus than members of Parliament and senators.

We do have a federal poverty elimination act brought into this House, but we have no action from the government. In fact in June 2009, in response to the United Nations periodic review, which suggested among other things that Canada should have an anti-poverty strategy, the federal government turned around and said “No, that is not our problem; that is not our jurisdiction”, yet the six provinces and a territory that actually have anti-poverty plans are telling our committee, myself, my colleague from Laval, the member for Niagara West—Glanbrook and others that we need the federal government to step up and at least acknowledge that poverty is an issue that affects us all and we all have responsibility for that.

Poverty is not getting the attention it needs. People in Canada are suffering.

I want to talk about education. Let us look at that statistic again, that today 44% of Canadians are not in the labour force and that is going to rise to 61% by 2031.

Canada is a fortunate country. Canada has done very well, in many ways more by accident than design. We have a rich land. We have lots of natural resources. People do not come here and fight on our land. Because of climate change, we have more of the kind of natural disasters that other places do, but we do not have them in the same way other countries do. We do not have the massive tsunamis that have affected parts of the world. Those kinds of tragedies happen less in Canada than in other places.

We have been very fortunate and very blessed as a nation. We have also taken advantage of our wealth to educate our citizens, but we are slipping. We made great strides on research and innovation starting at the turn of the century, investing in CFI and Genome Canada, increasing grants to the granting councils, to NSERC, to SSHRC, to CIHR and to all those organizations. We went a long way.

However we are starting to taper off, and other countries have started to say, “We can do that here”, not only on research and innovation where they are now investing but even on where their students are choosing to go to school. In fact they are coming to Canada and want our students to go there. That is a good thing.

We want our Canadian students to travel the world. We want other students to come here. We also need to say we have a problem. We need to educate Canadian citizens. We need to take advantage of all the people in Canada we possibly can and make sure they get the education they need not only for their own benefit, which is important, but also for the benefit of the nation.

ABC Life Literacy Canada released a report indicating:

...3.1 million working age Canadians with IALS Level 1 literacy skills, the lowest level of literacy, are employed with an additional 5.8 million working-age Canadians employed with a Level 2 literacy level. These 8.9 million people represent nearly 50% of the entire Canadian labour force...

Many Canadians struggle with literacy. Four out of ten Canadians age 16 to 65 struggle with low literacy. This is a problem. We need to address this issue. We need to make sure that people who are not attaining the level of literacy they want can get that level of literacy.

One of the very sad moments in my career as a parliamentarian was when a gentleman sat down with me and said, “Look Mike, I have never really done very well in my job. I have done my best. I work hard. I was offered a promotion but a literacy test went with it”. He was afraid he would lose his first job if the literacy test showed that he could not attain the level of literacy he needed.

These are the people we need. For their benefit and for the benefit of all of us as a nation, we need to allow them to attain the level of literacy they want.

With regard to aboriginal Canadians, as part of our study on poverty in May, the human resources committee visited the Lac Simon First Nation in Quebec and the Kitcisakik Indian settlement. I want to read to the House some statistics we found out while we were there.

I will mention Lac Simon first. With regard to educational attainment, of the 705 residents age 15 or over, 555 had no certificate, diploma or degree; 40 out of 705 had a high school certificate; 45 had an apprenticeship or trade certificate; 20 had a college, CEGEP or other non-university certificate; and only 35 had a university certificate. I would like members to think about that. Of 705 residents of working age, 555 had no certificate, diploma or degree. The labour force included only 220 individuals of which 175 were employed. The employment rate in Lac Simon is 24.8%.

We then went to Kitcisakik. Let me give the House the numbers from there. In 2006, of the 170 residents age 15 and over, 145 had no certificate, diploma or degree; another 15 had a high school certificate; 10 had college or CEGEP; and 10 had a university certificate. Of the 170 residents, 145 had no certificate. The labour force totalled 85. The employment rate was 31.2%.

I do not say this to try to educate my colleagues in the House. We know there is an issue, but what are we doing about it?

There is both a social justice argument and an economic argument for this country; we cannot allow that to happen in Canada. That should not be the case in a country as rich as Canada. We need to make sure that by 2031 all these people are not part of the 61% who are not in the workforce. They do not want to be part of the 61% who are not in the workforce. They want to be part of the group that is paying its way and making a difference for Canadians. I know we all believe in that. It takes an effort, a commitment and a belief that we can get there in order to make that happen. We are not doing anywhere near enough.

It is about choices. The Conservative government has chosen to spend money on certain things, and we all use those numbers and statistics in different ways.

Let me mention the G8 and G20 summits with a cost of $1.3 billion. As a comparison I will give the House the costs of hosting other summits. Let me begin with security costs at the G8. In 2009 in Italy security cost $124 million. The year before it cost $280 million in Japan, and it cost $124 million in Germany.

I can recall, as I am sure the member for South Shore—St. Margaret's would recall, the beautiful days of 1995 when we had the G7 in Halifax. The total cost of that summit was $30 million. Bill Clinton, John Major, Boris Yeltsin and other leaders came to Halifax. It was a very positive experience. I thank former Prime Minister Chrétien and the regional minister at the time, David Dingwall, for their work in bringing that summit to Halifax.

Summits are where things get done and they do work if they are in an environment where things can happen in a positive way and we do not end up being badgered around by spiralling costs for fake lakes, gazebos and all those sorts of things.

A couple of headlines in today's Quorum read, “Commons to probe G8/G20 spending, security”, and “Dance floor, gazebo among stimulus waste...”. For the millions of Canadians watching on CPAC who may not know what Quorum is, it is a summation of headlines in the news today.

We need to decide what Canadians want. Governments, whether they be Liberal, Progressive Conservative or any others that might hope to be a government in this country, need be responsible for their decisions.

That brings me to the announcement this week made by my own leader, which fits into a discussion of the budget. It is fully costed, fully accountable and it is a clear choice for Canadians about what they would like to spend money on. Their tax money, after all, is what is used to fund the priorities of whatever government they elect. They now have a clear choice with the Liberal family care plan.

I have spoken before in this House about my own circumstance as a family caregiver. Like just about everybody in this House, I have had the opportunity to provide care to loved ones myself. In my case, I had two parents who passed away almost simultaneously, six weeks apart, from cancer. They both died at home and, while it was sad, the circumstances were a lot better than if we had not had the family resources and financial resources to care for them. Many Canadians do not have those choices. Many Canadians who take care of sick relatives, whether it is an autistic child, a disabled adult, a brother or sister, or aging parents, do not have those choices.

I mentioned before that one the saddest meetings that I have had as a parliamentarian was when a person with low literacy skills came to me and said, “I need the government to step up”. That was at a time when the government had cut $1 million out of literacy programs.

One of my happiest days was a bit unexpected. I, as were many other members, was visited on Tuesday by members from the ALS Society. A woman, who some other members would have met, sat in my office and thanked me. This woman had lost her husband at 45 years old in a very sad passing from ALS. She had 14-year-old twin daughters. She told me that she had visited Parliament last year and that she had been listened to.

The family care plan that our leader introduced is a reflection of what Canadians need. To look at the six month EI benefit and the family care tax benefit, one of the concerns people have had about compassionate care under EI for a long time is that the six weeks are not very useful. It needs to be longer. The other thing it needs to be, not just for ALS but for people dealing with multiple sclerosis, struggling with depression, going for cancer treatments and many other things, is more flexibility so that within that six month period people can choose to take it as they need it.

People are not generally sick for five and a half months and then get better and go on about their life. Quite often they need to the support of their family for a few weeks here and a few weeks there. It also needs to be flexible to allow family members to share that. At six weeks, that is not much of a choice. The family care tax benefit, based on the child tax benefit, is another measure that people struggling with making difficult personal choices have asked for. I have met with people in my riding, as I know all members have, who are dealing with circumstances that we simply wish we could do more for and, in some cases, we cannot. They need that kind of help.

Bill C-47 is part of the budget and budgets are about choices. Are we reflecting the values of Canadians? Are we anticipating the needs of Canadians? Are we going where Canadians need us to go or are we simply going where we think we want to go, either for political or ideological reasons?

In my view, the budget that the government has brought forward does not do enough to help people who need help the most. Middle-class Canadians and low-income Canadians who, in most cases, through no fault of their own, need the help of a government. They need a government that will be on their side, that will be in their corner and that will provide assistance to them when they need it. We can do better as a country.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour for his passion toward poor people.

When I look at my riding of Newton—North Delta, it is a very diverse riding. Many immigrants came to this country to try to make a difference. I must agree with the hon. member that if we are to be competitive in the world on the global stage, we need to have a knowledge-based economy. We need to provide the necessary education for our young people. On the other hand, we also need to ensure that in the early days of childhood the children are well fed and are given all the support they need in the first six years of their life.

When I was talking to the firefighters in my riding of Surrey Delta, they told me that there were still a large number of kids going to school hungry and that they were providing them with breakfast to ensure they could focus on their education.

When it comes to all the social justice issues, whether it was the Kelowna accord which affected aboriginal children, or cancelling the landmark child care agreements that we signed with the provinces, the Conservatives have taken them all away. The immigration lineups are growing longer and longer. On the other hand, the deficit is the highest in Canadian history.

Could the hon. member tell me, so I can take it to my constituents, where the government is lacking and what can be done to take care of vulnerable people?

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Madam Speaker, I visited with my colleague in his riding and I have some of the needs that he talks about and for which he advocates so passionately in the House.

On the issue of child care, I neglected to mention child care because there are so many other needs. However, the fundamental need in the education system is that we have some kind of standardized early learning for children. In terms of the OECD nations, we are tied with another country for last place out of 25 nations in terms of indices for how we are educating our children.

Children do not start learning magically at the age of six when they go to school. Children start learning before they are even born, but certainly as soon as they are born. In many cases, the parents want to provide all the care for them and, in most cases, these days they probably cannot. We need to ensure again, not only for the individual family or children but for the betterment of our society and for Canada, that we have some kind of a national early learning program for those children that provides those opportunities and gives the foundation. That will impact on things I referred to like rates of literacy and post-secondary attainment.

It all starts when our kids are very young. We know kids do not start learning at age six. They start learning even before they are born. My wife took my daughter to a Céline Dion concert three days before she was born and I think that is why my daughter was colicky eventually when she was born. Children learn at a very early age and, if we get to be the government, we will ensure they get that opportunity.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, we heard a lot from the government in terms of announcements of its vision for spending $9 billion expanding the prison system in this country, but we have heard very little from the government in terms of the green economy.

Government members should know that Germany is a very advanced country in terms of the green economy. Why does the Canadian government basically ignore best practices and new ideas from countries like Germany and instead concentrate on building prisons as its solution for the future?

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Madam Speaker, I think that Angela Merkel's government recently decided to look at corporate tax cuts and postpone them in the way that we are proposing here so they can invest in some of those things. We need to ensure we are investing in those things that keep people out of prison. That obviously is child care and schools. Again, it comes to choices. How do we take care of people who may be in trouble? We need to help them not get into trouble before they do, and that means education and schools, not prisons.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Madam Speaker, I know my colleague has done a lot of work on the EI file. He talked about the compassionate care program that we announced a short time ago. I know the compassion that he has for the people who are the most vulnerable in our society.

One of the sectors, among many, would be the seasonal worker and how in the past while we have been asking the government to make permanent the best 14 weeks. We started three pilot projects in 2005. One expired back in September and one is about to expire on October 23. That, in and of itself, is a very special program because 55% of what people earn during their time of work is based on the best 14 weeks of earnings. If this program expires people will need to use the last 14 weeks and the employers will be at a disadvantage. It is hard for them to hire people when there is a disincentive to work. It is human nature.

I also would like the member to comment on the fact that over the past while we have not heard a lot about pension securities. Many people are not so much involved in company benefit plans, whether they be through direct contribution or a defined benefit. What we are seeing now and what we hope to do is have pension plans that allow people the flexibility to move across the country. Perhaps they have a skilled trade that takes them to many places around the world and it would allow the government to help them contribute to their latter years.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor certainly knows this issue much better than I do.

I want to talk about the pilot projects because there has been a lot of misunderstanding about these. They are a double win. Just as education is good individually but also good for the country, these are good for employees and good for employers. These are economically responsible programs that recognize an essential fact of Canadian life, which is that we have seasonal workers. That is how it is, folks, and we need what they do. We need them to contribute to the economy. It is good for them and it is fundamentally good, sound business policy to extend these pilot projects.

As the member said, one of them, the best five weeks, has expired. The best 14 weeks and working on claim, these are important for both employees and employers. They are responsible programs that the government needs to extend and it needs to signal that very soon.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Madam Speaker, I would ask the member one final question.

He touched on another important issue, which is child care. What we have lost sight of along the way is what it takes for early childhood education. I was wondering if the member would like to comment on that as well.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Madam Speaker, child care is very important, not only for all children but there are certain children who would have really benefited from the previous Liberal plan.

For example, autistic children, minority language children, new Canadian children and, in many cases, children in remote areas whose parents are not able to get child care because they get a $100 cheque taxable in the mailbox. That does not create child care. I am sure it is a program that families need but it does not promote early learning and child care.

If there is one thing Canada really needs to do to catch up with those in the world we consider competitors, the OECD nations, is we need to invest in quality early learning and child care.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased today to speak to Bill C-47, another of the budget implementation bills. In fact, the government wants to call it the Sustaining Canada's Economic Recovery Act.

Certainly that is the difficulty of the situation, because on a macro basis, on a global basis, we are looking at some countries in the world that are having much more difficult times than we are right now. We only have to look at Europe to see what is happening in the country of Iceland, which had to declare bankruptcy in the last two years, and in the countries of Ireland and Portugal. We have to feel sorry for some of the measures that are being taken over there right now, because a lot of the workers in those countries are suffering a lot because of the restraint measures that are being forced upon them by the IMF.

We have not yet had to deal with that situation here, but our economic situation is much, much different in the sense that we are very tied to the American economy. As a matter of fact, it is only in very recent months, and I am not even certain whether we are past that point yet, that there is a recognition that there is $1.3 trillion in commercial loans coming due in the United States. In the spring, there was a freeze in credit for small business. Banks were classifying commercial loans as risky, so they were very conservative in their lending policies. Manufacturers were having difficulty getting lines of credit.

In 2008, the 400 largest U.S. contractors were doing 80% of their business in the private sector. Now, two years later, the 400 largest U.S. contractors are doing 80% of their work in the public sector, which will be running out, both in the United States and in Canada, over the next few months. The concern will be what will happen when the stimulus packages in both countries run out, what will happen with the unemployment rate. There should potentially be a rise in unemployment and the problems that will come with that.

The recovery is tentative at this point and there is enough concern to be passed around. The question is, how is the government responding to this situation and is it responding correctly? We would argue in our party that its priorities are somewhat displaced.

For example, we only have to look to Germany where Hermann Scheer, a German green politician, has been the catalyst, has been instrumental in propelling Germany into the future with green energy development. A number of examples have been covered in the press over the last year of the great advancements that have been made in Germany in terms of green energy development.

Here in Canada, we have a much more tentative approach to that. There was a company in Canada that was making solar panels. I believe it was called ARISE Technologies, based in Waterloo. The owner of the company, Ian MacLellan, was not receiving much encouragement in Canada, so he responded to the German government's offer to build a plant in East Germany. At this point, his plant cannot produce enough solar panels for the German market. I believe it is several years behind in its production. It is expanding so quickly, and I believe they are building more than one plant there to keep up with the demand. This is yet another opportunity lost, because now Germany has an advantage over Canada and will only increase that advantage over time.

In Canada, the discussion over the east-west power grid has been raging now for probably 20 years, or maybe even longer. The concept is to build an east-west power grid so that we can transfer clean hydroelectric power from Manitoba, for example, which has only developed 50% of its hydroelectric capacity. Rather than sending that power to the United States, as is the case now because all the lines are running north-south, we want to be able to send it east-west so that we can help Ontario stop using its coal-fired plants and prevent the need for nuclear power plants to be developed in the next few years.

Once again, where is the initiative on the part of the federal government? Ten of the 14 members of Parliament in Manitoba are Conservatives. In fact, only one of them has spoken on this issue over the last year. The Minister of State (Democratic Reform) has spoken about this issue. Saskatchewan has 14 out of 14 Conservative members. The question is where they are on this issue. The 14 members in Saskatchewan and 10 members in Manitoba should be leading the charge to try to force the government to put a plan together so that an east-west power grid can be developed.

It is their predecessor, John A. Macdonald, who had a national dream for this country. The national dream was to build a railway from east to west uniting the country, as opposed to developing it on a north-south basis. In fact, if the railway had not developed, the Americans would have probably taken over the parts of the country that we now know as Canada.

If we fast forward to where we are now, where is that Conservative vision of John A. Macdonald? The government still follows the ideology that whatever the economics dictate, whatever is the cheapest and fastest, is what it is going to do, and if it means building all the pipelines and hydro transmission lines north-south, then so be it and forget about looking at a common national vision of an east-west power grid.

An east-west power grid would provide a lot of jobs in the economy that are certainly going to be needed after the stimulus package money runs out. I still hold out hope that the members in the Manitoba and Saskatchewan Conservative caucuses will actually get motivated to come onboard with this idea and push it along a little further.

We look to wind power as a good example of an activity that should be encouraged, but where are the initiatives for wind power by the government? I remember 20 years ago, in 1992, in Pincher Creek, Alberta there was a lot of development of wind turbines in that area. As a matter of fact, I went out to look at them at one time. Of course, today the wind turbines and their technology have changed. If one were to go there, it would seem almost like a museum, because one sees the little turbines from 1992 and then the progression to the huge turbines now.

Canada, once again, has squandered an opportunity at economic development, because there are a lot of jobs to be had in the manufacture of the turbines. We have seen that industry grow in Scandinavian countries. The companies that make the turbines are from Scandinavian countries such as Denmark and have only gotten bigger and better with time. We have looked at the construction of wind turbines, but to no avail.

We have looked into it in Manitoba. We are at the point where it just did not proceed, for one reason or another.

As a matter of fact, North Dakota and South Dakota have manufacturing set up there.

We are once again playing catch-up. We are not really even in the game. We had wind farm developments in Saskatchewan, at Gull Lake. There was 99 megawatts of power at Gull Lake. That was about 10 years ago or so. However, since then, we have seen the focus change to other parts of the country, and other parts of the country are taking up some of the slack in this area. That is another very big area that the government should be concentrating on.

What is the government's vision? The government's vision does not seem to be in these areas at all. As matter of fact, its answer so far for economic development seems to be developing more prisons. It has announced $9 billion for the expansion of our prison system.

As a matter of fact, in this bill the government has suggested that it is going to crack down on the TFSA program, the tax-free savings accounts that were set up in the last couple of years. Evidently a problem has developed where a number of organized individuals, I think higher-income individuals would be more to the truth, have been overcontributing to the TFSA program. The government, rightly so, is cracking down in that area. However, when will it be cracking down on all the people who are investing in tax havens?

Only last year we had a situation where an employee of a bank in Liechtenstein left that bank with computer diskettes. He actually sold the information on the diskettes to the German government. As a result, the German government has recovered quite a huge amount of back taxes from the people who were investing in the tax havens. Out of that, 100 names were given to Revenue Canada. We have yet to hear whether Revenue Canada has collected any back taxes from these people.

We know Revenue Canada offers an amnesty to people. The question is whether these 100 people whose names were turned over by the authorities were given amnesty. For all we know, Revenue Canada let them off with just paying whatever taxes they owed and the amnesty was applied to them too.

Just in the last few weeks there was another example of an employee from, in this case, a Swiss bank, who made off with I think it was 4,500 names on diskettes and turned them over to the French government. Out of that, Revenue Canada got its hands on the names of another 1,800 Canadians who are investing in tax havens. Once again I would like to know what the government is doing to track these people down. Is it going to offer them amnesty to get them to file their up-to-date returns, or is it going to actually charge them for tax evasion, which is the proper way to proceed in this case?

We are getting no follow-up from the government as to the situation with uncollected taxes. Out of all the people who are putting money into tax havens in Liechtenstein, Switzerland, Panama and other countries, there are probably thousands of Canadians in those situations and the government does not seem to be too concerned about catching them. If the government can catch these people and collect a half billion dollars here or a half a billion dollars there of taxes owed, it would help a lot in terms of balancing the books here in Canada and paying for the roads and hospitals that we need.

Where is the interest? We have such lax laws in Canada for white collar crime. It is absolutely laughable. This is from a government that talks about being tough on crime.

This is the record of the tough on crime government on white collar crime. Over the last few years, the United States has successfully prosecuted, convicted and imprisoned 1,200 white collar criminals, including Conrad Black who committed his crimes in Canada. The record of the tough on crime Conservative government is two convictions against the same guy. The government does not have to pay $9 billion for prisons to house one person.

These are examples of the mixed messages we get from the government. On the very day the story broke in the Globe and Mail, in the Greg McArthur article regarding the 1,800 Canadians, the Prime Minister was being questioned in the House about that very issue. On that very day, the government's bill on the order paper for debate was a free trade deal with Panama.

In the case of Panama, we have 350,000 foreign companies hiding money there because it is a tax haven. The Panamanian government is making little, if any, effort to share the tax information.

As a precursor to signing on to these agreements, one would think the government would use some common sense and require that the Panamanian government sign on and honour the OECD rules and protocols on sharing tax information, not go ahead and reward it with a free trade deal. That is the backwards approach of the government.

In addition to regular companies doing business in Panama and hiding their money there, we have Mexican drug cartels laundering money through the Panamanian system. The government is only too willing to ignore that. It forgets the fact that Manuel Noriega, the former president of Panama, is doing time in a Florida jail because the Americans captured him for aiding and abetting money launderers.

Clearly the government has a very questionable set of priorities when it comes to dealing with economic development in our country.

One of the members opposite introduced a bill earlier this year to support a national hunting day, which is a great idea, and we supported the bill. In fact, Manitoba passed a similar bill just two years ago. I was at its annual meeting a couple of weeks ago. One of the reasons given for introducing the bill in the House was to encourage American tourism, to encourage Americans to come to Canada to hunt and fish and to help our economy.

The recognition by the Conservative member was that tourism was down. Partly as a result of my talks with him in the spring, and support in speaking to his bill, I was able to introduce a resolution to a legislators conference this summer, one I have been at now four or five years. This group includes 11 border states, from Illinois to North Dakota, and 3 provinces, Ontario, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. I think Alberta is on the verge of joining that organization.

The legislators meet every summer. There is a western conference and a southern conference as well, but this is the Midwestern legislators conference. This group has met now for 65 years. At that conference, I was able to introduce a resolution, which they passed unanimously. I will not read the resolution at this time, but I will if I get asked about it in a question.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Madam Speaker, so the hon. member can finish his resolution, I will pare down my question as much as I can.

I want to paint a scenario about what is happening now with the economic action plan. My home community is for the most part rural. A town in that community wanted to fix its hockey arena for the coming year. It wanted to delay the fixing of the boards around the rink because it had used some of the money from the RInC program, the recreational infrastructure for communities. It wanted the delay it so the kids could play hockey right now. Unfortunately, because of the deadline of March 31, the kids will be unable hockey this winter.

Could the member comment on that narrative and on how these deadlines are perhaps a little too stringent? Perhaps he would like to finish his resolution as well.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, clearly the government has to apply a certain measure of common sense, which is sometimes lacking over there. Perhaps the member will see, as the deadline approaches, some extensions given on some of these projects, whether the government does it on its own or is forced to do it.

I want to finish the resolution that the legislative conference in the United States, the 11 border states and 3 provinces, passed. It states:

RESOLVED, that the...Conference calls on President Barack Obama and [the] Prime Minister...to immediately examine a reduced fee for passports to facilitate cross-border tourism;

...we encourage the governments to examine the idea of a limited time two-for-one passport renewal or new application...

Half of Canadians have passports and one-quarter of Americans have passports. When it comes to multi-member families, the fees can be around $500 for passports, which is quite high, for Americans to come to Canada.

I believe letters have already gone to the President and the Prime Minister. We expect action in the future, starting negotiations on some sort of a reduction in passport fees for people on both sides of the border.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Madam Speaker, I listened with great interest to my hon. colleague. He is pointing out what I think many Canadians are beginning to realize. When it comes to economic policy, the Conservative government and its finance minister are like the little old man in The Wizard of Oz. They throw around a lot of fear about coalitions, prisons and Russians flying by. Yet when we get behind the curtain, we see this ideological bitter little man with no vision. What we also see, when we start to look at the numbers, is how wasteful the Conservative government is and how much money it is blowing.

For example, the present industry minister racked up a lot of the $1 billion. He put in a fake lake in Toronto and drained a real lake in Muskoka. He shut down real lighthouses in the Maritimes and put a lighthouse in land-locked Muskoka. He even put heated sheets in the arena for his constituents.

The government uses federal dollars to heat the derrieres of Conservative voters, yet it tells our senior citizens in northern Ontario that the cupboard is bare, but this is not fiscal prudence.

What does the hon. member think about the derrieres of Muskoka Conservatives being warmed, while my senior citizens are living in the cold this winter because they are paying the HST?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, that would be a great question for question period. I would love to hear it again.

The fact is the government favours private businesses. We have seen it with the corporate tax cuts. In 2009 the banks made a profit of $15 billion. I think people would be shocked if they knew how much the CEOs of these banks made. For example, the CEO of CIBC, Gerald McCaughey, made $6.2 million in a year. This is in a recession when people have lost their jobs and there have been cutbacks. This is the kind of money the CEOs are making.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Madam Speaker, I have two questions on the member's rare intervention in Parliament. They are related to the power.

First, he talked about the north-south and east-west grids. I agree with him in a lot of cases, but in our particular case in Yukon, the north-south grid is not completed yet. We would love federal government support to increase the B.C. grid north so it would join the Yukon grid and perhaps one day join the Alaska grid. It is the same with the Internet. We have been cut off a number of times in the last few weeks because there is only one access. If the pipeline for the Internet could be extended to join the Alaska grid, that would give us some redundancy. Could he comment on that?

Second is the issue of wind energy, which the member brought up. In the north we need an extra subsidy for wind energy. It used to be a great program at 1¢ per kilowatt hour. It was all used by southern Canada, because 1¢, when energy is 8¢, is a big proportion. However, in the north, if energy is 40¢, 50¢ or 60¢ per kilowatt hour, 1¢ does not mean anything. When we asked the government to increase the subsidy, it cancelled the entire wind energy program.

Would the member agree to support me in the campaign I have had for the last couple of years, of trying to have a special wind energy program in the north with a larger subsidy than in the south? In fact, that would apply to all renewable energies because the cost is higher in the north.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the member raises a very good point. With regard to the east-west power grid, voters in Manitoba and Saskatchewan wonder why they supported Conservatives. In Saskatchewan they voted for 14 out of 14. In Manitoba they voted for 10 out of 14, and only one, the Minister of State for Democratic Reform, even brings up the idea with his caucus that we should have an east-west power grid. That is not very good service from those members.

[Tom Lukiwski, Conservative, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I do not want to interrupt my hon. colleague's dissertation, but I know he is a stickler for accuracy and he is wrong. In Saskatchewan we only have 13 out of 14. We are working on the 14th—

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Order, please. That is clearly a matter of debate.

Questions and comments, the hon. member for Thunder Bay--Rainy River.

[John Rafferty, NDP, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, ON]

Madam Speaker, Bill C-9 is a very interesting bill in that there are some things in it that the government says it never does. Specifically I am talking about raising taxes.

I will not ask my friend from Winnipeg about raising the export tax on softwood lumber products by 10%. We will not count that as a tax. We have talked many times in the House about the HST and the government contribution to it.

However, let me ask about a tax in the bill about which my colleague knows quite a bit. I am talking about the airline tax that increases, by 50%, the security fees paid for in flights. Could he comment on that?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, this is just one of many measures that the government put into the 880-page omnibus bill it brought in with its budget. It brought in the issue of post office remailers, which have absolutely nothing to do with the budget. This is just another example of the government adding on different charges.

In terms of the taxation on air tickets, Canadian airlines already had a competitive disadvantage to American airlines because our airline taxes were higher in Canada than in the states in the first place. The government has now raised them another 50% to make them even higher than the American—

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Resuming debate, the hon. member Scarborough Centre. I can see by the clock that he can begin his comments but I will have to interrupt him.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, when I get up again after question period, I will pick up on where the member left off. The Conservatives talk about raising taxes. On EI, for example, they say they will not raise the premium a certain amount, but then turn around and raise it less than that amount. That is the same as a store that offers a special 50% discount, but it jacks up the price by 100% and then lowers it by 50%, and says that it is giving a 50% discount. That is what the Conservatives did with EI. Later on I will point out what they have done. The Conservatives have tried to pass it on to Canadians as a tax break, but in essence it is a tax hike.

We cannot support these initiatives. It boils down to a matter of trust. We simply cannot trust what the government says. The Conservatives say one thing but do another. For example, the Prime Minister promised in writing not to tax income trusts. He used that in his campaign. One of the first things he did when elected to office was to renege on that promise. I cannot use the word “lie” because that is unparliamentary language, but I can use the word “renege”. He reneged on his agreement. It boils down to a matter of trust.

With respect to EI premiums, I have a quote from the finance minister who said, “It's one of those job-killing taxes, a direct tax on employers and employees”.

[An hon. member]

Who said that?

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

The current finance minister said that, Mr. Speaker. What has he done? Again, I cannot use the word “lie”, but he has reneged on his commitment. He said his government would increase it by $90 but then said it would only be increased by $30. He then told Canadians that it was a tax decrease. I do not know where the finance minister learned his math.

Mr. Speaker, I look forward to continuing my speech after question period.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

The hon. member will have about 18 minutes remaining in the time allotted for his remarks when debate on this matter resumes.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Just before question period the hon. member for Scarborough Centre had started his speech. He has 18 minutes left to conclude his remarks.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as I started saying before question period, for me and my constituents, and I believe many Canadians, this boils down to a matter of trust in the government, trust in what it says it will do.

For example, during an election period, we make certain commitments. People either vote for us based on those commitments or they do not. In this specific case, the Prime Minister, at that time a candidate for prime minister, campaigned in Newfoundland and Labrador. Some of his campaign literature and the Conservative Party campaign literature made several commitments. One of those commitments was not to touch income trusts.

Many people, especially seniors, believed that commitment and they voted in support of the Prime Minister because they trusted him. The key words are “believed” and “trusted” him. Seniors believed he would not touch income trusts. Decades ago these people invested in a certain venue, so come retirement they could assure themselves of an X amount of money on a monthly basis for their golden years.

The Prime Minister has won two minority governments. This shows that Canadians were not fully comfortable with electing a Conservative government. In fact, three out of five Canadians did not vote for the Conservatives. Nevertheless, they had enough numbers to form a minority government.

What was one of the first things the Prime Minister did? He reneged. He went back on his word. He chose to go after income trusts and increase taxes 31.5%, the highest in Canadian history. These people were disillusioned. They were going to lose income.

We have to understand that seniors are not income generators. They are income dependents. They depend on the fixed income they had planned decades ago. All of a sudden, that income became less by x%. They had to adjust their lifestyle downward, and that was totally unfair. That was the result of the Prime Minister going back on a commitment he made. The Prime Minister's literature stated “There is no greater fraud than a promise not kept”. In the Prime Minister's own words, he committed, in essence, fraud, because he did not keep his promise.

Commenting on the Prime Minister's words about no greater fraud than a promise not kept, Progressive Conservative, and I emphasize those words, Premier Danny Williams of the beautiful province of Newfoundland said in one of his speeches:

He used these words as he successfully attempted to woo voters from this province to not vote for the opposing party. Naively we trusted him. He rewarded that trust with a broken promise. According to his own brochure—he is a fraud.

The theme of my presentation is all about trust. Canadians trusted the Prime Minister to keep his word, and he did not.

I will quote again from the speech of Danny Williams. He said:

His own candidates and MPs admit that the promise was broken, but we should forgive and forget. Well folks, forgiveness may be a virtue; but forgetting is just plain fool hardy.

A year ago the Prime Minister's own candidate in St. John's East said, “Given his handling of equalization, who can trust the Prime Minister anyway?” Again, this is what I have been saying all along. It is a matter of trust.

The Conservatives stand and give us different figures. All Canadians need to do is look at the records. They can google things. The technology of today permits people to do research and come up with stats for themselves. The Conservatives have neglected, over and over, to point out that when they took office in 2006, they were left with a surplus of $13.2 billion and there was a zero deficit. The unemployment rate was at 6.1% or 6.2%. Today we all know where it is. It has skyrocketed, according to the national figures, and when we plug in youth unemployment and the unofficial numbers, I believe it is well over 12%.

I will refer to the government's own action plan, “Leading the Way on Jobs and Growth” and use the figures from its budget book, because if I were to say something, the Conservatives would say that I was a bit biased and that I will say it the way I want to.

On employment insurance, the figures in its own graph, going back to 2000 and right up to 2010, show is that under a Liberal government, we started lowering the EI premiums going back to 1997. After we balanced the books, year after year, EI premiums were being lowered. At the time when we took office, it was $3.05 per $100. When we left office, it was $1.75 or $1.76, and then it was frozen.

I will use a quote, as I did earlier, from the current finance minister who said, “It's one of those job-killing taxes, a direct tax on employers and employees”. We agree with him. What happened pre-1993 is that employers told us that they would like to hire and if payroll taxes were lower they would invest in hiring. We listened very carefully, we implemented such a program and we saw job creation unfold.

I would point out that these figures are Liberal figures, not Conservative figures. What was one of the first things the Conservatives did when they took over government? They started to jack up the payroll taxes. As a matter of fact, technically speaking, they were going to jack them up so much and then they lowered them and said that they were lowering taxes. For example, instead of paying $90, people will pay $30, but that is still a tax increase. Instead of hitting them with a $17 billion increase, the government will only hit them with a $6.5 billion increase. Nevertheless, it is still an increase.

I would just like to quote some comments here on payroll taxes that the Prime Minister and the finance minister have said. For example, in January of 2009, the finance minister said, “For many businesses, an increase in payroll taxes would make it harder to sustain existing jobs”. We agree with him. The question is: why is he increasing taxes?

On March 29, 2009, in the Toronto Star, the Prime Minister said:

So there is no need in Canada to raise taxes. We have not got the structural budgetary deficit that exists in the United States and obviously limits the administration's options.

Here is another declaration from the Conservative election policy declaration of 2008:

We believe that payroll taxes should not exceed the amount necessary to properly fund Employment Insurance because unnecessarily high payroll taxes are a tax on job creation. Lower payroll taxes encourage hiring and business expansion.

We agree, and that is why, if we look at the Liberal record, year after year after year, those payroll taxes were consistently coming down, until of course now, where it is a repeat of what Brian Mulroney did. When unemployment was going up, he was increasing the payroll taxes.

Twenty years down the road and we are back to the future. The Conservatives are now repeating exactly what the Brian Mulroney administration did. We are encouraging them not to do it.

The business community has made some positive statements. Of course, when they were going to jack it up by 15% and now they are lowering it down and saying that they are not increasing it by yea much, that they are giving us a break, of course the business community is happy. That is why some statements are coming back from the business community sounding positive.

They talk about research and development and investing in the economy. We agree. When we took office, one of the areas that we invested in was in the knowledge-based economy. However, in order to move ahead in that new area, we need to make investments.

On page 86 of the Conservatives' own book, it states:

Canada invests more directly in public R and D than any other G7 country.

What figures are they using? The figures end in 2006, which has Canada, indeed, first. That was from our budget of 2005-06. It states here that the data is for 2007, which is the latest year for which they are available for all G7 countries. What happened after 2007? We have become the lowest.

China, for example, as was mentioned earlier by the critic for finance, the member for Kings—Hants, has invested much more than we have. The United States has done so as well and it is moving forward with the green economy and bringing forth new jobs.

On the debt side, there is an interesting graph on page 167 of their literature which shows the debt to GDP ratio in 2004-05 and then their projection of 2013-14 brings it back to the same level as it was in 2004-05. That is taking us a decade back, according to their figures.

The graph very clearly outlines the debt to GDP ratio. It starts from 2008. I will admit that when they took office they took all that surplus money that was left over from our government and just plunged it into debt retirement. Was that a good move? As it turns out today, it was not a good move because, if members will recall, at that time we also had a contingency plan of $3 billion. If we did not use that money for an emergency, it went right to debt retirement.

I have often used the finances of the nation to draw a parallel with the average home. When the paycheque comes home every week, we do not put it all toward the mortgage. We need to put some toward groceries, some toward gas, some toward clothes, some toward the mortgage and maybe a little aside for a rainy day. At the end of the year, if we do not use that money, it is wise to pay down that mortgage as quickly as possible, as the Liberal administration did. Slowly, we ended up saving, according to the figures then, almost $3 billion in interest payments. So, Canadians were benefiting from that $3 billion because the money was going into programs such as health care, post-secondary education, the military, et cetera.

In this graph, I would like to point out that the debt to GDP ratio in 2008-09 was 29%. It goes up to 33.9% and 35.4%. Then, in 2012-13, it starts to decline to 35.2% and levels off. Hopefully, in 2014-15 it will drop to 31.9%.

However, we cannot trust those figures because, according to the Parliamentary Budget Officer, the finance department is quoting one figure and the Parliamentary Budget Officer is quoting different figures.

We all know that the Parliamentary Budget Officer is Mr. Kevin Page and that he is not someone we Liberals appointed. He is an appointee of the Prime Minister and the Conservative government. He was supposed to be someone who would be kind. He is a fair person and he called it as he saw it.

The moment he made statements about these figures I am about to bring forth, the Prime Minister and the Conservative government were not happy so they started to eliminate his budget. They started to take away the tools that he needed to do his work and, of course, he was not able to bring forth the information, not that we needed to have but that Canadians needed to have.

For example, “Budget predictions for 2012-13, $17.5 billion deficit”. The Parliamentary Budget Officer's prediction was a $20.6 billion deficit. For 2013-14, the government says that it will be a $8.5 billion deficit. The Parliamentary Budget Officer says that it will be a $16.3 billion deficit. For 2014-15, the current government says that it will be a $1.8 billion deficit. The Parliamentary Budget Officer says that it will be a $12.3 billion deficit. It goes on, which is why I keep referring to the word “trust”. It is a matter of trust.

Given the statement I made, which I chose not to repeat during the campaign, we cannot trust the Prime Minister and the government. We cannot trust their figures. It is not something that we are saying. It is something the figures show.

When I am out there speaking to my constituents, they tell me that they have great concerns because of what is happening in the world economy. Earlier today, government members were comparing the crisis in different countries. I was shocked to learn that the average debt-load per household in Canada is about $42,000. We know Greece is having some difficulties and the average debt-load there is just over $30,000. Who is worse off, I ask?

The Conservatives have mortgaged our future, our children's future and our grandchildren's future. All I am saying is that if they want to recapture the trust of Canadians, they need to come out with figures that can be substantiated, figures that are accurate and figures that we can talk about and realistically work with the international community. The OECD, for example, this is their figures, not ours. It is an embarrassment for us to go on the international stage and say how wonderful we are when, in essence, beneath that thin membrane things are not looking good.

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Before we go on to questions and comments, it is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Cape Breton—Canso, Sydney Harbour; the hon. member for Malpeque, The Economy.

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his comments regarding Bill C-47. However, I think he neglected to point out that in terms of debt to GDP, which is a very important measure in terms of debt to GDP, Canada is in a much better position than the other countries he is talking about in Europe, such as Greece, Ireland and Spain, regardless of the fact that their household debt figures, which he mentioned, are somewhat comparable.

I have a question for him. As far as e-government is concerned, the g-tech annual conference just finished up today here in Ottawa. Since the new Conservative government came into office five years ago, we have found a dumbing down of government online programs. When Reg Alcock was in this House and Paul Martin was the prime minister, we saw a lot of activity in the federal government in those days trying to get government programs online, transactional and usable to the citizens of Canada. This was particularly helpful for people in far-flung rural areas who had to drive or fly into cities to do their government business. Now they can simply do it online with a credit card.

There was some sort of a vision, some sort of a direction that was similar to what they have in England, the United States and Australia. However, since the present government came to office five and a half years ago, there has been absolutely no talk of any government online programs or any sort of measurement of any kind of success, no targets in fact. One would think that for a government that prides itself on wanting to make itself more efficient and provide its services to the public online and transactional, that would be one of the areas that it would prioritize and put some effort toward.

Why does the member think the government has not seized on this opportunity to make services more broadly available to the taxpayers of Canada and, in fact, save the government money in the process by making the government more efficient? Why would it be neglecting that area?

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for that most important question.

I do not think he was looking at my notes, but I will refer to page 8 again of the action plan. The Conservative government states that it will invest $1.9 billion to create the economy of tomorrow. That is a drop in the bucket compared to what other nations are investing.

I can compare that to a decade before, when we invested $2 billion in research chairs, for example. I remember at that time I had the honour and the privilege of being Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry, John Manley, and then Brian Tobin.

We rolled out this program and not only were we investing in the new economy, the new tools, but we were retaining and attracting brains for Canada, which allowed us to not just make our government an e-government or make our country more efficient but we made our country more competitive. In addition, we had created an export product for Canada.

We invested $2 billion then and the Conservatives, 12 years later, were so kind as to invest $1.9 billion. That is really progress.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend from Scarborough Centre for a most compelling speech from history.

There was not a lot in his speech that talked about where Canada is going or the direction we are taking Canada in. The fact is that the member spent most of his speech talking down Canada, talking down our economy. Perhaps he should cheer up.

We are in the best position in the G7, fiscally and financially far ahead of many of the other countries. It is because of the leadership we had in place that paid down debt to put us in a good, solid position.

I have two questions. The member was suggesting that we were actually not helping unemployed Canadians when we changed what was recommended and reduced the recommended increase in EI for workers, to encourage our employers to hire more Canadians, when the day before that announcement was made, the Liberals, the Bloc and the NDP actually stood in the House and voted to raise EI premiums by 35% at a cost of $7 billion per year.

Then the member criticizes our prudent measure of making sure that we did not hurt industries.

Also could the member enlighten us as to where he was in government when the $58 billion that was in the EI fund disappeared into general revenues? I wonder if he could give a little insight into whether he had any idea where that went.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be very glad to.

My good friend misunderstood. I was not talking down the country. I was pointing out facts.

I would like to point out one other fact, but before I do that, I want to say that we voted as we did the other day to provide immediate relief to those in need today. When a family is hurting, that is when we have to be there. When a person is unemployed, he needs to put food on the table. We have to support that.

On the accumulated federal debt, it is not my words; it is the Conservatives graph here that I will point out. I first of all acknowledge that they retired a portion of the debt with a tremendous payment. I personally think it was wrong to do it the way they did it. They could have done it gradually.

However in 2008-09, after that lump sum payment, it was $463 billion. We had brought it down to just over $500 billion, and it had been over $600 billion when we took over. In 2014-15 it continues to rise. It will be $622.1 billion of debt. That is $122 billion, according to their figures, not ours. And we left them a clean slate.

Tell me then how our country is better off.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to again highlight some of the points that were brought up by my hon. colleague.

What I find most alarming is the household debt at record levels. The average Canadian owes almost $42,000, which is among the highest levels in the OECD.

Some of the other issues we addressed earlier regarded measures in the budget for EI and pensions.

I brought up pensions first thing this morning and I would like to leave with it as well. One of the options that is being discussed here, and I remember it being discussed in the U.K. some time ago, is the idea of having a supplemental CPP. That would allow Canadians to increase their contributions to the Canada pension plan and get a defined contribution plan that is portable.

I say portable because there are so many people, especially from my neck of the woods in Newfoundland and Labrador, who are travelling, and they are the skilled workforce at that. They are travelling to the west and to many areas around the world as well as to Labrador in the mining and technical sector. This would allow them to have the savings, have the money available, at pension time and to get close to their income just before they retire.

I was wondering if my colleague could comment on some of those options that seemingly are not within this particular discussion.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that is what I call forward Liberal thinking. That is what I call Liberal compassion. As years go by we have to make changes to our pension system, health system, et cetera. We have to find the means and the ways to provide that portability for the security of each and every Canadian.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak on behalf of the Bloc Québécois about Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures.

The Bloc Québécois voted against the budget, and rightly so, because this budget left an entire segment of the economy, the forestry sector, to fend for itself. This sector is currently going through a very tough time. This is why the Bloc Québécois once again voted against the budget.

However, members must understand that when the time comes to implement the measures in the budget, this is done through certain bills. One of these budget implementation bills is before us today.

The Bloc Québécois is in favour of sending Bill C-47, which implements certain measures in the budget, to committee to be studied. We are giving our approval because we analyzed each of these measures one by one. We often need additional information to get the government to move on these measures and show some openness—a quality that the Conservatives have yet to show. But we are in favour of several of the provisions being proposed today. I will mention the measures we support.

First, to improve the allocation of child benefits, the government agrees to pay half to each parent who shares custody. Parents who have shared custody can now divide the income from these benefits in half, which makes sense.

Also, the government is proposing to ease the tax burden of beneficiaries of a registered disability savings plan, a plan that was designed to ensure the financial security of severely disabled children. This is an interesting measure that is worth adopting.

The government is also cutting red tape for charitable organizations and some small businesses. Red tape has always put a huge burden on corporations, small companies, not-for-profit organizations and charities, which often lack the administrative staff to handle paperwork. This bill would lighten that load, and that is worthwhile.

The bill tightens the rules around TFSAs to prevent tax avoidance. TFSAs were brought in previously, but it did not take long for some people to see them as a way of avoiding and evading taxes. I think it is a good idea to ensure that measures such as the TFSA are not used to avoid taxes.

Lastly, businesses will stop benefiting from double deductions for stock options. Even though we feel that this does not go far enough, we will see what happens in committee. These measures are worth sending to committee for discussion.

But we have to be careful. We are concerned about pension plan reform, because the bill gives the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions discretionary authority in the case of pension plans that are subject to the legislation of more than one jurisdiction.

This measure must be studied, because it pertains to private pension funds and it can encroach on the provinces' jurisdiction. The pension funds can be partly under federal authority and partly under the authority of Quebec and the other provinces. We feel it is important to ensure that Quebeckers' interests will always be protected and that Quebec law will always apply.

At the same time, this is a good opportunity to talk again about the whole pension system and how the government could help. The government likes to brag that it came out of the recent economic crisis in the best shape, but one reason is that our banks were smaller than the U.S. banks.

When I arrived here as a member in 2000, the first lobbyists who came to meet me were from the banks. They wanted permission to merge so that they could buy other banks outside the country, for example, large American banks.

By fighting tooth and nail to block those mergers, we saved those banks. Canadian banks had fewer investments in American banks. They were less contaminated than the other banks. This is the reason Canada has weathered the crisis better. Our banking system was smaller, less concentrated and less at risk because it had fewer interests in the United States. That is why Canada has weathered the crisis better than other countries.

At that time, the Conservatives were in favour of bank mergers. The Liberals caused quite an uproar. Then there was an election and the mergers were blocked. I was the one who was the most surprised to see Paul Demarais Sr. admit to the media, three or four weeks ago, that his one mistake in life was supporting the merger of Canadian banks. Paul Demarais was not born yesterday. He has met all the heads of state. He was one of the biggest advocates of bank mergers. He regrets it bitterly because the fact that we blocked bank mergers is the reason that Canada weathered the crisis the best. It has nothing to do with the Conservative government, which was in favour of bank mergers, and it has nothing to do with the Liberals either because they were also in favour of bank mergers but decided to oppose them at the last minute—because of the election, I suppose.

We were always against those mergers, from start to finish. Once again, we stood up for Quebec. That allowed Canada to weather the crisis. Once again, Quebeckers came to Canada's rescue. That happens quite often. Some might say too often, since Quebec does not get the rewards it deserves.

There is also the important question of pension funds. This morning I had the chance—or the sad duty, as I told the people who invited me—of attending a march with former Fraser employees. They were all retired workers who saw their August and September pension cheques cut by 40% on average. One worker came to see me and told me that his retirement pension had been cut by 58%. What a difficult situation.

For the past five years here in Ottawa, we have been calling for programs to help the forestry industry. That industry was the first to be affected, even before the big crisis. The government started to react when Ontario was affected by the automotive crisis, but the forestry crisis had already been going on for three years before the recent financial and banking crisis. This was not important to the government, since it was happening primarily in Quebec and in the northern areas of some provinces. The fact remains that this bad financial situation led to losses for many companies.

Now the government is telling us that it is a question of markets, or lack thereof, even though what the big forestry companies wanted was loan guarantees, which are allowed by the WTO. We have proven that in this House. Was the problem in the automobile sector not a market problem? Cars were not selling. Yet the Conservatives still gave the auto industry $10 billion to help it through the crisis, which was causing a drop in the market. They did not do the same thing for the forestry industry. In fact, that is why the Bloc voted against the most recent budget.

Let us go back to pension funds. Today, 200 Fraser workers and their families organized a march. Approximately 300 pensioners have been affected. They were there to try to make sense of the situation. The owner of Fraser is the majority owner of Brookfield Renewable Power. This corporation made more than $900 million in profits for the period ending December 31, 2009. The majority shareholder is a multi-billion dollar corporation that posted huge profits even during the economic downturn. The employees have difficulty understanding why governments allow a rich multinational to close its subsidiaries, to place them in bankruptcy, when the unfunded liabilities of their pension fund total $175 million.

Considering Brookfield's profit of almost $980 billion at the end of the 2009 fiscal year, this amount would have been acceptable had the company been nudged by governments to cover the liability, given that it was very rich. I am putting myself in the shoes of these workers and their families, who are wondering how this can be permitted. How can governments allow a multi-billion dollar corporation, through its subsidiary, to go bankrupt with the result that the workers, who have worked all their lives for the company, have their income cut by 40%?

In the La Lièvre and La Petite-Nation area, that amounts to $470,000 less per month and $5 million less per year in the local economy. Some will say that it is a small business and that 300 employees are not very many. However, the same thing has happened with other companies such as Nortel and AbitibiBowater. Once again, I was reading the Nortel agreement in which the employees instructed the government to make risky investments in order to not lose their pension income. They instructed the government, which is now managing their pension fund, to make risky investments. Is there someone somewhere who will stand by these investments in these times? It is suicide, but that is the decision they made in order to not lose their monthly income. We shall see what happens in the medium and the long term.

As for AbitibiBowater, the corporation negotiated a secret agreement. All we know is that governments allowed it, and that the union consented. Governments will say that the union said yes. But what choice did it have? When the time comes to renegotiate an agreement allowing a corporation to forego making up the pension shortfall, the choices are approve it or watch the company close its doors. The reality is that the employees are doomed and governments give their approval. But afterwards, governments take no responsibility. They say yes to the company and give it five to ten years to make up the pension shortfall. In the case of AbitibiBowater, rumour has it that it may even have up to fifteen years. Once again, if the company does not make it and declares bankruptcy, the employees have the most to lose. Governments do not have a plan because the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act does not protect the unfunded liabilities of pension funds, even if they were approved by governments. The government does not want to change the law.

The Bloc Québécois introduced Bill C-270, which would create a refundable tax credit to cover such losses. The government is not interested. The Liberals and the Conservatives oppose it. They say we must not spend money.

That is how it starts, with 300 Fraser employees losing 40% of their income. It will happen with other companies. In this region, many people are employed by the government, with good pension plans. But one day, a political party will get elected by promising a 35% cut in pension plans for public servants, to save money or to invest it elsewhere. As was mentioned earlier, the Liberals pillaged $54 billion from the employment insurance fund surplus to spend on their budget. The Conservatives keep telling us here that the Liberals pillaged $54 billion and spent it. But when the Conservatives were bringing in $17 billion a year, they never offered to pay back the money taken from the employment insurance fund. Now, when we want to improve the plan, the government says that we need to increase premiums. The government would never tell us to take the $54 billion that was originally pillaged to try to cover other expenses. No, it will blame the Liberals, but it would never do that. Inevitably, it is always the worker who pays.

In the case of the Fraser employees, it is the workers who pay. Their income has dropped by 40%. They are between 64 and 75, and 75 and 80 years of age, and they cannot find a new job, because now is not a good time to try to find one. So they have to cut expenses and are forced to pinch pennies after spending their whole lives working.

Let us all think about it. One day, we will be pensioners ourselves. If our governments decided to cut our pension fund by 40%, I do not think that we would be happy about it. This will happen because we will have allowed multi-billion dollar companies like Brookfield to cut employee pension funds, claiming that it was just that one company. Then, there will be another. In the end, all pension funds will be cut by 25% to 30%. Will federal, provincial and municipal public servants be able to protect their pension funds? No. One day, the majority will say that the government must cut all pension funds. I thought that the bill before us would address this situation.

So it must be understood that in committee the Bloc Québécois will do everything it can to make the government understand that it could show some interest in jurisdictional issues. Should Ottawa, Quebec or the provinces be managing this? We also need to discuss the real problem. When the plans post actuarial losses and governments have covered those losses, how will the people be compensated? Often, because we do not want companies to close, these losses are authorized and this has happened on a medium, large and extra-large scale.

So we can try to reduce these losses for the people. I am not talking about eliminating them. But the 200 families that I saw today were resigned. They knew they were going to lose money. But when it is that much, it starts to hurt. At first, they thought it was a bad joke, but now they are not finding it so funny.

Often, these people are not the most educated, but, once again, they dig around and try to find out who the shareholders, the owners, are. For example, the majority shareholder of Brookfield is a multibillionaire who is still making billions of dollars in profit annually. This is paid out in dividends to dozens or hundreds or thousands of shareholders, but no more. There are not hundreds of thousands of shareholders, just tens of thousands. At some point, governments need to think about that.

Inevitably, one day the people will have the power and will try to put everything back in order. And you wonder why the Bloc Québécois does so well. It is because we are close to people and because, as I did this morning, we walk with the retirees to try and understand their situation, to try and sympathize with them but, above all, to try and see if we can find solutions. We were elected to represent them and to help them understand why they have lost 40% of their pension funds, of their life's work, and that, every month, that 40% will be lost.

Meanwhile, here in Parliament, we see Conservative government misspending, we see contracts going to friends of the party, we see all sorts of things going on. People wonder why politicians do not sit down with them to work out solutions. As I said, they are willing to make sacrifices. They know they are going to lose money, but is 40% a norm we should hope for or accept? It is unacceptable. We are going to have to sit down very soon to discuss the future of all the pension funds of all the companies.

Government employees often watch us and listen to us. One day, political parties will get elected by promising to cut pension funds by 35%, because that is the only way to get money back. That will happen because the government allowed private companies to cut their pension funds and stood by while banks made bad investments. The bank managers were not put in prison; they were given bonuses. That is what happened.

People see that and they realize that the bank managers, who were often paid to give talks, all lost money during the recent crisis, like sheep. It always amazed me that a chamber of commerce or some other organization would pay a bank manager to come and give a talk. They may have had all the staff they needed, but they all got caught with risky investments. They all lost money, and not one went to jail. I find that shocking. What is more, they are protected by all of us here, and we allow them to get outrageous bonuses, because the practice of paying bonuses is starting to take off again. Bank managers are getting bonuses because the banks are restructuring. They have laid off employees, yet they are entitled to bonuses.

No one ever thought they might lose everything because they had lost 25%, 30% or 40% of people's pension funds. No one ever thought that. Once again, it is time to stop standing up for the wealthy and start looking after the people with problems.

I would say that pension funds are a real problem. All of us need to use our position here in the House of Commons to stand up for our workers who pay taxes and who pay our salaries. If there were no workers and no pensioners who still pay taxes—because pensioners do pay taxes—we would be out of a job.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, earlier today the parliamentary secretary rose to talk about one of the benefits of this bill, which is to change the rules on tax-free savings accounts. Evidently, there has been some abuse in the past year on the part of some high-level taxpayers who were over-contributing to TFSAs. Clearly, the government is on top of some of the abuse, but the parliamentary secretary did not say how many people are involved, how much money the government is trying to collect, or whether the government is even trying to collect it.

In addition, we know that between $6 trillion and $10 trillion is stashed away in tax havens around the world, and we are wondering what the government is doing to collect from some of the people who have been investing in tax havens. There were 100 people identified last year in the Liechtenstein bank situation. We know there were 1,800 Canadians identified with the recent Swiss bank information, which has been shared with Revenue Canada.

The question is, why is it only Germany and France, so far, that seem to have any interest in trying to track down these tax cheats, collect some of the money, and put up some figures to show how much they collected. We have heard nothing from the government over the last year and a half. They have said they have an amnesty in place, but there is no indication that they have collected one dime from any of the people investing in tax havens.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the NDP member for his question.

My colleague is quite right about the TFSA. Canada's major banks were surveyed and earlier this week I heard that barely 30% of taxpayers old enough or otherwise eligible are using a TFSA. Once again, this measure helps only a few privileged people in society. This program has not been very popular.

On the other hand, it was a way for the government to further its election cause. It was more a election promise or commitment than something the people were really wishing for. Now we realize that there have been some abuses. It is quite likely that among the 30% who are benefiting from a TFSA, some are abusing the program.

We have heard nothing. My colleague is quite right. I heard a news report with the individual responsible for the investigation in France. He said he was surprised that some countries, including Canada, were not making any requests regarding the tax evasions, because he had a list of the individuals involved.

Is the Conservative government afraid of seeing who is on the list, because they might be friends of the Conservative Party? I do not know. There is a problem here. I am a member of Parliament and I was astounded to hear the person responsible for the investigation in France say that he was surprised that no one had contacted him. Canada has not requested any information about Canada.

I must thank Radio-Canada for going to interview that individual, but it is still a harsh reality to face. The government could be recovering money owed by some of the wealthiest people, yet it does nothing. However, when the time comes to crush my 300 Fraser workers and take away 40% of their pension, the government does absolutely nothing to protect them. This is hard to take.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, our Bloc friend has quite rightly concentrated his remarks on the impact that the economic cycles have on working Canadians.

He says that Canadians who are not working are not able to contribute to pension plans. He also makes the point that the actuarial costs of multinational corporations are paying a large dividend, and that the actuarial costs with respect to corporate pensions are not in keeping with the draw required for retirement. It is much less. Corporations are going out of business and leaving workers high and dry.

The Bloc and the opposition parties looked at amendments to EI that would tap into the many billions of dollars that are in the EI fund. That is a fund that has been set up by workers and contributors to be used not only as insurance but also as an investment in workers.

We have been castigated by the government because they say the draw is going to be $10 billion on a fund that is now over $50 billion.

My question to the member is, are the criticisms of his comments and the government's principles fair or unfair?

Does the member see the ability to use the employment insurance fund for protecting workers and investing in key corporations?

I have to take exception to his criticism of the payments to the automobile industry, given the spinoffs and multipliers generated by that industry, particularly in the province of Quebec.

I would like the member to respond to the criticisms having to do with using the fund for investment in workers, in light of the objectives that he has outlined.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would point out to my colleague that the forestry industry creates two and half times as many jobs as the automobile industry. The economic spinoffs from the forestry industry are two and a half times greater than those of the automobile industry. A choice was made. I am aware that his party supported that choice, but he could acknowledge that roughly 35% of Quebec's economy is based on the forestry sector. It is a very important industry in Quebec.

When it comes to employment insurance, he only has it half right. Just last week, the Bloc Québécois called for a vote on a bill to improve the employment insurance system. The majority of Liberal members voted in favour of the bill, but the Leader of the Liberal Party left before the vote; I remember that quite clearly. He was criticized by the Conservatives and reminded of precisely what the parliamentary secretary was saying earlier, that this would cost $7 billion and create a deficit.

It is true that because of the current economic crisis, if we wanted to improve the employment insurance system, premiums would need to go up. How soon we forget that the EI fund contributed to reducing some of Canada's debt with the $54 billion it had accumulated over the years. I take issue with the fact that the Liberal Party and its leader are not speaking out and telling the government to stop saying foolish things. It is true that the Liberal Party used money from the employment insurance fund for other purposes. However, today, it is time to use that money to help the unemployed, who deserve it. The Liberal leader should have put the Prime Minister and the Conservative Party in their place.

When we ask for improvements to the system, the Conservatives tell us they will have to raise the premiums for all workers. They do not need to raise workers' premiums. They need to take money out of the consolidated revenue fund, which is where the surpluses ended up. That is what we need to do to help the unemployed. It is as simple as that.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today to speak briefly on what Bill C-47 means to most Canadians.

In general, this budget means very little to ordinary Canadians. It has little positive impact on them. Instead, it provides a road map for the large corporations to use in reaping greater profits and for the average working Canadian to lose faith in their government. What this budget bill does not do is provide any relief for the unemployed or any hope to those who are in imminent danger of losing their employment.

Let us look at the record of the finance minister. He has wasted away a $13 billion surplus that was left to him as a legacy to protect for the Canadian people. This was left to him by the prudent and excellent fiscal managers, the previous Liberal governments, under the leadership of Prime Minister Chrétien and Prime Minister Martin. What did the minister do? In good economic times, he wasted away the surplus and has now turned the $13 billion surplus into a $53 billion deficit. This is in good economic times, and he wishes Canadians to believe that he can manage their money in bad economic times.

Canadians need to be told how the finance minister intends to add further to this deficit by borrowing more money to pay for unneeded tax cuts for big businesses to the tune of approximately $6 billion, another $16 billion on new fighter jets, and untold billions wasted through mismanagement of the economic stimulus package. Why is it that the Conservatives preach fiscal responsibility but practice the complete opposite? The minister is the brains behind the biggest-spending government in the nation's history.

The current finance minister has a history in Ontario of destroying finances. He did it in Ontario by borrowing money to give tax breaks. He cut hospital funding, which led to the closure of 26 hospitals and layoffs for some 16,000 nurses. He left Ontario in a huge deficit, which Ontario is still reeling from. In many economic and financial circles, the finance minister has been labelled the architect of deficit .

The Conservatives and the finance minister take credit for Canada's being able to do better than others during the economic crisis. But let us look at the facts. Canada was able to buffer the economic crisis because the Liberals did not allow bank mergers and put in strict financial controls, so that we would not have a sub-prime mortgage scenario. Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and Prime Minister Paul Martin also ensured that the CPP was funded for 75 years.

What did the current finance minister do? Remember the introduction of a 40-year mortgage with no down payment? It smells like a sub-prime mortgage. Remember trying to create or dip into the CPP to pay for boutique tax cuts? Is that really economic sense?

The opposition stopped him. Instead of taking credit for fiscal management, it is high time that the Conservatives took a hard look in the mirror and realized that they have been the biggest spenders since Confederation, turning a $13 billion surplus into a $54 billion deficit, and overspending by $70 billion. And for what? They have nothing to show for it except a huge, growing deficit. And to compound their economic incompetence, guess what else has been done?

The Conservatives have the temerity to give, through EDC, a loan to a foreign company to the tune of $1 billion. This foreign company is Vale, a Brazilian company. For those who do not know it, it was Vale Inco that created a hostile environment for workers at the Sudbury mine and then shut them out for a year.

Is this how Canadian taxpayers are treated by the government? Their hard-earned money is being given away to foreign corporations that have no intention of fulfilling their obligations to give work to Canadians, and to boot, the Canadian workers have to foot the bill. How do they foot the bill for this economic incompetence?

Canadian workers will have to fork out higher EI premiums. The effect of this tax on small and medium-sized enterprises and hard-working Canadians will be to the tune of $13 billion.

This pattern of Conservatives taxing the middle and lower income people and giving breaks to their friends in large corporations, both domestic and foreign, is a very similar pattern that we have seen recently.

The government is spending $16 billion on untendered contracts for jets, which will not create any jobs for Canada or benefit any regions and which even the Pentagon thinks is a wrong choice. Members should think this through: $16 billion has nine zeroes after 16. What could be done with this money if invested in a Canadian company, in Canada, or if a Canadian company could bid? The multiplier effects are tremendous. There would be millions of good-paying professional jobs.

It is simply unfortunate that, every day, working Canadians will be paying more as they worry about keeping a roof over their heads and food on the table. These decent Canadians will have to pay through their noses while the corporate friends of the Conservative government get to boast to their international colleagues about paying the lowest rates of tax in the industrialized world. I need to emphasize that the large corporations do not create jobs. In fact, they drain jobs away. It is the small and medium-sized enterprises that need the benefit.

How does the government then have the temerity to show such utter contempt for the vast majority of working Canadians while giving money to those who least need it?

In the past, some governments have talked of a trickle-down theory in which the wealth of the rich would somehow trickle down to those with much less. The Conservative government seems to favour the flooding-up theory, in which they take desperately needed funds from the average worker and small businesses and just dump it on those who will use it to buy toys, a second Mercedes, et cetera. Canadians want and deserve better.

I would like to give a few examples of the government's economic mismanagement. Let us look at the stimulus package.

The government's stimulus plan created photo opportunities for ministers and Conservative backbenchers to pose with oversized cheques with Conservative Party logos on them. The real truth is that it has yet to be revealed where these billions of dollars have been spent.

We have found some examples. In Kitimat, B.C., $2,316 was used to purchase a portable dance floor. In Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, a group received $404,416 to build a floating gazebo. In Maniwaki, Quebec, the owners of Auberge du draveur received a $212,500 federal grant to install a glass dome over their terrace pool.

We now know that rather than wanting results that would benefit unemployed Canadians and those in danger of losing their jobs, the government's priority was to situate signs on every piece of wall and fence and it demanded that 8,500 public workers would go and do that job for it.

If the Prime Minister and his colleagues were a little more interested in running the government for the benefit of all Canadians rather than changing government websites to Tory blue colour schemes, I might be a little less critical. Unfortunately, there is little good I can say about the budget and the government, except to say it has finally done something that I thought almost impossible. It makes Brian Mulroney look good.

Aside from a feel good campaign in the stimulus area, what jobs have actually been created?

The minister responsible for infrastructure and his officials are still unable to show how many jobs have really been created or have been saved by these stimulus funds. In fact, they have made a conscious effort or decision not to track these numbers. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has complained that the government is frustrating his efforts in getting the real numbers and what exactly this expenditure created.

Let us look at some of the areas where I think there is incomprehensible economic thinking.

One wonders why the government, between 2009 and 2014, is planning to borrow about $156 billion which would then cost the taxpayer $10 billion in interest payments each and every year for decades to come. Borrow $156 billion and add another $10 billion every year. Does that make economic sense, especially when the government is trying to state that it wants to create a recovery? There is no recovery when the government keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper.

To boot, the government is going to spend $13 billion on constructing jails for unreported crime. One wonders what the purpose is. We need to get to the bottom of economic thinking.

When it comes to giving prisoners an opportunity to work, the government says no and gives us no rationale for killing the prison farm system. The farm system has been proven to be beneficial not only to the prisoners, but to the system itself by providing low-cost food. It also provides many prisoners the first responsible job that they have had in their lives.

The government would rather have prisoners locked in their cells wasting away than learn a viable work ethic. The government will feign surprise when the recidivism rate climbs up to the 70% figure of our neighbours to the south.

What could have been done with the money? What are the alternatives? We can talk about the mismanagement, the bad spending, et cetera, but what is the issue here? The issue is Canadians who are dying to get a job, Canadians who are struggling to pay their mortgages, Canadians who are struggling to put food on the table.

What could the government do? It could do a lot of things. For example, the $1.2 billion that it wasted on a 72-hour photo op could have been utilized to give relief to caregivers. There are many caregivers in Canada. There are approximately three million caregivers who look after their elderly parents or their sick children. It is important for this sandwich generation to be given some relief.

There are so many other areas in which the government could have worked to help Canadians. Instead, it reduces the corporate tax, thereby reducing its revenue by $6 billion, which it could ill afford, and for corporations that really do not create jobs. Small and medium-sized enterprises create one job in eight.

What could the government have done? What can the government do with the $13 billion that it is planning to spend on building prisons for unreported crime?

We could use that money to address the deterrents of crime. We could use the money to alleviate poverty and illiteracy. There could be money for mental health and affordable housing. There are so many things the government can do that are positive for Canadians in general. It is important that the government listen.

As I review this I just cannot believe that the government keeps on increasing taxes. It created a payroll tax and it will increase the EI premiums in 2011 for both employees and employers. This will have a negative impact.

A lot of small and medium-sized enterprises are run by women. Women, who form 50% of the population, will get a double whammy. They are there as sole proprietors and they will have to fork out more in EI premiums. They work individually or as a collective and they employ people. The problem they are facing is that they do not only look after the economics of their business, but they also look after the family. Sometimes they have to bear the burden of caregiving.

With this double whammy, I would ask the government, why does it not change its thinking and not focus on ideology but on investing in Canadians? It is important to invest in Canadians.

In conclusion, if the Finance Minister and the Prime Minister stay the course they are following, they will not have any economic recovery. They will crash and the economy will go into a tailspin. There are issues around the environment and issues around programs, and it is important that these be fixed.

The budget reinforces my belief that the Conservatives are not here for the average Canadian, and unless they change their minds, they are only here for their friends in big business.

[James Rajotte, Conservative, Edmonton—Leduc, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to address this bill, the second budget implementation act. I did not actually hear the member address any of the contents of the bill in her speech. I would like to perhaps highlight three sections of the bill.

This bill allows for the sharing of the Canada child tax benefit, the universal child care benefit, and the goods and services tax or harmonized sales tax credit for eligible shared-custody parents. That certainly seems like a good idea.

It allows registered retirement savings plan proceeds to be transferred to a registered disability savings plan on a tax-deferred basis, which is a very popular measure.

The third item I want to highlight is that it expands the availability of accelerated capital cost allowance, which is depreciation, for clean energy generation.

These items are on the first page of the bill.

Can the member address these three items and inform the House as to whether she and the Liberal Party support these three measures in Bill C-47?

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my biggest consternation is that the government has no money in its kitty. The government is saying that it will give from one hand, but it takes from the other.

The government has taken away research and innovation. It has killed programs and then reinvented them. Why does the government talk from both sides of its mouth?

I want to see what is there for the average Canadian, the Canadian who is trying to put food on the table, the Canadian family that is trying to send its kids to school, the Canadian family that is trying to get its kids to university. Where is it?

Canadian firms need technology, but the government kills research and development, kills what the scientists present, and then it claims that it is doing something wonderful. That is not valid.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, over and over again I have heard Liberal speakers in the House criticizing the budget implementation process, with Bill C-9 and Bill C-47. With Bill C-9, they complained about the airline tax increases that would raise airline tax fees 50%, bringing them much higher than competing American airlines from which Canadian airlines were trying to draw business. They criticized the provisions of the omnibus budget bill of 880 pages that threw in things like the privatization of the remailers with Canada Post. Then when all was said and done, the Liberals ended up supporting the government, keeping the government in power by making certain that 30 of their members walked out just before the vote.

Are the Liberals going to continue this practice of keeping the government in power, or this time are they going to vote with other members in the opposition and defeat the government on this budget bill? If they are so opposed to the budget, then why do they not vote against it?

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I do not need to take lessons from a party that killed Kelowna, that killed Kyoto, that killed child care and that killed the cities agenda. NDP members had absolutely no principles when they went to bed with the Conservatives.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

It being 5:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

The House resumed from October 7 consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud, as always, to stand in the House and represent the wonderful people of Timmins—James Bay and to speak to the implementation of this budget bill.

What has become very clear over the last number of years with the Conservative government is a pattern, and a very disturbing pattern, of reckless spending, reckless attacks on the credibility and the institutions of public office in this country and a sense of entitlement that we see again and again of who one knows in the PMO. If one is a buddy of the Conservatives, things happen.

We are looking at the largest debt in Canadian history but, as we would all agree, some of that debt was necessary in order to stimulate a very broken world economy. However, when we look back at what we have after spending the $50 billion, I think future generations will wonder what the Conservative government was thinking.

For example, the Conservatives blew money right across the country on personal pet projects. For instance, in the industry minister's riding, they paid stimulus dollars to heat the seats in the hockey arena so that the derrieres of Conservative voters would not be discomforted while they were watching amateur hockey.

Meanwhile, there is no plan for national broadband across this country. In Australia, under the Labour government, it made a commitment to hook up 93% of Australia by massive broadband implementation, while, in my riding, they are still talking about dial-up as being a standard for duty to serve.

We could have had a massive infrastructure program to retrofit homes across the country so that people could live better. Instead, we again see personal pet projects, like draining a lake in Muskoka, building a fake lake in Toronto, blowing through $1 billion on a weekend, blowing $17 billion on stealth fighter jets to fight a Cold War that has long since past, $17 billion on a single source contract and no justification, and $10 billion for prisons at a time when crime rates are dropping. The latest figure is that the Conservatives will spend $155 million on 570 jail cells, which amounts to $270,000 per jail cell.

Meanwhile, in my communities of Attawapiskat and Kashechewan there are no grade schools and the government says that its pockets are bare. Children in Oxford House First Nation cannot go to school because it has been poisoned with mould. The government says that the cupboard is bare for them.

Again, if one is a buddy to someone in the PMO there is always money to be found.

We need to look at a few glaring examples. I think the Conservatives are sending the signal that if people are one of them, they should put the touch on them and they will look after them. Nowhere is this more glaring than in the fact that, as I raised in the House earlier this week, there is a NAFTA challenge by an American named Vito Gallo who is demanding $355 million from the Canadian taxpayer for the failed Adams Mine project. We have a number of NAFTA challenges at different times between investors in foreign countries and, as much as we have raised problems with chapter 11 of NAFTA, we have never seen anything as outrageous and bizarre as this.

Ten years ago, Waste Management Incorporated walked away on the Adams Mine project because of the issue of liability, in the same way that the second largest waste management company in North America, BFI, Browning-Ferris Industries, walked away just a few years previous to that because of the issue of liability. The deal died and the city of Toronto made it clear that it would never entertain this garbage project again because it was so reckless and so unfounded. It was also subject to a federal EA, so that if anyone even wanted to try to take on this bizarre scheme, they would have to face a federal environmental assessment because it had been identified as a threat of groundwater contamination on the Timiskaming First Nation territory.

Long after that deal went south, a group of Conservative businessmen set up a numbered company in Toronto. They secretly bought the site but they did not do anything with the site. They did not put any money on it nor did they bid on any contracts. It was just a numbered company.

The interesting thing is that Mr. Vito Gallo claims to be the sole owner of this site. He says that he is owed $355 million from the Canadian taxpayer. When we look at who invested in this site, we see connections to the present Conservative Party. It is quite staggering.

For example, on May 8, 2003, the Globe and Mail identified the owners of this numbered company, 1532382 Ontario Inc., as being the Cortellucci-Montemarano Group. The Globe and Mail reported that “A major contributor to...[the] Conservative Party has quietly bought the Adams Mine...in Northern Ontario.... The contributor, the Cortellucci-Montemarano Group, is attempting to buy 2,000 acres” of crown land beside this site.

On May 9, 2003, the Toronto Star reported that Mario Cortellucci had admitted that he was one of dozens of investors. This is not like Vito Gallo, who nobody had ever heard of, claiming to be sole owner. He claimed to be one of dozens of investors.

The article in the Toronto Star is very fascinating. It starts off with the line:

Walking into the Hollywood Princess off of the string of strip malls along Highway 7 in Concord is like stepping into another world. The massive banquet centre is all about glamour, complete with fountains, mirrors and white columns that have served as the backdrop to countless wedding receptions and, perhaps more significantly, dozens of high-priced Tory fundraisers. This is the world of Mario Cortellucci....

The address of the Hollywood Princess restaurant just happens to be the same address that a cheque was written to the Ontario government in an attempt to buy 2,000 acres of Crown land secretly from this numbered company. It is the same address, which is 2800 Highway 7, Concord, Ontario. We see direct money from Canadian businessmen in this numbered company. We do not see any Americans or any mention of Mr. Vito Gallo.

I am sure members are wondering why a guy like Vito Gallo would be so brazen as to think he could hit up the Canadian taxpayer for $355 million for a project that he never put a dime into or bid on any contracts. We would think this to be a spurious claim but when we look at the financial connections between those backers and the government, it is quite astounding.

For example, Mr. Mario Cortellucci gave $5,000 to the federal Conservatives in 2004 and $5,000 to the federal Conservatives in 2006. Ginesia, Nicola and Rosanna Cortellucci gave $5,000 each to the Conservative Party in 2004. Three others, Fabrizio, Nicholas and Sabrina Cortellucci, gave $2,500 each to the Conservative Party in 2004 and then gave the maximum of $5,000 each to the Conservative Party in 2006. Five other Cortelluccis gave $17,500 to the Conservatives in January 2004.

Now, through their numbered companies, which is where it gets interesting, Four Valleys Excavating and Grading Ltd., which is tied to Nina Cortellucci, gave $12,170 to the leadership bid of the present finance minister and then $5,000. Also, $10,000 was given to the leadership bid of the present industry minister.

Eiram Development Corporation, which lists Mario Cortellucci as director, gave $10,000 to the present finance minister. Another company, 1532382 Ontario Inc., the very company that is going after the taxpayer claiming to be an American company, gave $4,000 directly to the present finance minister in his leadership bid.

We have a number of other companies but I will not go through more details.

The fascinating thing about this--

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. While all of us are enthralled by the fact that the member stayed up all night writing this novel, it has little relevance to the issue that is being discussed today. Perhaps he could force himself to get away from his fairy tale and get back on the subject.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

I must say that I was wondering myself what this had to do with the budget implementation bill. Perhaps the member could make that clear in his comments so we understand he is addressing the second reading of the bill now before the House.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I was just bringing my point home when my hon. colleague rose. He seems rather impatient, so perhaps he should just sit back and listen to a few more facts. It will all come home.

Vito Gallo has decided to hit Canadian taxpayers for $355 million, which is a staggering amount. One would think the Government of Canada would stand up against such a spurious claim. However, in his statement of claim against the people of Canada, Mr. Gallo has a quote by the federal finance minister who supports his claim against the people of Canada. The minister made the statement when he was running for the leadership of the provincial party and getting direct financial commitments and investments from this same group of investors.

I will go back to what I said at the beginning of my remarks on this. The government is all about who it knows. A man, who nobody has ever heard of, wants to hit Canadians for $355 million. Vito “mysterious” Gallo is now taking claim for a company that was obviously tied to Canadian investors with the Conservative Party of Canada. I do not think he would ever have the nerve to hit on Canadian taxpayers unless he knew he had a lot of good friends. A lot of them hang out at the same Hollywood restaurant that was writing the cheques in an attempt to buy the land.

I will get back to the bigger picture of a government that is based on entitlement and on reckless spending for ideological purposes.

Yesterday, the member for Crowfoot, who was shouting and heckling from the backbenches, was denouncing the concept of an obligation on the part of government to have a national housing plan for seniors. He asked if we wanted the government to buy every citizen a car as well. Senior citizens in rural Timiskaming cannot afford to heat their homes. People living in old farmhouses heat with oil. I received a letter this morning from a woman in Matachewan who has to pay $70 this month in HST for her home heating.

The government has nothing to say to those people. It is not interested in them. It is only interested in big prison contractors. It will blow $10 billion on big prison contractors. Can anyone imagine what $10 billion would do if it were invested by a responsible government? We could put some of that money into our health care system to help people in small communities who are dealing with locums because they have no local doctor. We could put some of that money into a national seniors housing plan, which Conservative backbenchers have denounced as socialism, but it is something we have done in the past and we know that it works.

Crime rates are not going up. What is going up is the number of seniors living in poverty.

For about half of the $1 billion the Conservatives blew on the 24 hour binge in Muskoka, we could have improved the guaranteed income supplement to get every senior citizen out of poverty. That would take $600 million. That is less than any of the prison extensions that the government is going to do. Every senior citizen in this country would have been taken out of poverty with $600 million. However, the government does not have the money for that because it is not a priority.

What were the priorities of the government? It spent $300,000 for bug spray for a 24 hour lark that went to the pork-barrel king's riding of Muskoka. What can anyone do with $300,000 worth of bug spray? I want to know where all that bug spray is. I am sure we could stop malaria in a mid-sized African country with $300,000 worth of bug spray. However, the government blew that amount of money for a 24 hour lark in Muskoka. I imagine there is probably a warehouse full of bug spray somewhere in the PMO that the Conservatives might give out at their fundraisers. This was a priority for the government. It is staggering.

While the Conservatives were nickel and diming our veterans and trolling through their personal financial records, they were at the same time signing a $17 billion single source contract for stealth fighter jets to fight the last Cold War. The best they could come up with was a statement that some of those Russians and those rusty old migs were flying 4,000 miles north of us and that it had to spend $17 billion on fighter jets. It will spend $17 billion on fighter jets and $10 billion on prisons. It will spend $27 billion on two ideological vanity projects. It is absolutely staggering.

Of course, we know what is coming next. The government blew through $13 billion worth of surplus like drunken sailors. It went through massive corporate tax cuts. It knew that we would be in deficit before it even started the stimulus spending. Now it is out blowing the money on prisons, fighter jets, and putting little bum warmers in hockey arenas in Muskoka. It has spent the money on every possible thing it could, except on a national plan to improve this country.

Now the government is going to turn around and say, “The cupboard is bare. Now we have to start cutting. Now we have to start trashing the civil service. Now we have to cut down on the few federal programs that still remain to help people”.

It is reckless, it is ideological, and it is a poisonous way of doing politics, because any civil servant who stood up to the government has had his or her personality trashed and undermined. Very credible international diplomatic people such as Richard Colvin, who had the nerve to stand up, were trashed. The government lied about our chief statistician. He had to resign in order to restore credibility to the office of the chief statistician. This is a government that is based on recklessness, on an ideological pursuit of whatever bizarre agenda is over there.

When we get back to the issue of the budget, it is about making priorities. Rather than spending $27 billion on vanity projects for the defence minister and for the security minister who is running after phantom criminals that they cannot find, we need a national broadband strategy linking all of rural Canada, because we are starting to fall massively far behind. We are looking at 1.5 megabits per second as a standard for rural Canada, if we even get to that, when in Australia they are going to gigabyte capacity. All across Asia they are going to gigabyte capacity, and the government thinks we are going to be able to compete when it is severing off rural Canada. Instead of money on prisons and fighter jets, we need a national broadband strategy.

We need to invest in pension protection. The government said it had thousands of complaints against the long form census, but then when it was asked to produce them, it could not find any, so it said, “We had one complaint. If one complaint is enough, that is good enough for us”. Meanwhile it had tens of thousands of complaints, begging, families from Nortel, families from Abitibi. It did not have time for them and it still does not have time for them. It has no interest at all in pension protection in this country, but that is what a credible government would do at this time. A credible government would say that we need a national overhaul of our pension plan and to improve the guaranteed income supplement so that our seniors come out of poverty. We need to protect the pensions of companies facing bankruptcy, such as Nortel and Abitibi, and find a way so that for the workers of today, the many hundreds of thousands of people who have no chance of paying into a pension, we have a system in place.

That would be a budget plan of a forward-looking government, instead of supporting blindly the pillaging of the tar sands. There is nothing wrong with the development of the tar sands, but what we are seeing is the way they are being developed, the amount of money that is being put in to cover the basic costs of what industry should be covering.

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

That would be the oil sands.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

It is funny how they get so upset whenever we say the words “tar sands”. That is what they are. It is in the tar. They are burning the tar and they are doing it recklessly because they want to make as much profit as quickly as possible, and really, to heck with the rest of the planet and to heck with the rest of the country.

Rather than having a long-term development of the tar sands, we could be putting that money into the retrofitting of every house in Canada and every major business so that we actually start to reduce and we actually start to make life more affordable for Canadians.

It is about choices and the government consistently makes the wrong choice. The one choice it made very clear was that if people know someone in its gang, it is going to look after them. No wonder these crazy, outrageous schemes, such as the Vito Gallo hit for $355 million against the taxpayers of Canada, are being brought up at this time, because they think these guys are going to go along with it. I challenge the government to stand for Canada and say clearly that it will not negotiate with Mr. Vito Gallo, whoever he is, that it will not give a dime of taxpayers' money just because he and his buddies and their numbered company have been good financial friends of the present industry minister, good financial friends of the present finance minister, and good financial friends of the Conservative Party of Canada.

We have to do politics a different way. If we follow the money trail, we always end up back in that cesspool of Conservative backwater corruption.

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am sure anybody watching these deliberations this morning is, at best, getting some humour out of the rhetorical rantings of the member for Timmins—James Bay as he paints his storybook pictures for Parliament today.

I want to make two points. These are actual facts. I say this to the House and to all the people who are watching, particularly those in his riding of Timmins—James Bay and the other NDP ridings.

Fact number one is that when this government presented its economic action plan, which created hundreds of thousands of jobs all across this country, including hundreds of jobs in the ridings of these NDP colleagues across the way, when we presented that action plan to put workers back to work and to keep families together and able to make their payments, that party, that member, those NDP MPs voted against that plan. They voted against putting laid-off workers back to work. They voted against projects in their communities that would help the social and economic structure of their communities.

Fact number two is that the member for Timmins—James Bay talks about brazen acts. Here is a brazen act: a member who goes to his constituents over the years at every election and tells them, “When that long gun registry comes up for a vote, I am going to vote against it because it is useless and ineffective”, a member who says, “Folks, you vote for me and I am going to vote against that registry as soon as I can. I promise you”, and then he stands and brazenly votes to keep the long gun registry that has cost us billions of dollars and is costing us tens of millions of dollars every year and does exactly nothing to fight crime in this country and put the bad guys away.

These are two facts. The NDP voted against the economic action plan, jobs for laid-off workers and families; and the member for Timmins—James Bay promised his constituents during the elections that he would vote against that stupid, ineffective, costly gun registry the first chance he got. What does he do? He stands and votes to keep it.

That is all I want to say.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there we go. Look at them. We are talking about the fact that the Conservatives are blowing $17 billion on stealth fighter jets and $10 million on prisons, and seniors in northern Ontario cannot afford to heat their homes. What does he want to talk about? He wants to talk about long guns.

I am a gun owner. The one thing I know, being a gun owner, is that we cannot heat our houses with guns. However, the Conservative Party thinks that is the only thing that rural Canadians are concerned about. Maybe it thinks people are dumbed down. But we are talking about people who are falling further and further behind.

Let us talk about the Conservatives' great action plan.

They continue to try to change the channel on what they did. They came in here at the beginning of the worst recession since the Depression. What was their economic action plan? Spending zero dollars on stimulus. They were not going to run a deficit. They said they were going to attack the right to pay equity of women, because that was the most important thing.

Number two, they said they were going to trash the environmental assessment process federally.

The third thing was that they were going to get their little partisan kick at the other political parties by getting rid of public financing for elections, because we know what they want to do. They want to go back to the good old ways where they got their money in the pocket from people like Vito Gallo's friends. That was their plan. They almost lost government over it, because it was known across the world that if they decided that they were going to turn off the taps for ideological reasons, Canada would have sunk into a depression. These guys panicked because suddenly they thought they were going to lose government. Then they came back, but they did not have a plan. They just started to blow money in all their ridings. That is the truth behind the economic action plan. They only did it, as they always do, to save their own skins. They blew through $50 billion without a plan.

We never had a problem with the stimulus spending. What we had a problem with, and it still remains in this budget bill, were the choices as to how they were going to blow that money.

Even after they have blown all that money, they are now going on another spending binge. They are going to spend more than $27 billion, at a time of the biggest deficit in Canadian history, on bizarre, whacked-out, personal ideological vanity projects.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member for Timmins—James Bay has raised a lot of interesting and disturbing points about the spending of the current government. I wonder if he would like to comment a little about where Canada is getting the money that we are wasting these days when we have more regressive taxation, huge tax cuts to big oil and big banks, et cetera.

I know the member is knowledgeable about this. Could he share a few perspectives on the revenue stream?

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague raises a great question, because one of the fundamental principles of economics is how we pay for something when we do not have the money. When there was a $13 billion surplus, the Conservatives blew through it as fast as they could and it was not spent on targeted tax investments.

Targeted tax investments play a really crucial role in stimulating necessary elements of the economy. The Conservatives blew it across the board. Big profitable corporations got lots of money, and a struggling forestry company got zero money because it did not make any profits. Now they have put us in a deficit position because we do not have the revenues anymore to sustain major national projects and they are adding to the deficit, which we are going to have to pay for through borrowing.

A great example is Canada's forestry industry, probably the second or third largest industry in this country. What did the government do with forestry? As soon as it was elected, it wanted a quick, desperate deal with the United States, so it signed on to the softwood agreement. Basically, whatever the Americans wrote on the paper, it signed on to, even though Canada had won every single legal challenge under international trade law.

We had won every single challenge, but the Conservatives came in, and with a stroke of a pen, crossed out all those rights. They not only crippled our industry but our access to markets and we have not recovered. Then, of course, we add the crisis in the United States and the fact that our major competitors in the U.S. in the forestry industry are subsidizing their own industry again and again, so our pulp and paper companies cannot compete.

Abitibi decided that it was not going to invest anymore, that it was going to walk away, and Danny Williams stood up to Abitibi and said, which is what should have happened in Ontario, that Abitibi had access to the forests and waters of Newfoundland as long as it was willing to invest. It was an agreement between the people of Newfoundland and Abitibi so that both would benefit.

Danny Williams took the position that if Abitibi was not going to make its share of the investment, then the resources of the people of Newfoundland should go back to the people of Newfoundland.

What did the government do? It sold out the people of Newfoundland and Canada. It said if a big company such as Abitibi wanted some cash, it would give it to it, and not give a tinker's damn for the rights of the people of Newfoundland.

Once again, we have a government that will do anything ideologically, without a long-term plan for the development of its economy. That is a very shameful way to run a country. We see it in its handling of the long form census and in its vicious attack on the privacy rights of veterans who speak up against it. We see it at every single level of the government.

In the United States, we see the poison waters of the Tea Party. What we are seeing here are the poison waters of the “me party”, an autocratic ruler who says it is his way or the highway and has never encountered a piece of reality that has stopped him from pursuing his agenda. He is rewriting the rules on everything. Who knows? When I am walking past the West Block, will I have to walk past construction helmets with “Hells Angels” on the back?

What is happening under the government's watch is outrageous. We need some accountability, transparency and a measure of prudence in the decision-making on how money is being spent.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today. First, I would like to say that I will share my time with my dear colleague from Gatineau.

As many of our colleagues have said, we will support sending this bill and its budget measures to committee to be more closely studied. However, it is clear that the Standing Committee on Finance will have a great deal of work to do in the coming weeks because this bill, which could be considered yet another omnibus bill, contains a number of clauses regarding taxes for individuals, businesses, and different levels of government.

Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, would implement certain measures. It is true that the Bloc Québécois rejected the latest Conservative budget because it was unfair to Quebec. This government gave tax breaks to the oil companies and heavily subsidized the auto industry in Ontario at the expense of the forestry industry in Quebec, which was experiencing a major crisis. For these reasons, and many others, we voted against this budget. Since 2006, this government has done essentially the same thing as the Liberals. Unfortunately, it forgets about the least fortunate members of society.

A close look at these measures makes it clear that the government is still subsidizing industries and banks that are making billions and billions of dollars in profit and putting their money into tax havens around the world without necessarily paying taxes. And what did the last budget do about it? The government brags about cutting corporate taxes and about giving companies tax breaks. At the same time, it continues to steal money that belongs to the unemployed, as it has done for years. That word has serious implications, but sometime words like that need to be used in the hopes of waking the Liberals and Conservatives up. Nearly $60 billion has been pillaged from the employment insurance fund. Yet the last budget contained no help for the unemployed and no employment insurance support for people who lose their jobs.

During the last crisis in my riding of Berthier—Maskinongé, a crisis that hit the rest of Quebec and Canada as well, numerous people lost their jobs. Many of them came to our constituency offices because they did not have enough hours to qualify for employment insurance. There were young people who were in their first job. They worked 15 weeks in seasonal jobs. They did not have enough hours to qualify for employment insurance. What can we say to these young people and these workers? In Quebec, we told them to go to social assistance for support because they were not eligible for employment insurance, to which they had been contributing, some of them for their whole lives.

And what about the employment insurance fund? There was a $55 billion surplus. The surplus disappeared with the last budget. The Liberals and Conservatives were complicit because they knew they were both in the same boat. They simply decided to spend the surplus. There is nothing left. They have told the unemployed that they cannot help them. It is shameful to have so little empathy for the least fortunate in our society.

We see the same insensitivity when it comes to the guaranteed income supplement for seniors. Yesterday, the Bloc Québécois presented petitions with thousands of signatures from FADOQ, a Quebec seniors' organization, calling on the government to improve the guaranteed income supplement and pay the people who have not received their supplement. FADOQ is also asking that people be registered automatically for the guaranteed income supplement and that it be paid automatically. It is simple. The government has tax data and could automatically pay low-income seniors the supplement. But there is no will. The government has no money for seniors.

The government is investing billions of dollars in weapons, billions of dollars in oil companies that are making a fortune, and billions of dollars in other initiatives. It is investing outrageous amounts of money in the rich and famous and institutions like the banks that have huge sums of money stashed in tax shelters.

We are talking about people, children and families. Quebec is in the midst of a heated debate about whether health care should be privatized. We need money. Quebec needs larger transfer payments for its health care system.

Yesterday, I listened to the debate, and equalization came up. Quebec was described as a have-not province that needed a certain amount of equalization. But the government is investing $20 billion in weapons and giving oil companies huge tax breaks. This money, which is given away and does not come back as tax revenue, cannot be redistributed. These exorbitant amounts are not factored into equalization.

A sovereign Quebec could control its own tax revenue and its own economic, political and social levers. Yesterday, during a speech here on the budget, one member said that a sovereign Quebec would not be viable because Quebec currently receives equalization. I do not think a sovereign Quebec would choose to invest billions in F-35s. Because of its ideological bent, this government is aggressive when it comes to military spending.

I see a member from Quebec entering the House. I would ask her—and the government members—to think about Quebec's social democratic values when she votes; to think about the people in her riding who need support, especially unemployed workers and seniors. She should be asking her government to increase health and education transfers, instead of investing in budgets dedicated to fighter planes, and in services and tax breaks that only help the wealthiest people in our society. That is the usual approach taken by this government: always reducing corporate taxes, increasing fees and cutting social services that help people in need.

At this time, the President of the United States is making huge efforts. He is aggressively attacking tax shelters. He wants to raise corporate taxes, because nearly 50 million Americans do not have health care. Here, the Conservatives are doing the opposite.

In the last budget, when the government decided to invest money to help the economy, the media and environmental experts alike, and everyone really, said that in addition to helping our workers more, the budget could have also included a green shift, an ecological shift. The Conservatives could have used that money to transform our economy into a green economy. What they did instead was to continue investing in dirty energy and continue more or less with the same old approach, that is, supporting the banking system and corporations. There was no shift.

In closing, I would like to say that Bill C-47, like budget 2010, completely disregards the economic situation Quebeckers find themselves in. It is high time for parliamentarians to address the real needs of Quebeckers and all Canadians.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I do not know whether the hon. member attended the technical briefing that was available to all of us on Tuesday evening. I attended it and took home a copy of the bill, which I read. I have a question for the hon. member that which puzzles me.

He said in his speech that the government had an ideological bias against the poor and that we were forgetting them. Has the member looked at pages 8 and 9 of the bill which talk specifically about making changes to the Income Tax Act to assist people who are the most vulnerable in our society, the people who are in need of RDSP and the opportunities for their families to make contributions? We have made some significant changes in that. Pages 30 and 31 talk about changes to the Income Tax Act for pensions plans. We have made changes on page 57 for CPP, also item 69 regarding employee benefit plans. Page 66 talks about changes to the act for the registered charities, which are specifically organizations that look to assist vulnerable people in our society.

Given the fact that we have had the support from the CFIB on a number of our initiatives and from the chambers of commerce across the country, my question for the hon. member is this. Has he read Bill C-47?

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Bloc Québécois has indeed considered this budget bill responsibly. That is why we have said that some measures, those concerning single parent families for example, are a step in the right direction, as the hon. member mentioned. That is why we are supporting the bill.

I agree with the hon. member, but it is not enough. The party must end for the oil companies. It is time to get serious. When companies earn exorbitant profits and do not pay their share of taxes, whether we are talking about the banks or any other company, they are basically taking tax revenue out of the budget. This additional tax revenue would allow the government to create more measures to support the people and sectors in need.

I have spoken at length about the fact that the forestry sector in Quebec is in crisis. If there were more money available, we could provide more support to certain key sectors. We could also support more seniors and increase the Canada child tax benefit.

Indeed, some of the measures are good and that is why we are supporting this bill. However, we can do a lot more for the people in need. We can make sure that Canadian companies that hand out performance bonuses or make huge profits contribute more to the tax base.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the hon. member's comments on Bill C-47. Yesterday the parliamentary secretary claimed that the Canada Revenue Agency was cracking down on over contributions to the tax free savings accounts, TFSA, but he said nothing about trying to collect tax on some of the $6 trillion to $10 trillion that are being held in tax havens around the world.

Four years ago the German government gave Canada the names of 106 Canadians with a combined total of more than $100 million stashed in Liechtenstein accounts. So far the Canada Revenue Agency has evidently closed only 26 of those cases. It assessed $5.2 million in back taxes, but has collected nothing, not one cent. However, since 2006, the Germans have recovered some 200 million euros and the U.S. is actively pursuing 150 individuals.

Why is the government unable to collect back taxes from tax haven investors when it has been given the names and the records?

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his question. It is strictly a matter of the government's political will. Does it truly want to attack the tax havens that so many companies, especially banks, benefit from? We do not have enough tax revenue. We do have enough, but we need more in order to support Quebeckers.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am rising to speak to Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures. The Bloc Québécois has a lot of concerns about this bill, and about the budget it implements.

The government will continue to treat stock options like capital gains for ordinary taxpayers. The Bloc Québécois deplores the fact that only half the income derived from stock options is subject to the federal Income Tax Act. The Conservative government could show fairness to the workers and collect $1 billion in tax by cutting off this gift. In addition, businesses are not being asked to pay their fair share to increase government revenue, except that they have to make source deductions to ensure that employees with stock options pay their taxes. That is something else that is missing.

This bill also attests to the Conservative government's inertia with respect to the environment and the fight against greenhouse gases. Only one environmental measure is included; it encourages the production of clean energy. A number of things could be put forward.

The government is ignoring the Bloc Québécois' urgent calls concerning equalization payments and increased transfers for education and social programs. $830 million in post-secondary education transfers are still not going to the Government of Quebec. The fiscal imbalance has not yet been resolved. The government is also ignoring recommendations concerning income security for pensioners. Large corporations are filing for bankruptcy and abandoning their employees who are entitled to pensions.

This budget implementation bill confirms the Conservative government's intention to spare rich taxpayers at all costs and have the workers and the middle class pay off the deficit. The ideology of the Conservative Party's neo-Liberal Reform government favours those who are well off. Just think of tax havens. When they were in opposition, the Conservatives were scandalized; now they fully support tax havens.

Yes to oil; no to forestry. It is just incredible what the economies of Quebec and all provinces have had to bear because of the Conservatives' abandonment of the forestry industry. To help the rich, they are refusing to implement a 2% surtax on incomes of more than $150,000 per year. The automotive industry, concentrated in Ontario, received $9.7 billion whereas the forestry industry, vital to the regions of Quebec and all of Canada, only received $170 million. That is incredible.

For all intents and purposes the environment was ignored in the budget. However, the Conservative government put $1 billion towards developing nuclear power, which benefits Ontario, Alberta and the oil companies. The latter already have generous tax benefits. In addition, no new funding was announced for the cultural sector, which is important to Quebec's economy. The neo-Liberal Reformers have refused to acknowledge the need to bolster employment insurance and the guaranteed income supplement for seniors, the most disadvantaged. They also refused to tackle the problems of affordable social housing and homelessness. These problems were completely ignored. The fact that women are the most affected by poverty has not been mentioned, either.

The current Minister of Finance's way of doing things reminds me of one of his predecessors. I hope that my Conservative friends feel somewhat shameful about the fact that it is 2010 and I am comparing their actions to something that happened a long time ago. Not a lot has changed. I am thinking about Alexander Tilloch Galt, who was the largest land owner in Canada in 1867, who also owned the largest textile plant at the time as well as the Grand Trunk Railway Company. He was closely involved with the Bank of Montreal and was the finance minister under John Alexander Macdonald, Canada's first prime minister. Who was he partial to? The wealthy.

He was loyal, a bit like our current Minister of Finance, to one of the sayings of John A. Macdonald, Prime Minister of Canada. To paraphrase, Macdonald said that minorities needed to be protected. The rich being the minority, their protection needed to be guaranteed. And he did his utmost to protect them. Then there was the majority, which had difficulty just making ends meet.

We have a similar government here, and the tradition continues. It is shameful. This helps to explain much of the Conservatives' economic vision, the vision of the current Albertan leader. Oil yes; forestry no. Automobiles, yes; affordable and social housing, no. Tax havens, yes; the guaranteed income supplement for our least fortunate seniors, no. I could go on. It is scandalous.

And just to report how things turned out, before Confederation, Alexander Tilloch Galt realized that he could no longer do business with the Americans. As you must remember—perhaps you were there between 1861 and 1865—the Yankees and the people from Dixie were fighting the Civil War in the United States. And who did the British Empire support? It supported the South, slavery and Dixieland. England supported the South, which was secessionist, to the detriment of the Yankees, who were federalists. It was completely backwards. British subjects were not popular with the blue coats from the northern states.

Galt was in a serious bind. So what did he do? This is interesting. He drafted a document to develop the British colony along east-west trading lines because for obvious reasons he could not develop north-south trade. He wanted to join together three provinces: the united Canada—which was divided into Canada East and Canada West at the time—wealthy Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. This document was called the British North America Act or BNA Act.

Galt was the father of this act. Why? To make sure it worked. In 1867, he became the first minister of finance of Canada. He had the newly minted Dominion of Canada borrow money from its bank, the Bank of Montreal, to build a railway across the country. What he did was a little like what the Conservatives are doing today. Know who your friends are; they will make you rich. Yes, yes, add to the campaign coffers. The Minister of Natural Resources could tell us something about that, seeing as how he is an expert in the field. So Galt had this big zipper, the railroad, built to pull Canada together. He even sold his own railroad, the Grand Trunk, to Canadian Pacific to further line his own pockets. Does that remind hon. members a bit of what we have been talking about this week?

For the Conservatives, it is useful to be both judge and judged. For the Conservatives, it is useful to favour the rich at the expense of the poor, and that is what we are seeing in this budget. There are things missing. There are some positive measures, but the poor are going to get poorer and the rich, richer. And that is very expensive.

Alexander Tilloch Galt was a member of the Conservative Party. And what was that party called at the time? Listen carefully. It was called the Liberal-Conservative Party. That way, people did not get confused; blue hat or red, it makes little difference, they have a good time and line their pockets. The current member for Pontiac should be happy with that title. He is being touted as the next leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec. It is not just the member for Bourassa. What is happening with the Conservatives makes no sense.

Coming back to Bill C-47, I will conclude on this note. We need to think about the workers at AbitibiBowater. Why does John Weaver get $27 million in bonuses, yet when the AbitibiBowater mill in Gatineau closes, the workers will not get $16 million in severance pay? That is what the Conservatives are doing, and their budget does nothing about this scandal.

They need to be put in their place, and that place is out of Parliament.

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

When debate resumes, there will be five minutes remaining for questions and comments on the speech by the hon. member for Gatineau.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

The hon. member for Gatineau has five minutes remaining for questions and comments.

The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague for his excellent speech on Bill C-47. He spoke about some inequalities experienced by workers at AbitibiBowater in the Outaouais. The government is pleased that the senior managers received huge bonuses when the plant was shut down, while the workers are having difficulties getting their pensions.

I would like the member for Gatineau to explain this situation a little more.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my Bloc Québécois colleague, the hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé, has asked an excellent question.

A few years ago, AbitibiBowater handed out $60 million in bonuses to its managers when it was under Companies' Creditors Arrangements Act protection and $6.8 billion in debt. One individual alone, John Weaver—let me say his name loud and clear—received $27 million.

In the meantime, workers are losing their jobs because AbitibiBowater is under CCAA protection. They are not getting severance pay. They may not even get their pensions if they are not 55 since older workers are not being offered any adjustment measures. The Conservatives are not doing anything or introducing any legislation to address this inequality.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the parliamentary secretary claimed that Revenue Canada is cracking down on people who made overcontributions to the new tax-free savings accounts, but he said nothing about trying to collect the tax on some $6 trillion to $10 trillion in tax havens around the world, Canadians who are investing in those things.

Four years ago the German government gave the Canadian government the names of 106 Canadians with a combined total of more than $100 million stashed in Liechtenstein bank accounts. So far, the Canada Revenue Agency has closed 26 cases, assessed $5.2 million in back taxes, interest and penalties, but has not collected one dime from these tax evaders.

Since 2006, the Germans have received 200 million euros from the people investing in tax havens. In fact, the United States government is chasing its own taxpayers.

The question is, why is the government not trying to get this money back? Who is it trying to protect?

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my NDP colleague very much for that excellent question.

When the Conservatives were in opposition, they would rant and rave about tax havens. Now that they are in power, they are letting tax havens be. They even want a Canada-Panama agreement, even though Panama is known as a tax haven. There are tax havens in Switzerland, yet the government is not doing anything to ensure that Canadians and Quebeckers who put their money there pay taxes here.

Before and during his tenure as prime minister, Paul Martin, the owner of Canada Steamship Lines, put his money in tax havens and avoided paying $105 million in taxes. That is scandalous.

Today, the Conservative government, which has the support of the NDP and the Bloc Québécois to abolish tax havens, is doing nothing, even though the Conservatives condemned tax havens when they were in opposition. That is scandalous. Tax havens must go, because they take money away from the government, money that should be paid by all taxpayers to help improve living conditions for the less fortunate in this country.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise and speak on Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures.

For the sake of bringing people up to speed on why we are even discussing such an unusual bill with a strange title, it is simply due to the fact that once the annual budget is presented, parliamentarians debate and then vote on the major overlying principles of the budget that is tabled. However, in order for the items presented in that particular budget to come into force, bills need to be presented so that the necessary provisions of the budget can be written into law.

Therefore, Bill C-47 is simply a technical bill that implements certain provisions of the last budget into law. As usual, a technical bill has turned into a possible reason to call an election. In the time I have been here, I have never seen more suspense surrounding technical bills than during the term of the Conservative government, simply due to the unusual way the government handles its parliamentary affairs when it comes to implementation bills. The budget says one thing and the bills say another.

For example, in a previous implementation bill tabled in the spring, the government included items to amend that had nothing to do with the budget. It requested amendments to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, introduced an airport security tax, proposed changes to the Employment Insurance Act, changes to the Canada Post Corporation Act and changes to allow for the sell-off of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. All this occurs because of the secret nature of the government, which tries to sneak divisive items into legislation through the back door in order to avoid public input or any type of parliamentary oversight. In this way, all decisions made by the government can be made under a shroud of secrecy to advance the Conservatives' secret agenda.

The budget for the year ending March 31, 2011, is expected to cost Canadians over $238 billion this year alone and add almost $25 billion to our national debt. The government likes to misrepresent itself by saying it is fiscally disciplined, but this is simply not true. The Conservative government has been the highest-spending government year after year for the last four years, and every year it has been in office it has broken the previous record for spending. Never in the history of Canada has any government spent as much money as this one has.

The government also likes to misrepresent itself by saying it does not raise taxes, but this is simply not true. To pay for its out-of-control spending spree in the last six months, the Conservatives are finding ways to increase taxes. The new airport security tax proposed by the government is in fact a tax increase. The government can call it anything it wants, but everyone in the chamber knows that it is a tax. Ordinary Canadians will feel that the government is reaching into their pockets whenever they have to travel, and they will know it is a tax.

In addition to the air travellers tax, this January coming, the government will charge Canadian workers, entrepreneurs and companies a payroll tax increase. The economic recovery is weak and fragile, and this latest tax hike will put countless small and medium-sized enterprises out of business. It will put thousands upon thousands of hard-working Canadians out of a job, and it will certainly cause a great amount of suffering in homes across Canada.

The Conservatives like to sprinkle money around on pet projects, they like to have their pictures in local newspapers holding giant novelty cheques and they like to fly the Prime Minister all over the country at the Canadian taxpayers' expense to make spending announcements, but the fact of the matter is that for all the spending the government has done, we have not seen any progress.

The budget 2010 stimulus package just is not working. National groups from different sectors of industry have all said that the stimulus is not doing what it is intended to do. As part of prebudget consultation hearings of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance, of which I am vice-chair, groups that have testified as early as this week have time and time again said the stimulus was appreciated but was not working. They say “appreciated” because they get intimidated by the government. However, when they say “not working”, they mean that the program was implemented, but with no consultation and vision for the future, how effective can the program be?

Canada's unemployment rate is 2% higher today than it was 18 months ago. Still, this number does not tell the full story. Too many full-time jobs have been replaced by part-time work. The government likes to claim that the stimulus package has helped to recuperate lost jobs, but replacing a high-paying full-time job with a low-paying part-time job is like a bad trade for a sporting team, and we all know how that works out in the long run.

Canada's economy shrunk in July, and this includes a downturn in the construction industry during what should have been the height of the construction season.

Just this morning, it was confirmed that the Canadian economy lost 6,600 jobs in the month of September, while expectations were for 10,000 additional jobs to be created. This is because the government has been slow to approve projects and has concentrated spending on pet projects in areas where the Conservatives hope to score political points rather than spending fairly and intelligently by listening to local officials who know what their communities need.

Consumer confidence has declined four months in a row. In this period of supposed recovery, Canadians are not feeling the benefits, and that is because the recovery is a lie. When unemployment is high, that is not a recovery. When people cannot get enough hours at work to make ends meet, that is not a recovery. When Canadians have to decide whether to fill up their gas tanks or buy groceries this week, that is not a recovery. When construction equipment idles while Conservative ministers take credit for a spending announcement, that is not a recovery. It is a photo op.

Household debt is at record levels. The average Canadian owes almost $42,000, which is among the highest levels of all the OECD countries. Canadians are trying to keep their heads above water, and all the government has to offer them is tax increases, billions in spending on prisons we do not need, jet fighters that have not gone through the proper bid process, and millions of dollars in advertising for Conservative propaganda. The only people to come out ahead during this recovery are the folks who make the economic action plan billboards.

Canada's monthly trade deficit is at a record high of $2.7 billion, and this is a warning sign for a country that depends upon trade for jobs and prosperity. Not long ago, we used to run a trade surplus in this country. Canada used to take in more money than it spent compared to trading competitors, but since the government has taken power and crippled our economy, we have seen revenues fall relative to expenditures.

When the Conservatives took power, Canada was running trade surpluses, unemployment was low, taxes were low, the government had a $13 billion surplus and the economy was growing steadily. In the last five years, its economic mismanagement has undone all of these accomplishments and Canadians are paying for its failure. The numbers are in and there is no hiding from the facts. The government has lost jobs, depleted our finances, increased our debt burden and raised our taxes.

This year's budget was critical because it needed to be bold enough and effective enough to stop the bleeding brought by three years of Conservative economic mismanagement. Budget 2010 failed to address the real economic challenges facing Canadian families, such as record household debt, the rising costs of education and home care, pension security and the loss of 200,000 full-time jobs in just the last 18 months.

The Conservative record of waste and mismanagement does not reflect the priorities of Canadians. The borrow-and-spend Conservative government has wasted Canadians' money with a record $130 million on shameless, self-promoting advertising; $1.3 billion for a three-day G8-G20 photo op, with spending on everything from a fake lake to glow sticks; $10 billion to $13 billion on American-style megaprisons to lock up unreported criminals, as the crime rate declines; $16 billion on a bad deal for stealth fighters, awarded without competition or guaranteed jobs for Canadians; and $20 billion in corporate tax cuts that we cannot afford.

The deficit has reached a record high of $54 billion and is projected to go even higher. The $156 billion of new debt that the Conservatives plan to borrow between 2009 and 2014 will cost taxpayers $10 billion in interest payments each and every year for decades to come. We have to pay $10 billion every year before we can even put a dent in repaying the debt.

What makes this even worse is that the government chooses to deflect criticism away from its pitiful record by creating divisions in this chamber and throughout the country by trying to stifle meaningful debate and oversight.

During a debate, we share ideas. I know that some issues are complex and can be emotional. But this government has gotten into the habit of constantly introducing bills that create divisions. Because of its rigid right-wing ideology, it does not want to put forward its ideas in separate bills.

Bill C-47 is a wasted opportunity by the Conservative government. Instead of offering meaningful help to Canadians in this time of economic uncertainty, the Conservatives have provided us with a mixture of taxes on ordinary Canadians, crippling deficits and recklessly ineffective spending on non-priority measures.

The Liberal Party of Canada would prefer we spend our time debating and implementing priority measures that benefit all Canadians.

These are difficult economic times, which means that governments must choose. The Conservatives choose tax breaks for corporations. We choose to help Canadian families.

That is why the Liberal Party has announced the Liberal family care plan to help people with the cost of caring for sick or aging loved ones at home.

Here are some statistics. There are approximately 2.7 million family caregivers in Canada. These people are responsible for 80% of home care services in Canada, providing more than $9 billion in unpaid care each year. More than 40% of family caregivers use their personal savings to survive. More than one-quarter of family caregivers miss one or more months of work to provide care, and 65% have household incomes under $45,000. Canada's population is aging; one in five Canadians will be 60 by 2020, and by 2017, Canada's 150th birthday, it is estimated that the number of seniors with chronic conditions requiring home care will increase by one-third.

Canadians want choices when it comes to caring for their families. Providing care at home allows our loved ones to live in dignity as they face their health challenges with their families. Making family care easier will also help to contain health care costs in the long run.

To enhance care for our parents, our grandparents and our sick loved ones, a Liberal government will invest $1 billion annually in a new Liberal family care plan to help reduce the economic pressure on hundreds of thousands of struggling Canadian families.

Our Liberal family care plan reflects the real value of family caregivers in our society—their value to our economy, our health, our families and our communities.

Canadians trust the Liberal Party to safeguard public health care. The fact is, the Canadian population is aging, and most Canadians expect to be responsible for the care of a very sick family member at home in their lifetime. The Conservative government has not shown any leadership on this issue, which is an important priority for Canadian families. One Conservative minister even suggested that family caregivers could use their vacation time to take care of their loved ones.

I would like to take a few moments to explain the Liberal family care plan in detail, in order to avoid any confusion.

The plan includes two measures: a new six-month family care employment insurance benefit and a new family care tax benefit.

The six-month family care employment insurance benefit, similar to the EI parental leave benefit, will allow more Canadians to care for gravely ill family members at home without having to quit their jobs.

For extended benefits, we will replace the six-week compassionate care provision with a new EI benefit lasting up to six months.

To make benefits more accessible and build more flexibility into the program, we are proposing changes to the nature of the required doctor’s certificate. At present, a doctor must sign a form confirming that a family member is “gravely ill with a significant risk of death within 26 weeks”. We will work with the medical community to relax that definition with a form confirming that the family member requires a great deal of care because he or she is gravely ill.

With regard to the flexible sharing of benefits, we will make the program more flexible by allowing the six months to be split up into blocks of time over a one-year period and by allowing eligible family members to share this time in order to provide care.

The new family care employment insurance benefit will cost approximately $250 million per year and will give support to 30,000 caregivers. A Liberal government will not increase employment insurance premiums to fund this measure.

The Liberal plan will also establish a new monthly tax benefit for family care. This new benefit will be applied in the same way as the Canadian child tax credit and it will be offered to all caregivers.

This new benefit will consist of a monthly tax-free payment, for a total of up to $1,350 per year.

The benefit will be gradually reduced based on family income starting at $41,000 and will be available to families with annual income under $106,000.

To qualify, families will have to produce a doctor's certificate confirming that a sick member of their family requires significant care and assistance to carry out daily or critical life tasks.

The new family care tax benefit will give support to approximately 600,000 caregivers at an approximate cost of $750 million per year.

We talked to Canadians. We know that more of us need to provide long-term care for our loved ones. The Liberal Party will do whatever it can to ease this burden. The choice is simple: stand with Canadians or stand with special interests. We will stand with Canadians.

Canadians are feeling the crunch of personal debt and they are worried that they will not be able to save enough for their retirement. Pensions are a priority concern and the Liberal Party has proposed pragmatic solutions to help out ordinary Canadians.

To further promote saving, we, the Liberals, are asking the government to consider our pension reform projects: creating a supplementary Canada pension plan to help Canadians save more and providing employees who lose their pension funds as a result of bankruptcy with an opportunity to increase their pension income through the Canada pension plan.

To allow Canadians to further invest in our national pension plan, on which we can rely, the Liberal plan proposes that the government work with the provinces, retirees, unions and the private sector to develop and implement a supplementary pension plan.

The Liberal Party will do whatever it can to help Canadians help themselves, which is why we have proposed a simple, pragmatic solution that will allow Canadians to save for their retirement.

The choice is simple: stand with Canadians or stand with special interests. We will stand, like I said before, with Canadians.

Budget 2010 fails, not only to address the real challenges facing Canadian families but to recognize that those challenges even exist.

When Canadians need their government to stand with them, the Conservatives have chosen to stand with special interests. Bill C-47 is just the latest example of the Conservative government's failure to stand with Canadians. As a Liberal, I have always stood with Canadians and will continue to do so by voting against Bill C-47.

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, President of the Treasury Board and Minister for the Asia-Pacific Gateway]

Mr. Speaker, in the interest of parliamentary debate, things rattle back and forth, and I find it always advantageous when a position is based on facts. In painting a picture of a devastated Canadian economy, I wonder if my colleague across the way has reflected on some statements made by those outside Canada in evaluating Canada's economy.

The International Monetary Fund affirmed again yesterday that Canada's economy leads all industrialized nations. The OECD has said, “Canada's economy shines”. The Economist Intelligence Unit says that Canada's economy is an economic miracle. The World Economic Forum has said that Canada's financial system for the third year running now is the strongest in the world.

The job numbers posted today, although they show a drop in part-time jobs, they show an increase of 37,000 new full-time jobs.

In light of my colleague's unfactually based assessment of Canada's economy, would he be willing to say that the International Monetary Fund, the OECD, the World Economic Forum and the Economist Intelligence Unit are all wrong or are they simply fabricating their evaluations?

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I find it a bit hilarious to hear a statement like that from a minister of the government. However, I will try to address a few of those questions.

He asks why Canada is coming out as one of the leading countries in its economic status. It is because of the Liberal government, let us face it. We had a German delegation and it understood that. A minister of the state who was an international minister and has been able to speak to people abroad should be the first one to understand that. The President of the Treasury Board has not been able to grab hold of the funds. He should be worried about why he is continuously spending more money than any government in the history of Canada. I think that is what he should be worried about.

The fact that the Canadian economy has been in such a positive light is because of the Liberal government, which is what everybody has been saying, except for the Conservatives.

When it comes to jobs, 6,600 jobs were lost in the month of September when the government expected 10,000 jobs to be created. We are missing out on 16,600 jobs. We can cut it as we wish, part-time or full-time, but we are missing 16,600 jobs, without including all that money we spent on stimulus funding.

With regard to the question concerning the OECD, I will try to answer that question later.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, other than Senator Percy Downe, I have not heard a Liberal in this House talk about the necessity of trying to collect taxes from people who are hiding money in tax havens.

We have a case here with the parliamentary secretary just yesterday talking about a crackdown on people who have overcontributed to the TFSAs, the tax free savings accounts, but not one mention was made of all the money the government should be trying to recover from people who invested in tax havens in Liechtenstein four years ago. As a matter of fact, the government was given the information that 106 Canadians had a total of more than $100 million stashed in Liechtenstein accounts. So far, Revenue Canada has collected not one dime of that money. However, in Germany, since 2006, it has recovered 200 million euros in back taxes from people investing in tax havens.

I would like to know why the members opposite are not pressuring the Conservatives to be more active on that file to collect those back taxes.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I first want to know where the member is getting this information from because I am having trouble getting information on my own tax return from CRA. He must have some inside information. If he is able to get all these statistics, I think he should be put in charge of CRA and try to go after that money. I do not think there is anybody here who is against going after that money. However, he must have some great contacts if he is able to determine that there are 40-odd people where the file has been closed. They cannot even find my file.

That is part of the problem. The government has not taken any leadership to go after the taxes owed by Canadians who put their money into offshore tax havens. What it is doing is going after people who have decided to put a couple of bucks into an account called the tax free savings account. It is a gimmick that the Conservatives decided to put together and I think less than 1% of Canadians have decided to utilize it.

Yes, the government has decided to go after the people who have not even offended.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I note that many quotes have been attributed to economists. I am reminded that when people come to my office they are actually looking for accountants to help them. They do not go to economists. I am trying to find those who can answer their questions with respect to taxes and so on and so forth.

My friend from Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel is an accountant and is also a vice-chair of the finance committee. I would like to ask him a question with respect to the contradictions in the budget. For example, I think we would all agree that it is a good thing to concentrate on the accelerated capital tax allowance for green energy that encourages the production of green products. However, the real job creation is through consumers buying those products.

The contradiction I find in the budget concerns the accelerated capital tax allowance, which is good, but then we see the discontinuation on the consumer side of the eco-energy program which would in fact allow people to buy those green products.

From a strategic fiscal planning perspective, does the member not think that is a good example of the contradictions in the approaches taken by the government? Could he give any other examples of that?

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my seat mate is one of the best MPs in the House and one of the best looking and he represents his constituents with a lot of hard work and devotion to his riding. I commend him for all the work he does, because I see it personally.

An example is quite easy. The Conservative government loves the corporate stuff. That is why it gives out all the candy to the corporate people and nothing is left for individuals. A perfect example is the corporate tax. Corporate tax deductions will be in effect in two months, but what is their for you and I, Mr. Speaker? Very little. That is the perfect example and that is the biggest difference between Conservatives and us.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, you will have to forgive me if I am just a little skeptical when I hear of yet another tax and spend Liberal program. We have heard of a national daycare program being part of the Liberals' creation since 1993. We never saw anything come of that one. That is the very reason why we put in place the child tax credit to allow parents the options for choosing their own child care.

I was pleased to hear him say, however, that he agrees with us that the economy is still weak and fragile and that our economic recovery still needs to be handled with great caution.

When I look at that and see the Liberals vote for a 45-day work year after their leader has said that it is fiscally irresponsible, I have to scratch my head. We know the projects in the economic action plan have created jobs across the country. It has created jobs in every jurisdiction of our country. I do not know how many projects are going on in the member's province.

Since these projects are a demonstration of three levels of government working together to create jobs, which constituents would the hon. member want to tell that they should not be working?

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to address one aspect before I address the question. The hon. member said something related to the Liberal Party being a tax and spend party. At least she caught 50% of what I said, and that is we will spend on family care when we are in government, but I am not sure where she got the part about the tax. Perhaps she can table the document where it says the Liberal Party will tax. I am sure she has a copy of our newest announcement on the long-term care family help, so I do not need to table that for her.

However, in answer to her question, as I stated in my speech, as a member of the finance committee, we have been going across Canada, listening to Canadians. Different Canadian organizations are saying that the stimulus program is not working. There are deficiencies. There is money being spent, but the projects are not being done, or are not being completed and there has been overspending on certain projects because they have been overbid and they have all been rushed to get these jobs done before the deadline.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to the sustaining Canada's economic recovery act.

Before I address economics, I must first pay tribute to the people of Etobicoke North and the community in which I was born and raised and pay tribute to my constituents, many now friends and many now family. I am humbled to serve my constituents each and every day.

I must also honour a new constituency I serve, namely the veterans of Canada. In our country's short history not every generation was called upon to defend our freedom, but every generation that responds does so with courage and conviction. It was 65 years ago that World War II veterans were among the members of a generation that saved the world from tyranny and it was 60 years ago that our veterans were dispatched to Korean waters.

Since then, our veterans have been among members of combat and peacekeeping operations to protect freedom, human rights and justice around the world in places such as Bosnia, Cyprus, Haiti and Iraq.

Our veterans' legacy of bravery and commitment to the leadership is continued by a new generation of Canadians serving tour after tour in Afghanistan. We must therefore invest, protect and defend the rights and legacy of our veterans.

Sadly, the government's 2010 budget failed to take action to really help veterans, including much needed housing and supports for operational stress injuries, including post-traumatic stress disorder. To be fair, Veterans Affairs recently announced $52.5 million for temporary housing, wheelchairs and other help for seriously injured soldiers on September 28.

However, Canadians must ask, where is the vision? Where is the budgeting for our veterans? Responding to crisis with piecemeal announcements is no way to run a department. Our veterans deserve better.

Moreover we learned during the summer that the government was considering recommendations to cut spending at Veterans Affairs, even though a report found the number of new veterans was expected to increase. A cut to the Veterans Affairs budget means less support to our veterans once our mission in Afghanistan comes to an end.

Lest we forget Canada's most precious asset is human, our serving men and women, and our defence commitments must include serving the men and women of our armed forces when they return home.

We also learned during the summer that the government would forge ahead with a sole-sourced military aircraft contract worth up to $16 billion, an enormous expenditure once the House of Commons recessed, with no transparency and no guarantee that Canadians would get the best value for their money.

While budget 2010 claims to recognize the significant efforts of veterans who helped build our country and make it strong, it does not ensure that our proud veterans are shown the dignity and respect they deserve. Coming home, for example, should not be the beginning of another battle, a battle for compensation, a battle for support, a battle for treatment.

Budget 2010 offers $1 million per year for the community war memorial program to partner with communities across our country that wish to build memorials to commemorate the achievements and sacrifices made by those who served our country.

Remembrance is a touchstone of Canada's identity in Canadian society. Canadian veterans, however, want their country to honour the covenant they entered to take care of them when they come home injured and to take care of their families when they do not return and that their government not break a sacred trust with veterans and their families.

Veterans want a change in culture at Veterans Affairs and a change in philosophy from the current insurance policy climate to a return to the social contract of the past. Veterans need real investment, investment that comes in the budget and not in response to criticism. Veterans want action on long-standing problems.

While the United States dramatically increased funding for veterans health care across the board, Canadian Forces members badly wounded in Afghanistan were shortchanged. On September 19, after four years in power, a task force and advocacy by the veterans ombudsman, the government finally took action, boosting aid to soldiers wounded in Afghanistan with more changes promised to come. Unfortunately the package is far from satisfactory and numerous questions remain.

Veteran Paul Franklin, who lost both legs in a 2006 suicide bomb attack in Kandahar, said that the announcement was good but that more needed to be done. He said that the changes were nice but it was not enough. He said that they would support the right decisions if they put vets first and not Treasury Board or budgets.

Franklin suggested boosting payments to the most seriously injured, overhauling the insurance payments to soldiers who lost limbs and making many of the payouts tax-free. He said that those were pretty cheap commitments to take care of people who had laid their lives on the line for Canada in our missions.

When will the government come forward with legislation for compensation for veterans suffering with ALS, which research shows that veterans are more likely to develop the devastating disease? Americans came forward in 2008 with compensation.

At most, injured veterans who are unable to ever work again can claim a lump sum payment of up to $276,000. Few Canadian veterans have ever qualified for the maximum. In the United Kingdom, total disability carries compensation of $850,000.

There are questions regarding the announcement. Will the monthly boost be retroactive? Will the extra $1,000, which is not very much, particularly when added to 75% of a private's pre-injury salary, be available only to the most severely injured and how will that be defined? Is the pension clawback issue being addressed and if not, what are the real dollar figures?

While President Barack Obama is making it easier for about 200,000 Vietnam veterans who might have been exposed to agent orange and who now suffer from three chronic diseases to get the health care and benefits they need, Veterans Ombudsman Pat Stogran reports that Canada has yet to pay out half of its agent orange claims. Moreover, only those who were still alive on February 6, 2006, the date the Conservative government was sworn into office, are eligible to receive compensation for exposure to agent orange. Widows of those who died prior to this date justifiably feel left out. Additionally, the list of eligible illnesses is much more restrictive in Canada than in the United States and other countries.

The quality of life for our veterans must be a top priority for Canada and we must keep faith with our newest veterans returning from Afghanistan; that is we must offer more of the economic, familial and work supports and counselling needed to transition back to civilian life.

We must offer real support for post-traumatic stress disorder. No one should have to suffer with the hopelessness, the nightmares that keep coming back and the rage that strikes suddenly. Too many of our veterans are taking their own lives. We need investments in awareness, outreach and suicide prevention, hiring more mental health professionals, improving care and treatment. Once veterans have a diagnosis, we need to make it easier to get the support.

We must uphold Canada's pledge to all who serve by pushing for targeted investments to improve the quality of life of our veterans and their families.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the member's speech. She spoke with great passion about the need to support our veterans, and our party believes very strongly in that. However, I have a memory that goes back prior to 2006.

I remember a previous Liberal government that slashed veterans programs, that eliminated benefits for allied veterans, that fought veterans every step of the way. I am proud to be part of a government that has extended a veterans independence program to more than 12,000 veterans, more than the Liberals did.

What really cuts me to the bone on this is the Liberals stand in the House and impugn this government and expect that people have absolutely no memory of what they did when they were in power and how they turned their back on Canada's veterans.

I think Canada's veterans do remember the Liberal government record and they also remember its record in rusting out the army, in sinking the navy and grounding the air force. That is the Liberal record.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we are addressing their budget. I would like to bring up the issue of atomic war veterans.

In 1957, 44 Canadians were exposed to five nuclear tests in Nevada during Task Force Warrior. Canadian troops were exposed to twice as much radiation the American troops. High-dose radiation exposure can cause cancer. Twenty-seven of forty-four soldiers have passed away. Ninety-seven per cent of the deaths were caused by cancer. Seventeen soldiers are still alive and three of them are cancer survivors. One soldier has just been diagnosed with leukemia.

In the United States, the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act was passed in 1988, and the United States awarded its veterans $75,000. In 2008, the Government of Canada awarded veterans $24,000.

[Rick Norlock, Conservative, Northumberland—Quinte West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know that every single member in this House cares about our veterans, but what I take great exception to is the politicization of it.

The member needs to know, as my friend from the riding of Peterborough mentioned, that they actually took World War II veterans off the veterans list. What she did not mention was that the defence minister, the chief of defence staff, received an award last year from the Mental Health Commission of Canada, because of the work we have done on post-traumatic stress disorder. What she left out was the fact that the previous Liberal government cancelled a helicopter contract, costing the Canadian taxpayers over half a billion dollars, and we got nothing for that. Now we have to go out and buy those aircraft at almost double the cost.

She refers to agent orange, which her government never did anything about. At least we did something about it, so I implore every member of this House, specifically that member, to stop politicizing our veterans and work with us to make their cause better.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will not be dragged into politicizing the issue of people. Instead I will address a real issue.

The Canadian Forces have made enormous advances in recent years in addressing mental health issues. But despite their best efforts, military culture retains a stigma against admitting psychological problems, and this interferes with getting an early PTSD diagnosis. Since symptoms may not appear until long after the initial trauma, it can be difficult to establish that they are service-related.

Many of our veterans are suffering with PTSD. Some are anxious, confused, and depressed, and we need new programs. To be fair and effective, the method of identifying and aiding veterans who deserve benefits needs to become more flexible.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad to have this opportunity to join in the debate on Bill C-47, the budget implementation act.

As the government operations vice-chair, much of my 13 years as an MP has been spent in an environment where budgetary restraint were the operative words. They were key. In fact, it was a period of cutting, hacking, and slashing in a way that we often criticized as going too far.

In the Liberal years, when they tried to balance a budget, they did so in such a way that they were not just trimming the fat from government programs but had gone through the fat and were into the bone. Some of those cuts have never healed. In fact, some of the Liberals' cutting, hacking, and slashing bordered on cruelty in that they seemed to take no notice of the human consequences associated with their deep, reckless, and irresponsible cuts.

That was the environment in which I spent most of my political career, trying to direct spending to social spending and to bring an element of reason and compassion into the slashing that was going on. I contrast that now with the position I find myself in as the vice-chair of the government operations committee, the oversight committee for estimates.

When I contrast the experience of yesterday with that of today, I see billions of dollars flying out the door at breakneck speed, with virtually no oversight, model, projection, or yardstick to measure progress by. This is irresponsible and cavalier, almost reckless.

Granted, this spending was called for by other OECD nations. We all knew we had to get some money into circulation. But surely with some prudence and probity, we could have designed a way to get money into circulation with some yardstick to measure progress by, with goals and objectives that could be stated, observed, measured, and then evaluated.

We in the committee asked for that type of participation. But we were given none of it. In fact, it has been incredibly frustrating. For instance, we asked for the projected job creation associated with this spending initiative, and we got nothing to go by. This is my frustration as a member of Parliament. I am finally given the opportunity at this late date to speak to the budget implementation bill. Yet I recall that, at every step along the way, I tried to speak to the issues associated with this massive windfall of spending. And every step of the way, I was stymied.

Instead of the government coming to Parliament and allowing members to test the metal of its policies through vigorous debate and informed participation, it has put a shroud of secrecy over what it is doing, as if policy can be discussed only behind closed doors and drawn curtains. It seems we have no right, according to the government, to know what the stimulus spending is doing, where it is going, and how it is being allocated.

Whether the Auditor General will ever be able to do a thorough analysis of these billions of dollars of stimulus spending remains to be seen. In any case, if such an analysis were to occur, by that time things would likely have gone too far. We will be into another political cycle and presumably another election will have taken place.

It would be disingenuous to allow the Canadian people to think that we have weathered this economic recession relatively well owing to the strong financial stewardship of the government, but that is the illusion the government is trying to create. In every speech Conservatives make in public on the international scene, they say Canada has weathered the recession a lot better because they did what was right. Let us remind ourselves that, if we had actually run with the Conservative budget in late 2008, a catastrophe would have ensued.

The budget we are seeing today is in fact a coalition budget, a budget that we forced the Minister of Finance to entertain. In November 2008, remember, he was in full denial that an economic crisis existed.

The government considered that it was just business as usual. It did not worry about the economy, suggesting that the crisis would pass. We said no. The rest of the world said no. All of the members on this side of the House said no. We told the government that we would not let it drive the bus over the cliff, so we stopped it, and it is a good thing we did. We scared the government straight, as it were, because it had to regroup, pull back, and withdraw. It came out with a stimulus package that has helped us overcome the economic challenges of the last few months.

The Conservatives did not listen to advice, though. With what has been called the biggest economic crisis since the great depression, one would have thought there would have been some effort to reach across the aisle and co-operate. When the country is at war, a war cabinet is pulled together. When the country is in crisis, one would like to think that the government would approach opposition parties and say, “Look, in light of this crisis, we need an unprecedented level of co-operation, because we have to be paddling our canoe in the same direction to get out of these dangerous rapids”.

None of that happened. In fact, the Conservatives ignored all the advice proffered. Surely, they cannot think that they have a monopoly on common sense and reason, financial responsibility and experience. There are talented people on this side of the House, too. We put forward good ideas to the Conservative Party, but those members ignored virtually every one of them. I will talk about only one or two.

I fully supported getting money into circulation as quickly as possible to stimulate the economy in a Keynesian way. But we suggested ways to achieve secondary objectives at the same time. Yes, get the money into circulation. Yes, public spending is the way to do it. Yes, get it into people's hands. But we could have done transformative things with our economy, if we had set out mind to it.

I heard a speech recently by Van Jones, who was an adviser to President Obama in the United States. Two important U.S. objectives in its stimulus spending were, first, to wean society off the carbon-based economy that was dragging the country down, and second, to bring in the new green economy of the future. A stated objective in the U.S. stimulus spending was to do things that were environmentally smart to wean the American people off imported energy from questionable sources. That was smart. That was making lemonade out of lemons.

There will never be a flurry of public spending like this again in our lifetime. It is rare. As I said, my entire political experience of 13 years has been in an era of budgetary restraint, cutbacks, spending less, and getting government out of things.

When we got into a crisis, we decided as a people that government needed to get into this. But I do not think we are going to see it again. It is a wasted opportunity. We could have used this economic downturn and this blitzkrieg of public spending to transform ourselves from a carbon-based economy into a more sustainable one.

A nationwide, comprehensive energy retrofit program would have put money into circulation immediately. The country would have been put back to work and people would have renovated their homes.

The government offered a paltry home renovation program, but it did not have an adequate energy component. One could get the home renovation stimulus money of $1,300, not a great deal of money, to build a sundeck, for instance. That grant should have been available only to homeowners who wanted to energy retrofit their homes, to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. I understand that, if a homeowner wanted use the program to put in windows, this would be an improvement in energy efficiency. But there was nothing mandated about that. That was a mistake.

The government could have done something else in home retrofitting. It could have set up a comprehensive asbestos removal program, so that people could rid their homes of harmful asbestos, especially Zonolite insulation.

I cite that specifically because the federal government subsidized and promoted the installation of Zonolite asbestos insulation in 350,000 homes across the country and a countless number of public buildings through CHIP, its Canadian home insulation program. People's homes were devalued and made unsafe by virtue of a government program.

When UFFI, urea-formaldehyde foam insulation, was put in and a few people started getting irritation from it, I think it was André Ouellet at the time who started a massive, nationwide removal program to take all that foam insulation out of the houses, which the government had just paid to put in.

While UFFI is irritating to some people, asbestos is deadly to everyone. Yet there is no corresponding removal program. This would have been a perfect opportunity to implement a nationwide asbestos removal program to help homeowners whose homes have been devalued and made unsafe by the government's own home insulation program from 1977 to 1984.

We believe another way we could have stimulated the economy and get money into circulation immediately, plus achieve important secondary objectives at the same time, would have been to increase the old age security payments to Canadian pensioners. Instead of a $1.50 per month increase, anti-poverty groups tell us that an increase of $100 per month would have elevated hundreds of thousands of Canadian seniors out of poverty to the poverty line. This would not make them wealthy by any means, but it would at least elevate them to the base minimum level of poverty that we identify with the low-income cut-off.

Our party costed this out, and for the 300,000 individuals involved, it would be a total cost of $700 million. It is a lot of money, and I am not trying to downplay that, but one could guarantee that the money would be in circulation immediately. A dollar in a poor person's hand is spent that day, in their home community, and it would be in circulation. We all know that every dollar spent gets re-spent four times before it finds its natural state of repose, usually in some rich man's pocket. However, that would have been one way to guarantee money in circulation immediately and solve a serious social objective of senior citizens living in poverty, for a relatively low price tag.

These ideas were put to the Minister of Finance during the brief, paltry, and now we find useless, consultation process. We made these arguments. Frankly, it would have been very smart politically and I think the government would have looked pretty good in the minds of the general public if the senior citizens living in poverty were brought up to at least the poverty line, for one-fortieth of the stimulus spending that went on.

Those are some of the ideas that I find myself frustrated with as an opposition MP and as a member of the government operations committee, now that we are finally asked to discuss the budget implementation bill.

I would also like to discuss in the context of Bill C-47 the enormous crippling deficit that we now must address collectively. I doubt there will be a great deal of consultation associated with that either. Perhaps there will be an election following the next budget and there will not be anymore Conservative budgets after that. However, we strongly suspect that the next budget will be a bad-news budget.

We can anticipate the Conservative government trying to balance the books, and I am afraid that it will try to balance the books along ideological lines. The Conservatives will be trying to achieve secondary objectives and goals as sort of a neo-conservative wish list of things they would like to do.

During the time that I have been an MP, deficits were about as popular as a hooker with a chipped tooth. Now we are faced with a serious issue of deficits.

One of the things we predict through the Conservatives' law and order agenda, the legislation they are putting through, is a very predictable increase in prison construction, an unavoidable increase in prison construction because virtually every one of the bills they are pushing through has mandatory minimum sentencing, which will result in more people in prison.

We have just had the Parliamentary Budget Officer to our government operations committee giving us a projection of what this will cost, and it will cost billions and billions of dollars. Mark my words, the Conservatives will look at privatization of prisons, and there will be some company like Onex or Halliburton that will come into Canada and say that it costs Canada $147,000 to house a prisoner in a federal penitentiary and they can do it for $125,000, and these guys will jump on it like a dog on a pork chop. They will just leap for that.

There is a point in law, and my colleague from St. John's East and I were talking about it. It says a person can be assumed to have intended the predictable consequences of his or her actions. They can be presumed to have intended the predictable consequences of his or her action. The predictable consequences will be stacking up prisoners like cordwood in our penitentiaries. The Conservatives will end up locking up a whole generation of young aboriginal kids, because from now on, if some kid steals a loaf of bread, he or she will wind up in prison, according to the agenda of the Conservatives.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

What about all those white collar criminals?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

No, no, rich people do not go to jail because the jail is too full of young aboriginal kids. There is no room for them. They can go to the country club and play golf.

Now we have a member of the board of directors of Onex Corporation as the Chief of Staff to the Prime Minister. We can just imagine the kind of bugs that are being dropped into the ear of the Prime Minister behind closed doors and under the shroud of secrecy that the Conservatives like to create. They can help us solve our deficit problem. They can privatize the prisons, privatize this and contract out that and get government out of all of these areas, which has been, as I said, the dream objective of the neo-conservatives since their beginning.

We have another contradiction or irony here that I do not think the public will be very pleased about. It will come up on the doorsteps in the next federal election, but in the context of Bill C-47, the budget implementation bill, it contemplates corporate tax cuts to the extent of $6 billion or $7 billion.

The astounding thing is the reasoning that goes into this. It is not as though we are in a surplus situation where we will be sharing some of the bounty through private sector tax cuts, personal tax cuts and corporate tax cuts. We are not in that environment. We are in a $50 billion deficit situation. To give this $6 billion or $7 billion more in tax cuts, we have to borrow that money. We will be borrowing money on the open market to give tax cuts to profitable corporations.

The irony about giving tax cuts in this way is that it rewards the most successful businesses. It does not give a hand up to a struggling business that is about to close its doors. They are not paying any income tax anyway because they are struggling. So this is not some kind of initiative to assist small and medium-sized enterprises. I could support that to ensure that we avoid plant closures, et cetera.

This will reward those most profitable businesses in the country, the very people, maybe the only people in the country, who do not need our help right now. It is the struggling small and medium-sized businesses that actually, legitimately need assistance to get them through these turbulent economic times, but by some convoluted pretzel logic, the Conservatives have decided to hand over this massive transfer of wealth to corporations instead of an option that I suggested, raising the old age security by $100 a month and bringing seniors out of poverty.

I wish I had more time to go into the tax-motivated expatriation, which is actually sleazy, tax-cheating loopholes that exist within our tax system, but the Conservatives have decided to leave that money on the table and not go after it, even though we are in a $50 billion deficit situation.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to address a question to the hon. member across the way. I have indicated that when the member leaves this place I would like to put an offer in on his thesaurus. I think he is amongst the better deliverers of lines in the House. I would not mind getting a copy of that when he has done. Perhaps he might even write it in a memoir for me.

I did want to mention a couple of points on his speech. I know he has companions in the Liberal Party who in last election indicated that they were going to cut corporate taxes farther and faster than I would cut them. Now they have skipped across, and they have apparently taken the 2008 NDP campaign platform and are running with that.

I am sure the member is actually happy about that in some regards, but at the same time I am sure he sees that it is not likely a truthful position from the Liberal Party since they have supported our reductions in corporate taxes. Good for them to this point, although most people believe that they actually supported it to save their skin.

I would say to the hon. member that this bill contains some key measures, including on the working income tax benefit. There are some key measures to help the working poor to climb and claw their way up, assisting them to get to middle class.

Has the member considered those measures in Bill C-47 and if he supports them?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, there is an old saying that even a broken watch is right twice a day. There are measures in this bill that we support. There are some gestures toward that.

Overall, it is the tone and the big picture of this massive undertaking that we are critical of. We feel it is a missed opportunity. Well, it ranges from a missed opportunity in one regard, in that I believe we could have done something truly transformative with that massive outpouring of billions of dollars of stimulus spending instead of just the old bricks-and-mortar projects, which I am not criticizing.

It ranges from that missed opportunity to the sheer perversity of borrowing $6 billion or $7 billion to give corporate tax cuts at this point in time. I appreciate my colleague's pointing out the flip-flop perversity position of the Liberals, too, who do sound an awful lot like New Democrats when they are in opposition, and as soon as they get into government they sound an awful lot like right wing neo-conservatives.

In fact, with respect to the cutting and hacking and slashing that took place under their watch, in my riding at least, we still have not recovered from the consequences of the virtually cruel actions of that party.

Let me give one example. The cuts to the EI program in my riding alone resulted in $20 million a year less federal money coming into my riding. We cannot bounce back from that very readily. We could not afford a Liberal government much longer, in my view.

[Luc Desnoyers, Bloc, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague raised many points, and I would like to take up a couple of them. He mentioned that important employment insurance pilot projects have been cut. I would like to hear a bit more on this topic because we know perfectly well that the economy is not in full recovery mode. I am thinking in particular about my riding, where there have been significant cuts to the aerospace and trucking industries. The entire industrial sector has yet to fully recover, but we are hearing from the other side of the House that they are creating jobs. People need employment insurance programs, but the government is not doing anything.

With respect to seniors, as my colleague mentioned, they have been given nothing. They are living at the poverty line right now and they are being kept there. The government does not want to improve their lot in Canada and Quebec despite the fact that they have contributed enormously to the development of Canada and Quebec's economy, monetarily as well as in terms of time and values. It is important that we remember them.

Why is this government still forgetting seniors?

The final point that I would like to raise is that they are telling us they have created jobs. But, in terms of the F-35 fighter jet contracts, the government has not received any guarantee that jobs will be created.

What does my colleague think of this?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's contribution to the case that we are making, which is that this particular initiative falls short of meeting the goals and objectives that we could have achieved with this massive spending.

The one thing I will comment on is the EI system. We squandered the fiscal capacity to have a healthy and robust EI system when they took the $57 billion surplus from the EI system. By legislation, they ripped that money right out of there. Now that we are in an economic crisis where we need EI, the cupboard is bare.

Again, they had no right to take that money. That money was employer and employee contributions. Not one penny of that was federal government money and yet they took it and misused it for other applications.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

It being 1:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

The House resumed from October 8 consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Mario Silva, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-47, the sustaining Canada's economic recovery act.

When reading reports or listening to speeches on economic issues, it is often possible to be overwhelmed by numbers, statistics and projections. However, beyond these figures and complicated tables are human stories of Canadians simply trying to build better lives for themselves, their families and their communities in times that are increasingly less certain.

As we all know, seniors across Canada face some of the most pressing challenges in terms of maintaining a decent living for themselves. Upon retirement, the vast majority of Canadian seniors see a significant reduction in their income. Whether they have managed to purchase their own homes or not, the expenses they face can appear daunting to them as they enter their retirement years. Indeed, these expenses are significant to those on fixed incomes.

These expenses include electricity, gas, food, home maintenance, property taxes, transportation costs, health costs in terms of prescriptions and assistance devices, and the list goes on. Unfortunately, all of these expenses are increasing as time passes, while income, particularly retirement income, simply does not keep pace.

It is for this reason that we as a society must recognize that our population is aging and that many of our seniors find it difficult to make ends meet. The challenge will only become more acute in the coming years.

While public policy encourages Canadians to save for retirement, it is widely recognized that only one in five Canadians has an employment-based retirement pension plan. It is a simple fact that most Canadians without an employment-based pension plan have little left over to save for retirement.

While others may save independently, many Canadians are relying on the Canada pension plan to support them in retirement and these payments are simply not enough to maintain a reasonable standard of living.

Those are some of the challenges for seniors in Canada.

We as a society must recognize that we have an obligation to consider fully the unique challenges facing Canadian seniors. We have an obligation to consider the kind of programs and initiatives to ensure that those who have worked hard all of their lives can live decent and meaningful lives when they retire.

We need to have serious discussions in this country about public policy considerations, such as reducing property taxes for seniors or providing a rebate for these payments through tax policy, increasing assistance for those who need prescription medications or specialized in-home medical care, and proper community support systems that are adequately funded. These are only a few of the areas of concern.

We owe it to seniors in this country to ensure that they can enjoy their hard-earned retirement years.

Similarly, many young families in this country are struggling, which should not be the case in a prosperous country like Canada. It is shocking and intolerable that, according to a 2008 report, one in nine Canadian children lives in poverty. That is one million children who must contend each day with the terrible reality of poverty.

These are working families who, at the end of the month, simply do not have enough money to cover all of their expenses. It is this kind of poverty that is vicious, in that it is circular in nature. It traps people in a cycle of poverty which in most cases is difficult to escape.

Recently, the Senate of Canada released a report on poverty, “In From the Margins: A Call to Action on Poverty, Housing and Homelessness”. The report contains 74 recommendations that should be considered. These recommendations include a call to increase the guaranteed income supplement for seniors, a national affordable housing program and to make the disability tax credit refundable. We must consider these kinds of public policy initiatives.

I would remind members that it was the previous Liberal government under Prime Minister Paul Martin that began to invest in affordable housing for the first time in a generation. It was also the Liberal Party which, in the last general election, had a specific plan to address poverty in Canada in general and child poverty in particular.

Young people in this country require an increasingly specialized level of education if they are to have any chance at all of competing in the rapidly changing global marketplace. It is only the fortunate few who, through family or other means, have the resources to fully cover the cost of their education. The reality for most students is that they work while attending post-secondary institutions. They also assume large student loan debts which will hound them for years to come.

It is incumbent upon us as a society to have serious debates about what we can do to address the issues facing young people who are increasingly leaving school with unmanageable debt loads which they assumed simply so they could obtain an education.

Not only is it in the best interests of the students to attend school and become as competitive in the world marketplace as they possibly can, but it is also in the best interests of our country.

The future belongs to our young people. We need to do all that we can to position them well as they enter their working lives. For them to do so with the burden of enormous debt is not the way to achieve this goal. We must look at ways to make post-secondary education more affordable and less burdensome. Today unfortunately the opposite is happening.

Universities and colleges are facing ever increasing fiscal pressures and as a result are charging higher fees. Students, even those who are fortunate enough to find work during their years of study, have to borrow more to cover their education costs. We need to lessen this burden and adequately fund our elementary, secondary and post-secondary schools.

There is an infrastructure deficit in this country which, several years ago under the previous Liberal government, began to receive the attention it deserved. The global economic meltdown in 2008 forced many of these reports from the front pages. If we are to remain competitive and in order to sustain healthy cities and communities, we must have a plan of action that is well-funded to repair or replace and sustain infrastructure across the country.

It is simply not reasonable to suggest that we can remain competitive when our infrastructure is aging and in disrepair. In my home city of Toronto there are sewage systems that are over 100 years old and clearly in need of replacement. This story is repeated across the country. As the previous Liberal government had begun to do, we need to start addressing the infrastructure needs of Canada's cities and communities.

I recognize that in the hue and cry about fiscal realities the inevitable question is, how does one pay for the kinds of programs and initiatives mentioned in my remarks today? It is about priorities and putting in place the public policies we need to get the job done.

How can it be that the government can find $1 billion to cover the costs of a 72-hour meeting in Toronto and Huntsville which produced questionable results, and yet when it comes to poverty, the cry is that there is no money to be found? That $1 billion would have gone a long way in helping to address poverty in this country. It would be better spent in this way than on photo ops and closed door meetings.

Similarly, the government maintains there is no money to fund students or address the needs of seniors and young families, yet it continues on a program of corporate tax cuts in the billions of dollars.

Canada's economy is competitive. Corporations are effectively competing on the world stage. We would do better to cancel the billions of dollars in tax cuts for the large corporations and instead channel that money into the areas I have referred to in these remarks. We need to be building schools and hospitals with this money, not corporate office towers. We need to be helping young people go to school, not world leaders at meetings of dubious value at billion dollar conferences.

The reality is that we must adopt public policies that would help Canadians and their families to live the lives they deserve. We can be prosperous and prudent, compassionate and responsible. We can also be progressive and sensible. This is how we build a nation in which all have the opportunity to excel. In so doing, we help create what is considered to be the greatest country on earth.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to compliment the member for Davenport for making an effort at putting on the table a discussion about a vision the country ought to have through the House of Commons.

I went through Bill C-47 and I am sure he did not find that macro-picture which the government says it would like to address. It is another little Chihuahua piece of legislation: lots of bark but very little bite. Here is where the bite is, and I would like the member for Davenport to address this.

There are some very light issues in this legislation about what the government is trying to do in order to maintain the sustainability of the recovery, and yet as part of this package, in part 2 of the bill the government is asking for the authority to impose a $3.2 billion tax on air travellers. One wonders whether the sustainability of an economic recovery would be maintained by hiding taxes in a piece of legislation that is allegedly designed to do something more.

Is this another one of those cases where it is sound bite legislation, lots of sound and no bite?

[Mario Silva, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague and I would probably agree that we are concerned about what is in this legislation, but we are also concerned about what is missing from the legislation. What is missing is the whole idea that as a society and as legislators, we are responsible for the social building blocks of this country, and what I see is that they are being slowly eroded and dismantled. We are not putting enough into both our social infrastructure and our physical infrastructure.

I am very much concerned about the direction in which we are going and where our priorities seem to lie. We want to make sure that we are investing in our communities and our social infrastructure, and that we also look at changing some of the policies and directions. We have an aging population. We have crumbling infrastructure. We have cities in need. We have problems of youth unemployment. Are they being addressed? My concern is that unfortunately they are not being addressed in this bill.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the Liberals' new-found conversion to our cause which for a very long time has been to scale back corporate tax cuts so that we can invest in the real priorities of Canadians. I have to say that it is a bit of a death-bed conversion that we are seeing here.

The corporate tax cuts did not just start under the current Conservative government. In fact, they were started and expanded under previous Liberal governments. Now we find ourselves in a situation where the current government is borrowing $20 billion to fund its additional corporate tax cuts, when we already know that our corporate tax rates are much lower than those of our nearest competitors south of the border.

The Liberal Party in fact supported all of those tax cuts and the budgets in which we found them, either by voting with the Conservatives to keep them in power or by abstaining, thereby in essence still allowing those policies to pass.

I wonder whether the member could comment on how long this conversion will last. Will it be only until the next election and then the Liberals will reverse their position yet again? How can Canadians have faith that the Liberal Party has actually truly agreed that corporate tax cuts need to be cut, and the shift of the tax burden has to move away from individuals to corporations?

[Mario Silva, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there has been no conversion because we do not see politics as a religion, nor are we concerned about ideology. We are much more concerned about getting things done for Canadians.

We have to look at things also in a practical way. When the economy is healthy and things are growing, when we think we can afford a tax cut, we will have to put a tax cut in place. When there is a different scenario before us and Canadians are in need, then let us invest in the social infrastructure.

It is not a question of converting from one ideology to another. We do not believe in conversions of ideology. We believe in getting practical things done for Canadians when it is the right time to do them. We have always done things in a practical and meaningful way. That is the direction in which I would like to see the country go. I think the vast majority of people who are in the middle actually believe that is the best way to move forward as a country, not in an ideological way either from the right or the left.

[Mark Eyking, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I want to take the Minister of Finance on a little trip down memory lane to December 2008.

After a rather mean-spirited budget, the finance minister invited the opposition members to come forward with some issues from their ridings. I was asked, so I made some submissions. I talked to my constituents and we gave a submission to the finance minister in January 2009 and there was quite a list there. The sad part is that most of it was not taken care of over the last two years.

There were some things done because of the Auditor General. She brought forward the issue of Marine Atlantic in her report and how Marine Atlantic definitely needed more money for infrastructure. When we look at the importance of Marine Atlantic since Newfoundland and Labrador joined Confederation, it was part of the Confederation deal that it would be maintained, that goods and services would be able to travel freely across the strait to Newfoundland and from Port aux Basques and Argentia back to North Sydney.

The last few years have been really desperate in terms of the amount of infrastructure that went into terminals and into the vessels. The Auditor General noticed this, and yes, there was some money put forward to Marine Atlantic, so I have to give credit where it is due on that one.

When we look at the action plan, on page 18, the Conservatives talk about the $62 billion, over 16,000 projects and 12,000 already completed. It is kind of shocking when we look at what has not been done in Cape Breton. I brought it up in the House on Friday. I had a question to the Prime Minister about the public building that should have been in Ingonish, a $10-million building, the same as was spent on the Prime Minister's promotion budget. The building in Ingonish would house Parks Canada, DFO and the RCMP. It was well put together by public works. It was an efficient building. It was an environmental friendly building. But the Conservatives took it off the table. It should have been in one of those 16,000 projects. It was a win-win situation for those three departments that are so important for northern Cape Breton.

Also in northern Cape Breton we had the Cape North arena, which should have been one of the projects. We have projects right across. The most work was done by the community, and the Province of Nova Scotia has put some money in. Even the municipality of Cape Breton, CBRM, came forward with a couple of million dollars, and it is a fairly poor municipality when we think about how it tries to make ends meet. However, it put this money together for the dredging of Sydney Harbour.

I have asked this question many times in the House. It was part of the submission that was given to the finance minister at that time, that this was the number one priority for Cape Breton. So it is not that he did not know about it. The stakeholders and the municipality and the province all stepped up to the plate on this, but where is the federal government? It is nowhere to be seen, nowhere in this action plan. I do not know if the Prime Minister knows where Cape Breton is. He should come down. The whole Liberal caucus came down there this summer and had a great time. The Prime Minister should do this thing, especially when all the stakeholders are stepping up to the plate, and get this harbour dredged. It would mean so much for the future prosperity of Cape Breton.

Right now, coal boats come in half filled because they cannot come through the harbour. It needs to be dredged. We have a growing tourist industry on the cruise ships, up over 50% over the last few years; and of course, the dredging would open it to a container port. We have companies ready to step up to the plate to have a very modern container port in Sydney Harbour, but they need the dredging done. This government needs to step up to the plate and get it done.

Another issue that was brought forward and we were hoping to see in the budget is permanent employees at Citizenship and Immigration. Right now, the Department of Citizenship and Immigration in Sydney, Cape Breton, does a lot of processing for immigration. There is a steady flow of immigrants coming into this country, so it is no shock to know how much work needs to be done on these files, but they continue to lay off the employees.

They laid them off again last year and the backlog in the immigration file started increasing again. Now they are hiring them back. It is a totally disruptive system that they have going, not only for the employees but also for the immigration process, as many of the members here know with people coming to their offices trying to get their applications processed. There are 160 jobs. The union and the representatives came to the immigration committee of the House. They showed their case and how important it was. That should have been in the budget.

I am also the critic for rural affairs and I would like to talk about the rural issues that are not being taken care of. Last year was rough on a lot of farmers out west. It was a cold spring and a very wet fall.

My colleague, the hon. member for Malpeque, visited the farmers in Manitoba. He had a hard time getting in the fields. There was a lot of water in the fields and they are in rough shape.

It has been a rough year, when we look at the numbers in terms of crops that are being harvested. What do my colleagues from the Conservative Party bring to the House to talk about? The long gun registry. That is all they talked about this fall.

Why did they not talk about the conditions that the farmers were facing and how we as Parliament can help these farmers through their crisis? But no, it was not brought up in the House. It took the member for Malpeque to go out there, visit these fields and talk to the farmers. They want action not only by the members, but by the Prime Minister.

It is sad to see what is happening to our pork and beef producers and we do not see the government stepping up to the plate.

Another issue is what is happening with the lobster fishermen. I have many small communities that rely on the lobster industry. They had a very bad year last year, not only because of the amount of fish they were catching but also the prices.

We were thinking that perhaps the Conservatives were listening and the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans came out with a policy. My hon. colleague from Cardigan said it was not enough money and it will not be accessible for those fishers, and he was right.

We found out later that most of the lobster fishers could not receive the money, and the little they did receive did not go anywhere. So the program they had to help the lobster fishers was a total failure.

We wonder where the money is going for rural Canada. We do not see it. We do not see it going to the fishermen and we do not see it going to the farmers.

However, they had another opportunity, which is part of our platform, and that is to recognize the volunteer firefighters. The work they do in these small communities across Canada is unbelievable. They are sometimes the mainstay of a small community. Many times these young men and women who are working for volunteer fire department have to put all their courses into it. It would have been a great opportunity to have had a tax credit of $3,000 for them in this budget. It would have shown respect. It would have helped to encourage them, because they are the lifeline for these rural communities.

As the critic for rural affairs, I cannot believe how little was done on the Conservative side. There was so much opportunity. When we look at the amount of money that was spent on signs, photo-ops and building fake lakes, and promotion of the Prime Minister's office, a lot of that money could have gone into these small projects across the country. It could have helped farmers, fishers, and small communities and we would have had something to show for it.

What do we have now? A big deficit. We could have seen the money go to the areas where it should have gone, but what we see now is a big deficit. The previous Liberal governments invested in communities. We used to have the SCIF program, which helped small communities. It was a good program for the small communities. When a small community would step up to the plate with funds or volunteerism, the SCIF program kicked in. It was a program that could have really worked. The government did not have to reinvent the wheel and it did not break the bank.

What we see are many programs and initiatives that cost a lot of money that did not go where it should have gone and we definitely see it in Cape Breton.

I suggest that the Prime Minister visit there, stop playing politics with Cape Breton and get the projects done, especially the projects where the community steps up to the plate. Just get it done and if the government is going to do it, it should do it fairly right across the country.

I now will entertain questions from my hon. colleagues.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I know my colleague will answer this question, because it is an important one.

When we looked through the budget implementation bill, looking for the government's response to what Canadians have been demanding, which is better action on the environment particularly dealing with climate change, there was a program, and it is rare for opposition to do this, that the government continued. The eco-energy program allowed Canadians to receive some support from the government to make their homes more energy efficient and to retrofit their homes.

We found that the take-up from consumers in particular, not so much on the business side but on the individual consumer side, was excellent. People were picking it up. We heard from contractors across the country. If we want to talk about stimulus spending, this was a good way to stimulate the economy. The contractors who were doing the renovations were often buying the products locally and doing the work, obviously, at a local level, and it was a way to stimulate the economy.

Instead, we saw the government continue its outrageous support of the tar sands with $2.1 billion. I am asking my hon. colleague, is this in any way a balanced response to the demand coming from Canadians to deal with environmental issues and to help control their own costs, such as home heating, in these very difficult times?

[Mark Eyking, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad the environment was brought up.

Since we are talking about the environment and how we stepped up to the plate, there were two big environment projects that had to be done in Cape Breton. One was the Sydney tar ponds. It was the worst site in Canada that to be cleaned up. There was almost $400 million announced through our government to clean up that site and it is getting done now.

We also had the former coal mines in Cape Breton that were getting cleaned up. That was a big environmental issue.

No doubt about it, the environment is still a big issue for Cape Breton because we have so many fishing communities. Time and again, as the tides are rising and the water is getting higher, we are having problems with our breakwaters and wharves.

The hon. member mentioned this program, which was a good program and should have been continued for another year. It dealt with making homes more energy efficient and there was a tax credit. I am ashamed that the government took it away.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague from Sydney—Victoria two questions, very briefly.

The first has to do with the constitutional obligation of the Government of Canada to Marine Atlantic and to the people of Sydney.

The second has to do with a question from my colleague from Cape Breton—Canso and the obligation of the Government of Canada to maintain the efficiencies and the reputation of Canada through the citizenship and immigration offices in Sydney.

First of all, in terms of maintaining the culture of continued growth, as the member for Sydney—Victoria asked me to attend Marine Atlantic in my capacity as transport critic at the time, we realize and we see that the government is not fulfilling its obligation. I wonder whether he would address that issue, the constitutional obligations of government to do that.

Secondly, why would the Government of Canada refuse to make the investment in a very large processing centre in Sydney so that we could eliminate that long, 18-month waiting period before an application for citizenship gets considered?

[Mark Eyking, Liberal, Sydney—Victoria, NS]

Mr. Speaker, those were two very good questions.

My hon. colleague came to Cape Breton many times and he has seen first-hand the importance of Marine Atlantic. People can go to the town of North Sydney and see the traffic and travellers who go back and forth and we rely on that service. It is critical for Newfoundland and Labrador, and it is critical for the economy in Cape Breton.

To neglect the investment in that piece of infrastructure is really going against the Constitution. There is no exception. We should not have the Auditor General having to step up to the plate for us on this one.

The citizenship and immigration processing centre in Cape Breton is quite a success story. People do a fantastic job. They process the applications quickly. There are not a lot of immigrants who come to Cape Breton but there are a lot who go to Vancouver, Toronto, and Montreal. Every member in this chamber should realize the importance of processing them in an efficient, speedy manner.

We need to keep these people on full time, because they are trained and they can get the job done. In Cape Breton we can get the job done, and these guys need to learn how to get the job done.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, politics is about choices. In fact, one classic definition of politics defines it simply as deciding who gets what, when, where and how. When the government has made its choices, it lays them out in the single most important document that comes before Parliament, and that is the federal budget. It is essentially the blueprint for the government's plan between elections.

As an opposition MP, it is my role to hold the government to account for the choices it has made. It is a debate about competing visions and priorities. I acknowledge that things are not always black and white in politics, but I have never before seen such a huge disconnect between the priorities of the government and the priorities of my constituents. Whether we are talking about children, adults or seniors, the government simply is not reflecting the priorities of hard-working families on the Mountain. The Conservative government is making the wrong choices.

Let us look at children first. As policy makers, we know that for children to succeed in the knowledge-based economy of the 21st century, they must get off to the very best start. That is hard to do when far too many still go to school hungry. In 1989 the House of Commons unanimously passed an NDP motion to eradicate child poverty by the year 2000, but successive Liberal and Conservative governments have chosen not to implement it. An entire generation of children has paid the price for their misguided priorities.

In fact, under the tenure of the Conservative government, the child poverty rate has actually increased from 9.5% to 12%. It is a case of Nero fiddles while Rome burns. Instead of taking concrete actions to help the most vulnerable Canadians, the government is obsessing about providing additional tax cuts. However, tax cuts do not help the poor because their incomes are so low that they do not pay income taxes in the first place, so there is no tax rate to cut.

For middle-income Canadians, the benefit of their modest income tax decreases have been swallowed up by higher user fees, the rising cost of everything from gasoline to electricity and, of course, the HST, which is now costing the average Ontario family an extra $1,200 a year.

However, then the kinds of tax cuts that the Conservatives were proposing were not really intended to level the playing field for individuals anyway. On the contrary, the vast majority of cuts were corporate tax cuts, cuts that were specifically designed to benefit the Conservatives' friends in big business.

The Conservatives made a choice. They chose to put the interests of corporations ahead of the interests of kids. They are recklessly mortgaging our children's future by borrowing $20 billion for additional tax cuts to corporations, corporations that are already taxed less than their main competitors south of the border. It is just plain wrong.

There is a different choice that the government could and should have made. Imagine how far that money would go if we invested it in our children's early education. While the Conservatives would like us to think of child care as mere babysitting, all the evidence, from the groundbreaking Fraser Mustard report on, makes it clear that it is a critical investment in the future success of our children.

Parents understand that. That is why they are spending between $200 and $1,000 a month on child care, per child, to ensure their children get the very best start. The Conservatives ought to listen to these parents. Instead of providing their measly child care benefit, they should invest in universal, regulated public child care. That way they would be helping struggling families and giving children the best chance to succeed.

Make no mistake, families are struggling and are worried. They are worried because they do not know how they are going to make ends meet. They have a mortgage and they are barely able to make payments now. They are afraid of what is going to happen as interest rates rise. They are struggling to save for their retirement. They are struggling with the costs of higher education for their children. As part of the sandwich generation, they are struggling to take care of both their children and elderly parents.

In these difficult economic times, families are looking to the government for a little help just to ride out the storm, but the Prime Minister does not even acknowledge the challenges that hard-working Canadians face. He simply points to soaring bank profits and says that the recession is over. For him, if his banking friends are out of trouble, everyone is out of trouble. I see things differently.

There are 1.5 million Canadians still out of work. Six out of every ten Canadians live paycheque to paycheque. Household debt is at record highs. Life is more expensive than ever, and the HST has only made things worse. For me, the recession is not over until middle-class families are back on their feet. Canadians are in this together and a true recovery cannot leave anyone behind.

Bringing about that middle-class recovery is not just about spending money. There are a number of urgent, concrete steps that the government could have taken without spending a dime.

The government can and must protect Canadian jobs from foreign takeovers before they approve such buyouts. Once the purchase is approved, there is little the government can do to ensure that job and production levels are maintained. Due diligence must happen at the front-end. U.S. Steel's purchase of Stelco is a poignant example of what happens when the government fails to take job protection seriously.

Second, the government can and must help the innocent victims of this recession by ensuring that EI is expanded and extended. Successive Liberal and Conservative governments stole $57 billion out of the EI fund and used it to pay down their deficits. It was not their money. It accumulated solely from contributions made by workers and their employers. Workers have a right to the insurance they paid for and it is time for the government to do right by unemployed Canadians.

Third, the government can and must take on the big banks to halt the outrageous credit card interest rates. Canada is experiencing record numbers for household debt, $1.41 trillion, or $41,740 per person. That is the highest level of debt-to-financial assets ratio in the OECD, surpassing even Greece and the United States. The government can, and must, ease that burden and it would not cost a dime.

However then, the Conservatives are much more concerned about their friends in the banking sector than they are about hard-working Canadians. How else could one possibly explain that the very banks that posted profits in excess of $15 billion in the first three-quarters of 2010 received an additional tax cut of $645 million from their Conservative friends? Surely that money would have been better spent on supporting decent family-sustaining jobs, investing in blue/green industries and extending the stimulus commitments that were made to cities so that desperately needed urban infrastructure renewal would not end up on property tax bills. That would require the government to choose people over profits, and that just is not in the Conservatives' DNA.

Despite all the rhetoric, elderly Canadians are not on the government's priority list either. In fact, the Conservatives consistently put shameless self-promotion ahead of seniors.

The Conservatives spent $1.3 billion for a 72-hour photo op at the G8-G20 summits. That included $1 million for a fake lake, $300,000 for a gazebo and bathrooms that were 20 kilometres away from the summit site, $400,000 for bug spray and sunscreen, over $300,000 for luxury furniture and $14,000 for glow sticks. The Conservatives would want us to believe that such is the price of hosting events on the world stage, but the security cost of the G8 in Italy was $124 million in 2009. The year before it cost $280 million in Japan. It cost $124 million in Germany.

Once again, it is about choices. For just over half of what it cost to host the G8-G20 in Canada this summer, we could have improved the guaranteed income supplement so no Canadian senior would have to live in poverty. The remaining $600 million would still have been higher than the expenditures on any other summit. Clearly, the Conservatives' claim of being fiscally responsible is not borne out by reality.

There are dozens of other examples, but just let me conclude with one other.

Out-of-pocket spending on prescription drugs in our country is now more than 70% higher than it was in 1992. Canadian households are spending over $3 billion a year on prescribed medications. Seniors, in particular, are enduring financial hardship because of soaring drug costs. That means our health care system is no longer truly universal.

Instead of investing in a national pharmacare program, the Conservatives chose to spend $5.6 billion on bribing Ontario and B.C. to implement the HST. That just adds insult to injury. Not only do seniors still carry the growing cost of their medications, but they now have to come up with additional money to pay the HST on everything from haircuts to home heating. Even funerals are no longer exempt. How does the government expect seniors to make ends meet when everything goes up except their incomes?

The Conservatives have made their choices and acted on their priorities, but they are not choices that seniors can afford. For me, that makes them the wrong choices. It is time to say “enough is enough”. It is time to put seniors first.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the speech of my colleague from Hamilton Mountain was well-researched speech. I thank her for contrasting the choices that the government has made with respect to this budget.

Those choices include the billion dollars plus for the 72-hour G8-G20 meetings versus taking care of seniors and children in poverty. If there is any two groups of Canadians that we should be most attuned to, it would be those two, particularly the young folks as the choices were not made by them. They were born into certain circumstances.

The question I have is around the HST. I think a lot of folks listening and watching might not understand the perverse logic of how this tax came to be from the government.

Talks were initiated by the Conservatives in Ottawa to both Ontario and then later British Columbia because the government was running the largest deficit in Canadian history. The government borrowed money, more than $5 billion, to bribe Ontario and British Columbia to raise taxes on those same taxpayers.

I wonder if the hon. member can follow the logical stream in this from a so-called Conservative government, a government that was supposed to be interested in reducing taxes and reducing debt in our country.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if governments had theme songs, the Conservative government's theme song would be Takin' Care of Business, because the HST surely only benefits the biggest corporations.

The member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley talked about the negative impact on hard-working families, and he is absolutely right. Families that are already trying to make ends meets, whose budgets are already stretched beyond belief, cannot possibly pay for the additional HST on basics such as home heating, hair cuts, recreation fees and arena rentals.

However, it is not just families that are hurting. Small businesses, and we do not talk about those nearly enough in the House, are also negatively impacted by the HST. The government says that it is all about helping big business, but what about the real engine of the Canadian economy? Those are small businesses. Think about the people who are providing taxi services, who are running restaurants, who are providing services such as cleaning services to offices. All those folks now have to charge the HST and all those restaurants have to charge the HST to people whose budgets are already stretched.

The government's priorities are completely misguided, and I thank the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley for pointing that out so eloquently.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is very important to have a quick review of who receives and who does not.

As we approach Remembrance Week, I am struck by the fact that there is a great deal of lip service given to support for veterans, who are also seniors. I was struck by the member's comments in terms of the cost of prescription drugs. We know that seniors are, by and large, the greatest consumers of prescription drugs. What solution does she see for the high cost of that?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is absolutely no doubt on this side of the House that what Canada desperately needs is a universal pharmacare program. I spoke about that a bit in my speech, and I would be happy to go on at length. I do though want to get to her other comments about veterans.

One of the national disgraces, frankly, for all of us should be the fact that at the end of this week, on November 6, veterans will take to the streets. They are protesting at members of Parliament's offices because of the abysmal treatment they are getting from the Conservative government. The government pays lip service to the great job that our troops are doing, both past and present. However, when it comes to respecting the soldiers who have come home, who have served their country with dignity and courage, nobody is there to help them, first to readjust but second to deal fundamentally with the most important health issues they are likely ever to face in their lives.

Veterans are now taking to the streets and protesting, and that is fundamentally wrong. In this week, as we lead up to Remembrance Day, I hope the Conservative government will rethink its strategies with respect to paying respect to veterans and do it not just with lip service, but actually put programs in place to give meaningful support to all of Canada's veterans.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the second piece of budget legislation, Bill C-47, sustaining Canada's economic recovery act.

Sustaining Canada's economic recovery has to be the most important issue before Parliament today for all Canadians. The current Conservative government would tell Canadians that Canada is in shipshape in comparison to other countries around the world, and yet, when I look at my riding of Random—Burin—St. George's in Newfoundland and Labrador to evaluate the success and stability of Canada's economic recovery, it is not encouraging at all.

Small communities are facing many challenges today with limited employment opportunities, aging and insufficient infrastructure and few alternatives for young people to establish careers in their home communities.

Regardless of reports of economic recovery, these continue to be difficult times for rural Canadians and for rural communities.

It was in July that Canadians saw the economy start to falter and an indication that Canada's economic growth was not as rosy as the government would have Canadians believe. Consumer confidence has now declined for four straight months. It is foolhardy to ignore that Canada's economy remains vulnerable. We need to ensure measures are taken that will ensure long-term stability and growth, and not a short-term quick fix that will leave us in a worse position in the near future.

The recession hit Newfoundland and Labrador hard. The province suffered the second largest increase in unemployment in Canada. The unemployment rate in Newfoundland and Labrador rose from 13.8% in October 2008 to 17% in October 2009, which was the highest in Canada at that time. Canada's unemployment rate is 2% higher today than it was when the federal Conservative government was elected just over two years ago. Unfortunately, the full-time jobs that were lost are now being replaced by part-time work.

Families have had no choice but to depend on the employment insurance program, particularly the best 14 weeks' project, which calculates benefits based on the highest 14 weeks of earnings. While I am pleased that the government decided to extend these employment insurance pilot projects after many appeals to do so, what Canadians want are long-term jobs. In the meantime, these pilot projects are vital for the seasonal industries that are found across the small communities throughout Random—Burin—St. George's and throughout our country. The short-term nature of the extension of the pilot projects leaves one to wonder whether the Conservative government really appreciates the tentative nature of Canada's economic recovery.

Rural Canadians have specific needs that cannot be ignored in building Canada's future prosperity. We cannot leave rural Canadians behind. Unfortunately, our rural communities are underserviced by the Conservative government. Services, such as high-speed Internet connections, expanded cellphone coverage and local postal service are essential to enable communities to connect to one another and to the world.

Rural communities are being left behind because of a lack of access to basic services. The Conservative government has divided communities into haves and have nots based upon where people live. Something as accessible for some as broadband Internet service is taken for granted in the large urban centres and 80% of Canada. However, for many of the people I represent, high-speed Internet is not a reality and it poses a substantial hurdle for economic growth.

One indicator of a strong economy is ensuring Canadians have access to the tools needed to move ahead and be gainfully employed. Education is one of the keys to providing these tools. Unfortunately, in rural communities, students who do not have access to high-speed Internet are at a disadvantage. There are courses they cannot access that are readily available to students at urban centres. They are disadvantaged because of where they live and yet they live in Canada.

The Liberal Party of Canada believes that economic opportunity and a high quality of life can be achieved in all regions and is committed to tackling the rural-urban divide.

Too many Canadians are leaving rural communities because they cannot find jobs or do not have access to essential services, like Internet and education, and even basic services like banking and mail service.

Canada's economy is increasingly linked through the Internet. As jobs, education, and communication become more dependent upon the Internet, Canadians without Internet access or Internet skills will be left behind.

Internet business opportunities are compromised without high-speed Internet. Opportunities to market products globally do not exist without high-speed Internet and access to education resources is greatly hindered by our lack of high-speed Internet services.

It is imperative that the Conservative government take a look at the issues in rural Canada, like rural broadband, and work toward a plan for nationwide high-speed Internet to give every community the essential resources to work toward Canada's economic recovery, instead of relying on an economic stimulus plan which one would have to question just how effective it was since consumer confidence has been steadily declining since July.

Of course, the government points to its $200 million broadband strategy as proof of doing something about access to broadband for Canadians. This is the same government that is willing to spend $16 billion on jet fighters without an open competition, which Alan Williams, the former assistant deputy minister in the Department of National Defence, says would save 20% if we had an open competition, and in this case that would be $3 billion. On can just imagine what could be accomplished in terms of connecting Canadians to high-speed Internet with just the savings that would be realized by holding an open competition for the fighter jets.

Then, of course, there is the $10 billion that is being spent on prisons, and the list goes on.

Bill C-47 raises the issue of pensions. We have been pressing the government to bring forward meaningful pension reform to make retirement easier and more secure. We called for three specific pension reforms: a supplementary Canada pension plan to give Canadians the option of saving more for retirement; allowing employees with stranded or abandoned pensions following bankruptcy, the option of growing their pension assets through the Canada pension plan; and protecting vulnerable Canadians on long-term disability by giving them preferred status as creditors in bankruptcy.

Canada is aging. One-third of Canadians lack the savings to maintain their standard of living after retirement and the same number again have no retirement savings at all. Today's pension crisis cannot be ignored and should not be ignored but the Conservative government has continuously failed to delivered on its promise to introduce pension reform.

The fiscal record of the Conservative government is cause for concern for all Canadians. Canada was in an enviable financial position with a healthy $13 billion surplus when the Conservative government took over in 2006. The Conservatives abandoned prudent measures that were built into the federal budget under Liberal leadership and spent the cupboard bare, plunging Canada into a deficit before the recession even hit.

The finance minister continues to lead the government on a spending spree with taxpayer money. The Conservative government's economic record is nothing to boast about. Spending ballooned by 18% between 2006-08, putting Canada into a deficit position even before the recession began in the fall of 2008.

Even today, with a deficit of $55.6 billion, nearly $2 billion higher than projected just last spring, the Conservative government remains determined, as I mentioned earlier, to waste billions on megaprisons, untendered stealth fighters and unaffordable tax breaks for large corporations.

What Canada needs is an economic plan that puts the needs of Canadian families first with strategic investments in health and family care, pensions, learning and jobs, and global leadership.

I know families in my riding are not in a better position economically as a result of the investments by the government. What I hear from them is that they are not better off after Conservative budgets. They are worried about making ends meet, whether it is finding or paying for child care, looking after sick or aging loved ones, paying for their children's post-secondary education or simply saving enough to retire.

Recently, the Liberal opposition shared its family care plan with Canadians and the government. In fact, we encourage the government to run with our plan because it would mean better services for Canadian families. The Liberal family care plan recognizes the important contribution of family caregivers and would invest $1 billion in a six month family care employment insurance benefit and a new family care tax plan.

Not only is the Liberal plan the right plan for Canadian families, it is a way to contain health costs by making it possible for Canadians who are sick to stay at home and be cared for by family members. The smart thing for the government to do would be to snap up the idea and support the 2.7 billion Canadians who are providing care for seniors. Unfortunately, the Conservative government has different priorities.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Random—Burin—St. George's spelled out fairly well how the government is really a borrow and spend government that has driven us into the biggest deficit in Canadian history. It also has the record for the biggest spending budget in Canadian history.

The member mentioned rural Canada. Both of us are from rural Canada and we think it is extremely important to build the economy in that area. In my province of Prince Edward Island, ACOA, which is supposed to be a regional development agency, has, in the last couple of years, become a home of political patronage for friends of the government, instead of being a home to people who really want to attract business and do the economic projects to draw people in so as to boost that rural economy.

I wonder if the member could tell me what her experience has been in Newfoundland and Labrador relative to regional development. Is it happening under the government or is it not?

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Mr. Speaker, there certainly is a need for agencies like ACOA, FedNor and the list goes on. Unfortunately, these agencies must take their leadership from the government of the day, which tends to happen in most bureaucracies.

There are people who are committed at the ACOA level and at any of these funding agencies, but when they look at the leadership, at the priorities and where the emphasis is being put by a government, they must determine whether the money available to them to spend in regions is in fact being spent according to the priorities of the government of the day.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question of principle for my colleague and it is a question surrounding the HST, which has different implications in different provinces.

Last month, the NDP member for Welland asked the government to remove the HST from the sale of poppies. While seeming like a small thing, the sale of poppies actually helps out legions which use the sale as their chief fundraiser throughout the year. As it turns out now, about $375,000 will be going back because, after some pressure, the government relented and is taking the HST off the sale of poppies.

The government's argument leading up to this decision was that it was unable to remove the HST from certain items. Since that has now been proven wrong, would there not be some value in the government taking another look at its increased taxation policy and removing the HST from things that Canadians see as essential, like home heating, as the Government in Nova Scotia has done, because Canadians simply do not have a choice when spending the money?

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Mr. Speaker, this goes back to getting our priorities right. The member is absolutely right about home heating. Seniors, for example, who cannot afford the cost of home heating and the cost of their medications, will have to sit down with their friends at a shopping mall in order to keep warm during the winter months.

This is about priorities. The whole idea of paying HST on poppies shows no respect for those who have worked so hard and who sacrificed so much on behalf of Canadians.

This goes back to what is important to Canadian families, not what is important to large corporations, especially at a time when it is unaffordable. Canada has the lowest taxation policy with respect to corporations compared to the U.S. and other countries, and that is thanks to a previous Liberal government, but it was at a time when we could afford to make tax cuts.

When we are looking at budgeting, we need to take the issues and concerns of Canadian families into account.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance recently announced that Canada is facing a record deficit of $55.6 billion. I am always amazed that this government has no problem spending billions of dollars on the G20 and its fake lake, on the F-35 fighter jets—which might not even be the right plane and are definitely too expensive—and on an action plan that has not created any long-term jobs and that now, because of the deadlines, threatens to eliminate assistance for some people. These are all expenditures that do not provide any economic stability. It has to be seen to be believed.

Not only does this government spend money irresponsibly, but it also makes cuts in important sectors. This summer, the Conservative government made cuts to youth initiatives and community programs. For example, in the riding of Papineau—the riding I am honoured to represent—funding for Canada summer jobs was cut by $8,000 compared to last year. Although it may not seem significant, the cuts nevertheless translated into unemployment for four or five young people who otherwise would have been helping community organizations during the summer. A significant number of jobs subsidized by Canada summer jobs consist of counsellor positions for summer camps. The loss of five counsellors affects almost a hundred children and teenagers, as well as their parents.

This very government that makes heartless cuts, proudly announced an investment of several hundred million dollars in youth programs in its recent budget. Why, then, did they cut the funding for Papineau's young people? Perhaps we will find an answer if we take a look at Conservative ridings. However, without even looking elsewhere, we have always known that our young people are not much of a priority for this government. That is why I believe it is clear that the recent budget is filled with gimmicks and has no vision for galvanizing our young Quebeckers.

Our youth today believe in the environment and in our culture. They desire the jobs of tomorrow. Unfortunately, there is nothing in this budget for culture. There was nothing, not even a mention of the word “culture”. Words can be very revealing.

There is nothing about climate change or renewable energy. After embarrassing us on the world stage on several occasions with their inaction on climate change, the Conservatives continue to ignore this issue in the 2010 budget, which contains no new climate change initiatives. This is also the case for investments in renewable energy, a sector that other countries are developing and spending money on.

The government does what it likes: it cuts economic development. A weakened Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec, which could have helped create local jobs over the years, has been allocated a paltry $29 million over two years in the 2010 budget.

This is unbelievable and frustrating. The Conservatives have us $55.6 billion in deficit after a decade of surplus budgets under the Liberals. The Conservatives managed to put Canada into deficit even before the global recession hit, by increasing government spending by 18% in their first three budgets. They are the biggest spending government in Canadian history.

However, it is okay, because even though we have reached a record high deficit, they have a plan. Somewhere down the line, five years from now, everything will be back to zero deficits. I hope you will forgive me, Mr. Speaker, if I do not leap to believe that.

This is a promise from the same people who in the last election talked about a government that would not run a deficit, period, while they were busy running a deficit. Yet since then, their track record of waste has steadily piled up: a record $130 million on shameless, self-promoting advertising; $1.3 billion for a 72-hour G8 and G20 photo op, spending on everything from the fake lake to glow sticks; $10 billion to $13 billion announced on American-style megaprisons to lock up unreported criminals as the crime rate declines; $16 billion on a bad deal for stealth fighters awarded without competition or guaranteed jobs for Canadian industry; and $20 billion in corporate tax breaks that we cannot afford.

Budget 2010 failed to address the real economic challenges facing Canadian families, like record household debt, the rising cost of education and home care, pension security and the loss of 200,000 full-time jobs. The Conservative record of waste and mismanagement does not reflect the priorities of Canadians. This borrow-and-spend Conservative government has got to come to a stop.

That is why a couple of weeks ago the Liberal Party presented an economic plan that will reduce the economic pressures facing middle-class Canadian families. Canadians have a choice between our economic track record of fiscal responsibility and a plan to make strategic investments and lasting economic legacies, or the Conservatives who spent Canada into deficit before the recession and want to waste billions more on prisons, untendered stealth fighters and tax breaks for the largest corporations.

The Liberals will ease the economic pressures on Canadian families with strategic investments in health and family care, pensions, learning, jobs and global leadership. We need to ensure that Canadians have the means to make ends meet. We need to help our single parents and our modern parents find and pay for early learning and child care.

We need to be there for our young people, to help them get the degrees they need to be able to compete for the jobs of tomorrow. We do that by supporting their post-secondary education. We said it time and time again over the summer as we crossed the country that if students get the grades, they should get to go.

Our investments in the learning economy, in the knowledge economy, in the capacity of Canadians to participate fully in building the jobs of the future and making sure Canada continues to be a world leader on economic terms and in terms of modelling the kinds of solutions the planet needs mean we have to invest in our young people.

We also have to invest in our seniors, because the work they did to bring us to this place means that we do not simply need to marginalize them and allow them to suffer in silence. We need to make sure that they are living well, that they have the support of family members when they go through difficult times. These are things that are addressed by the Liberal proposals but ignored in the Conservative budget.

We have presented a balanced and fiscally responsible economic plan, and all the finance minister could offer was a vitriolic attack on the opposition. As a country we got through the worst of the recession, thanks to the Chrétien-Martin legacy of balanced budgets compared to the Conservatives legacy as the biggest borrowing, biggest spending government in Canadian history.

The priorities of this place need to be Canadian families first with strategic economic investments while reducing the Conservatives' record deficit. We will help our young people be the leaders we need them to be. We will face the challenges awaiting us around our 150th birthday seven years from now together.

Our capacity to pull together as a nation only happens when we start looking at the long term and investing in the capacity of individuals to contribute to their families, their communities and their country. That is where a government is strong, when we are enabling individuals to become full participants in our society.

The Conservatives like to talk a lot about enabling individual success, letting people succeed on their own with no need for government interference, but what we actually see is that people need a boost so they can get to a place where they can contribute and shape their future, strengthen their communities and care for their families.

We have a country that is extraordinarily wealthy in so many different ways. We need to make sure we are leveraging that wealth into allowing individuals to achieve their full potential and contribute in their very best ways to the world around them.

We can no longer survive on the laissez faire approach of a government that does not believe in government and sets out to make everyone else believe less in government by its mistakes, misspending, short-term ideology and attacks and aggression toward anyone who disagrees with it.

The government expects Canadians to fend for themselves even during one of the most brutal, jobless economic recoveries we have seen in generations. Our families deserve better. Our seniors deserve better. Canadians deserve better.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, when we look at other so-called developed countries around the world, usually categorized in the OECD as western economic developed countries, and try to find another country that has no national housing strategy, a developed federal government, a so-called western power that has neglected to have any kind of a plan or a strategy around housing needs within its country, we find that Canada is the only one.

It is strange to me that the Conservatives have obsessed about a national prison strategy. They are going to spend billions on that. I am wondering if that is meant in a sense to take the place of a national housing strategy. The government sees anybody who may be homeless or who is threatened with homeless as near to somebody who should be in jail.

The Conservatives are willing to spend billions on that and nothing on national housing, nothing to help Canadians who are facing a housing crisis get a roof over their heads.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting to note that the member represents a riding on the very west coast of the country, very far from my riding of Papineau, and the concerns faced by citizens in both of our ridings are very much the same.

The need for affordable housing in Papineau is greater than it has ever been before. It is the number one thing I hear of when I talk to low and middle income families, single mothers and aging seniors who are worried about keeping a roof over their heads as the months and years go by. The fact that Canada does not have a national housing strategy is a real shame.

There is another area that that impacts as well. I recently spoke with a number of experts in immigration, and in resettlement and integration, in my capacity as immigration critic for the Liberal Party, and two elements that came back that would help new arrivals the greatest were a national housing strategy, giving them opportunities to settle and contribute from a point of stability, and a national strategy on public transit, on which we also do not have a pan-Canadian outlook.

I thank the member for bringing up that point, and I agree with him on the need for a national housing strategy.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I was listening with interest to the member opposite's comments. I understand that he voted for the budget that he just pilloried, so he either voted for the budget because it was expedient to do so or perhaps because he thought it was good at the time that he voted and then he changed his mind.

I would just like to ask the member to consider maybe breaking through and transcending the encrusted tradition of criticizing because one is in opposition and finding something good to say about what he voted for, and then perhaps the credibility would be greater when he criticizes.

[Justin Trudeau, Liberal, Papineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal Party supported the budget because we believed a lot of what the Conservative government had to say. We had some concerns about some of the directions and some of the decisions that were taken within the budget, but we agreed that Canada needed to spend, to invest in things.

We have to establish something important. There is nothing inherently wrong with a deficit, with borrowing money, if we invest it wisely in a way that is going to give us returns, as individuals or as a society, a few years down the line. Our problem with this budget, as we have seen how it has unfolded, is that the partisanship involved in the decisions made and the focus on short-term, electorally pleasing expenditures rather than long-term investing in social infrastructure, for example, have left us weaker than we should be for the amount of money Canadians poured into stimulus to recover from this global recession.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, this is a good debate because we are able to talk about many things that impact on Canadians and how the government implements what we believe to be a misguided budget, a budget that loses out on opportunities.

Unfortunately, for almost 15 years the riding I represent in northwestern British Columbia has been experiencing a steady decline in some of the foundational elements of its economy especially in the resource sector, including fishing, forestry, mining. As well there is a lack of creation of the next economy. It is to that issue I put my mind when determining whether or not this budget deserves support. Is this budget preparing us for the next economy, not just in Skeena—Bulkley Valley in the northwest of B.C., but right across rural and urban Canada?

On many different levels, I question the choices that were made in this budget. This budget will be running the highest deficit in Canadian history. The government will be borrowing money to spend on a number of things which many Canadians have great concerns about or feel are deeply flawed. Opportunities lost may be a better name for this budget, rather than the spin the PMO came up with.

The numbers do not lie. Canadians are experiencing more household debt. Canadians are borrowing more money per person than ever in our history. Adjusted for inflation, adjusted for real term dollars, Canadians are more indebted than ever before. Canadians are borrowing increasingly larger amounts of money for mortgages. They owe more on their Visa cards and lines of credit. All of this is a stop-gap measure. People do not want to borrow money. They do not want to have to take out such large mortgages, but the reality is there is a housing bubble and increased costs and spending.

Governments often take credit for things they have had nothing to do with and they also get blamed for things they had nothing to do with. However, there are some things about which I question the government on its choices.

Child poverty is an important indicator for all of us, regardless of political persuasion or stripe. We have seen it grow from 9.5% to more than 12% in this country. That number does not lie. More and more children are living in poverty now than when this government took office. While the Conservatives cannot be held accountable for all of it, the Conservatives must recognize that their policies, to this point, if they were designed to alleviate child poverty, are failing. Child poverty could go up by as much as 30% in this country and the government would pat itself on the back. That is unconscionable.

Members on the opposite side care about the issue, but they do not care enough to push their own cabinet, their own finance minister to change the dial on some of the government's choices. More than a billion dollars went toward the 72-hour G8 and G20 summits. The government lauded Canada for earning its place on the world stage and then weeks later, for the first time ever, was voted down for a seat on the UN Security Council. It was the first time Canada ever asked for one and did not receive it. So much for Canada's place on the world stage. We blew more money on the G8 and G20 summits than any other country that has hosted the summits and any country that is about to host the summits. We have seen the budget numbers come in from Korea and other places, and other countries are spending 10% to 15% of what the Conservative government spent over three days.

This is not the Conservative government a lot of its supporters voted for. It was pointed out earlier that in the first three years of taking office, the Conservatives increased public spending more than any other government in 30 years. Before the recession, before the downturn in the economy, before the stimulus spending, those guys were spending on things that were not contributing to the long-term sustainability of this country.

It is a government that has turned the tool of a tax cut into an obsession. Tax cuts can be very useful in doing certain things in the economy at certain times in certain places. It has been said that if all one has is a hammer, every problem will start to look like a nail. The government truly believes there is not a problem in the universe for which a tax cut is not the automatic and only answer.

As a former small business person I will argue that tax cuts can help if they are strategic and intelligent, and if they fit in with some larger strategy, but if we rank the top five priorities for a struggling business, the taxes being paid is not number one. It is the ease of doing business, the ability to do business, to have a market. It is the ability to get qualified and trained employees on a regular basis. These are the concerns of businesses.

Recently I spoke with the owner of a small business in Terrace, British Columbia. The fellow owns Checkers Pizza. He has done a fantastic job building his business. He is dealing with the HST right now. Just in the time the HST has been in, he figures it has cost him more than $15,000. It prohibits him from hiring staff and expanding his business.

The way the HST was set up helps his competitors that are a chain. His business is not part of a chain; he is a single operator of a business. He has to charge HST on all of the products that he gets in because they are locally sourced, which is what we want. We want businesses to buy locally. However, his competitors have all their processed ingredients for pizza and whatnot brought in and they are able to pass on the cost of the HST. He cannot as a small business operator and it is killing him. It is absolutely frustrating for him. He would likely be a conservative-minded person. He is fiscally prudent and he is socially conservative. However, he is so frustrated with the government because it does not pay attention to the most fundamental and basic principles of business and it is hurting him.

We also know that the government has borrowed $20 billion over time for tax cuts that went to companies that simply make no difference in their hiring policies because of them.

We saw the banks earn record profits even in the midst of a recession. They dipped for a moment but came raging back. Those profits were not being put back into the company. They were cutting staff at the same time.

We saw this with the oil companies which received more support from the government than companies in any other oil producing nation. With respect to companies drilling for oil in other countries around the world, it does not matter whether we are talking about Iraq, Iran, Venezuela and Nigeria, our government gives more subsidies than any other country.

These same companies will be at the finance committee this afternoon asking for more, which I suppose is their right, but common sense and decency indicate that the government should refuse them, and say that enough is enough. At the same time as handing out more than $2 billion in subsidies to the tar sands alone, the government was cutting the eco-energy program for average Canadians to retrofit their homes, to spend less of their money on heating their homes, to put less greenhouse gases into the atmosphere if people were heating with a fossil fuel.

This makes no sense as our competitors are ramping up efficiency. The United States, Europe, Australia and the Far East are spending taxpayer money on making their economies, their industries, their individuals more efficient, not less efficient. We do not need to subsidize the tar sands. The Exxons and Shells are doing fine. They are doing better than fine.

Where we need help is for low income seniors who are struggling to pay next month's heating bill. The government needs to give them a small bit of support to help them put more insulation into the walls of their home, to get better windows and a better heating source so that they will pay less for their heating. A byproduct of that is it contributes less pollution.

We have been waiting for the green energy revolution in this country for a long time. In northwestern British Columbia oil companies that want to push risky projects are lining up. Enbridge wants to run 1,200 kilometres of pipeline across mountains and rivers all across northern B.C. and put supertankers into the water on the west coast. It has all sorts of support from the government. The government kicked in $30 million for a program to train people to build a pipeline for three months.

We want real job training and real support for the green energy projects. Business folks come to my office all the time. They are revolutionizing the forestry sector. They talk about bio-coal, wood pellets and changing the way we do forestry which is long overdue. When they look to the government for equivalent support that the government is giving to the oil and gas sector, there is nothing. These business people are conservatively minded. They want to make a go of their businesses but they want fair treatment. What they see across the border in the U.S. is a completely unfair playing field. The Americans are actually supporting these industries.

The most perverse logic we see in the budget and from the government is the concept that the government borrowed more than $5 billion to cut cheques to the governments of Ontario and British Columbia in effect to bribe them to raise the taxes on their own citizens with the implementation of the HST. In British Columbia in particular, we saw a government that was entirely duplicitous in negotiations with the federal Conservative government for months. There was an election and within hours of the election being over, it foisted the HST on its citizens.

Thankfully the people of British Columbia have recall legislation. The people of British Columbia are standing up and threatening the government. They are asking it to rescind the HST. We were able to push the federal government to do it on the Royal Canadian Legion's poppies. The government should take the HST off of essentials. As it did with the poppies to help our veterans, the government should take the HST off such things as home heating to help everyone.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague has a beautiful riding from what I understand. My niece is a teacher in his riding, in the community of Kitkatla.

If we look at the current situation and all the points the member has made about the misgivings of this particular government, there is no doubt they are there. The expression he used was “opportunity lost”. He brought up a valid point. When I think about opportunity lost, I think about pensions first and foremost and just how we seem to be on the edge of a new way of doing pensions across the country.

For example, my riding is probably a lot like his. People in the trades travel a lot in this type of environment. They go to Alberta, Saskatchewan, Africa, Russia, especially countries in the oil and gas sector. What is one of the things he would do to help people who are not with a particular company?

Where is the opportunity lost for the Conservatives to make meaningful changes or perhaps some new legislation regarding pensions to allow people who move from company to company or country to country to find the income they need to replace their current income when they decide to retire?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek who is observing the debate today has done an incredible job getting out and talking to folks facing the pension crisis which is upon us right now in Canada. It is a storm that has been brewing for many years.

The government can choose to hide its head in the sand on this issue, but if the Prime Minister actually has any of the credentials that he claims to have as an economist, he will know for a fact, undeniably, that if we do not address this issue now, the generation presently moving into retirement and generations in the next 10 or 20 years, the Canada pension plan will not be there for them.

We have seen with our European friends that public pensions are becoming more movable. Pensions that accrue with one company can be transferred to another company. As my hon. friend says, we have similar ridings in the sense that professional people move around in the trades. They need to be able to take their pensions with them. There are small tax adjustments the government could make to allow that or insist that companies not dump their pension programs. The government has to start funding pension programs. When it came to providing $18 billion for jets or lifting seniors out of poverty, the government chose the jets.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask my colleague about the HST in British Columbia. He and I travel back and forth all the time and we still hear a lot about the HST from folks in British Columbia. It is not very popular out there, which is probably not a surprise to anybody in this corner of the House. What is surprising is that nobody responsible for bringing in the HST wants to take responsibility for it. Nobody wants to say whose idea it was or that it was a good idea.

In Ottawa I hear that it was Premier Campbell and the B.C. Liberals that are responsible for the HST. In British Columbia, I hear it is the Prime Minister and the Conservative government that are responsible for the HST. The reality is that it was a big group effort. It took federal Conservatives, federal Liberals and provincial B.C. Liberals to bring us the HST.

I am wondering if my colleague could say why it is that nobody will take ownership of this idea. Why do they blame it on somebody else?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am going to get the expression wrong but it is something to the effect that victory has a thousand fathers but failure has none. The HST has proven to be not just a political failure but an economic failure. Business owners are saying this is a tax shift. All that has happened is that large multinational corporations actually do quite well and did as of July 1 when the HST came in, but small and medium size local businesses are getting hammered, never mind the consumer who is paying more tax.

The Conservatives clearly came up with the idea. They promoted the idea and budgeted for it and the federal Liberals supported it and voted for it. To blame their provincial cousins or to say it is a provincial issue entirely is simply wrong and not true. If they think it is such a good idea, then they should own it, be proud of it and campaign on it. I dare them. They will not say a word about it in the next federal election, not in British Columbia or Ontario.

[Lise Zarac, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in its sixth report to Canadians on the economic action plan, the government itself admits that economic growth remains fragile and that too many Canadians are still unemployed.

During a meeting held in Toronto in June, leaders of the G20 countries agreed that stimulation measures should continue to be implemented in order to strengthen the economic recovery. I will provide examples of the astronomical amounts of public money wasted on this event later in my speech. Yet, the Conservative government is refusing to push back the deadline for the infrastructure program, which ends on March 31, 2011. Numerous projects are at risk of not being completed.

According to their own data on page 8 of the economic action plan, more than 2% of the projects have not yet begun, just months before the end of the program. Do I need to remind the Minister of Finance that we live in Canada, that there are four seasons in the year, including winter, which begins on December 21 and ends on March 20, leaving little time to complete projects that are not yet finished? In addition, this government has shown no transparency.

Still on page 8 of its economic action plan, the government does not even dare mention how many projects have been completed. The information it has provided is not black and white. It says that 97% of the projects are under way or completed. Are they under way or are they completed?

A government with transparent management would have clearly stated how many projects were finished to date and how many were still under way. If this government is actively managing the implementation of its economic action plan, as it claims to be doing, why is it not sharing this information and extending the work deadline in order to really allow economic recovery to take root?

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives and the finance minister are trying to take credit for Canada being able to sustain itself and do better than other countries of the G7 during the economic crisis. What the Minister of Finance fails to tell Canadians is that Canada was able to buffer the economic crisis due to the Liberals not allowing bank mergers and putting in strict financial controls so we would not have a sub-prime mortgage type of crisis. Prime Minister Jean Chrétien and Paul Martin ensured that the CPP was funded for 75 years.

What did the current finance minister do? Remember the introduction of the 40-year mortgage with no down payment? Remember trying to create the sub-prime mortgage scenario? Remember trying to raid CPP to pay for his boutique-type tax cuts? The fact is, the opposition stopped the finance minister.

Instead of taking credit for fiscal management, it is high time the Conservatives take a long hard look in the mirror and realize they are the biggest spenders since Confederation.

They managed to turn the $13 billion surplus that the Liberals accumulated through sound fiscal management into a deficit of more than $56 billion.

I would now like to go over some examples of how the Conservative government has wasted public money. In addition to spending billions of dollars on partisan promotional signs, the government demonstrated lack of judgment when it spent $1.9 million to build a fake lake in the Toronto media centre. That is just one-fifth of the $1.2 billion spent on the G20 and G8 summits. Money spent needlessly on a backdrop could have been used for social housing, for better community services, for job creation and to get people back on their feet so they can retire.

What about spending $16 billion on an untendered contract for F-35s? Is that responsible? How many taxpayers' dollars could it have saved by calling for tenders? Why is this government refusing to invest in Canadian companies? How many jobs will this cost Canadians?

During the worst recession in decades, and at a time when Canadians are having a hard time taking care of sick loved ones, saving for retirement and paying for their children's studies, the borrow-and-spend Conservatives have spent the last four years wasting billions of taxpayers' dollars. Since coming to power in 2006, the Conservatives have spent $94 billion on contracts for professional and special services, which is $2.2 billion more than the previous Liberal government.

The situation keeps getting worse. The public accounts show that there was a $1 billion increase last year in contracts for special services. This represents a total of $10.4 billion. We also see that the Prime Minister spent almost $7 million of taxpayers' money in just one year so that he and his assistants could travel around the world. Recently the government sent the largest delegation ever to the Sommet de la Francophonie, which was held in Switzerland. The Prime Minister has increased his office's budget by 30% over the past two years to nearly $10 million annually.

His ministers have also spent more money, or 16% more annually, even though they keep saying they are committed to tightening their belts to help lower the Conservatives record deficit of more than $56 billion. The total costs for ministers in 2009-10 reached $67.6 million, compared to $59.3 million the year before. That is what they call tightening their belts. If the Conservatives continue such outrageous spending, they will not be able to fasten their belts.

Last week when the Liberals questioned the outrageous spending, the government leader in the House was quick to defend the Prime Minister saying that the Prime Minister had an important responsibility to communicate with Canadians and that there were fair and reasonable costs associated with that. We agree with him that the Prime Minister has a duty to listen to Canadians, and he should listen to Canadians, and that costs associated should be fair and reasonable, but this is not the case. These costs are outrageous and Canadians are telling the Prime Minister and the finance minister that they have to stop this mismanagement of public funds.

The finance minister is labelled the “architect of deficit” in many economic and financial circles. He has a history of destroying finances. He did it in Ontario. He borrowed money to give tax breaks that left the province with a huge deficit, from which the province is still reeling. Now he wants to steer Canada down that same lane. Canadians need to be told how the finance minister intends on adding further to the deficit by borrowing money to pay for unneeded tax cuts to big businesses to the tune of approximately $6 billion.

I want to close by condemning this government's incompetence when it comes to managing public funds. In 2006, the Conservatives inherited a $13 billion surplus and today they have a $56 billion deficit. What is more, this budget has nothing for seniors, nothing for women, nothing for the homeless, nothing for social housing and nothing for family caregivers.

Canadians deserve better.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question regarding infrastructure.

My colleague from LaSalle—Émard mentioned the deadline and the fact that the government should announce an extension in order to allow municipalities to complete the work. At home, in northern New Brunswick, the next two nights will be plenty cold: between -10^oC and -17^oC. Asphalt needs to be poured and infrastructure needs to be built. After water and sewer pipes have been put down, roads need to be redone. But it is hard to pour asphalt in -10^oC to -17^oC weather. We have to wonder whether we are making a skating rink instead of a road.

Can my colleague from LaSalle—Émard talk about that? Winter may start on December 21, but Canadian reality is catching up to us, and some projects definitely cannot be completed and never will be because winter will be over before the construction season starts up again.

Is this a serious problem?

[Lise Zarac, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question. I would like to take this opportunity to thank him, on behalf of his constituents, for the excellent work he does in his riding.

In fact, I wanted to raise this point in my speech. Winter is just around the corner, and construction comes to a halt at that time. No work is done. Because of the March 31 deadline, numerous projects will not be completed. Municipalities and provinces will not be able to finish the work, which will then be abandoned for lack of funding.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as long as the member has raised it, in my view, the biggest lie in the two budgets was the economic stimulus package for shovel-ready projects, if the member will recall that terminology.

One of the things we have found is that many of these projects in fact have not generated the jobs that were intended. We now have this problem that many of projects have had all the engineering and consulting work done but do not have shovels in ground and they face the possibility of not being completed within the time.

In my view, any project that has been agreed upon by the government, which is being delayed for no reason or for causes outside the control of either of the parties and which would create jobs, should be given the green light to go ahead and be completed.

Would the member like to comment on that?

[Lise Zarac, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his question.

It is true that a lot of projects will not be completed for reasons outside the control of those who are trying to get them done. Since it is outside their control, I think this government is being unfair. A promise is a contract. If the matter goes to court, and one party has suggested that it would pay, it is responsible for the expenses. So the government should be held responsible too.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I was taken aback by part of the member's speech, which I thought was very impressive. We forget to draw links between what was a record established prior to arriving in federal governance. The provincial government in Ontario at the time had all these tremendous tax cuts in order to grow its way out of a deficit position. It did not quite work out in that manner, certainly when it came to corporate tax cuts.

Would the member please comment on that?

[Lise Zarac, Liberal, LaSalle—Émard, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the government is proud to say that it is creating jobs. But I have to wonder whether jobs have really been created with these projects. Furthermore, are the jobs that have been created full-time or part-time? What are the proportions? That is where we might see the government's transparency. When it tells us how many jobs it has created or maintained, it should tell us specifically how many it has maintained, how many it has created, and whether they are temporary or part-time jobs.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak to this important budget bill, Bill C-47. It is another in a continuing series of discussions we are having with the government about what it should be doing to deal with some of our difficult economic realities. Among other things, it should be investing in communities and people, and looking after families that are finding it hard to make ends meet in these difficult times. As jobs continue to be lost or changed in nature, incomes go down, the cost of living continues to increase, and people struggle to keep body and soul together as they attempt to provide their children with support, education, and help with their health care needs.

As we continue this discussion about the budget and the economy, it is important to understand how they connect, and how we as government support communities that are struggling to keep all of their citizens' heads above water. It is important to understand and reflect on what got us where we are today. We need to consider the 2008 collapse of the world's financial sector and understand why it happened.

The government did not recognize the 2008 recession until the opposition on this side of the House made it aware of the problem. Then, all of a sudden, the government began to realize that it needed to respond in a serious way to this economic and financial tsunami that was coming at us.

The cause of this was that we allowed our banking systems, both here and around the world, to continue to be further and further deregulated. Besides the banks, we deregulated a lot of other financial practices. We allowed the ethos of greed and fear to be the driving force behind the decisions made by corporations and governments around the world. Finally, to keep things from getting even worse, governments had to step in and become engaged again.

Deregulation and free trade, which went hand in hand with the deregulation, allowed some corporations to become more powerful and wealthy than many countries. We saw a push towards less government intervention, which is what is now challenging the government of the day. Even though they are great believers in less government intervention, this government was forced to intervene in the economy as never before.

At the same time, we lowered taxes for corporations over and over again, at the provincial and the federal levels. Finally, the government woke up and realized that it had to come to the table with big bags of money to help its friends in the business world to weather these difficult times. But because it had given away so much of the treasury, so much of the capacity of the government to play a role in our economic life, the government had little money left. The result is that we now find ourselves with a huge deficit, and we will be in deficit for a long time to come.

Why are we in the New Democrat caucus speaking so aggressively against this budget today? It is because the government will not be turning these corporate tax breaks around. Instead, the government wants to reduce even further its ability to intervene in the economic affairs of this country.

If we do not stop, take a long look, and do something different, this will be tragic. It will be especially tragic for those who are most at risk and marginalized, and this is the group of people that government has the greatest and most urgent responsibility to help.

For the six years that I have been in this place, and particularly over the last two years since the collapse of the financial world, I have been calling for a national anti-poverty strategy. Six provinces in this country recognize that something significant needs to happen if we are going to deal with the increasing number of people who find themselves unable to make ends meet. Provincial strategies have been put in place. I was in the Northwest Territories a couple of weeks ago, and they are moving on a strategy to deal with poverty.

The provinces are telling us that they will not be able to do all that they have to do. They will not be able to put in place those programs that they know are necessary to lift people up and give them the opportunity to take advantage of the new economy when, a year or two from now, this recession has eased off.

The provinces just do not have the resources, and they are calling on the federal government to be a partner in this effort. They know that we need to move away from this ethos of greed and fear to one of hope and concern for the common good.

Those of us who have been engaged in this exercise over the last three years know that it makes good economic sense to deal with poverty. The choices we make will affect not only our ability to help those who are in difficulty, but also our ability to turn our economy around. Failing to address the problem is costing us in many direct and substantial ways.

We heard from all kinds of people as we travelled the country, getting input on what the federal government should be doing about poverty. They told us the choice is clear: we can pay to address poverty now, or we can wind up paying a lot more for a lot longer.

We pay for poverty through lost productivity, lost opportunity, and increased family violence. We pay for it through the health care system and our criminal justice system. We pay for it through growing demands on an already-frayed social support system. We pay for it through our children's reduced life chances, employment opportunities, and earning capacity.

For the first time in their lives, thousands of families across this country are going into Christmas relying on the good graces of provincial and municipal welfare systems, or what is left of them. People are finding that there is not much to be had.

After the government of the day's 1995 elimination of the Canada assistance plan, the reduction in the transfers to provinces, and the huge rollout of corporate tax breaks, not much was left in the coffers when people came calling in their time of need. People who pay their taxes, work every day, and pay into unemployment insurance are finding as they face this Christmas that the safety net they thought was there has disappeared.

If nothing else, when we consider this budget we should be addressing the difficult reality that is confronting many of our friends and neighbours, our constituents. We need to deal with the question of poverty in this country.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the question the member raised has come up often in the finance committee, namely, whether we need to cut back right across the board, without differentiating, whether we ought to try to grow out of this now, and make it up later on.

Some of the groups from the poverty coalition came before us and reminded us of the pain caused during an economic downturn. They told us how difficult recovery can be for those who had nothing in the first place. I tend to agree with my colleague.

I wonder if the member would like to comment on whether there was a time when we had to look at providing means tests so that individuals could get certain benefits in our social programs.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to suggest that the member go back to a time in our history when we used a means test to distinguish the deserving from the undeserving. That is long past.

We as a country, as a government, need to take the same approach we took a few years back. It was driven by the NDP, and it looked at the question of poverty and seniors. We brought forward hugely successful programs: the Canada pension plan, the old age security plan, and the guaranteed income supplement. We put those vehicles in place so that we would not have to get into long and hurtful discussions about who deserves and who does not. We put in place programs to help seniors, and we literally lifted all seniors out of poverty.

We need to be doing the same thing for all of our citizens today, no matter where they live or what their socio-economic condition may be.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member mentioned that he has done a lot of work on poverty and an anti-poverty strategy. I know he had wide consultations across Canada with many people active in the movement to eliminate poverty. He came up with a private member's bill that calls on the federal government to adopt a strategy for the elimination of poverty in Canada.

I wonder if the hon. member might talk about what that process would be. Perhaps he could also relate how he developed this piece of legislation that he tabled in the House.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member himself participated actively in the discussions by bringing to the House the stories of the people he represents.

The hon. member is absolutely right: there are real opportunities here. There will be a report tabled in this House, probably after the Remembrance Day break, that will make solid recommendations. If adopted, they will go a long way towards developing a partnership with the provinces, territories, municipalities, and first nations that will eliminate poverty in this country once and for all.

Bill C-545 would serve as the framework for this federal project. This empowering piece of legislation would give the government the vehicles it needs to begin working in partnership, so that we can once and for all get rid of the scourge of poverty that affects so many of our constituents, neighbours, and family members.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member mentioned poverty reduction in his speech. He mentioned six jurisdictions that are now making efforts to reduce poverty. One of them is my own province of Newfoundland and Labrador, which has a wide-ranging poverty reduction strategy. This strategy includes subsidized heating costs for seniors and nutritional supplements for young low-income mothers.

This could be important. Yet the vision does not lead to an overall poverty reduction strategy. Lacking a general narrative or theme, we have only a patchwork of short-term measures.

I wonder if the member could comment on one of the general themes that he would choose as a plank for poverty reduction.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Newfoundland was one of the first provinces to move forward with a strategy. But they are saying to us that, unless the federal government is at the table, it will be difficult for them to achieve all they know they can achieve.

There is no lack of good ideas out there. We heard them from many people, and there will be a lot of them in the report that will be tabled.

Bill C-545 mentions three areas that could immediately be addressed by the federal government and by all of us here: housing, income security, and social inclusion.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

We will now proceed with statements by members, beginning with the hon. member for Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Glen Pearson, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know we have spent a lot of time speaking to the budget's effects domestically within Canada and what it will do to Canadians, good or bad, but I would like to spend a few minutes discussing what will happen to Canada's image overseas; to our own image of helping other people who are in desperate need and who are dispossessed.

I am aware that international co-operation is a contentious issue right now as we look through the budget and at what is going on. However, I am more interested in the future rather than debating the decisions that have happened in the past. I am very much aware that CIDA has decided that it wants to focus on three areas: health, education and food. I am not so much against that idea, as those things are very necessary, but I wonder where the money will come from to be able to do it.

I have looked on in concern as CIDA has continued to narrow down its funding programs in such a way that, as it focuses on those three things, many other things are not getting done. I think that is a concern.

I think it is also a great concern, not just for people in Canada but also various multinational groups and others overseas, that CIDA has had its budget frozen for the next five years. It is not only that. It is also the fact that that represents almost a full 25% of the deficit reduction that will be going on over the course of the next five years.

My concern about that is that as the needs grow and as our other partners around the world, Britain, the United States, Norway, the United Nations, Brazil, China and other countries, begin to ramp up their international co-operation dollars, we are actually in a situation where we will fall behind. That does concern me.

I do not want to pick fights over the particular decisions that are made. My concern is that as the rest of the world moves forward, even in very difficult economic times, groups, like the Government of the United Kingdom, Britain, have decided that, in spite of their own massive deficits and the deficit cutting that they will do, they will still reach 0.7 of GDP by the end of their mandate. I think that is significant.

It is also significant that Norway and other Scandinavian countries are up at 0.9. It is interesting that the Obama administration wants to claw its way to 0.7 as well. We know that Brazil has signed on and that it is becoming an economic powerhouse. It will reach its 0.7 budget, which is significant because Canada, by freezing our aid dollars, will fall down below 0.3. I do not think any of us really expected or wanted that but it will happen. It is happening at a time when we all, as advanced nations, decided in 2005, in Gleneagles, Scotland, to sign on to the millennium development goals. Up until that time, poverty was just a dog's breakfast. It was all over the place. Nobody knew quite how to attack it. Nations were running on all sorts of different cylinders.

However, the leaders of the industrialized world at that time decided that the time had come to pull it all together, to come up with some major themes in which all the major countries of the world could come together.

I want to mention briefly what was agreed to in Gleneagles, Scotland. It was agreed to end poverty and hunger; to have universal education and gender equality; child health; maternal health; combat HIV-AIDS; environmental sustainability; and global partnership.

Those are very important goals and, as we saw this past September at the millennium development goals summit at the United Nations, we are failing. I want to commend the government for its own actions around child and maternal health. The fact that it attempted to show leadership in that area is a good thing, but we need to back that up with the funds that would help us get to that point.

It is also important that as a government we did not sign on to child and maternal health nor to the global fund. We also did not sign on to environmental sustainability. We signed on to global partnership which allows people in developing worlds to take more part in the allocation of aid dollars and in what needs to be done.

In universal education, Canada has done a very good job, even under the present government for a number of years, of keeping our levels high in universal education but now they are beginning to dip. The Government of Canada is freezing its budget at the same time that others, equally oppressed by very difficult times, are deciding to move ahead anyway and do their best to fulfill the millennium development goals.

Why is it that we are being presented with a budget like this and debating it, which is a really good thing, that we have opted to do this at a time when other countries, which are far more financially stressed than we are, are opting to go ahead? Once again I would remind the House of Great Britain and all the strains that it is under. Even its coalition that came together has decided that it will stick together and stick to 0.7.

Some great things are coming out. When I look at Haiti, I think about the 200 people who have died as a result of the cholera outbreak. The whole island was wiped out and it needs rebuilding and rebuilding is going to take funds. The Government of Canada matched funds with Canadians in a strong response to Haiti. However, Bill Clinton told me in New York that it will be a 20 year project. If in the first five years of that project, CIDA has frozen its budget, I do not see how we will get there.

I would like to talk a bit about Sudan. People know about my own particular interest in Sudan. Sudan will be signing a referendum in January of this coming year. That is only two months away. Many of us will be there as that is going on. South Sudan will be the world's newest country. I realize that CIDA has said that it will put money toward food, and that is important. I also realize that the Government of Canada has given $800 million to Sudan since it came to power in 2006. There is nothing wrong with that. That is important. Sudan has stayed a country of focus for both the previous government and the current government.

Our problem comes with the World Food Programme report that now says that food assistance has more than quadrupled from 1 million to 4.3 million people in South Sudan in 2010 who will need help. How do we help them if we have frozen the budget? I do not understand.

I spoke with southern Sudanese officials just this past week and they are greatly worried about the two million people who will come back in massive migrations from all sorts of countries around Sudan and swell over the villages that are already there. The health concerns are major. Although CIDA has said that health is a major concern, how will we meet those needs if we have frozen the budget? There are other things as well.

When it comes to Sudan, it is important to realize that both the previous government and the current government made serious commitments to the people of south Sudan and to the country of Sudan as a whole. Many of us in the House will be there to watch the referendum signing ceremony. In the years following that, what are we going to do with the two to three to four million people who have visited Sudan and have decided to stay? How can CIDA possibly keep Sudan as a country of focus if its budget is frozen? I am concerned about that.

There is Congo. The Globe and Mail had a good article last week saying that the Canadian government had a very unique opportunity to go into Congo and help to stabilize that region because of our bilingual nature, the training of our troops and the excellence of our CIDA people. However, It will not happen, in part because we have not made that commitment. Where will CIDA's money come from if it enters into the massive problems in that region?

We have some serious thinking to do. If this budget has been cut by 25% to just CIDA alone and we are part of a worldwide scope to try reach out to these countries of the world and help stabilize them, how will we do that if we are suddenly frozen and we fall below 0.3 when our other partners are moving toward 0.7?

These are serious issues and I am worried. I do not want to pick fights about what should have been done about KAIROS. Those are for another day and another time. I just want to talk in broad strokes. What will we do as a nation if our budget is frozen?

This is an important issue for members of the House and for Canadians. According to a recent poll, 77% of Canadians think it is important for Canada to be known as a world leader in funding solutions and 62% of Canadians think this funding should not be frozen.

The sum of $4.5 billion will be cut from the CIDA budget because the money will be frozen and it will not continue to be increased. What will we do as a nation? How will we answer the world when other countries are looking to us for leadership as part of broader partnerships. Do we tell them that all bets are off? Do we tell them that we have frozen our budget, that they will be left on their own and that we will keep doing what we want to do?

We are part of a global alliance. It is my hope that all of us will look at this budget and realize that one of its fundamental flaws is the fact that our hand of compassion to the world has just been cut off because of our own inability to continue to increase funds for international co-operation.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I commend my colleague from London not only on his comments with respect to this budget legislation, but for the work he has done in Canada and internationally in terms of international development and co-operation.

I have had the privilege of having a number of conversations with my colleague and his passion and knowledge on questions of international development, particularly with respect to the African continent are an inspiration. It is in that vein that I would very much like our colleague to share with us his views on how the lack of funding for development projects and for Canada's commitment to multilateral organizations like the United Nations has been reflected in our participation in United Nations peacekeeping missions.

Our colleague's knowledge of the African continent and of some of its difficult conflicts is worthy of sharing with this House as well as his views on what Canada could do more of to participate in the United Nations peacekeeping exercises and missions on that continent.

Does he have a sense of the number of Canadian military personnel, for example, involved in peacekeeping efforts under the United Nations banner?

I think a source of pride for many in this House is our past participation in those missions. I know we would benefit from the member's insight in this matter.

[Glen Pearson, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. friend's question is an important one.

We are about ready to look at the purchase of 65 stealth fighter jets. Right now Canada has between 30 and 50 peacekeepers worldwide. In 1992 we led the world in peacekeeping. We had more troops, more skin in the game in 1992, but today we are right near the bottom. We are 53rd out of 55 countries in peacekeeping.

There are 35 peacekeepers. I do not think Canadians know that or necessarily understand it, but that is a real issue. Peacekeeping is essential to international co-operation as well. We need that security in order to do our work.

I appreciate my friend's inquiry into this because we cannot separate peacekeeping, foreign development, international development and our troops from one another. They are a whole unit. It is time we realized that peacekeeping has to be part of the game and we have to be part of it.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is probably no member in this House who has more knowledge and authority on the issues he just spoke about. The member is very articulate in showing the relative and absolute decline in the influence of CIDA as far as our nation is concerned. It shows an absolute decline in numbers.

For whatever reason, we have chosen to deal with our deficit on the backs of the poor of this world. We have recently suffered a slap in international prestige before the United Nations. CIDA is a diminished force. Of course, there is what happened to Bill C-300 last Wednesday night. All of this makes us, in my judgment, a diminished nation.

I am interested in the hon. member's views on the diminished nature of CIDA going forward.

[Glen Pearson, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, to put it simply, the rest of the world is looking at us and wondering what has happened. I know that from speaking with people.

Right now we are 22nd on the list of OECD donors. We used to be near the top. We are now at a point where the rest of the world is no longer factoring in Canada. The delegations and others that we speak with about international co-operation realize we are on a downward track. It affects very much how the world will respond. Canada used to be one of the key players in peacekeeping and international co-operation. Without Canada, that work is greatly hindered.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to say a few words on economic recovery and on the budget.

First, in case I am not on my feet again, I would like to pay my respect to the older Canadian veterans who did so much to make it possible for us to be here today and have freedom and democracy in this great nation, and also to remember our newer veterans.

It is fair to say that we understand more what our veterans go through and what they suffer when they come home. It is vitally important that the Government of Canada has a package in place to ensure that when these veterans return they are able to live a normal life. Some of them suffer physical and mental illnesses. We must have the funds in place to assist them. That is why I have some concern about the lump sum payment for veterans. If that takes place and something happens and the fund is gone, what happens to them? Will there be people on the street with no dollars, people who stood in a foreign land in order to preserve our democracy? I hope the government will take that in hand.

I had the privilege of sitting at the cabinet table for a period of time representing veterans and I did learn many things. One thing they told me was that we certainly should know our history, and I do the best I can, because if we do not know it, we are very apt to repeat it.

In looking at the economic situation in the country today and reflecting back to when I came here, there was a previous government in place. When I reflect on the budgets that were presented at that time and the projections that were made, very fine people with great intentions gave great projections, none of which were met, and all the deficits were added onto the debt.

In fact, when Mr. Chrétien formed government and Mr. Martin gave us our first economic update, the debt was $38 billion, going to $60 billion if we did not do something. It kind of reflects what is taking place today and it is a great concern. Today I am fearful of how the economic situation might be straightened out in this country. We have to be sure it is not straightened out on the backs of the poor.

In Prince Edward Island, and in the Cardigan riding which I have the great privilege of representing, agriculture, fisheries and tourism are very important. In the agricultural field, I often hear the minister and other government members talk about it being from the gate to the plate. It sounds great but I can tell the House there is absolutely no problem at the plate, but there is a great problem at the gate.

If we go beyond the gate of the family farms and meet with the people who are involved in the agricultural sector and get an understanding of the debt they are carrying, farm debt has doubled in the last three years. It is a sad situation. This is the second largest nation in the world. If we are not careful, we will not be able to feed ourselves. It is certainly true that the measures we have do not meet the requirements for what is needed in the agricultural sector.

There is one thing a number of constituents say to me. They want me to remind the government that it is the government. In fact, some people in my riding feel it has been the government a bit too long. For government members to stand in their places and indicate what took place five, ten or fifteen years ago is not good enough. People need answers.

At the agriculture committee, a number of things have been suggested. The emergency advance payment program must be re-established at a higher level to meet producers' needs. Producers have a great difficulty. Looking at the hog industry in Prince Edward Island, many people had great difficulties. Another suggestion that was made to the committee was that we have funds in place to make sure that Canadians know that they are eating Canadian pork. The problem with the hog industry in particular is that little or nothing was done and they went broke.

We need to take care of our farmers.

Fishing is another very important industry in the province. There are a lot of problems in the fishing industry in Prince Edward Island. There are certain areas in the lobster fishery that are doing quite well. However, there are areas that are in a very serious situation. They need help from the government.

On June 10, 2009, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans announced a $65 million investment to help the Atlantic lobster industry. Why was it not an announcement of $165 million or $265 million, because the government is going to spend practically none of it anyway. That is the difficulty in the fishery. The fact is 80% of the total dollars that were announced have not been spent.

There were $15 million of this fund put in place in order to help fisher people who are in great difficulty, for example, in area 26A. There are always ups and downs in every industry. The pork industry needed help a year ago and a number of my constituents did not get any. They went broke. There is great difficulty in the fishery in 26A. I remember travelling in that area a number of years ago and the catches were high, but for the last number of years the people have been in a desperate situation and they need some input from the government.

The difference between fisheries and agriculture is that when fishers go broke the fleet is repossessed. It goes back to the lending institution and somebody else buys it. Somebody else invests in it. The fact is that all governments have issued lobster licences to people in this area. It is the responsibility of the Government of Canada to put a publicly funded rationalization program in place to help, in somewhat of a decent way, take out of the fishery those people who wish to come out. It is important to realize that the government issues the licence, but the people involved in the fishery spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on boats and traps to get their fleet in order, only to lose it.

The difference between the fishery and agriculture, when the government does nothing for the agricultural sector, people just go broke and go away. In the fishing sector they go broke and the lending institution is hurt. It is always a family operation and the people go broke, but it goes back to the lending institution. Someone buys the fleet and that fleet is back on the water creating the same amount of pressure on the fishery in 26A. It is not the only area in Atlantic Canada that has great difficulty. If the government does not put something in place that would take these people out of the fishery, there is going to be a continuous cycle of people going broke, people reinvesting in the fleet and the strain remaining on the resource.

As far as a recovery for people in the fishery is concerned, I suggest that the government spend some of the $65 million it announced. It has dealt with fishermen since it made that announcement. Nothing has happened in my area. The people are still up against it financially. They are asking to do this and do that, but in the end there is nothing done in order to take that fleet out of the system. The licence has to be taken back by the government and taken out of the system altogether. If 30% are taken out, it leaves 70% of the people able to make a living. Why would the government not see that? That is exactly what we need in order to ensure that the economy in that area of Prince Edward Island becomes even better.

A number of things were put in place. In fact the Liberal government put in place pilot projects in the EI program. Pilot programs have succeeded for years. They should be made part of the EI program so businesses can continue to thrive in Prince Edward Island.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Cardigan is well known in this House as somebody who defends the fishing industry, coastal communities, agriculture, and those who require employment insurance at periods of the year when there is no work.

I hope that the member for Cardigan will share some of his vast experience in this House and in government as a senior minister. I wonder whether he might comment on small craft harbours. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has a budget for small craft harbours.

A previous Liberal government increased the budget. In fairness, the current government, as part of the economic stimulus program, also increased the budget for the important work of repairing fishing harbours around the country. Certainly, in my riding of Beauséjour, a number of wharves still need work.

I wonder if the member might share with us his views on whether this program should be extended or allowed to sunset, as the Conservatives seem to want. We think this would be irresponsible.

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague from Beauséjour, who represents fishers, understands very well how important small craft harbours are. Small craft harbours are just like our homes. If we do not spend money on them every year, they deteriorate. It is for the government to decide whether it is going to keep them in proper condition or not.

If this sunsets, if these dollars are not left in place, we know what happens. It is like anything else. These harbours become a massive bill for government, or they deteriorate and we cannot use them.

I remember all the barricades that were up when we formed the government in 1993. It was pretty sad. There were barricades up, and we were not able to use them, because they were not safe.

I agree with the member for Beauséjour. Let us ensure that the barricades are not put back up.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I always appreciate listening to my colleague from Cardigan when he has an opportunity to speak in the House.

I want to ask him a question that I think is relevant to today's discussion. During my fourth or fifth year on the Hill, there was a debate about cutting back the support for the Pictou-P.E.I. ferry, the ferry service through the Northumberland Strait. I recall that the former premier of Nova Scotia, Premier John Hamm, for whom I have a great deal of respect, phoned my office. We had a great discussion about the impact that this would have on the people of Pictou County and P.E.I.

I know the member has a terrible reputation. He has been besmirched in this House for fighting for the people he represents and for dragging too much back to his constituents. I am sure that this is a reputation he will never want to apologize for.

However, I want to ask him, what is the current state of the Northumberland ferry service? Does he believe that the current government will be able to address the situation to the benefit of the people of P.E.I. and Pictou county?

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Cardigan, PE]

Mr. Speaker, the Wood Islands-Caribou ferry service is a vital link. If we want to maintain, just maintain, the economic growth that has taken place in eastern Prince Edward Island, we must have the Wood Islands-Caribou ferry service in place. It is no good to have members of the government saying they support the service. That is no good at all. It is a government decision, a political decision, that will decide whether the Wood Islands-Caribou ferry service remains.

The government has asked for a public service review of the ferry. I can tell members that I am some concerned about this public service review. What happens if the public service review comes back and says that this service should not be there, that the fixed link was built and this should not be there?

Nothing could be more devastating to the economic growth of eastern Prince Edward Island than failing to reinstate the funding for the Wood Islands-Caribou ferry service. We need to maintain it as it is today.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have this opportunity to participate in the debate on Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures. It is nicknamed Sustaining Canada's Economic Recovery Act.

This gives me a chance to address broadly the government's economic priorities. I have to say that in my home community of Burnaby there are lots of folks who question where the government is headed. They question the expenditures that the government is undertaking, especially during this period of recession. They question things like the large expenditures the government undertook on the G8 and G20 meetings, which were larger than those of any G8-G20 meeting in the past, and more than any that are planned in the future. People in Burnaby are left wondering just what the heck is going on when the government puts out that kind of money for that kind of meeting.

People in Burnaby are wondering about the planned expenditures for building more prisons. They do not understand why that should be a priority, especially when crime is falling in many of our communities. They just do not get why that kind of building program should be a priority for the government.

People wonder about the purchase of new fighter jets to the tune of $9 billion, and the $9 billion maintenance contract associated with the purchase. They do not understand that kind of expenditure when there are other needs in our community going unmet. They do not understand why the government continues with its massive corporate tax cuts at a time when the government is in deficit, and why government would borrow to continue these tax cuts when it does not have the money for them. It does not make sense to people. People would not do that in their own budgeting. They do not understand why the government is pursuing such activities.

They do not understand why this is not a time for us to work together to solve some problems instead of undertaking massive expenditures. People in Burnaby are coming together to put forward a clear program on homelessness and affordable housing. They favour addressing this issue by working together, across political lines, working among different agencies, with the public and private sectors.

There has been a lot of activity in Burnaby over the last year on this issue. A lot of it was motivated by the Burnaby Task Force on Homelessness. I want to pay tribute to the co-chairs of that group, Wanda Mulholland, a citizen activist on homelessness issues, and Irene Jaakson, from the Lookout Emergency Aid Society. I also want to recognize the various other partners in the Burnaby Task Force on Homelessness.

People have come together from all over the community to address these issues: the Fraser Health Authority, B.C. Housing, all of the local MPs and MLAs across party lines, the Lookout Emergency Aid Society, Burnaby Community Connections, Burnaby Mental Wealth Society, Faith Lutheran Church, West Burnaby United Church, South Burnaby United Church, the Burnaby Hospital, the city of Burnaby, the Salvation Army, the community policing offices, the Progressive Housing Society, the Ministry of Children and Family Development, the Regional Steering Committee on Homelessness from the United Way, the Greater Vancouver Shelter Society, the Progressive Housing Society, the Greater Vancouver Transportation Authority Police Service, the Mental Health and Addictions Geriatric Team from the Fraser Health Authority, and the Dixon Transition Society. All kinds of organizations and their representatives have come together to work on solutions to housing affordability and homelessness in Burnaby.

Recently, we marked this with a National Homelessness Week, which included a number of events that highlighted the program in the city of Burnaby.

What is remarkable about Burnaby is that there is not what might be considered the usual collection of community agencies, churches, and other agencies that serve people who are underhoused or homeless. Nevertheless, this message has spread to the business community in Burnaby. The exciting news is that the Burnaby Board of Trade has also got on board with this campaign and taken some significant initiatives of its own with regard to housing and homelessness.

A recent survey by the Burnaby Board of Trade established that homelessness and affordable housing were the top two social issues that business members could address. A full 64% of the members of the Burnaby Board of Trade identified those two issues as the key social issues in our community. The Burnaby Board of Trade Social Development Committee then began working on these issues.

The Burnaby Board of Trade's committee identified a number of reasons that homelessness was important in our community and to the business community. They noted that homelessness is just plain bad for business, that it is expensive, that it is a waste of human capital and productivity, and that it reflects poorly on our society. They found out that homelessness numbers are increasing in Burnaby and other communities in greater Vancouver. They noted that affordable housing is in short supply. They talked about solutions to those problems, and made some recommendations.

But they did not leave it there. They decided that they were going to take it further, and they got together with the Surrey Board of Trade and the Greater Victoria Chamber of Commerce. Last September, they took a motion and a report to the annual meeting of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in Ottawa. That annual meeting adopted the report suggested by those three organizations, the two boards of trade and the chamber, on reallocating federal funding to develop a national plan to end homelessness.

That was a significant move. To have the Canadian Chamber of Commerce adopt a policy for ending homelessness and providing affordable housing is an important development. The government should be getting ready, because it will be hearing from representatives of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce on this issue when they have their next meeting here on Parliament Hill.

It is interesting to note that in the report adopted by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce they make some clear statements. They say:

Homelessness is bad for business and the federal government does not have a national plan to end homelessness in Canada. Homelessness has a direct financial impact on businesses as it deters customers, damages employee recruitment and retention, harms tourism, and discourages companies from setting up offices in areas with a visible homeless population.

They begin their report with some bold and clear statements about the impact of homelessness on our communities and on the ability of businesses to be successful.

They note a number of statistics. The one that is often drawn to our attention is that Canada is the only G8 country without a national housing strategy. They note that homelessness costs Canadian taxpayers between $4.5 billion and $6 billion annually, including health care costs, criminal justice, social services, and emergency shelter costs. They note that between 150,000 and 300,000 people are homeless in Canada, which is shameful to report. They note that in greater Vancouver homelessness increased by 22% after the homelessness count in 2008.

The Burnaby Board of Trade, the Surrey Board of Trade, and the Great Victoria Chamber of Commerce know about affordable housing and homelessness. In their report, they say, “The sooner the federal government commits to ending homelessness in a reasonable time frame, the sooner Canadian businesses and citizens will benefit from the resulting increase in Canada's economic productivity and quality of life. The development of a national plan to end homelessness is the necessary first step towards fulfilling this commitment”.

They make four recommendations. They call upon the federal government to reallocate funds from within the federal budget envelope to develop a national plan to end homelessness; to establish a reasonable target for the reduction of homelessness in Canada and set a reasonable time frame to accomplish this goal; to maintain a housing-first approach of creating and sustaining affordable and supportive housing as a first priority in the development of the national plan; and to consult with other levels of government and community partners in the development of the national plan.

If the Canadian Chamber of Commerce gets it, I wonder why this is not on the agenda of the current government. That is another failing in the government's economic program.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member with great interest. Perhaps he does not know about the homelessness partnering strategy. Of course, I realize that his party did not read the budget and voted against it. In my riding, extensive work is being done through that strategy. It supports everything from food banks to the development of low-income housing.

This is solidly in the budget. Perhaps he could speak to how he should actually support our budget, because we are doing many things on this issue that he cares about.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would suggest the member go back and talk to housing activists from coast to coast to coast. The first thing they will tell her is the federal government is not pulling its weight on this.

I was briefly the housing critic for the NDP awhile ago and in that short time I had a stack of reports, over a foot high, from every corner of the country, from coast to coast to coast. The first recommendation in every one of those reports was the need for a national housing plan, a national housing strategy, that actually built homes for Canadians.

We do not have that now. We have some maintenance of old programs. We have the Conservatives still living off the avails of the NDP budget that we talked the Liberals into at the end of their term. They cancelled a corporate tax cut and put a billion dollars into affordable housing and homelessness programs. The Conservatives are still living off of that. They implemented it after the Liberals were defeated and they came into power. It is just not good enough.

We need a national housing program that builds homes for Canadians. Other G8 countries have that. Every community in the country that has looked at this has identified the primary failure for our communities and our country to address the housing and homelessness issue is because the federal government is not involved in a serious way. That needs to change.

[Dominic LeBlanc, Liberal, Beauséjour, NB]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague has outlined a number of the failings or the frustrations with which members on this side of the House find common ground in terms of the government's budgetary priorities.

Could my hon. friend give us the benefit of his insight? He has talked about affordable housing. I agree with him. It is a major challenge that the government has ignored, not only in large urban centres like those in British Columbia but the small rural communities that I represent as well.

One issue the member might enlighten us on is his sense of the government's failing with respect to early learning and child care, making serious investments, not giving a tax break to parents, which may be a very worthy family policy but fails to deliver actual child care spaces right across the country. Has the member a view on the government's failure with respect to early learning and child care?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, all of us know that after housing costs, child care costs are probably the most significant expense for families in our communities. That is certainly the case in my community of Burnaby—Douglas. People there know they are spending a great deal of money on that. They are envious of other places that have better child care and early learning programs.

They look at Quebec, for example, and wonder why we in British Columbia cannot have a similar program, why we cannot nationally have a similar program. The reality is we could if we had the political will to do it.

They look at some of the things on which the federal Conservative government is spending money. They wonder if we would not be better off if it spent it on some of these things that actually improve the lives of families and children in our country.

We know that early learning and child care even out all of the benefits of coming from a wealthy family, that this early start for children is hugely beneficial to the future development of that child and the future development of our society.

The fact is we have been dragging our heels for decades on that. The former Liberal government promised and promised that program and never ever brought it forward. We need that to change and the sooner the better because it will make a huge difference in the lives of Canadian families and in the future of Canadian children.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have this chance to speak to Bill C-47, the second budget implementation act.

Everybody, rich and poor, young and old, doing well and not doing well, we are all looking for the same thing: a chance, a real chance. Even the rich who have been rich all their lives, to develop a new product or to break into a new market, at some moment they need a chance, too.

For those who are not rich and for those who are poor who have not had the same chances or who did not give themselves the full chance they needed, what do they do? Where do they go? For them, for all of us, at some moment, government matters.

A budget matters. A budget offers a path to our economic future as a country and for each of us as individuals. However, the impact of a budget is far more than just economic. It can add a piece to a life that up to that moment does not quite work. A budget has often to do with money in the form of an investment, in training, learning, health, research and development, housing, literacy, in things that might not make today much better than yesterday, but which will give us a shot at a better tomorrow.

I have watched the government for more than four and a half years. I have listened as it has brought down several budgets. A budget day offers many announcements about many things, so much it seems is about to be done. Then the next day and every day after that we also begin to see what is not being done. For me, the test for any budget of any government is, what will its impact be 5 years or 10 years from now? How will it make us better off, as a country, as individuals? How much is a budget just stuff and in truth will not have any real impact on our lives at all?

That is my disappointment with the government. More than four and a half years have passed with very little benefit to the future of Canada and Canadians.

Learning, we know, will be central to every country's future. As parents, we worry about our kids. As we look into the future, more than anything we want to know that they will be okay. We see these immense, unimaginable changes ahead and we do not know how our kids will adapt.

We know that passing on to them some money will help a little, but money gets spent. Over time, we have come to realize, to know that in their future their only real security, their only real opportunity is learning. Therefore, when things change, they have in them the capacity to learn and change with them.

Our kids need to learn more and better in their early lives, to have enriched opportunities outside their own homes as well, in early learning and child care, just as they do when they get to kindergarten and beyond. They need to have better chances at college and university so their learning is not interrupted constantly by the need for part-time jobs or years off to limit the debt they incur.

Many adults who do not learn to read early in their lives, who live under the suffocating ceiling of illiteracy need literacy programs to give them another chance at life.

What is the government doing in these regards, in this budget? What has it been doing in these more than four and a half years? Very little. Enough to say in question period and in scrums that it is doing something. Enough to meet its political needs, but not enough, not nearly enough, to meet the needs of those outside government, to meet the needs of Canada and Canadians for the future.

When this recession ends, one thing is certain, the world's economy will not go back to where it was before the recession began. Shifts have taken place. There are new ways to do things, new technologies, especially in the energy sector, new opportunities, new risks. The need for any government, for any company, is to move to where the world is going, not to where it was or is.

In this budget and in the last four and a half years what has the government done to prepare us to succeed in the future? It has done just enough to say it has done something.

It is even more dramatically the case for those who are poor and who need a chance in so many different directions, affordable housing, income assistance, child care, disability supports and even more so still, those who are aboriginal. The government has done just enough to say it is doing something, but not nearly enough to make a difference, to offer a chance at a real life.

For more and more families, it takes both parents in the workforce to make ends meet. We are living longer. We are living healthier. However, as extended families, less often do we live together. What happens when something goes wrong, when there is a major illness in the family, a child or an elderly parent? When lives are closer to the margin, how do we adapt? How do we help caregivers? The government has done just enough to say it is doing something, but not enough to make a difference.

If someone notices just how little the government is actually doing for Canadians, the government discourages those voices. According to how the government thinks, these problems should not exist. If government gets smaller, if a little more money is put into the pockets of people, everything will be fine.

The reality is, however, that life as it is really lived annoyingly gets in the way, unless of course the government does not notice. For the Conservative government, it is the miracle of ideology. If the Conservatives know something already, then they do not have to listen. The government does not have to listen to community groups, so why not cut their funding. It does not have to listen to people who oppose or criticize it, so why not fire or humiliate them. Because we cannot know what is not knowable, the census is cut. Everybody knows that if something is not measured, then it does not exist. If it does not exist, then it cannot be a problem. If it is not a problem, why have government programs to fix what does not need fixing? It is magic, magic for the government but not magic for those who need a chance.

In a time of global economic transformation, in a time of climate change, in a time when the gap between the rich and everyone else has grown, in this more than four and a half years, as exemplified by the second budget implementation act, the hallmark of the Conservative government has been political management, not national stewardship.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, last weekend the member was in the United States and he probably had an opportunity to observe the rally to restore sanity and/or fear. It is a tongue-in-cheek, ironic exercise to poke fun at yet initiate serious discourse on things like the political rhetoric or what passes for political discourse in the United States.

I would be interested in the hon. member's observations on what passes for political discourse here and whether we are in danger of some similar kind of nonsensical conversation.

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a question for all of us. As much as we find a lot of the debate we have here fascinating, I am not sure many people at home do. We can see it in the problems with low voter turnout, especially among younger people. The majority of those who do turn out feel an obligation to vote, not necessarily out of a great engagement in the process. That is a problem for all of us.

Our biggest problem, and we can see this in the United States, comes when there is nothing really compelling on the table. That is when the problem arises. All of us have been around tables where we disagree with each other. Unless we have something to focus on, something we think is much more important than each other, we will focus on each other and the snipping begins.

That is our challenge and it is also the challenge in the U.S.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, in my riding of Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, we have been particularly hard hit by the global economic recession. We have a forestry-dependent community and a cattle industry and they are truly struggling. The message I am hearing from my constituents is that absolutely education is important, all these things are important, but we need to find ways to keep our economy vibrant to provide the jobs that provide the tax base that would enable us to do many of the things we truly want to do.

My question at this point is, will focusing on jobs, economic growth and economic opportunity not actually lead to the ability to provide some of the support that the hon. member spoke about?

[Ken Dryden, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that when the economy is working well, the greatest social justice program is a well-functioning economy. However, one of the challenges we are finding now, even when there are two jobs within a family and oftentimes there are not, is that the end result still has the kinds of problems that I was talking about, whether it has to do with housing or other experiences in low income and poverty.

I do not think it is enough just to say we will do what we can in terms of the economy. I would caution the members across the floor to not just look at and listen to what they are doing, but to look at the dimensions of what they are doing.

Anybody can do a little bit, an inch deep, but if the challenge is a foot deep, then an inch deep does not matter a heck of a lot. An inch deep can lead to very nice, interesting rhetoric and make everybody feel better, but it is the other 11 inches that are really the question. That is my problem with the focus and direction of this government for the last four and a half years.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to join in this debate this afternoon. Certainly a number of speakers have touched on various aspects of the budget and have referred to the continued spending. One speaker referred to the gravy train and the billions that have been spent in various areas, so I believe those issues have been brought forward already today. I would like to get more specific with my comments and look, for the most part, at two issues that I can bring home to my constituents, that will have a fairly significant impact on a couple of different aspects of day-to-day life in my riding.

One of those issues is the lack of any kind of long-range planning or long-range funding commitment to particular programs. I know there was a fair amount of concern raised in the House last year as we drew down to the fiscal end of the year. Many community groups did not know whether their funding was going to be renewed or if they were going to be able to continue to operate going forward. It causes a great deal of uncertainty and a great deal of concern.

One group in particular, ACAP, the Atlantic coastal action program, is a network of not-for-profits that do very good work in the environment, educating constituents and communities and empowering communities to do something about the environment. It went right to the wire last year before it realized whether it was going to get funding. We are finding that same type of pattern emerging from the government at this time and it is truly unfortunate.

When we looked at some of the programs that had been offered through NRCan, a number of them had been initiated under previous Liberal governments. The present government changed the colours, for sure. It threw a little blue and a little green in there and went from eco-energy to EnerGuide and it figures it has a new program. That is okay. As long as the results are there and the impact is there, we see merit in those types of programs.

There was merit. There is empirical evidence that shows that these types of programs had a considerable positive outcome for homeowners throughout the region. For the most part, low-income and middle-income households throughout the region were able to go into home renovations and home retrofits that would allow them to bring down energy costs, but even more so, would have an impact on the reduction of greenhouse gases. That was a tremendous benefit.

To date we have not seen that commitment to go forward with this program. Applications are no longer being accepted. The funding is set to lapse in 2011. The Conservatives will say they are going to assess this program; however, there is an incredible amount of uncertainty that lies in the lap of these community groups that are not just trying to do good things, but have proven that they can be of great, positive benefit to these communities if given the opportunity and a little bit of support from the federal government. I would hope that the federal government would see the merit in these programs and continue to support them and not let it go until the last minute. Give these groups an opportunity to succeed. Give these groups an opportunity to plan going forward. That is my wish and I would like to see that carried forward.

The other issue that I want to bring forward is EI. Certainly with the economic downturn we saw the government take some half measures to help those who were most impacted. There was a downturn coming in Canada before the global economic downturn, but some of the measures that had been undertaken, such as the extension of five weeks of EI to all Canadians, was a program that had been initiated as a pilot project under the previous government to 21 different areas of the country, areas of highest unemployment.

The government saw the merit at the time, that this did have an impact and would be a way to help some of those who had lost their jobs or were struggling to find work. So it decided that it would extend that.

Other pilot projects that had been initiated have approached their sunset date as well. I am talking specifically about the best 14 weeks, and working while on claim is the other one. Those are two of the most important programs.

The government has recently said it is going to continue those pilot projects through until next June. That is just not enough. Some people who are receiving benefits now are workers who are in seasonal industries. They are not seasonal workers, they are in seasonal industries. For people who work in the tourism sector, the lion's share of their employment is from mid-June through to Thanksgiving weekend, and then it is pretty spotty after that. Unless they are at a ski resort, employment is pretty spotty. Not a lot of people are on the beaches at Ingonish in the middle of February.

People are still in those communities. Their children are still going to schools there. They will find work. They will go out and will survive by picking up part-time jobs, filling in part time here and there. They will take work when they can. What they need is some type of assurance that the premium they are going to receive over the course of that winter will be one that can at least sustain them.

That is why we believe the continuation of the best 14 weeks program is essential for these communities and for these industries. We are not just hearing it from the workers. I am sure many members of this House, from both sides of the aisle, have heard from constituents. From Catalone to Country Harbour, I have heard them say that it is essential that we maintain the best 14 weeks as opposed to the last 14 weeks.

We are hearing it from businesses as well, business operators in the fishing industry, fish processors, those in the lumber industry, woodlot owners, and tourism operators. This has an impact on anybody who operates in a seasonal industry.

It is the best 14 weeks that one can pick from that year. There are some weeks with great intensity, where a worker may work 60 or 80 hours a week. That provides them with a very good stamp. Maybe after that peak season, things will slow down.

We will use the fishery for an example. After a crab or lobster season, when the mackerel boats come in, processors are having trouble getting workers to come out and work a few hours to offload the mackerel boats or the herring boats, because it gives them a poor stamp that would affect their benefits for the rest of the winter. It is tough. We are talking about households. We are talking about kitchens and sometimes the cupboards are going to be bare.

I would have liked to have seen the government being more aggressive. I would have liked to have seen a strong statement on what the government is going to do for workers in seasonal industries, especially on the topic of the best 14 weeks and the topic of working while on claim. We have not seen that. Certainly that is unfortunate.

Hopefully we will see some kind of statement forthcoming, but the one that extended the benefits of this program just until June of next year is not adequate.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to allow my Liberal colleague, who is a member of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, to elaborate on some fisheries aspects, like the government aid that should exist in response to the recent crises that have hit the groundfish, shrimp and crab industries this year and the lobster fishery last year. All these crises unfortunately have a common denominator, namely government complacency.

A plan was announced to help the lobster industry and of the $15 million earmarked for this plan, only $8 million was spent.

I would like to hear what the hon. member has to say about that.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine works hard on that committee. Certainly I was expecting a question more on small craft harbours but nonetheless he makes a very valid point. He asks a very pertinent question.

I do not know if there were signs out on this but I would bet there were. The government, with great fanfare, with great hype, announced this great envelope of money that was going to help those in the lobster fishery, as we saw the significant downturn last year in the lobster fishery. We can identify that envelope of money, that program of money, but if we make the regulations so stringent and so restrictive, so that there is no net benefit to those who most need it, then what is the point? What is the use of that? There is no benefit to the people who most need it, and that was a prime example that we saw last year with the lobster program.

These individual operators, these individual fishermen, it was their own enterprise and they were not able to access the help they needed, when they needed that money, when they needed that assistance.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am really interested to know where the government speakers are, because I really do want to ask them, given the current deficit the government is in, to give us an accounting of what the situation is regarding arrears in corporate tax, GST and income tax.

The economy is in tough shape, and it is owed to us to have information as to how much could be owed to the government, how much in taxes could be collected in terms of outstanding GST amounts, corporation taxes, income taxes and any other taxes the government is collecting. However once again, we do not have the benefit of having government speakers making presentations on this bill so that we could ask them these questions.

I would like to ask the member whether he has any observations on that.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I heard in question period today a reply from the Minister of Justice that the government is going to advance its crime agenda.

The crime is the $6 billion tax cut to the corporations in this country on borrowed money. It is going to be my children and my grandchildren who are going to be paying for this corporate tax cut. That is the crime we should be dealing with. The crime agenda is a crime to all taxpayers in this country.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Louis, Natural Resources; the hon. member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, the G8 and G20 Summits.

Resuming debate. The hon. member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-47. It is certainly interesting to watch the debate as it has unfolded and listen to the Liberals talk about the corporate tax cuts and how they would stop them, when they were the party that started them when they were in government. It is just amazing.

The NDP has been consistent for the last number of years, calling for an end to these tax breaks, and suddenly the Liberals have jumped on board in a big way. I guess it is interesting when they take our speaking notes.

My particular focus today is going to be on pensions and seniors. I am kind of saddened because there has not been enough talk about the seniors' situation in the House during the debate.

You will know, Mr. Speaker, that I spent the last two years touring Canada talking and listening to Canada's seniors. I have been saying throughout the 38 community meetings that I have attended from coast to coast that it is time to change the conversation.

We have EI premiums and we have our pensions, which are deferred wages. Neither are payroll taxes. They are purchases that we make as Canadians to protect our future. That expression, payroll taxes, was started in Canada by the former Liberal government, and we have to take that language back and bring about that change, take it back away from corporate Canada, away from the right wingers who view this as their own particular territory.

Pensions are clearly the assets and money that belongs to workers. EI premiums are very clearly intended to purchase insurance against hard times. As I said, they are not payroll taxes, no matter who says they are. They are premiums for the provision of protection for workers and their families.

Two years ago when I met a number of delegations of seniors, they were talking to us and trying to get our attention, saying that there was a crisis developing on pensions in Canada. Neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives were seized with pensions at that time.

I reported to the House that the NDP held round tables two years ago, followed by months of intensive research, and on June 9 of that year we proposed an opposition day motion on pension reform. You will know, Mr. Speaker, that the NDP opposition day motion on pension reform was passed unanimously by the House.

That particular motion set out a road map for retirement security for seniors, a road map that to date the government has failed to implement. It was during the debate that our leader, the member for Toronto—Danforth, called for an immediate increase to the guaranteed income supplement to help 300,000 seniors who live below the poverty line. I will say that a majority of those seniors who live below the poverty line are women.

We also laid out a strategy for the doubling of CPP, and we said there must be a national pension insurance plan. Later in that year, October 22, 2009, the member for Toronto-—Danforth, our leader, and I released a New Democrat seniors retirement security plan.

I want to say again that the first line in the House that was spoken by the leader of our party was to address the situation with seniors who live in poverty. We must eliminate seniors poverty now, and it can be done.

This is a national disgrace, but how did it happen? How during 13 years of a Liberal government with five surplus budgets and five years of the current Conservative government did they allow this to happen on their watch?

It happened because the Prime Minister and the federal Liberals before him put the interests of Bay Street ahead of the interests of the workers and the pensioners of this country. I am here to say that our New Democratic caucus under the leadership of the member for Toronto—Danforth will no longer stand for this.

Today when I look at Bill C-47, I do not see the things seniors need. I remind the government that the NDP plan proposed an immediate increase to the GIS to close that seniors' poverty gap, and we can even put a price tag on it. Statistics Canada says fixing the poverty gap for seniors would cost less than $700 million.

This $700 million would ensure dignity and respect for the seniors who built this country. However it is not here in Bill C-47.

To pay for this particular boost for seniors, all it would take is the cancelling of one of the yearly tax breaks to the corporations of this country, the tax breaks that have been going to the banks and big oil and big gas.

Next, in consultation with the provinces, we can begin the process of strengthening the Canada pension plan. We know, and I have reported in the House before, that 63% of working Canadians today have no pension and no savings. How could they save when they are barely getting by? Consider that 93% of all working Canadians are part of the Canada and Quebec pension plans. There is no other option that will provide the advantages at so little cost.

Specifically, we are proposing a phasing in, in consultation with the provinces, of the doubling of CPP. I reported to the House just last week that pension expert Professor Kesselman and Jack Mintz, who worked for the government during the studies they have been doing, both agreed with the NDP plan for the increase in CPP. Our plan, as it is proposed, would increase the benefit from $908 a month to $1,817 to help secure a livable retirement for Canadians.

I also believe it is time for a national system of workplace pensions insurance. I am sure it is not news that underfunded pensions are an epidemic and collapsing pension plans are demanding a range of solutions. Today we are still fighting to move workers' underfunded pension assets to the front of the creditors line during CCAA and BIA.

Members will likely recall that I introduced Bill C-476 to protect pensions assets during CCAA and BIA in the House and another bill, Bill C-487, which would have done the same for LTD. Today I would suggest that one of the main problems facing Canadians is preserving private pension assets.

We are all aware in the House of the situation of Nortel workers. The Nortel workers became the poster children for the suffering workers who face companies using CCAA or BIA to avoid their responsibility to their workers and retirees. The frustrating thing for the NDP caucus remains the fact that the bill could have been before the House before the Nortel pensions were reduced to 64%, had the Liberals and Conservatives supported my original call for unanimous consent to address that motion. We could have helped those workers, instead of watching them lose over 30% of their pensions.

Beyond CCAA and BIA, the NDP recognized that workers also need insurance guaranteeing a minimum pension income when their workplace plans fail. As part of the NDP's seniors' retirement security plan, we proposed a self-financing mandatory insurance system funded by the plan's sponsors, and I stress the word “self-financing” as there would not be a cost to the government.

This is not as groundbreaking as it sounds. In fact, this is standard in the United States, Britain and elsewhere in the world. There are countries in which the governments actually back the pension plans. Where has Bill C-47 contemplated such important measures? The answer is it does not.

The NDP has proposed a national plan ensuring pension payouts are secured up to $2,500 a month. We insure our cars, we insure our homes and, in fact, we insure ourselves. Is it not common sense that we should insure our futures, our pension plans?

We are pleased that in June, as the last session of the House was ending before the summer break, the Minister of Finance agreed with the NDP plan for enhancing CPP. In fact, recently the Ontario minister of finance also agreed with New Democrats in our call to increase CPP.

I want to talk a bit about the government's actual spending priorities that we have heard repeatedly. They include $9 billion in corporate tax cuts so far with the one this year; $16 billion for stealth fighter jets; $9 billion for prisons, and I have suggestions of some people we might put in them; and $130 million last year in advertising. Yes, everyone heard that, $130 million spent on advertising. What did seniors get? They got $1.55 a month. People can imagine their disappointment.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we are talking about a budget implementation bill today and I noticed that my colleague from the NDP chose to make pensions the focus of his talk today. It is a major concern at a time of economic turmoil and global economic downturn that we have been dealing with, and very successfully, in Canada.

Several times in his speech, the member chose to attack what he calls “corporate tax cuts”. I wonder what it is about this that our NDP colleagues fail to understand. We went through a global economic recession. Other countries had to nationalize their banks and they had to use a lot of taxpayer money to take over those banks. Where does that come from?

We had some corporate losses in Canada. He mentioned one of the companies that we lost with terrible economic consequences for the workers. This affected the jobs and pensions of those workers. We are lowering corporate tax rates so that our corporations can be competitive in a very tough world and maintain the employment that provides the taxes to provide the services and the pensions that the member is looking for.

By the way, we cut taxes for all Canadians; small businesses and individual Canadians. When we cut the GST from 7% to 6% to 5%, why did the member vote against that?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it sounds like some people want to be all things to all people.

However, I want to be very clear when I say that the corporate tax breaks that the government is giving away to the big corporations have only gone to profitable corporations. This does not help the guy little down the street running the variety store and it does not put money into the pockets of Canadians.

We can take a look at the bank profits and at the bonuses the banks have been paying their executive boards if we want to see where that money is going.

The reality is that 300,000 seniors are living in poverty. I make no apologies to anybody.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, to continue with the theme of tax relief, it certainly is appropriate to give tax relief when the government's revenues are in surplus. However, we are looking at a deficit this year of $56 billion.

How, in heaven's name, does it make any sense whatsoever to give a $6 billion tax cut, as the hon. member rightly says, to the most profitable companies in Canada, which, cumulatively, will add up to about $20 billion, while simultaneously running a $56 billion deficit that will go up to $165 billion?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it was the Liberal government that started the tax breaks initially. The corporate tax rate in Canada was approximately 35% to 38%. The previous Liberal government lowered it to 22%. Then the Conservative government came in and lowered it and it is making its way to 15%. Between those two parties, we have seen a tremendous lowering of the tax shift from the corporations to the working people of this country.

We cannot go back to the 1950s, but at that time the corporations paid 85% of the taxes and we paid 15%. Today, thanks to those two parties, we are paying 85% and the corporations are paying 15%.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I the thank the member for his work on the whole issue of pensions, especially on the doubling of the CPP, and for convincing the government to go against its natural inclination to allow Bay Street insurance companies to benefit through an expanded program.

What sort of confidence does the member have that we will see the government follow through on those commitments to double the CPP in the near future and to also bring in a private insurance plan to protect private pensions?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we have the word of the finance minister that that is an area the government is looking at. Professor Kesselman, who is an advisor to the government, has endorsed it. Jack Mintz, the person who ran its consultations, wrote the paper for it. I am optimistic that something will happen on this file.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in the debate.

On the weekend, our American friends had a rally to restore sanity and/or fear in Washington and it attracted a substantial crowd. It was a sort of humourous, ironic poke at previous rallies. At its core, it was really a response to the bombastic nonsense that gets spouted by the Conservative right, with, may I say, some assistance by the left, as well, which is not without guilt in this matter.

The lunacy that passes for political discourse in the U.S. sometimes makes us shake our heads. It is hard to take things seriously when the United States is looking at multiple trillion dollar deficits, historically high unemployment and absurd disparities between the über-wealthy and literally millions of people who are desperately poor. However, listening to the high-paid media punditry is a little like watching a dialogue of the deaf. It is all gesturing and positioning but no hearing or listening. Yet America goes from crisis to crisis and back again.

My favourite sign at the rally was one that said, “What do we want?”. The response was, “Reasonable discourse”. Another sign said, “When do we want it?”. The response was, Well, sometime in the not too distant future”.

Indeed, in some respects, that applies to our situation here. Canadians do tend to be a touch overly smug about our American cousins. We do tend to sort of watch them like a train wreck in slow motion and want to scream at the television, “Engineer, stop this train”.

However, we should really have our own rally here to restore fiscal sanity.

How can the Conservatives possibly pat themselves on the back if they take a $13 billion surplus, inherited from Messrs. Martin and Chrétien, and turn it into a $56 billion deficit in three short years? How do they take an unemployment rate of something south of 6%, turn it into an unemployment rate of something north of 8% and call themselves a good fiscal manager? How do they take spending, which, by any measurement anywhere, is out of control, and count themselves as a good fiscal manager?

How do they take $14 billion out of a revenue stream year after year, which, over five years, is something in the order of $90 billion, jack up the debt by $156 billion and freeze funds for the most desperately poor in the international community, and still go around patting themselves on the back?

That is why I think we should have our own rally here to restore fiscal sanity to our nation.

The irony was that it was called a rally to restore sanity and/or fear, because in this nation, with the current government, it really is give fear a chance, tap into people's fears and they will let us do almost anything. We certainly do not need to have any political dialogue that makes any sense at all. In fact, members are so disgusted with the level of discourse in this chamber that they supported the hon. member for Halton's motion to reorganize the way in which we carry on political discourse here in this chamber.

We also do not want anything that would pass for miracle research, hence, the big fuss over the census. The census is probably the bedrock of empirical data for this country. It is relied upon by literally thousands of organizations. However, If we do not have that bedrock of data, we do not necessarily have any problems and, if we do not have any problems, we do not need to worry about them. We can simply rely on our own ideology to initiate or not initiate things as we see fit. All we need to do is play on people's fears. We can say that the crime rate is out of control but who actually knows? There is no data to support that one way or another. Without the census, there is no hard data and no objective way of deciding. Therefore, we just play on the fears, so we will be having another crime agenda, according to the justice minister in question period.

How would we actually know that there are crime related issues if there is no data to support it one way or another? Therefore, we repeat and repeat and feed into fears and, whether it is objective nonsense or not, we keep on with the repetition of phrases like tax and spend, one of the favourite phrases around here.

It is irrelevant that the government is far and away the nation's most aggressive and biggest spender, literally in the history of the nation. It is supposed to drum that tax and spend message home. It is irrelevant that the government has burdened multiple future generations with debt. It is irrelevant that debts and deficits are merely nothing but postponed taxes. It must drive that tax and spend message home because it may get people fearful enough and dumb enough to believe that the biggest borrow and spend government in our history fancies itself as a good, economic steward.

A rally to restore fiscal sanity is in order. Canadians are sensible people but even sensible people can be stampeded by fear. We want to keep fear alive. It can take a healthy balance sheet inherited from Messrs. Martin and Chrétien, a sane banking system and strong economic fundamentals and turn it upside down and blame the very people who brought us the fiscal sanity in the first place. The government's economic credentials would do credit to a Monty Python skit: up is down, in is out. As Jon Stewart said, “we are living in hard times we are not living in end times”.

Does anyone not smoking something actually believe a finance minister who says that he will not cut transfers, not cut program spending, not cut his largest program items and still balance the budget? However, he will offer a further $6 billion in tax relief to corporations that do not need it, commit a further $35 billion to an airplane and spend $10 billion to $13 billion on prisons, which the government did not really tell Canadians about when it was passing the Truth in Sentencing Act. It was not until the Parliamentary Budget Officer caught the government with its hands in the cookie jar that it fessed up to it at the last minute.

When we put that all together, it just does not make a lot of sane economic rationale.

A rally to restore fiscal sanity cannot begin soon enough. Our nation cannot afford to go the way of the U.S. where its revenue base has been destroyed, costs are through the moon and the country is slogging through a legacy burden that would have destroyed a lesser nation.

Borrowing to cut taxes just does not work. It never has worked and it never will work. CEOs would not cut back their revenues and then let costs get away from them. It does not work in a business, it does not work at home and it does not work in government.

I am hopeful that I am starting a revolution, a rally to restore fiscal sanity. Tax cuts are not a religion. It is rank demagoguery to say tax and spend and all that sort of silly nonsense that gets spouted by the finance minister and the Prime Minister and others.

The government needs to have conversation about its revenue base and its cost base. The government spends 15% of the nation's GDP. It cannot carry on the way it has been without bequeathing to our future generations multiple billion dollars worth of debt. That is no way to run a nation and it is certainly not fiscal sanity.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's comments about restoring our fiscal sanity. One of the other issues would be restoring our social sanity in the sense that we are missing the broad picture.

One of the key elements of a broad policy outlook would be through pensions and pension reforms. One of the ideas that has been floating around for quite some time, certainly on this side of the House, and one which we have looked at with a great deal of attention, is the idea of supplementary CPP. To do that, it would allow this large and one of the best managed funds in the world to be available to the average Canadian who may be moving around from place to place, from one company to another, people with a great amount of skill that they can put on the market, both national and international. It would allow them to invest in their future once they retire.

I would like for the hon. member to comment on that and other social policies he feels this particular budget misses out on.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member touches on probably what will be a future insane conversation in this chamber.

The need to have a supplement to the Canada pension plan is obvious. People's pension situations are desperate. They are only going to get worse. The last time they were meaningfully addressed was by Mr. Martin and Mr. Chrétien, when they actually upped the payroll deduction in order to properly fund the Canada pension plan.

In order to have a supplemental plan, it is going to require a payroll tax. Listen to the nonsense dialogue that will come out from the other side that we cannot do it. We cannot have it both ways. Either we will have an adequate pension or we will not. One way or another, it has to be paid for, but to aspire to a dialogue such as that would be a bit too much to hope for.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the hon. member that the government really has a lack of focus. It is confused. It lurches from misstep to misstep. The long form census is a really good example of that. I think the public are beginning to see this, but its confusion in some ways is exceeded by the confusion of the opposition party itself.

The member introduced Bill C-300 last week in the House, which we voted on, regarding corporate social responsibility for mining companies that operate in other countries. It was an excellent bill and his party had the ability to make it pass. Yet his leader had 30 members miss the vote so the bill would be lost. That gives a terrible message to people out there in the public who supported his bill, liked his bill a lot and wanted to see his party support him.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, naturally I was rather disappointed in the results after all of that work. I thank the hon. member for his observation that it was an excellent bill, but it failed and it failed for a number of reasons, all of which are contained in the House.

The first and foremost reason that it failed was the Prime Minister whipped the Conservative caucus. I have never seen a situation where a prime minister insists that 140 of his members show up and vote against a private member's bill. He also, in the last hour of debate, had two of his senior ministers speak against the bill. He further had one of his senior ministers go out and scrum against the bill. It was an extraordinary response to what literally millions of Canadians wanted done.

On the other side of the House, there were a number of people who did not show up, including a number of members in the hon. member's party. It is what it is and it is a disappointment to us all. I thought we could have actually done something on this file. It looks like, for the balance of this legislative period, for the balance of this Parliament, nothing will be done because the Prime Minister shows no interest in a legislative response to the egregious abuses of Canadian mining companies operating abroad.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

Before we resume debate, I would like to remind all hon. members of the House that the matter before us at this time is Bill C-47. When members ask questions, they ought to address that bill. It is a broad bill, so there is a great amount of leeway involved with that. The last question did not address it and I gave the hon. member from Scarborough—Guildwood significant latitude in terms of answering the question. However, I would encourage all members in future to ask questions regarding the legislation before the House.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Mississauga—Brampton South.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very honoured to have this opportunity to share my time with the member for Scarborough—Guildwood, who so eloquently spoke on the issue before us, which is Bill C-47.

I rise to speak to Bill C-47, the second act to implement the provisions of the budget of 2010, which we heard in this place on March 4. As I have mentioned in the past, budget 2010 not only fails to address the real challenges facing Canadian families, it fails to even recognize that those challenges even exist. That is why Bill C-47 is a continuation of that failure. Therefore, the Liberal Party and I will not be voting in favour of the bill.

The budget 2010 stimulus package is not working. That is the underlying premise of what I will be talking about here today. The question I ask many of my constituents and many Canadians when I travel the country is whether they are better off today than they were when the Conservatives came into power. The overwhelming response is, no, they are not better off.

I will speak to a few key areas that this budget touches upon and the concerns that many Canadians have brought to my attention.

The first issue that comes up time and time again is jobs. The unemployment rate is 2% higher today than it was during the last election when the Conservatives came into power. In particular, if we look at the jobs number, full-time jobs have been replaced by part-time jobs. We have lost over 200,000 full-time jobs.

People who have part-time employment are unable to find full-time employment. Around 11% to 12% of people who currently work in part-time jobs have difficulty trying to find the full-time employment they are seeking. Employers trying to find employees for certain jobs are unable to do so as well.

At the Montreal conference that the Liberal Party held not too long ago, one of the themes that emerged, and this was when we did public policy, was that there were jobs without people and people without jobs. The job market has gone through a major restructuring. People looking for jobs are unable to find them. People who have jobs are not satisfied with the one they have.

This is a real concern. This is the number one issue that I hear about time and time again. Unfortunately the job story is one that the government does not get and it is something as parliamentarians we need to address. This budget in particular fails to do so.

The second issue that comes up in my discussions with my constituents and Canadians is the current trend we see with the government with respect to borrowing and spending. Household debt is at record levels. The average Canadian owes about $42,000, which is one of the highest amongst the OECD levels.

I want to emphasize this point because my constituency of Mississauga—Brampton South very much relies on trade. We have the Pearson International Airport and major highways in the constituency. Trade is absolutely critical for economic growth and activity in my region.

As a trading nation, we have a monthly trade deficit now at a record of $2.7 billion. What further compounds the issue now, focusing on the borrowing aspect of it, is that we have a record deficit of $56 billion and climbing. This number continues to be revised, over and over again, as the government is unable to demonstrate that it has any type of control when it comes to borrowing money. It increased its spending and doubled it just before we entered the recession. It was the most expensive endeavour taken by the government. It turned a $13 billion surplus into the $56 billion deficit that we see before us.

This is something that obviously is consistent. If we look at all of the budgets of the government, it has increased spending at unprecedented levels. What is even more troublesome is that in the next four years, it is projecting a deficit increase of $156 billion over those four years. It actually adds to our debt, which in turn costs Canadian taxpayers and future the generations $10 billion in interest. This is the kind of legacy the government is leaving for our children.

The government is borrowing and spending at a reckless rate and is leaving a legacy for future generations that will cost hard-earned taxpayer money to pay and finance the deficit and debt left by the government. People just do not understand how a government could spend so much money and borrow so much money.

Then people focus on the spending. We in opposition have highlighted this because it is important that the Canadian public realize the rate at which the government is spending money.

For example, the government spent $130 million on shameless, self-promoting advertising. I spoke with the Auditor General at committee last week about these quarterly reports and statements the government put out. She clearly indicated that it was simply a show and tell exercise. She said that it was simply a government exercise to promote and market itself. She said that the numbers were not substantive and the figures were not accurate. Those audits clearly demonstrated that the figures were not reflective of the real picture.

The Conservative government is spending all this money on twisting things in order to promote itself, and the public is now becoming acutely aware of this pattern. The government spent $130 million promoting itself through signs with respect to the economic action plan, for example, in my riding. That money could have been used for additional projects. This is a clear example of the government's loss of control and its reckless spending.

The government spent $1.3 billion on a 72-hour photo op. This was unprecedented, especially when we compare the cost to G20 summits in other countries, particularly the amount of money spent on the fake lake and glow sticks. This kind of spending at a time when people are worried about their jobs and concerned about household debt cannot be justified.

Here is another example of how the government has spent so much money. It wants to spend $13 billion on American Republican-style megaprisons for unreported crimes. This is not in line with the priorities about which I hear. It is an expenditure that makes absolutely no sense in the current context with a record deficit and the job situation that we face as a country in this difficult economic time.

The government is going to spend $16 billion on F-35 stealth jet fighters. It was a sole-sourced awarded without competition. People are stunned that the government would continue with this decision in light of the record federal deficit.

The Auditor General presented a report recently with respect to the helicopter purchases. She indicated that the sole source process for the F-35 was not the best way to go. It was not the best value for money proposition for the government and for taxpayers. This is alarming to me and to many Canadians. Why does the government continue to spend this kind of money during these difficult times?

The Conservative government provided $20 billion in corporate tax cuts that we cannot afford at the present time. Again, we are giving money away to large corporations when we should be investing in Canadian families. I will speak to this a bit later as well.

Those are some examples of how the government has spent recklessly and how much money it has borrowed.

When I ask Canadians if they think they are better off today compared to when the Conservatives came in to power in 2006, they say no. The reason they say no is because of government mismanagement. Through the various examples that we bring up in the House of Commons, through what they read in the media and see on TV, what they see in public, Canadians are beginning to realize that the government has really mismanaged taxpayer money.

Last week I had the opportunity to highlight two examples of where the government has really misspent and they highlight a bigger problem. The government outsourced the VIA Rail press releases at a cost of $3,400 for approximately 1,300 words. That was completely unnecessary. This reflected the bigger problem.

I want to highlight the fact that the most recent public accounts show that the Conservatives spent $9.4 billion on external contracts for professional and special services, a $2.2 billion increase over the previous Liberal government. That is just another example of mismanagement at a time when people are worried about the bottom line.

This budget is not in line with the priorities of Canadian. Canadians are worried about jobs, and this budget does not address that issue in a real significant way, specifically, with regard to the restructuring that is taking place in our economy. A lot of full-time jobs have been lost and those jobs are now being replaced by part-time jobs.

The government is borrowing and spending money at a reckless pace and that is going to leave a difficult legacy for future generations. It is mismanaging taxpayer dollars at a time when Canadian families are going through difficult times.

Families in my riding care about health care, education, their pensions. This budget is a clear example of the difference between what the current government is planning versus what we are proposing. Most recently we came out with a family care plan. That clearly outlines how we care about our families and our communities.

My colleagues and I will be voting against this bill because it is not in line with Canadian families. It is unfortunate that we are worse off today than we were in 2006, but I hope that changes in the near future.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out to the hon. member that perhaps he might like to take a look at the Public Accounts of Canada 2010, volume 1, where earlier his colleague talked about the debt that Canada has taken on, and I would like to read this into the record. It says:

With reductions in the stock of interest-bearing debt and a decline in interest rates over the 1997-1998 to 2007-2008 period, the share of public debt charges in total expenses fell over 15 percentage points from a high of nearly 30% of total expenses in 1996-1997.

The hon. member said that people were concerned about their jobs and I sincerely agree. We have been through a global downturn in the economy and many of our businesses have struggled to keep up. Since businesses and corporations are the only entities in our economy that create real jobs, how does the member suggest that they do this if they are continually taxed by government? We want to reduce those corporate taxes because we know that corporations and businesses are going to create real, well-paying jobs in our economy and that is what we want to see.

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to clarify one point; 8 out of every 10 new jobs are created by small and medium-sized enterprises, and that is absolutely important to note. That is why the corporate tax reduction applies to large corporations, not to SMEs. The Liberal Party understands that we will need to support small and medium-sized enterprises. That is why we put forward a comprehensive list of initiatives to help small and medium-sized enterprises.

More importantly, when the member talks about the government's track record on deficit and debt, and I want to take this opportunity to highlight that, if we look at the public accounts textbook, as the member alluded to, the most recent public accounts showed that the Conservatives spent $9.4 billion on external contracts for professional and special services. That is a $2.2 billion increase over the previous Liberal government.

If we look at Conservatives' projections going forward, we see that they plan to increase deficit and our debt by $156 billion, which would amount to a $10 billion increase in interest payments. Again, this is living beyond our means obligating future generations because the government is mismanaging the public fund.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague mentioned that, since 2005, Canadians are worse off today. I would suggest that he take that timeline and go back to 1995 and he will find a StatsCan report. Albeit we are going to lose some of that great data when it comes to the census being eliminated by the Conservative government, but nonetheless, it is there today and it shows that the majority of working Canadians are no better off and in some cases are worse off in 2010 than they were in 1995. We cannot blame the Conservatives for the entire piece, but we can talk about where we lost jobs and how we lost jobs and how budgets have an effect on that.

I wonder if my colleague would like to comment on the fact that the continual two-party alliance of blue and red has decided to continue with free trade. As we lose those jobs, and we see that at an accelerated pace this past recession, how does the member intend to make sure that those good jobs come back so Canadians can actually prosper as we head to 2011, 2012, 2013 and on?

[Navdeep Bains, Liberal, Mississauga—Brampton South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad that the hon. member talked about free trade, because I want to take this opportunity to highlight the fact that I very much support free and fair trade. We are a trading nation. It is absolutely critical that we look to foreign markets, particularly for small and medium-sized enterprises that have the opportunity to penetrate into those markets, to get market access, to create jobs. Many businesses in my riding rely on free and fair trade to be able to expand and to grow. This is something that the Liberal Party very much supports. This is something we tried to promote through various initiatives, in particular with SMEs as I have indicated.

I am actually shocked that the NDP is against free trade, because when we talk about free and fair trade its members say they support it. Any time we have discussions around that on any bills, they tend to go against those positions without any hesitation. In this particular matter I want to go on the record by saying we support free and fair trade.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today to Bill C-47, sustaining Canada's economic recovery act.

I am pleased to have this opportunity to speak on behalf of my party today because I strongly oppose the government's vision and I think Canadians deserve to know the truth about how it is rapidly destroying our social infrastructure, which was once strong and proud. Budgets are about making choices. Time and time again, we have seen the government make choices that are not in Canadians' best interests.

Borrowing billions to give corporate tax cuts, building more prisons, sole source contracting for fighter jet planes, the government's choices have led to a proven track record of poor economic choices.

Canadians want their money to be spent wisely on things that improve the quality of life of their families. I even find the title of the bill misleading. We are led to believe, based solely on the title of the bill, that the current government is making the choice to do everything possible to help our country recover from a tough economic time. In reality this budget bill is doing exactly the opposite.

It is a typical game of the government, smoke and mirrors, clouded by wasteful spending and irrational choices and shattered by mistruths.

I am deeply concerned that the choices that the current government is making are not to the benefit of Canadians. On Friday I listened to Power and Politics and heard the Parliamentary Secretary for Official Languages telling the CBC about how the government has undertaken significant consultations with Canadians across the country and that these consultations had been meaningful. That means having a real substantive impact on public policy.

I find this disconcerting because a few weeks ago I had the opportunity, in my role as critic for democratic renewal, to travel across our great country to talk to Canadians about issues that matter to them. What I heard during this “Canadians Make the Rules Tour”, as it was called, was that Canadians across the country felt shut out and disengaged from the decision making that goes on here in Ottawa.

I heard about how Canadians are tired of the government's top-down, paternalistic, father-knows-best style of governing. They want change. They want another option to choose from.

At every round table across Canada, I heard about the importance of having a strong independent media holding the government of the day to account. Canadians believe that a Prime Minister should be accessible and take unfiltered questions.

I was shocked at the overwhelming ground swell of concern that the CBC has no longer sufficient funding to do its job properly.

This is a choice, a strategy on the part of the current government to limit the democratic discourse in Canadian public life by silencing any dissenting voices. Instead the government has made the choice to bloat the PMO communications budget in order to sell its bad choices to Canadians.

In Vancouver, people expressed concern about the government's failure to listen to the people and about how stakeholders are basically being left out of the decision-making process.

In Calgary, people expressed concern about the concentration of power in the Prime Minister's Office and talked about how the government should be accountable to Parliament.

In Fredericton, people talked about the importance of Parliament's role as a place for dialogue and developing policies that are in the interests of the Canadian people. Unfortunately, the government does not share that vision of parliamentary supremacy.

Rather, the government seems to think that Parliament is a kind of suggestion box and a good place to put up Christmas lights once a year.

It is a terrible shame that Canadians have to watch our democratic institutions go downhill over time. Those are the facts. Canadians have spoken. When will the government finally choose to listen to what Canadians have to say?

Scholar Ursula Franklin has said that good governance is fair, transparent and takes people seriously. This government has not been fair, funding only Conservative ridings. It has not been transparent in terms of the redacted documents that are now the joke of a government elected on transparency. With sleight-of-hand announcements of the re-announcements of the re-announcements, this is a government that does not take people seriously. It bullies and silences civil society, choosing only to listen to the small number of Canadians who actually agree with it.

The government has made choices to eliminate the Canadian Council on Learning and to cut government funding to organizations like KAIROS, the Canadian Council for International Co-operation and women's groups across the country that represent the voices of social justice. This does not even mention the government's ideological bungling of maternal and child health, which is both failing Canadians and ruining what was once a sterling international reputation.

Time and time again, we bear witness to the shell game of this government. We have seen funding announcements recycled. The theme here, though, is consistent: never any new money.

The chill in the NGO community in Canada must come to an end. Within civil society is real expertise that could and should be tapped in order to get the best possible public policy for Canada and Canadian families.

As Liberals, we do not adhere to the same principles as the current government. We know that there are tough choices to be made. That is what governing and democracy are all about. We believe we should be investing in people and bringing about transformative change with the dollars that government spends.

However, time and time again this government has made the choice to abdicate governing in favour of never-ending campaigning and trying to convince Canadians that its draconian actions are not as bad as the dissenters make them out to be.

The leader of the official opposition has indicated a three-pronged approach to the return of a fair, open and compassionate Canada. It would put the emphasis on learning, care and a renewed sense of Canadian leadership in the world.

We have listened and made our intentions clear to take care of Canadians who devote a good portion of their lives to supporting their ailing loved ones.

We listened to the ideas that came out of the May 2010 public consultation on the digital economy and have announced a strategy to make our government more open, with free access to government data, a policy that the U.K. estimates has created an economic benefit of over six billion pounds.

With that in mind, we in the Liberal Party are committed to maintaining a government strategy.

As we have demonstrated with my private member's bill to bring back the long form census, we believe it is crucial to provide Canadians with evidence-based data so they can make informed decisions.

Contrary to what the Parliamentary Secretary for Official Languages said last Friday, we want to conduct real consultations with Canadians in order to draw on the knowledge and expertise of a strong civil society.

As former chief statistician, Munir Sheikh, was quoted in the Toronto Star on Sunday:

With the government’s decision to abolish the long-form census, it is not clear how one would get reliable answers to these important questions.

...in the absence of high quality census data, it may become considerably more difficult to deal with some of the fundamental economic and social issues we face.

In fact, I would like to note that the Legislative Assembly of the Northwest Territories last week passed a motion to urge the Government of Canada to reverse its decision to eliminate the mandatory long form census.

We believe that without the empirical evidence needed to create policies, ideology will inevitably become the default foundation for debate and discussion in Canada, something that truly frightens me.

This government will spend $30 million more to get less reliable information.

I do not believe that public money should be used to finance projects like the construction of prisons for hypothetical prisoners who, strangely, cannot even be counted.

It has just been pure ideology and fear mongering. Speculation and hearsay is not sufficient evidence. It is crucial that we have the best possible information on which to make proper decisions with public money.

Choices governments make can be transformative or hold a country back. Progressive governments invest in their people, invest in science and invest in the future. Borrowing money for prisons, fighter planes and corporate tax cuts are on one side; care, learning and earning back Canada's place in the world are on the other.

This bill demonstrates the priorities of this government. It refuses to invest in our people and those people who share our tiny planet with us. Canadians deserve a government that listens and understands the reality of their daily lives. Young entrepreneurs keen to conquer the digital economy, single mothers who want to go back to school and women trying to take care of a loved one at home know this government could and should be helpful. This government has not heard their needs. The budget bill has let them down terribly.

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. We will have to move on to questions and comments.

The hon. member for Newmarket—Aurora.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I sometimes think the members across the way have selective memories. They talk about re-announcements. I remember in 1993 when the Liberal government promised in the election campaign to get rid of the GST and we were still waiting in 2005. They promised a national day care program, which never came to fruition. They cut $25 billion to the provinces in health and social transfers, and they were responsible for the sponsorship scandal and Canadians are still waiting to get their money back.

I have been privileged to make many announcements on behalf of our government in Toronto ridings for infrastructure programs. None of them are yet Conservative-held ridings.

I would also like to refer back to the public accounts books, which talk about major transfers to other levels of government increasing by $10.5 billion over the previous year. That is money going into the provinces for health care, education and social programs.

My question to the hon. member is this. When her party was in government, why did it not get these things done?

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind the hon. member that the 6% increase in the health transfer is because of the 2004 accord that was signed. The member should realize that it is an annual increase that the Minister of Health stands up virtually every day taking credit for. It was signed by all levels of government, and therefore, the Conservative government did not have the opportunity to cut it as it probably would have.

I would ask the hon. member to listen to the answer to the question posed. It is absolutely ridiculous for her to declare that there was nothing done on early learning and child care. The deals signed by the provinces with the minister of human resources and skills development at the time have created thousands of child care spaces across this country. In fact, the number of child care spaces has actually doubled in this country from the time that the Liberals formed government in 1993.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague talked about controlling government with regard to how democracy gets eroded and people having the sense that somehow they do not play a role and are not listened to. I could not agree with her more. That is absolutely true. I used to be in municipal government when the budget process was opened up after looking at the example of Pôrto Alegre in Brazil, which has an open and transformative budget process in which citizen engagement is the primary piece.

It is not just this PMO that tries to put a straitjacket around the House and all the other things that happen inside government. I hate to say it to my hon. colleague, because we have worked very closely in other areas, especially in the CFIA, and worked very well, but her government indeed did something similar. This has been an ongoing problem for a number of years, where the PMO has talked about control and exerted it from the top down.

I wonder where she has suggestions, because I know she always has good suggestions, about how we can democratize that process and open it up so that Canadians will re-engage themselves and indeed feel not only comfortable, but assured that their voices are heard, listened to and eventually acted upon.

[Carolyn Bennett, Liberal, St. Paul's, ON]

Mr. Speaker, before Paul Martin became finance minister, there was a very close process in which a few elite people would whisper in the ear of the finance minister, and voilà, there would be a budget. In 1993, Liberals began the process of prebudget consultation, which became a best practice in the world.

The member would have to admit that after going across the country in prebudget consultations a number of Liberal budgets were no surprise. People knew and citizens were onside with what needed to be done. A lot of the good ideas came out of those consultations and many members of Parliament did prebudget consultations in their ridings that actually became part of the finance committee report.

People need now to not feel that it is some sort of occupational therapy that they come and submit their papers or speak and the government has already decided what it is going to do. We have to move forward—

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. Resuming debate. The hon. member for Windsor—Tecumseh.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak on Bill C-47 and address a couple of issues in the bill, both hearkening back to the original budget bill, which this is just apart of, and also some specifics in this bill.

In that regard, the budget, last time, was a classic of opportunities missed, and even where issues were addressed, government having gone offside.

I want to address in particular the funding that was promised, first, in the throne speech back in late February or early March of this year, then the actual dollars put into the budget, and then an announcement made just this past weekend on the issue. It was with regard to the horrendous issue of the number of aboriginal women who have gone missing in this country over the last decade or longer.

The sad part about this is not just the tragedy of all those women going missing and presumably, in a lot of cases, having been killed, but the fact of both the current government and the prior government not paying any attention to the issue at all. The dimension of the problem was raised by groups coming out of the first nations and having to do work that should have been done by our police forces, our justice system and our governments, which was ignored in large part by all of those sectors of our country.

It is inevitable, I think, to conclude that had the issue been treated seriously from the very beginning as these women went missing, a great deal of the loss of these women to our society could have been prevented. The current government in particular, but the prior government as well, spent way too much time on prosecuting crimes, on punishing criminals, as opposed to spending much more effort as is needed to prevent those crimes from ever happening.

Again, the announcement that we saw on Friday is just typical of that.

What was promised in the throne speech was that $10 million would be spent on what in effect I thought, from reading the speech and hearing the speech, would be mostly on prevention and assisting aboriginal groups in particular in identifying the loss of these women and trying to use methodologies that would teach us what happened to them and ways to prevent that from happening in the future.

One group in particular, the Sisters in Spirit, had done tremendous work. I was totally amazed when they brought it forward both to this House in a standing committee and to various members of Parliament who have responsibility in these areas. What was clear was that they had done very effective work in identifying how severe the problem was, but they were also literally begging the government to provide them with additional resources. That is what I thought part of that $10 million was going to be used for.

Did that happen? No, it did not.

The announcement on Friday by the minister responsible for women's issues made it very clear. When we look through the individual areas where these funds are going to get spent, it is not focused, certainly, on first nations people, aboriginal people, Métis or Inuit women. It is much more broadly dispersed among the whole population.

In spite of that promise in the Speech from the Throne that it was going to be dedicated to first nations, the aboriginal population, in fact it is not. If we do any kind of apportionment of the dollars, less than 10%, or maybe 15%, would end up aiding those communities. The rest is going to be spent on the general population.

In addition, this is not an issue that was new this past weekend. We have known about it for some time because of the work, over the last couple of years, done by the Sisters in Spirit and other groups like that from the first nations.

However, what has happened? The government says that it is going to spend the money. It is only $5 million per year for two years. That is all it has committed to. We get the announcement of how it is going to spend it, more than six months after the promise, when in fact Sisters in Spirit in particular were ready to go immediately. They had an outstanding application for funds. The government could have given them a portion of the $10 million back in March, quite frankly, when the budget first got passed. It did not do that. It spent all this time, I am not sure doing what, because when we see what it is proposing to do, it did not take six or seven months to plan that out.

In any event, we are now here, again too late, unfocused, for the $10 million. Some of that money is supposed to be spent this year on aiding some of the groups that would be providing some preventative work. It is very small amounts of money, maybe as little as $1 million per year for the next two years. I cannot see how any of that money is going to get spent this year, given how late the government has come down with it. We are going to have to wait for proposals to come forward. With the year-end break, very little of the $5 million for this year is going to get spent this year, and of course, with the risk of an election next year, it may not get spent at all.

However, it is typical of the government's attitude towards this problem, that it is not taking it seriously. Nothing could make that clearer than the way it has handled this money. There have been lots of photo ops, lots of press conferences and press releases about how it was going to do something, but the reality is that it is too little, not nearly enough money, for sure, for the problem that the aboriginal community is faced with. It is too late and what little it is doing is going in the wrong direction.

We look at this and ask why we are bothering with the government even doing this. The answer, of course, is that it gives the government the opportunity to do those press releases and have the photo ops.

The other reality with regard to this particular money is that it is quite clear from our discussions with first nations people and aboriginal communities generally that they are not at all happy, but we are not hearing any negatives from them because they are intimidated by the government. So often with so many other groups, it has intimidated them into silence by not renewing contracts and cutting off funding, KAIROS being a classic example of that and any number of other groups that it has cut funding to because they did not toe the government line, and this is again another example of that. The $10 million is really of questionable value, and whether it is going to get spent or not is questionable as well.

Let me switch to the other point that I want to raise in this brief speech, which is with regard to the pension issue.

We have in Bill C-47 one paragraph on pensions. We have had the finance minister running around the country, as well as in this House, making all these forecasts that the government is going to do something about reform of the Canada pension plan. We are promised repeatedly that it is coming, and again what we see in this bill is one paragraph that really has nothing to do with reform of the Canada pension plan.

We had been promised repeatedly, and even some dates were put on this. We were supposed to have something by the spring. Then we were supposed to have something this fall when we came back from the mid-term break. There is nothing in regard to pensions. We know, and I say this from a really negative personal experience as a member of Parliament, how traumatizing this is to a large number of our constituents.

I come from a city that is heavily dependent upon the auto industry. When it looked as though both General Motors and Chrysler were going to go into bankruptcy, and that the pensions were going to be in serious jeopardy, we expected more from the government. We expected them to deal with it. We expected them to deal with reforming Canada pension plan.

Let me conclude by saying that paragraph 70 in this bill does nothing for any of those issues.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I was disturbed to hear comments regarding the comprehensive strategy to deal with the horrific incidents and missing aboriginal women across this country, particularly in the riding and the province where I live.

The strategy is comprehensive. On one hand, he says there is not enough money; on the other, he says they will never even be able to spend it this year.He cannot have it both ways.

Can the member actually say that it is not important for the policemen to have the tools to find these women? Is the funding not important, the funding that is going to the groups, for the awareness materials, and for pilot projects in the communities?

Again, it is a comprehensive strategy, and I think he needs to speak to the good work it will do for the missing aboriginal women and their families.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the reality is that it does not do it.

Is this not a serious problem? Yes, it is. I have been the justice critic for my party for nearly seven years now. I understand how serious this is. I also understand that the proposals and the so-called programming that were put out on Friday go nowhere near meeting the requirements.

It is not focused. A good deal of this money is not being spent on the aboriginal community or the missing women. It is being dispersed in various programs throughout the Canadian community.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I was going to comment on the stimulus plan and its deadline.

Would the member care to comment? Right now many of the communities in my riding are suffering as a result of this hard deadline. Perhaps the member could talk about a possible extension.

The member did talk about the pension situation, which I raised in the House several times today. He mentioned the auto sector. In my riding, a plant that had been shut down in the last two years belonged to AbitibiBowater. The pensioners throughout the community, and there are a lot of them, are facing uncertain times because of the uncertainty of the company. It has since made great gains in getting out of bankruptcy, but it was touch and go there for a while. We had an uncertain pension plan that created defined benefits for a large swath of the population in my riding.

Can the member comment on the future debate on security for these plans? They are held by large corporations or even smaller businesses. Just how much trouble they are in, and where will this debate be going in the near future?

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, with respect to the government, I do not see any programming coming in at all.

This is not radical thinking. This is not radical planning. Most of the states in the United States, which are much more conservative than we are, much more oriented to a free market, have provisions at the state level for guaranteeing pensions. They are backed by the state governments. That is not a radical plan. It is quite common throughout most of western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, all societies that have markets similar to ours.

In the case of insolvency or insufficiencies in the pension plan, we need for those to be backstopped by a reserve fund, and that reserve fund needs to be backstopped by government, at both the federal and provincial levels.

We are probably 40, 50 years beyond where we should be in providing this in our social safety net. It is not so difficult to do it. We know how to structure it. But we need the political will to put that legislation in place.

With regard to the stimulus program, my community is somewhat unusual. I am in the southernmost part of the country, and so weather has not been a problem for construction. My community was in such bad economic shape that they had a number of programs ready to go as soon as the funding became available.

We think we are going to meet our deadlines, but we are pretty unusual. There are other parts of this country that are going to need extensions.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak before the House regarding this bill. On September 30, 2010, the Minister of Finance introduced Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, Sustaining Canada's Economic Recovery Act.

A lot of it is smaller plugs filling the holes on the back end of the budgetary process. Nonetheless, in the spirit of fair and balanced debate, I would like to congratulate the government on some of the measures.

Part 1 implements a number of income tax measures. It allows for the sharing of the Canada child tax benefit, the universal child care benefit. That is a different debate. The universal child care benefit, through which parents get $100 a month, is being passed off as a child care program. I have misgivings about it. It does not give enough attention to the policy of early childhood education, and it does not address the fact that we have early childhood educators who are not given the right tools.

The problem with this type of thinking, just mailing out a $100 cheque every month, is that no one knows where it ends. Where is the broad vision for what we want to do, which is to allow accessible, universal child care? Under this thinking, we might as well mail $50 to everybody and call it a pharmacare program. It might work, but members will see what I am getting at.

I do not want to sound facetious, but I want to get to a positive aspect: allowing registered retirement savings plan proceeds to be transferred to a registered disability savings plan on a tax- deferred basis. I was considering doing a private member's bill on that, but the government introduced it in its budget, and here we have it, so I would like to congratulate the government. That is a positive step for people with disabilities. RRSPs are much more prevalent now than they were previously, and this provides a bit of flexibility for caregivers to pass it on to people in their families who suffer from disabilities. There we have one positive step.

In the spirit of raising the bar, there are also other issues we could look at with respect to the flexibility of registered retirement savings plans, whether to bequeath them to another person in the family after a death. This should be looked at. It is a positive first step to take the unused part of an RRSP, after a death, and pass it on to someone who is invested in an RDSP, a registered disability savings plan.

The other issues in part 1 amend the Canada Pension Plan, the Employment Insurance Act, and the Income Tax Act to provide legislative authority for the Canada Revenue Agency to issue online notices if the taxpayer so requests. In the digital age, online notices are more prevalent, more available. As a member of Parliament, I get a lot of calls regarding the Canada Revenue Agency. A lot of people are in arrears, owe money, fines, interest, and so forth. These things can be quite crippling, and the financial forgiveness that is available is always hard to get. Sometimes there is a lack of information, not just for individuals, but also for small and medium-sized businesses. This could be a positive step toward a free flow of information.

The only other issue is that the government has to commit to 100% penetration on broadband Internet. During the economic stimulus plan, part of the budget announced the penetration of broadband Internet to rural and northern areas. In all of Atlantic Canada, despite all the money that was talked about, only one project was approved.

I do not want to take away from the rest of the country, and I wish them all the best in their projects. But there was only one in Atlantic Canada. This leads me to believe that we did not put enough emphasis on the availability of broadband Internet. It would have allowed far more communities, small groups, and educational institutions to be connected.

We ask people to sign up for Service Canada, EI, and the Canada pension plan, and we create a flow of communications so that people can receive their benefits that much quicker. But without a commitment to 100% penetration, our attempts to promote on-line interactive government services will fall short.

In light of how much the government has gone from paper to on-line services, and how much we interact with the government, whether municipal, provincial, or even federal, it should be a right for people to be connected on the broadband Internet.

In the beginning, we had a railway service that connected our country. Then we had the Trans-Canada Highway, and now everyone would consider it a right to have highways and roads that connect even small communities.

I have 191 communities in my riding. That is a lot of pavement, a lot of asphalt. But of the 191 communities, 31 do not have access to broadband Internet. Put aside the issue of affordability. It is just not there.

On an individual basis, that is bad enough. But how do we attract industry? How do we say to a company that our plant has closed down, but we have a well-trained talent pool within this community, and we want the company to come in and set up a business?

Do I have vital services? Yes. Water hook-up? Yes. Asphalt to the back of the business? Yes. Do I have broadband Internet? No, we do not. We have dial-up.

How can a company bidding on major contracts do this when it is already at a terrible disadvantage? That is part of the issue.

I applaud the government for moving toward more on-line services, but I think the debate has to continue beyond this. We have to talk about the fact that not everyone is hooked up under broadband services.

Part 7 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to implement the total transfer protection for 2010-11, to set out the treatment of the one-time transfer protection payment under the fiscal stabilization program. That is pretty straightforward.

Let us talk about equalization and transfer payments. We joined Canada in 1949, and today I can stand in the House and say that I live in and represent a “have” province. That was a long time coming. There were certain sacrifices along the way, but we have become a “have” province.

We are not doing things just for the sake of making more money out of revenues from oil and natural gas development. My province now has one of the best poverty-reduction strategies in this country. I congratulate the provincial government for doing it. It is well managed and it is going to make a big difference.

Recently, a program for a home heating rebate for seniors was announced. It is a fantastic program. This was done federally in 2005. It was the energy rebate. As far as I can gather, energy prices have not decreased, so I think that is something we should look at.

It also mentions the Pension Benefit Standards Act. It is almost as if we do pension reform on the margins. I discussed this earlier.

Pension reform is going to be part of this debate. I understand first ministers are currently discussing it. I hope that they come up with a plan that allows more flexibility in the Canada pension plan.

I do like the fact that we could have a supplementary Canada pension plan. That is one element and a visionary element that could bring a greater amount of benefit and income for our most vulnerable seniors.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to convey greetings from the sisters and brothers of the AbitibiBowater workers local to our fellow sisters and brothers in Grand Falls. I know the work the member has done on behalf of those workers.

We know what it is like. There were five paper mills in my riding not that long ago and we now have one. We know what it is like to watch the Domtars and Abitibis leave and then become the Gallahers. We understand what it is like to see pension plans wound up. We understand, like the Atlas workers in Welland, what happened to them when they received a registered letter on a Friday that said, “As of 12 p.m. on Sunday night your benefits are terminated” and this was to retirees, “and your pension will be cut in half”.

We understand the need for pension reform in this country that not only talks about an enhancement to CPP. This is where my friend and I have a slight disagreement about what we should do with CPP, whether it be a voluntary piece or a mandatory piece as we expand that program. However, I think we would agree upon this one aspect. When workers work all their life and contribute to a defined contribution plan, their expectation is to get it out. I would ask my friend to comment on that and on how we should ensure they get what they deserve when they retire.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned earlier, I had one mill that closed down. The member had five mills and there is now one. I did not know that before. If there is not a better illustration of how we need to look after people who relied so heavily on their defined benefit plans, that gave them that chunk of security for the rest of their lives, and not just them but most of these people raised entire families on this defined benefit plan that now finds itself at half value and no benefits. Five plants and now one. If there is not one hallmark, one sign, one beacon of distress out there that is it.

If it is AbitibiBowater or Domtar, to back these pensions up for security is so necessary and yet so vacant from a debate in the House. It is absolutely incredible.

The member for Windsor—Tecumseh had a good point when he mentioned that many American states have gone further than we have on pension security. What do people do if they are in their mid-seventies? They know they are going to live for another 10 or 15 years and they need to rely on this defined benefit plan that is no longer is backed up, is half the value and is out the door. How do we pick up that slack? Through what, social welfare? This is something that they have invested in all their lives.

[Raynald Blais, Bloc, Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC]

Mr. Speaker, to understand what we are talking about today, I would like to understand what the member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor is saying regarding his position on the budget. We are discussing the implementation of the budget today because when it was time to vote on the budget in the spring, the Liberals abstained.

Based on what I just heard, it sounds as though he thinks we should throw everything out, even though there may be some worthwhile measures in this budget. The budget before us today was supported by the Liberals, but it contains some amendments or applications that could be worthwhile today. It is a bit too late, in a way.

I would like to know how the member could say what he did today, in light of his past actions.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, when it comes to my personal actions, I have never wavered from the fact that pension security in this country was never an issue or something that just came about over the last two or three years. We knew this. Unfunded pension liabilities have been around for the last 20 or 30 years, particularly when it comes to DB plans.

The mindset is now beginning to change. Due to the recent downturn, people are now realizing that these pensions are not as bedrock solid as they used to be. Now, all of a sudden, we find ourselves in a situation where we need to educate ourselves, educate the public and make legislation that would help these people decide on how to live the rest of their lives.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am rising to speak to Bill C-47, an act to implement certain provisions of the other budget tabled in Parliament, blah, blah, blah. The short title is “sustaining Canada's economic recovery” and the blah, blah, blah is about sustaining Canada's economic recovery because, although I will speak specifically to the universal child care benefit and pensions, I want to highlight for people that this so-called economic recovery has not reached from coast to coast to coast in our beautiful country.

I want to refer to a Statistics Canada study that was in The Globe and Mail article entitled, “Natives bore brunt of job losses, study shows”.

When this recession was rolling out across this country, first nations, Métis and Inuit said very clearly, I am sure to many members of this House, that they did not want to be left behind in this recession and that we should not forget that they are already the poorest of the poor.

In Canada's economic recovery act, we see that first nations, Métis and Inuit are absolutely left behind.

According to Statistics Canada, this article reads:

Aboriginals have long struggled with higher unemployment than the rest of Canadians, but the recent economic downturn saw the trouble mount, widening the gap between natives and non-natives.

...in communities across Canada, aboriginal people not living on reserves were hit by bigger drops in employment rates from 2008 to 2009 than the rest of the population.

It mentioned that Statistics Canada did not measure employment on reserves.

The article goes on to state:

The unemployment rate among aboriginal people aged 15 and over rose to 13.9% in 2009 from 10.4% the previous year. At the same time, the unemployment rate for non-aboriginals rose to just over 8% in 2009 from 6 per cent in 2008.

We can see that clearly highlights the starting point difference between aboriginal people working off reserve versus the non-aboriginal population.

The article goes on to give a couple of numbers in a couple of different sectors. It states:

There was a 30% employment decline for natives in manufacturing, compared to just 8% among non-native manufacturing workers. A similar decline was noted in construction, with a 16% drop for native workers compared to 5% for non-natives.

The reason I raise this today is that the legislation before us would do nothing to change those numbers for first nations, Métis and Inuit. We had fair warning before we entered into this recession. We simply have not seen the kind of action that would alleviate the poverty in some of these communities from coast to coast to coast.

I want to speak very briefly to the part of the legislation that deals with the universal child care benefit.

When the Conservatives introduced the child care benefit, the New Democrats stood and said that it would not provide quality, affordable, regulated, licensed, publicly-delivered child care for families in this country.

Despite the fact that people receive $100 a month per child, which is partially clawed back through the tax system, we are now seeing, just as we predicted, the disappearance of child care spaces. The government talks about having a choice in child care. How is $100 a month a choice in child care when the child care bills can run up to $1,000 a month or more, depending upon the city in which one lives? Mothers and fathers are left struggling to figure out how they can continue to work. I must point out that work is often not a choice for people. It often takes two working family members to pay the bills and keep a roof over their children's head. These families are struggling with the fact that they must work and are concerned about what happens with their children when they drop them off at a child care centre. There are many fine family-run child care centres in this country, but that is not the point. The $100 a month is not a choice in child care.

In my riding, an article recently said “Childcare shortfall reaches five hundred kids”. In an article in the Cowichan News Leader, on July 30, it said, “There are 538 fewer childcare spaces in Cowichan compared to 2007”. I happen to know that it is not because we have 538 fewer children in the Cowichan valley. It is because these child care centres are being forced to close.

An organization called Social Planning Cowichan is doing a lot of work around examining the reasons why these child care spaces are disappearing and what the options are for families. It says:

According to [Social Planning Cowichan] numbers, about half of Cowichan's 10,000 kids under age 12 need care—a percentage and total virtually unchanged from three years ago.

There are 10,000 children just in the Cowichan Valley who are requiring care. These are children under the age of 12. It goes on to say:

In 2007, childcare support was available for 48 per cent of those needing it, and now that figure is just 37 per cent.

One suspect is the recession, stealing families' childcare cash. An accomplice could be government cuts to childcare programs. Wages often in the $12-$13 an hour range have also made it hard to attract and retain qualified help.

Somebody once reminded me that we want to provide really good child care for these children because they are going to grow up and change our diapers when we are in long-term care facilities. However, what we are saying is that we are going to pay those workers $12 to $13 an hour, and they are raising the future generation. They are raising the future business leaders, community leaders and perhaps politicians. That is what $100 a month in child care choice contributes to.

We should be looking toward the province of Quebec that has done a very good job in providing child care for the children in the province. It is a model for the rest of Canada and we should look to it for a program that has been very effective in terms of providing real child care choice for family members.

I want to touch briefly on pensions. Before I do that, this is relevant because it is about poverty.

HungerCount 2009, put out by Food Banks Canada, has a couple of interesting figures in its report. It says:

This year’s HungerCount survey confirms what we all suspected: food bank use across the country has escalated as a result of the economic downturn. More than 790,000 people walked into a food bank in March 2009, 72,000 of them for the first time. Not surprisingly, food banks themselves, running on shoestring budgets and staffed largely by dedicated volunteers, are struggling to meet the demand. This year’s HungerCount portrays a country in need of change.

Sadly, I only have 10 minutes so I cannot read all of the very good information about poverty in our country, which is resulting in increased food bank usage, but it does say who is turning to food banks. It says:

In terms of household composition, food bank use did not change significantly from 2008 to 2009. Nearly half of assisted households were families with children, split about evenly between two-parent and single-parent families. The proportion of single people turning to food banks for help edged up.

It says that 49% are families with children. It also points out that 12% of those assisted are aboriginal.

That was going to be in the context of pensions, and this economic recovery bill, Bill C-47, does have amendments to the Pension Benefits Standards Act. However, what it sadly does not do is look at increasing CPP, OAS and GIS to some of the poorest, marginalized seniors in our country. What we know is we have the capacity to do that if we only do not go ahead and implement those corporate tax cuts. The $700 million annually that would be required to lift seniors out of poverty and protect pensions in cases of bankruptcy or insolvency could come from those corporate tax cuts, so we could afford to pay for it.

New Democrats do not support the bill and do not see it as a full-blown economic recovery bill.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there are two areas that I would like to ask the member about with respect to impact as a result of Bill C-47 and the budget. One is in the area of green technology and the fact that the government cancelled most of the eco-technology grants. It has suggested that in this budget there is an opportunity through the capital depreciation allowance for green technology that it will make up, but it does not really give incentives to consumers. How does the member feel about that?

The second question is about how this budget fails families. I would like the member to explore that a little, if she would not mind, for the benefit of the House. We have recent data which provides a strong rationale that the poverty gap is in fact increasing as opposed to decreasing. What does this budget do for families and could it be improved?

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, those are two very good questions. On the green technology end of it, he is absolutely correct that there are two problems with the approach the government has taken. First, the retrofit program that was in place, which could have been converted to a longer-term sustainable environmental retrofit program for households, is gone. Those retrofit programs would have been one way of reducing our ecological footprint in the country.

I want to talk more about that, but he mentioned family poverty. We know that renters and seniors live in homes that could benefit from environmental upgrades. Oftentimes seniors are cash poor and house rich and they do not have an opportunity to do an environmental upgrade. If we want to help families reduce their heating and water bills, we should provide some funding to help them reduce those costs, which would help their bottom lines in terms of eating, for example.

The other piece with green technology is for businesses we need a long-term fund so they can make 5 and 10 year plans for the kinds of environmental upgrades they need to make their businesses more efficient.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my colleague's remarks and was quite taken with what she had to say about the $100 a month child care benefit. It very clearly has failed. It was a bill of goods sold to Canadians and it utterly fails.

I want to ask her about the studies done by Fraser Mustard, which show very clearly that registered regulated child care provides an important foundation that would allow children to flourish and prepare them for the future. Our kids will be competing with the kids of the world and they will need that good start. Could my colleague comment on that importance?

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, a couple of weeks ago I had the good fortune to hear some presentations from the Women's Committee of the Public Service Alliance of Canada. It was very difficult to listen to the stories that some of these women had to tell about their struggle with raising their children and ensuring they had the kind of quality regulated licensed child care that was so important to them.

One single mom was telling me that she was the mother of two children and one child was disabled. She is in the position of trying to find two separate kinds of child care because a disabled child needs some additional care. She was talking to me about her struggle and said that the $100 per child simply did nothing to defray the expenses of having to deal with her particular situation. Hers is just one of many stories.

The member for London—Fanshawe has ably pointed out that these children are the future of our country. We want to give them the best start possible and that kind of quality child care is an important part of the best start possible.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity to have a few words at this point in the debate over the budget implementation bill.

First there is the overall situation within which the budget is being considered, and then there are the issues that the budget is silent on, where it could deal with some of the confidence issues that I think Canadians are very concerned about at the present time.

The budget implementation bill is within the context of a stimulus approach that the government initiated with the support of all parties in the House, I believe, certainly of this party. The objective of the stimulus package was to look at infrastructure in particular from coast to coast to coast, with municipal levels of government, the construction industries and the future needs of the country, to invest in literally thousands of projects. These projects would add value and create confidence. Investors and those looking particularly at small business expansion would see this as a background for the confidence needed to make their decisions. The stimulus package, to some extent, has been successful in doing that.

However, there are some ominous signs. Even against the added value that has been created, there there are some signs that Canadians are worried about the future. Let us look at a few of those signs. The unemployment rate today is 2% higher than it was a few years ago, but that does not really tell the full story. We have heard others speak about the erosion of full-time career-type jobs, which are being replaced with the creation of short-term contract jobs. Particularly for young people coming out of university and trades apprenticeships, this has given them a sense that there is not the same stability and continuity that would allow them the quality of life that their parents and their parents' parents had. This is creating a great deal of uncertainty within the present and future generations.

Also, in real terms the economy is seasonally adjusted, sort of like the weather used to be. In real terms, the economy in July shrank. When we think about the objective of the stimulus initiatives that were taken under the action plan, the hardest hit have been in the area of construction. Their percentage of GDP has shrunk. The overall economy has shrunk, but the percentage occupied by the construction industry has disproportionately shrunk. That has to give all of us concern.

The budget talks about adjustments to the capital tax allowance, which would allow a more rapid writeoff of capital equipment. It is a good thing, but on the other side of that, we mention the green energy plan. There are no incentives to the consumers that would be the variable in the equation that would, in fact, absorb those green products that are being created.

On the one hand, yes, those in small businesses, in green technologies, and so on are being encouraged to write off capital equipment sooner. However, on the product they produce out of that, there is no incentive to the consumer to participate in the economic activity that would create more jobs and sustainability in that field.

It is sort of an opportunity that is there as a result of one part of the capital plan in the budget but not offset by an operating infusion of money that would put money into consumers' pockets that they could then go out and use to purchase green technology and green equipment, be it heating, air conditioning, different automotive products or whatever.

One of the areas that I found extremely concerning in that light was that from coast to coast to coast there has been an absolute understanding of the role that rapid transit, high-speed transit and transportation systems, plays. We are a tremendous exporter of transportation technology into the rest of the world. It always befuddled me somewhat that while we are a grand exporter of the best that Bombardier can produce, we are not the highest user of those same goods.

So I link the absence in this budget of the opportunity to create, for example, electrified technology that would in turn deal with issues related to climate change, urban and inter-urban transportation, and converting the older diesel technologies into electrified technologies that would in fact add value and deal with the issues related to climate change.

I use that as an illustration because every so often we have a chance to link government policy, supported by the House, to an issue that is very top of the mind in our ridings. The whole issue of expansion of rail corridors, the use of those corridors to relieve the congestion on the roads and for the transport of goods and people is looked at as an absolute objective that we want to achieve, but on the other hand, we have not invested in the technology that grabs the confidence of the cities and commuters to be participants in a very firm strategy to create those systems.

Another thing that shows a great deal of lack of confidence is that it appears that consumer confidence has declined for the fourth or fifth straight month. Again, that has to do with the taking away of some of the incentives that people have to participate in the purchase of green goods, and so on and so forth. There is no mention of that in the budget.

Household debt has apparently climbed to all-time high levels. We have been privy to what happened with respect to the disastrous decline of the economy in the United States, the fact that because of borrowing policies laid out by the federal government and state governments, the elasticity was so great that there was actually a point where people where paying for mortgages on their debit or Visa accounts.

We have to be very careful, obviously, that we do not reach that point. As has been said, there has been government support for a strong banking and financial institutions regime. Perhaps that is a counterbalance to the kind of thing that could happen in Canada and mirror that situation that happened in the United States.

It is an ominous sign that while the budget attempts to stimulate confidence, there are some indicators that this is not happening.

Much has been said with respect to the area of pensions. I think we have to be very clear that while there are some mechanisms in this budget that allude to the pension issue, we have to deal with the issue of actuarial solvency.

In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, on the one side, there are some very positive aspects of the budget, but--

[The Deputy Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. The hon. member will have a five-minute question and comment period the next time the bill is before the House.

The House resumed from November 1 consideration of the motion that Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Madam Speaker, I rise today to participate in the debate on the economic statement.

It is fitting that I rise today on “waste Wednesday” when we are debating an economic statement that the government boasts about. The government is either oblivious or ignoring the truth.

We do not have to look much further than today's PBO report or today's unemployment numbers for a dose of reality. This morning's report on business tells us that 300,000 of the 1.5 million Canadians who are unemployed have been so for over 27 weeks and this number has doubled since pre-recession times. Canadians are remaining jobless for longer stretches and those most affected are over 55 years old.

This past summer, for the first time, the Conservative myth of competent manager was exposed for all to see. Misstep after miscalculation, the Prime Minister was exposed as an imprudent fiscal manager, as an emperor with no clothes.

Just a few short weeks ago, Canada suffered a humiliating defeat at the UN, a once proud role in peacekeeping and international reputation sullied by the government's foreign policies; an embarrassing withdrawal of landing rights in the United Arab Emirates at Camp Mirage; the senseless abolishment of the long form census; a wasteful $9 billion to build prisons based on unreported crimes; and a sole-sourced, untendered $16 billion contract for F-35 fighter jets and now a Chinook helicopter deal that was neither transparent nor accountable.

Since 2008 when I was elected, we watched the Prime Minister prorogue Parliament not once but twice when he would have otherwise lost a motion of confidence. He reduced the fiscal capacity at a time of economic contraction and recommended a stock purchase when the market bottomed out and the unemployment rate soared. He spent through the $14 billion surplus that the Liberals left behind for a rainy day, when he should have prepared for the looming and imminent economic downturn.

This list does not even include the lengthy list of broken promises such as income trusts from previous budgets, causing unnecessary and undue hardships for many seniors.

As a result of the 2010 budget, Canadians were left with a $54 billion deficit and a fire sale on gems such as AECL and Mississauga-based proprietary nuclear technology about to be auctioned off at a barnburner price tag.

Yes, Liberals demanded infrastructure stimulus to jump-start the economy and get Canadians back to work, but we cried foul when we realized that cheques were not in the mail after all. Fifty billion dollars was to be spent on roads, bridges, sewers and much needed municipal infrastructure spending, but with hard to meet exploding deadlines, communities scrambled to complete projects and saddled themselves with overtime costs and overrun budgets, all for naught. A once in a lifetime opportunity to invest $50 billion in projects would be spent with no leadership, no vision and no lasting legacy. Worse, it was discovered that ISF money would arrive in Conservative-friendly ridings or those being targeted in a hostile takeover.

The Conservative Party continued to demonstrate both arrogance and incompetence with a string of announcements highlighting its wasteful ways of economic mismanagement, beginning with a fake lake as part of $1.3 billion price tag for the G8 and G20 conferences, all this when the security costs of the winter Olympics were only $200 million.

We have since learned that South Korea will be spending 2% of what Canada spent on security, only $25 million.

We also saw outrageous, lavish and unjustifiable spending in a time of austerity and restraint, on items such as $200 million on hotel bills, car rentals, bug spray, lunch boxes, cell phones and parking; $300,000 on bug spray, hand sanitizer and sunscreen; 22,000 bottles of sunscreen, 33,000 bottles of bug spray and 111 bottles of hand sanitizers, all for one day in Deerhurst.

The government also spent $85,000 on snacks in a swanky downtown Toronto hotel, on 42,000 bags of chips, 71,000 chocolate bars and 57,000 bottles of Coke. That is more waste and mismanagement.

Next up was the $9 billion price tag to build prisons despite a declining crime rate, on a pretext that unreported crimes were on the rise. If that was not bad enough, the Prime Minister claimed we needed 65 new F-35 fighter jets to protect us from the Russian threat, an excuse to hand out $16 billion in an untendered contract announced late on a Friday evening in the hopes that Canadians were not paying attention.

Canadians have begun to realize that the cost of the emperor's new clothes is unsustainable and reckless in its disregard for public accountability. After all, one needs to have an ability to count to be accountable.

More recently, the Auditor General confirmed that there was no transparency, no fairness and no accountability by National Defence in managing the $11 billion Chinook helicopter purchase, which ballooned to twice the original estimated cost. It did not take the procurement to tender, it did not account for full life-cycle costs and it will not sign the maintenance contracts until after the purchase, thus losing all bargaining power. This kind of waste and mismanagement has become a pattern.

Canadians have also been innocent bystanders in the Conservatives' breathless contempt for democracy and democratic institutions. The Prime Minister does not tolerate disobedience or dissent. Canadians have been left panting, gasping and wheezing at the democratic deficit.

The Conservatives silence Canadians who speak the truth, Canadians including: chief superintendent, Marty Cheliak, director general of the Canada firearms program, who disagreed with the government on the long gun registry and was sent away for French lessons; Colonel Pat Stogran, veterans ombudsman, who was told that his contract would not be renewed; Linda Keen, chair of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, who was fired because she stated the truth about the government's mishandling of the isotope crisis at AECL; Peter Tinsley, chair of the Military Police Complaints Commission, who was fired for acknowledging that prisoners were being tortured; Paul Kennedy, chair of the RCMP Police Complaints Commission; Mr. Munir Sheikh, head of Statistics Canada, who tried to put the sense back into the long form census; Steve Sullivan, ombudsman for the victims of crime, who was replaced for questioning the government's claim of unreported crimes; and Kevin Page, the Parliamentary Budget Officer, whose office is chronically challenged and underfunded.

There was also Canadian diplomat, Richard Colvin, who had his good reputation smeared for speaking the truth about tortured prisoners; and Rémy Beauregard, chair of Rights & Democracy, who found himself under siege by Conservative ideological appointments. God rest his soul.

There was also the government's failure to present unredacted Afghan documents despite a parliamentary motion requiring it to do so, or its unwillingness to allow witnesses to appear before certain committees.

I have provided the House with an exhaustive but still incomplete list of individuals and agencies created to uphold democratic conditions and keep our government accountable but which have been shut down or shut out.

Further proof of the democratic deficit and lack of respect for the supremacy of Parliament is evidenced in the government's unfounded and unilateral decision to cancel the long form census. The consensus on the census is that cancelling it was senseless, or cancelling the long gun registry and twice proroguing Parliament. We recently heard that the Prime Minister was willing to go as high as the Queen to obtain his prorogation had the Governor General turned down his request.

What about the economic costs? Results since January 2008 speak louder than words. Canada has lost 200,000 high-paying, full-time jobs which were replaced by part-time and temporary full-time jobs. Canada's unemployment rate at more than 8% is 2% higher than it was during the last election. That is 370,000 more unemployed Canadians since 2008, except in the PMO of course where staff costs have increased by $10 million, or 30%.

The Conservative government put Canada into deficit even before the recession. The first three pre-recession budgets increased program spending from $175 billion to $206 billion, an 18% increase. Our deficit currently sits at $54 billion and is estimated to be $100 billion over the next two years, higher than it has ever been in the history of our country. The Conservative government is the highest spending, largest debt, largest deficit government in our history.

Household debt is also at record levels. Canada's trade deficit for the summer months was at a record low.

The Conservatives imminent $13 billion unemployment insurance tax hike will cost another 200,000 jobs and hard-working Canadian families hundreds of dollars.

The $156 billion of new debt that the Conservatives plan to borrow between 2009 and 2014 will cost taxpayers $10 billion in interest payments each and every year for decades to come.

The government has a disregard for democracy, a distaste for openness, fairness and accountability, a disrespect for fiscal prudence, and a disdain for competent economic management. It is a spiral that cannot continue.

As Thomas Hobbes' Leviathan predicted, the Conservatives reign will be “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short”.

[Gord Brown, Conservative, Leeds—Grenville, ON]

Madam Speaker, I listened intently to the presentation by the member from the other side and I found it quite interesting. She talked about the creation of jobs and how we are facing some challenges.

Maybe she could explain to the House how it is that her party is proposing to roll back the corporate tax cut that comes in on January 1. I happen to come from a business background and know that if a company has to pay more in tax it will not be investing more in jobs and it will not be investing more in the company. Maybe the hon. member could explain to the House exactly how she thinks that reversing that corporate tax cut will create more jobs.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Madam Speaker, we roll back corporate taxes or any kind of taxes when the country can afford it and when the economy is booming as it was when we put $13 billion away for a rainy day that the Conservatives spent like drunken sailors during the last election.

The Conservatives have been disingenuous with the House and with Canadians. They told Canadians in 2009 that we would have a surplus and then we entered one of the largest, strongest recessions of our day and they have become the greatest spenders. They have dug us into the largest hole with the biggest deficit and biggest debt of all time.

As we heard in question period today, we have a finance minister who cannot add and a Prime Minister who can only divide.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Madam Speaker, in question period, the finance minister was pretty exercised about tax and spend, and I see why. The Parliamentary Budget Officer's report shows that over the next five years the finance minister will increase taxes by $68 billion and he will simultaneously increase spending by $39 billion. He has already, with the deficit this year, run us up another $156 billion by the end of 2015-16.

Just who is the tax and spender around here?

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Madam Speaker, clearly the question was rhetorical. It is a government that has led us into a $100 billion deficit. No, we cannot count on the government because it cannot count.

I would like to emphasize the effects of the government's waste and mismanagement on Canadians and average families. The growing strain to find new work has gone beyond the manufacturing sector and has hit not only factory workers but long-term unemployment has spread out to professionals, to accountants, to executives, to educators and many older workers who have not been able to and will not be able to cope without a job for a long period of time.

Let us look at the effects on families. The increase in long-term unemployment has many implications. The longer individuals are out of work, the more skills they lose and the tougher it is to find a job. Many workers will be forced to find jobs that are beneath them, beneath their skill set or they will need to take a pay cut. Their confidence ebbs. There are health issues, mental health issues, marriages suffer and, in fact, marriages fall apart.

The consequences also affect the broader economy and more people move to social assistance, or depend on family members to live, or live off their savings or sell all their assets just to re-enter the job market. “This is human capital, which is being depreciated,” said Stephen Gordon, economics professor at Laval University in Quebec City.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Madam Speaker, I would like a quick clarification and then I have a question. Being a recreational sailor who enjoys the odd libation, I want to assure the member that I would never spend money like the current government spends money. I want her to understand that.

I had the pleasure of working with my colleague from Mississauga—Streetsville this past summer. We met with a group from the National Philatelic Centre in Antigonish where we are seeing great full-time jobs being lost at that centre. What we are seeing in the public service is a shell game where some positions will not be renewed. Does the member think we can expect more from the government as we go forward, not backfilling those positions within the public service?

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Madam Speaker, we cannot count on the government for anything and certainly not to create or sustain jobs, that is for sure. It is the Liberal Party that will protect the jobs of today, create the jobs of tomorrow, invest in research and innovation, commit to lifelong learning and protect those who are most vulnerable.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Madam Speaker, it is an honour for me to stand in the House and speak to the bill before us, Bill C-47, which looks at the budget and the economic policies taken by the government.

Essentially, this is a budget that people back home in the riding that I have the honour of representing, the riding of Churchill, know it is not a budget for them. In fact, it is a budget for very few Canadians out there, often Canadians who already doing quite okay, when we should be looking, especially in a time of recession, at what might benefit everyone and at particular areas, whether it is industries, regions or communities, that have faced particular hardships as a result of this most recent economic recession.

I am proud to stand in the House along with so many of my colleagues in the New Democratic Party to speak out on how this budget has done little to support Canadians. While we are happy to see that some of our measures and work in the area of employment insurance and in some small ways in certain other areas have been heard, the vast majority of proposals and the spirit of looking out for average Canadians and the challenges they face has not been heard in this budget. It certainly is not reflected.

This budget does something that is not only counterproductive to the situation we currently face but also presents a dangerous trend when we look ahead at our future. Budget 2010 presents ample evidence of a tax strategy that begins to take away increasingly from average Canadians and benefits more and more those who are well off and work in sectors that have been very successful.

The government continues to drive the country deeper into debt so it can give tax cuts to profitable corporations: $21 billion worth since 2008 and $60 billion worth by the time they are fully implemented in 2014. During that same period, the government, by its own reckoning, will add $162.4 billion to the public debt, $60 billion more than the 10 previous years of surplus erased.

While the government is giving corporations a free pass on contributing to the country's financial recovery, it is planning to take a big chunk out of the pockets of Canadian workers. Over the next four years, the Prime Minister plans to rake in over $19 billion more in EI premiums than is paid out.

While the oil and gas and banking sectors have benefited from tax breaks, the same has not been the case for the average Canadian. In fact, with the increase in EI premiums, that burden has been increased.

There are specific stories in the region that I represent that speak to how this budget has not responded to people's needs. I would like to first begin by looking at how this budget does very little when it comes to the needs voiced by aboriginal Canadians.

I have the honour of representing 33 first nations and many Métis communities in my area. When I visit these communities and hear from aboriginal peoples in northern Manitoba, they speak out for the need for adequate funding for education.

Just this afternoon I was speaking out on a new study that showed record high dropout rates among aboriginal Canadians in my own home province of Manitoba, something that is so disheartening to see in the year 2010 when so many of us know the value of an education. However, the reason we see these rates is because the federal government, both under the Liberal leadership and now under the Conservatives, fails to adequately fund education on reserves and fails to adequately fund post-secondary education across the board for first nations and Métis students. This prevents them from accessing opportunities that we all know are key to them progressing into the future.

We know that $10 million were put aside for the work around missing and murdered aboriginal women, many of these women coming from the region that I represent. However, instead of the government listening to organizations, like the Native Women's Association of Canada or the Sisters in Spirit organization, it has chosen a very narrow approach. While work to collect statistics and the policing approach is important, we also need to be looking at specific measures in terms of domestic violence and violence perpetrated against aboriginal women, as well as awareness and prevention in that area, something we do not see this pocket of money going toward.

In this budget, there is no new money for water or waste water management in aboriginal communities. This week, I have stood in this House to ask the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and the government what they are going to do about the third world living conditions in the first nations that I represent. The Island Lake communities face some of the worst water and sewer conditions in all of Canada. These conditions are shocking to Canadians. Yet, this is the reality for some Canadians today. This budget does nothing to address this dire need in northern Manitoba.

Housing is another area in need of significant action. There is a housing crisis not only in aboriginal communities but in northern communities and communities in general across the country, many of which have fast-growing populations. Yet there is no new money for housing. Aboriginal people, the people of northern Manitoba, northerners in general, all these groups are affected by a shortage of adequate housing.

Another issue with a direct negative impact on the communities that I represent is the way the government has handled foreign ownership.

My hometown, which depends on the mining industry, has seen the buying out of the company that ran the mine. It was formerly Inco; now it is Vale. We look forward to negotiating with this company, which put Canadian workers out of work when they went on strike for benefits, a proper pension plan, and a decent commitment to the people of the region, who allow these companies to produce such profits. Yet, the current government failed to say no to the foreign buyout of Inco, a profitable Canadian company. Moreover, it is continuing that trend, amending the Investment Canada Act in this budget bill so that only significant investments will now be reviewed.

The people who live in the communities I represent need a federal government that will stand up to foreign corporations, that will protect our resources, and that will protect Canadian working people and their communities. This budget would not do any of these things.

Smaller rural and northern communities require assurances that our essential services will be supported. This budget attacks our postal service through the withdrawal of international mailers from the monopoly that Canada Post now holds.

This means a reduction in the revenue that Canada Post depends on to provide service to rural and northern communities, which often do not fit a market model. In The Pas, Kelsey, Thompson, Flin Flon, and in communities across northern Manitoba, we fear that postal service to rural Canada will be the first to be cut back. We are already seeing some reduction in service. Yet, instead of having a government that will step up and recognize the importance of delivering this service to Canadians, no matter where they live, we see a move toward privatization and a lack of support for the crown corporations we rely on.

Finally, the state of infrastructure in the north is alarming. We have heard a great deal about the current government's commitment to infrastructure in its stimulus package.

I can tell members that there is a great deal of concern when it comes to ensuring that these infrastructure projects go out in time. I represent communities that are isolated, that have a very short construction period, and that are concerned about running out of time, despite having tried their best to get these projects rolling as soon as possible.

So, all in all, there are many ways in which this budget would not serve the interests of northern Manitoba. That is why I find it so disappointing.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, I wonder if the hon. member would care to comment on the budget and the waste of money involved in the government's decision to cancel the long form census, and what these things mean to the future of the country.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Madam Speaker, the government has not always based its decisions entirely on facts.

By eliminating the mandatory long form census, the government has reduced our access to the information we need to make better policy decisions. For people like northern Manitobans, the people whom I represent, it is a grave concern. As for aboriginal peoples, they are often silenced, and without the long form census their voices will be even less in evidence in the decisions that are made. This is truly troubling.

The same goes for medical decisions. When it comes to health care services in rural and northern Canada, we need the facts from the long form census. When it comes to child care, recreation, or infrastructure, we need the mandatory long form census.

As the member of Parliament for Churchill, I have never heard any of my constituents say that the mandatory long form census compromises the right to privacy. Many people, however, have told me that the absence of the long form census will serve to silence a part of Canada that is all too often not heard.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Madam Speaker, the member for Churchill mentioned in her remarks the mining company Vale. When that company was given the authority to take over a couple of mines, it gave many wonderful assurances.

I ask the question because today seems to be decision day for the future of PotashCorp, a tremendous Canadian resource that seems likely to be sold out by the Prime Minister, who is selling our resources out from under us again. Maybe we will be greatly surprised, but I doubt it. There will no doubt be some conditions put on the sale, but in similar cases, I believe the conditions have been broken.

I am wondering if the member could comment on her experience with other multinational corporations, foreign corporations from around the world, taking over, under certain conditions, Canadian mining companies.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Madam Speaker, the NDP has been clear in the message we are sending to the Conservative government that we want our resources to stay in our hands. We do not want to repeat what has so negatively affected so many of our communities.

We see nickel, steel, and other elements of our mineral wealth moving out of our country, to the detriment of our working people. We see that foreign companies have undertaken an attack on benefits, pensions, and even communities themselves. This is why we ask our federal government to stand up for our communities and make sure that our resources stay in our hands.

[The Acting Speaker, NDP, Denise Savoie]

Before resuming debate, it is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Saint-Bruno—Saint-Hubert, Copyright; the hon. member for Nanaimo—Cowichan, Aboriginal Affairs.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Malpeque.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak on Bill C-47, A second Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures.

Speaking in my role as agriculture critic, I can tell this House that the budget was one of the biggest disappointments ever for the farm community. There was not a new dime for primary producers in that budget, even though many in the livestock sector were facing the worst crisis that Canada's beef and hog industries have ever seen.

Sadly, the government has become known as a borrow and spend government, with both the debt and the deficit out of control. We heard some of those remarks in the House today with respect to the budget officer.

One of our worries with this Minister of Finance was that he might do to Canada what he did to Ontario. Certainly, this has come to pass. We all know that this minister is more responsible than anybody else for Ontario's fall from a have to a have not province. He cut services, downloaded costs, and drove up the deficit, hampering the ability of the Ontario government to do its job. Now he is doing the same thing to Canada.

What do we have for the farm sector? We have two of the biggest spending budgets in Canadian history, together with the biggest deficit in Canadian history. And what did the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food provide for the farmers in their time of need with all that spending? Zero. Nothing.

The minister claims that he puts farmers first, but the only area where the minister has put farmers first is in the area of debt. Since the government came to power, farm debt has reached $64 billion. That is up $9 billion under the Conservative government's watch. Net income on the farm has gone down, especially in the hog and beef sectors.

We worked with the government. We tried to work with the government to get money to the livestock sector when commodity prices were at an all-time low. For beef and hogs, we actually managed to get a program through; the government committed itself at the time. However, we warned the government that it could not expect the moneys associated with the emergency advance payment program to be repaid until the market improved.

Our worry was that the government would not stick to its word. Now we know it did not. In fact, on August 6 of this year, the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food made an announcement in which he basically demanded that those moneys be paid back. The announcement, which was made in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, lays out the terms of repayment.

This is how bad it is. Starting on June 1, 2011, just a few short months away, producers who took the $400,000 advance have to pay that money back in 10 short months. That is $40,000 a month in an industry that is barely able to get back its cost of production.

That was not the original commitment of the Government of Canada. The government assured us at the time that farmers would not have to pay those moneys back until prices improved. Farmers again were given a line.

Now in my province, in Prince Edward Island, I am told by the cattle industry that effective next June or July, as high as 70% to 80% of those livestock operators could find their loans in default. That is unacceptable. The government has to support the farm community and find a way of doing that. I am asking the minister to support the farm community, to not put farmers in the position of where they are in default.

Last night I spoke with a key Prince Edward Island producer. He said that the livestock industry is hurting, especially so in Atlantic Canada. Atlantic Canada is a deficit area in beef production and prices are discounted by 10¢ a pound as compared to Ontario. Ever since we have had BSE in this country, prices for cattle over 30 months are discounted by 20¢ a pound. Producers cannot survive in that kind of regime. They are not getting their costs.

We offered suggestions of things the government could do that would assist farmers in their time of need. In the livestock sector, it could eliminate the viability test. It could change the reference margins and get moneys out there under the safety net program, but there is not the political will. The government has money for everything else. It has $16 billion for untendered airplanes, $9 billion for expanding the jails, over $1.2 billion for the Prime Minister's photo op, but it has no money for primary producers. That is unacceptable.

It is not just in Prince Edward Island. The minister gets up in the House and quotes a farm leader from somewhere. We do know, strangely, when the minister makes an announcement, his office calls up some of the farm organizations and asks, “Could you praise the minister on this a little bit, please”, and then he uses the quotes in the House.

However, when we talk to producers on the ground, we get an entirely different story. Linda Oliver from Mozart, Saskatchewan said that the minister “turns his back on the livestock sector”. She said that approximately 125 producers and supporters at a meeting in Weekes, Saskatchewan sent a message that contradicts that of the Minister of Agriculture. She said that cow-calf producers are in a dire situation. She also said:

However, we, at the same time have to make a living at this farm. We have not been very self-sufficient for many years now because of the lack of response to the situation by the [Minister of Agriculture].

It is just unacceptable that in this budget, primary producers, farmers, the suppliers of food in this country, the people who are really responsible for food security in Canada, who bring in dollars to the country because of their exports, are basically left to wither on the vine. While exports increase, farm incomes have gone down.

Last week I was at a farm meeting at the Ontario Federation of Agriculture. There was the same strong message from farmers in financial difficulty, especially in the livestock sector. They asked the government for a risk management program. They asked that at least under the agri-flexibility fund the Government of Canada allow that to be used for the farm program that farmers want jointly with the Ontario government. The Government of Canada has again refused.

On Thanksgiving weekend I was in the Interlake region, and the crop damage there is phenomenal. It is in a quarter section of land of canola. There are well over 100,000 acres of land that have been affected by water damage. Those farmers have said consistently that agristability, the safety net programs do not work. Where is the backbench in the government party? Why are those members not arguing for these moneys and telling the government the concerns of farmers in the Interlake region? Why is the minister not coming forward with a program to assist?

The bottom line is that the Government of Canada has seriously failed the farm community in this country. While the government has the biggest spenders and the biggest deficit, the farming industry has been left with virtually nothing. Those in the farm community are the generators of wealth, but the Government of Canada has failed them.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I compliment the hon. member on raising such an important issue.

Wherever I go throughout rural Canada I hear from a lot of farmers about their frustrations and their challenges and whether they should continue on in the farming industry.

The hon. member mentioned having to take 20% less in many areas. In the hog and livestock management situation, what would the member suggest the government actively do? Does the member have a plan for the necessary changes the government should make to protect those farming industries?

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Madam Speaker, in terms of the hog and livestock industry, the safety net program, agristability, needs to be changed so that it will work for those commodities that have lost their margins. It is allowable under the trade agreements. I do not understand it. Last year the government could have put out $900 million to the farm community that way, but it failed to do it.

It is a complicated area, but all the government needs to do is change the viability test and the way the reference margins are calculated. That can be put over three good years, or over a longer period of time, so that it would trigger a payment. That is where the government goes seriously wrong. The government believes that our farmers can do it on their own.

The European Union and the United States stand up for their primary producers. In fact, in the United States, between 1995 and 2009, there was $245.2 billion paid out to the farm communities. The White House this year recognized there was a problem in some of the commodities and recently announced a new disaster aid program, which would cost an estimated $1.5 billion annually. The United States stands up for its farm community.

This government is allowing our farmers to go under. The only thing farmers are coming first in with this government is first in debt. Our debt of $64 billion is roughly four and a half times per farmer what it is in the United States. It is unacceptable.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, I would like to ask my hon. colleague from Malpeque about the Wheat Board.

It may surprise the hon. member to know that my grandfather, Jack Harrison, was a member from Saskatchewan from 1949 to 1958, from the area of Meadow Lake and North Battleford. My mother was born in Glenbush, Saskatchewan and grew up in a little place called Medstead.

My grandfather would have spoken in this place and defended the Wheat Board. He had spoken about the Wheat Board many times and I am sure he would have been appalled at what the government has done to the Wheat Board. I wonder if my colleague would like to speak about the situation.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Madam Speaker, the Canadian Wheat Board, being a single desk selling agency, maximizes returns back to primary producers on the moneys that are in the international marketplace. Western farmers support that board.

It would take me too long to go through the list of ways in which the Conservatives have tried to undermine the board, but I will mention what the minister said in this House yesterday.

When the Wheat Board had asked for the initial prices to be raised, in other words, an increase in what we call the interim payments, the minister tried to blame the opposition parties for that taking so long to happen and said it was because we would not support his bill last spring.

There was a problem with his bill. One part was good in that it set a timeframe and Treasury Board would have to respond quickly to initial prices. However, the other part of the bill would have undermined the ability of the board to do its work.

In a letter to the minister, I offered that the bill be split and we could deal with the initial payment part in a matter of one day in this House with tremendous co-operation. If the minister would have acted on our request, farmers would have had that money in their pockets right now.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to have a chance to raise some of the concerns I have with respect to Bill C-47. It is difficult to follow my hon. colleague because he speaks very well and raises the issue with such compassion and caring, but I will do the best I can.

Let me say at the outset that I do not accept that the government has demonstrated either the will or the skill to manage any economic recovery. While the Conservatives may claim to have a steady hand on the wheel during a raging storm, I suggest that if they looked more closely, they would find that they are standing on the docks as the good ship Canada has left without any predetermined plan.

The only saving fiscal grace that we have seen is the thousands upon thousands of small businesses pressing for success, a banking sector that is stable and secure as a result of the previous Liberal government, and a labour force that is skilled and dedicated. The government has been too busy developing sound bites and using the treasury for self-promoting commercials.

In the election of 2008, the Prime Minister insisted that Canada would never fall into a recession, that we were all dreaming. He suggested that the warnings of a global meltdown were nothing other than alarmists bent on undermining the Canadian economic success story. He dismissed any public discussion of advance preparedness as fearmongering and said that slashing taxes to Canada's largest corporations would prevent any global economic calamity from touching down domestically. How wrong he was and how right we were.

Today looking back, it is very clear that the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance were either hiding something for partisan electoral reasons, or they were totally oblivious to the impending economic difficulties. Either way, their approach has been unacceptable, shortsighted and damaging to all Canadians.

Setting all that aside and ignoring the fact that the government has abandoned any semblance of fiscal prudence or long-term planning in favour of a borrow and spend approach to public policy, we now need to focus on the task at hand.

Bill C-47 does have a very few redeeming qualities. For example, in part 1 it seeks to allow for the sharing of the Canada child tax benefit, the universal child care benefit and the HST tax credit for eligible shared custody parents. It also expands the availability of accelerated capital cost allowance for clean energy generation. While, yes, these are good measures when viewed in a singular fashion, when viewed as part of a larger picture, I fail to understand how these items address the impacts of the global economic slowdown in Canada.

While it is true that Bill C-47 makes some technical amendments to the tax free savings accounts and allows registered retirement savings plan proceeds to be transferred to a registered disability savings plan on a tax deferred basis, it fails to address some of the most serious problems faced by individual Canadians and Canadian business leaders.

For starters, Bill C-47 is silent on the fact that Canadians are being forced to carry greater amounts of personal debt just to survive. It is silent on the looming pension crisis that many of us know about. It does nothing to help stabilize the increasing gap between government revenues and government spending.

The Prime Minister inherited a $14 billion annual budgetary surplus from the Liberals. Then, in one of his first fiscal decisions, he moved to slash the federal fiscal capacity. We watched as government revenues plummeted, something that eliminated any ability for the government to make strategic investments or to help business, labour or seniors when times get tough.

The government took Canada from the economic envy of the world to what the finance minister now suggests is no worse than everyone else. Imagine crowing about mediocrity. That might be acceptable to that borrow and spend gang of mismanagers, but it is certainly a far cry from what Canadians had come to expect under the previous Liberal administration.

The government has used the word “stimulus” to justify everything it ever wanted to do. I will give the House a few examples.

The government recently billed Canadian taxpayers, all of us, a substantial sum of money for a so-called town hall meeting in Cambridge, Ontario, to release the second economic action plan report card. The cost was $108,000 just to make an announcement that clearly could have been made here in the House or anywhere here in Ottawa.

Then just three months later the government did it again, to release the third report card in Saint John, New Brunswick, at a cost of $143,000.

That is more than $250,000 for stunts to tell Canadians we are in good financial shape when it is untrue, because we are not.

That is over and above the 332% increase in the amount the PMO is currently spending on communication consultants, or spin doctors, beyond its internal communications staff, which is immense to begin with and has also increased by 30% in two years.

Canadians can only be fooled for so long.

Canada's fiscal capacity was damaged long before the Conservative government ever began spending on stimulus.

In the name of stimulus and promoting Canada, the Conservatives have spent billions on faster jets, bigger prisons and caviar summits. But when it comes to pension reform, or putting money into the pockets of our seniors, our small businesses or our vital social programs, the Conservatives cry poverty at that point.

Canadians are catching on to the kind of games being played.

In part 5 of Bill C-47, there is an amendment to the Canada Disability Savings Act to allow a 10-year carry-forward of Canada disability savings grants and Canada disability savings bond entitlements. I have no problem with that and I do not think most of us do.

Bill C-47 proposes to make changes that would require consent of a member's spouse or common law partner before the transfer of the member's pension benefit credit to a retirement savings plan. Again, I am not complaining about that.

My greatest concern with Bill C-47 is what is missing from these pages: fiscal prudence, long-term planning, compassion, a real plan for economic success. These are the things Canadians want, need and expect from their government.

During the Chrétien and Martin years, Canada went from the massive Mulroney debt to a global position of strength and envy. Liberals worked and Canadians worked to eliminate the deficit, to reduce the national debt, to make the largest series of strategic tax cuts in history and to pump billions into vital programs such as health care.

But in just four short years the government has transformed itself from alleged fiscal conservatives to the largest and most lavish spenders in Canadian history. Our deficit is now larger, if one can imagine that, than it was during the Mulroney years.

I guess we should not be surprised though. After all, when the same finance minister was the minister of finance in Ontario he pulled the same stunt along with premier Mike Harris. He sold provincial assets such as Ontario Hydro in order to pay for his mismanagement, and then he promised that hydro bills would not go up. But they clearly did.

While Paul Martin's legacy as finance minister is one that demonstrated a real ability to manage the finances of a nation, the current finance minister can only crow that Canada is not the worst kid on the block. But I guess we all gauge success differently.

Bill C-47, like budget bills before it, has its strengths but it does nothing to show real leadership. It fails to address real problems and it fails to chart a long-term, sustainable course for Canada's economic success.

I know the minister and the Prime Minister say it cannot be done. They say there was no way to see the storm clouds gathering on the horizon, but I wonder why almost everyone else saw it coming.

In the election of 2008, the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville devised a detailed plan to help Canada stay off the rocks, but the Conservatives said that our economic fundamentals were wrong. They dismissed it as not being prudent and proactive.

I say to the emperor and the keeper of the purse that perhaps they should contact Paul Martin or the member for Saint-Laurent—Cartierville or the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore, who saw this economic slowdown coming.

Just as we did in 1993, the Liberals stand ready to clean up this mess left by the reckless, short-term habits of the Conservatives.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Madam Speaker, I know the hon. member has worked long and hard on the pension issue and has had quite a number of town halls and various other meetings with people affected, and there are a couple of ideas that are floating out there with respect to creating a stranded pension agency and a supplemental plan for Canada pension so that Canadians are not stranded. Yet in Bill C-47 I see nothing on either issue.

I would be interested in the hon. member's views with respect to both of those ideas and whether the government would reorganize its priorities so that these kinds of issues of keen concern to senior Canadians would be addressed.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Madam Speaker, clearly these are issues that are of extreme importance. I have been asking questions of the minister for more than 650 days about just what the plan is. We have been told for more than 650 days that there is a plan, but nothing is being done currently that is going to have any kind of a vision for the future. Our supplementary Canada pension plan program that we are suggesting and we want to move forward with is a way to offer another vehicle for Canadians to be able to save money for retirement.

Clearly as a result of the bankruptcies we have heard about over this difficult last couple of years, many pensioners are also looking for other vehicles to help them. We were suggesting that a stranded pension agency be created so that when companies are going bankrupt, instead of individuals having to receive those pension moneys in an annuity and losing 30%, 40% or 50% of their savings, that could be folded into a stranded pension agency that the government would oversee.

Quebec already did this some months ago because it recognized the problem. We are still waiting for the government to do something for the Nortel pensioners and for those on long-term disability who are suffering. We have a bill coming up in the Senate that asks for that very issue, to try to get the government to support it so that we can help those on long-term disability.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, we just heard that it has taken more than 600 days for the minister to respond. My goodness, for our seniors who have contributed so much to building this great country, in the twilight of their years when we should make sure that they live in comfort, we are condemning and the minister's inaction is condemning them to live those final days, in many cases, in poverty.

How many seniors has the member heard from who are in those last days of their lives unfortunately having to live in poverty while the government continues not acting on this file?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Madam Speaker, I have toured the country and talked to many seniors and listened to their frustration about struggling to live on $11,000 a year. I ask anyone who is watching if they have ever thought how they would live on $11,000 a year. Some of them live on even less. We know that, in spite of everything that has been done, we still have more than 200,000 seniors who are living below the poverty line. We should ask ourselves, never mind $11,000, how we would live on $9,000 or $8,000 a year. How would we possibly manage to do that? It is very difficult. We hear about seniors struggling and going to food banks. This is Canada. That is not the way things are supposed to be.

There has been very little from the government as far as increases toward pensions are concerned; $1.42 I believe was the cost of living increase that many seniors across Canada received. There is no sense waiting. It must cost far more than $1.42 just to implement that increase. We need to seriously look at what else we can do to ensure seniors have a good quality of life.

Today, though, it is going to have start with planning for young people like our pages. We need to put more vehicles to be able to save money and make sure there is a financial literacy program out there so that people understand that when they get to age 65, they cannot expect that their old age security and Canada pension plan will be sufficient. They need to have a retirement savings plan, which is why we are suggesting the supplementary Canada pension plan would be a great vehicle to help with that.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in debate on Bill C-47.

I want to begin by congratulating my hon. colleague from York West on the excellent work she does on behalf of seniors. She shows great concern for our seniors who are struggling these days. Imagine being on a fixed income that is tied to interest rates when interest rates are as low as they are these days and what a challenge that is to live on very low incomes. When she spoke of people living on incomes of $11,000 a year, it is heart-rending to consider what kind of a life that means for a person. Think of widows, for example, living on that income or sometimes less and how they manage to eke out, to survive.

I want to extend my appreciation for her excellent work in this regard and also my appreciation for my colleague from Malpeque, who spoke before, who has always been a powerful voice for the farmers of Canada and who has great passion for agriculture and for the challenges farmers face. Thank goodness they have a voice like his in Parliament.

During the worst recession in decades, at a time when Canadians families have been struggling to care for sick loved ones, to save for the kind of retirements we were talking about a moment ago and to pay for their kids' education, these borrow and spend Conservatives spent the last four and a half years, almost five years now, wasting billions of taxpayers' dollars.

By the year 2015, the Conservatives intend apparently to add $170 billion to our national debt. Imagine that. When we came into office as the Liberal Party back in 1993, we came in with a Conservative deficit of $42 billion and we managed through the hard work of Canadians. Government obviously played a role, but Canadians sacrificed and got us into surpluses nationally and gradually paid down the debt, year after year for eight consecutive years of balanced budgets, paying down our national debt, moving our country in the right direction and helping to lower our interest rates.

When we lower interest rates, what happens? People can more easily afford to spend on things because they are not paying as much on their mortgage or on their car loan and they can afford perhaps a little more. They can afford to live a little better and it makes a difference in their lives. It makes it a little easier to go to the grocery store. That is important to people.

When interest rates come down as a result of the kind of work done by the Liberal government in the 1990s with the support of Canadians, it benefits the whole economy. There is more money flowing through the economy and that makes a big difference.

The worry is that, with the kind of spending the government has been engaged in, we are eventually going to see inflation and very high interest rates quite possibly. That is good if one is on a fixed income and receiving interest, but it can get too high obviously, so that it hurts the overall economy and it is bad for all of Canada.

The government has been racking up deficit after deficit over the past few years. Its fiscal mismanagement has meant that Canada was in deficit before the recession began. Imagine. The Conservatives came into office with a surplus of $13 billion and within a very short time they turned around in the wrong way and put the country into deficit before the recession began. They can talk all they want about how there was a need to respond to the recession. They did not believe there was a need at first. The Prime Minister said it was a good opportunity to buy stocks. He said things were a bit bad but everything would be fine.

Things got a lot worse. He was wrong. Things got a heck of a lot worse. In fact it was a lousy time to buy stocks as it turns out. It might have been better later if anyone had the money to do it, but most folks did not. Perhaps some of his prosperous, wealthy friends did, but most Canadians did not have the funds to buy stocks at that time.

Here we had a situation where the Conservatives put us in deficit before the recession hit, through their own mismanagement, with some of the biggest increases in spending in history. In the first year they increased spending by 18%. That is incredible.

This year they have done something else, something really spectacular in the annals of deficit creation, I suppose. They have recorded the biggest deficit in our history, $55.6 billion.

There is no question that the Conservative government is the biggest spending, biggest borrowing government in Canada's history. I hope they are not too proud of that record, because it is certainly not a record to be proud of.

It is remarkable to think that the Minister of Finance, also known as the minister of debt and deficit did the same thing in Ontario. I guess we should have known it would happen again when the Prime Minister made him finance minister in Ottawa.

Somebody has to tell the Minister of Finance that before he can do things like increase spending and lower taxes, first he has to balance the books. First he has to get rid of the deficit and then he can do those things, as the Liberal government did in the 1990s, but it is a lesson the finance minister sadly has not learned.

It is really a highlight of his mismanagement and of the government's mismanagement. They fail to understand that they do not start increasing spending dramatically and cutting taxes dramatically, as they want to do with corporate tax rates with the big corporations, until they have balanced the books. If they can balance the books, get things under control and get surpluses, then they have the room to do things like that, but not until then. Why they cannot understand that is startling. Their bad choices will mean that future generations are saddled with more and more debt. Those same choices are not helping hard-pressed Canadians today.

This right-wing Republican-style government, and I do not know if we say a tea party-style government these days because it is pretty right wing, is turning its back on people who are struggling to make ends meet in these tough economic times. Some of my colleagues have talked about this already. It is pouring billions of dollars into U.S.-style prisons and doing nothing about prevention of crime. It is pouring billions into untendered fighter jets and tax breaks for wealthy corporations.

It is interesting that the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defence say that there was a competition for these fighter jets. Yes, there was, in the U.S. 10 or 11 years ago. When was there ever a competition in Canada? Canada was not part of that competition. Since when do we outsource our decisions about making a $16 billion purchase? That is hard to imagine.

Even today in question period, the Prime Minister talked about how there was a contract for the F-35s. The fact, as members of the House know and as the Prime Minister ought to know, is there is no contract yet. The government has signalled its intention, but it certainly has not signed a contract yet. For the Prime Minister of Canada to say in the House that there is a contract when there is not is truly outrageous. If that is not misleading the House and Canadians, I do not know what is. It is very disturbing.

When we look at the government's treatment and we look at how it spends wastefully, is it any wonder that poverty is on the rise under this regime? Instead of punishing homeowners in March by killing the home renovation program, it should have taken the knife to some of its own pet projects. It could have started by cutting costs, for example, at the G8 and G20 summits, the 72-hour, $1.3 billion photo op to satisfy the Prime Minister's vanity.

Imagine what the money was spent on. The government wasted millions of dollars on fake lakes, glow sticks, gazebos and steamboats. It had a department responsible for summit infrastructure supporting the building of a gazebo that was kilometres and kilometres from any summit activity.

It had also supported the development of a steamboat that was not even ready to go in the water until three months after. What that could possibly have had to do with the summit is hard to imagine, except that it helped out perhaps the electoral prospects of the Minister of Industry in whose riding it was held.

[Wayne Easter, Liberal, Malpeque, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the remarks made by my colleague because he certainly has laid out many of the areas of wasteful spending by the government.

The amount of money that is spent on consultants and the increase in the cost of the PMO was mentioned earlier. However, something that really goes unnoticed, and I would like the member to comment on this, is the size of the cabinet. Most Canadians could not name 10 cabinet ministers because everything is run out of the PMO, the man who says, “I make the rules”. They are all full-fledged cabinet ministers, with their drivers and their full staffs. I do not know what some of them do, but it is certainly a cost to Canadians.

Could the member comment on that? Also, how could that $6 billion tax cut to corporations, when we are already below the United States, be spent better with wise decisions?

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Mr. Speaker, those are good questions. Let me start with the question about the $6 billion tax cut that the government is planning for corporations. Let us remember that the tax rate for corporations in our country has come down from 29% to 18%. When the Liberal Party was in government in 1993, it was 29% and we brought it down to about 20%, as I recall. Since then, it has come down to 18%. Now the government proposes to bring it down another 3%.

I am sure it is attractive to businesses, especially big corporations, to hear about their tax rate being lowered, but it would make a lot more sense if it were done in a time when we had surpluses.

The other thing is there are people who are in need. Think of the families these days that are supporting a loved one who is sick or who is elderly and requires a great deal of care. Our family care plan is something that would respond to that and it would be a much better way to spend that kind of money.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Barry Devolin]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

And the bells having rung:

The vote will be deferred until tomorrow at the end of government orders.