House of Commons Hansard #223 of the 36th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was budget.

Topics

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

12:45 p.m.

Liberal

Claude Drouin Liberal Beauce, QC

No, Mr. Speaker.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

12:45 p.m.

Progressive Conservative

André Harvey Progressive Conservative Chicoutimi, QC

Mr. Speaker, I will not call my colleague on the dispute between the government and my colleagues of the Bloc Quebecois on the referendum question. Like many others, even in the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, my region, I and my fellow citizens do not waken up at night thinking about the date of the next referendum. We have a lot of other priorities at the moment.

There are basic concepts we do not want to let drag on and waste our time debating, but I would like to call my colleague on the subject of taxes.

Every time a member of the Conservative Party rises, they raise the figure of the $42 billion deficit, but they always fail to say that this deficit had been accumulated with the $200 billion in debts the previous government had left us.

We are not going to change history, but it would be interesting to compare the two governments. We would see that there was no shame in being Conservative for nine years.

The essential issue is taxes. The big topic of conversation at the moment is that a lot of people are thinking of moving for tax reasons. It costs a fortune to live in the Province of Quebec, because our tax system is utterly regressive. I think the federal government must also have a more progressive policy on taxes.

In the analysis done by economists Ferland and Laferrière, 14 federal measures are prejudicial. I would like the opinion of my colleague from Beauce on that. Is it usual for a government to withdraw all the benefits from free trade, $22 billion from the GST and tens of billions of dollars from the surplus in the employment insurance fund, while overtaxing by some $30 billion at a time when people have no more money in their pockets.

We cannot afford to just say “Wait for the next budget”. For families earning between $25,000 and $70,000 a year, it is a disgrace to live in Canada and in Quebec at the present time, for tax reasons. They have nothing left of their pay cheques. They wonder how they can arrange things differently so that they have a little bit more left in their pockets.

There are, of course, some provinces that are better off than others at this time, like Alberta and Ontario. Their premiers decided to say “Yes, we are going to work at decreasing the deficit, but with moderation. We are also going to look at the taxation system”. They know it is a key to reviving the economy.

I would like to ask my colleague from Beauce whether he does not find it unreasonable to keep on pocketing people's money as the Liberals are doing, to create what are almost hidden funds, to have a taxation system that is hideously complex. People cannot figure out what is going on any more, but there is one thing they do know. The bottom line is: their net salaries continue to get smaller.

There are examples of this. There are typical cases that have been referred to in reports. People get pay raises that cost them money. Something must be done. We must not say “Wait for the next budget”. Administrative corrections need to be made. It is nothing complicated.

If a single-parent family with an income of $31,000 a year gets a $1,000 increase in income, which costs it $1,056, including a $260 drop in the child tax benefit, we do not need to wait for the next budget in order to remedy this. The Minister of Finance merely needs to send a note to his deputy minister indicating “This needs fixing. It is not right”. There are 14 different elements that have negative effects on Canadian families, Quebec families in particular.

I am sure that my colleague from Beauce is doing his best to represent his fellow citizens well, as did his predecessor. I would like to have his opinion on the taxation system.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

12:50 p.m.

Liberal

Claude Drouin Liberal Beauce, QC

Mr. Speaker, first, I agree with the hon. member for Chicoutimi that Quebecers are, unfortunately, the most heavily taxed people in North America. We must absolutely work to help people regain confidence, and I hope that the Quebec government will do its share in that regard.

The member for Chicoutimi also said that we must not only remember the $42 billion deficit that we inherited, but also recognize what was done before that. I agree, but we must not think either that the previous government does not have any responsibility.

We have begun to lower taxes. We increased the child tax benefit. But, we must be cautious. Canadians have made huge sacrifices to allow us to achieve fiscal balance. Today, we have succeeded and all Canadians are pleased to see that tax reductions have begun and will continue, at least as far as the Government of Canada is concerned. We hope that the Quebec government will do like its Ontario counterpart and that Quebecers will stop being the most heavily taxed people in North America.

Finally, I will conclude by telling the member for Chicoutimi, who is also well aware of what is happening and who works hard for his constituents, that we do not need to think constantly about separation. What people want is to work and to have the best quality of life while remaining in Canada.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

12:55 p.m.

Reform

Deepak Obhrai Reform Calgary East, AB

Mr. Speaker, today I rise to speak to Bill C-71. This is the third time that I rise to speak to this bill. I rise to speak because I feel strongly about what is happening in our country, especially in the past couple of years when we have seen taxes going up, our financial house not being in order and the burden that ordinary Canadian taxpayers are carrying.

I have been a small businessman and an accountant. In the last 10 years that I have been a businessman there is just one area where I could not control the cost which dug into my profit, and that one area was government taxation. Government fees, government taxation, UI, EI, all kinds of taxes, from the cities to the provincial governments to the federal government, have been hampering the growth of small businesses.

This started with the Conservative government. Now the Liberal government is claiming that it is working well to bring its financial house in order. That is not what I hear from Canadians who are coming into my office. That is not right. Despite the claim made by the federal government that it has been reducing taxes, that it has balanced the budget and that good times are around the corner, those who walk into my office cannot vote for that. They cannot say that good times are around the corner because their take-home pay is still going down.

Why is their take-home pay going down? Costs are going up, rents are going up and service fees are coming in. With all of these things they just cannot seem to make ends meet. How can this government stand and say that happy times are here?

Now we see a new debate going on. Businesses have finally started speaking out. They are saying that enough is enough. We hear Nortel talking about losing the brightest people in Canada. We spend money to train them and then we lose them to other countries.

We have free trade with the U.S.A. Now we have free trade with Chile. We have free trade with Israel. As we go on we will have more and more free trade, which gives Canadians the opportunity to go to other countries where there are better conditions and better take-home pay. They will do that and we will lose them.

While I am on the subject about losing our brightest, I want to talk about something that is very dear to me, the student debt. Let us talk about that for a little while.

In the past decade the average Canadian university tuition has risen by 119%. That is a substantial increase. However, transfer payments for post-secondary education have already been sliced by 18%. The government has sliced this money, part of which would have been used by the provinces for student loans. Now the Liberal government is coming up with a band-aid solution. The government has created the millennium scholarship fund which will only address 300,000 students.

Today I read a press release in which the government said that it had come to an agreement with the Government of Ontario. The Government of Ontario will be administering Canada student loans. From a cost and efficiency perspective I think that is great. It is a good initiative on the part of the federal government. However, that does not address the main issue of the high cost of tuition.

I will talk about the University of Calgary for example. This university has charged more and more for tuition fees because it does not have funds coming from the provincial government any more. The federal government has refused to meet its obligations despite the fact that it talks about the great transfer of money it is giving to the provinces to address their educational needs for the future.

We are at the dawn of the new millennium. Is it not important that we look at what our students need? Is it not important to ensure that Canada has an educational force that can challenge others and make Canada prosperous?

I am the international trade critic for my party. I have travelled around the world on behalf of Canada. I have seen how competitive Canadians are. We can rise to the challenge. What is curtailing us? High taxes are curtailing Canadians. Despite what the Liberals say, the facts speak for themselves. More and more Canadians are leaving.

On Monday I pointed to an example which I will repeat today. I visited an institution in Toronto where they are teaching high tech to students. I was told that IBM hired six students and took them to the U.S.A. We trained them and we lost them. The reason is high taxation.

In committee yesterday the Minister for International Trade sent his message out to the government. I hope the minister is listening to this. He sent a very subtle message to the government; he was afraid he might get slapped. His chain was yanked. He said there is a need to reduce the gap in taxation between the U.S. and Canada since we are losing our brightest to the United States. The minister has admitted there is a need. Of course he had to say the politically correct thing so his chain would not be yanked. The minister said that the Prime Minister and the finance minister were working toward this. When will they work toward it?

The cost of education is rising. I have repeated this many times in this House. I have two daughters attending university and I know firsthand that the cost of education is going up and up and up. And what is happening? A millennium fund, a legacy of the Prime Minister, but that legacy is not going to work.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1 p.m.

An hon. member

Where is your leader?

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1 p.m.

Reform

Deepak Obhrai Reform Calgary East, AB

Mr. Speaker, a member from British Columbia is talking about my leader while I am talking about taxes. Let us talk about taxes for a change.

We have problems. We have a problem with education. Post-secondary education is a problem. Small business people are facing problems. CPP premiums have gone up. Of course the government claims it has reduced the EI. In the overall taxation problem people do not see any hope.

The auditor general has stated that the underground economy has increased. I do not agree with the underground economy. When the government provides services we have to pay for those services. Why is there an underground economy? For the simple reason that people feel they are not getting back what they have been paying to the government. That is why there is an underground economy.

Ours is a voluntary system. We are supposed to declare what we earn. In a voluntary system there must be trust, trust between the government in what it is doing and those who are paying. If that trust is broken, we will get a situation where people will say that they will not voluntarily comply with it. This is what is happening. Over the past years the trust has been broken.

The trust was broken when the Conservatives brought in the GST. The GST was supposed to be paid toward the debt but instead it went toward spending. That was the start of the breaking of the trust between the Canadian public and the Canadian government. Up until now Canadians have not regained that confidence to pay taxes voluntarily. Canadians should pay their taxes. They should not break the law.

We as parliamentarians can tell the government that it is wrong, that it has not addressed the issue of what Canadians are saying. Everybody is tired. The burden on single parents raising children is so heavy yet the government refuses to recognize that. Canadians brought this issue up and now the government has a committee to address the issue. Mothers at home have not been recognized. Again the government said it would study this issue.

The minister of state for the status of women met a lady who had taken Canada to the United Nations. That lady had the impression that this government or the minister herself looked more favourably on women who went out to work and less favourably on those who stayed at home to raise their children. I do not see the logic.

Those who want to stay home to raise their children are equally important to this society because they are raising the young. They are equally important as those who are working and who come home in the evening to raise their children. It is a choice they have made. One choice is not better than the other. They both have the same objective of raising good Canadian citizens. But our current taxation system does not address that and this budget did not address that.

Let us talk about health care. I said on Monday that a constituent had phoned me. She said that she was afraid of what was going to happen with health care. She did not see that this government had addressed this issue. Despite the fact that this government has said it is going to pour money back into health care and despite the fact that this government is going to give money to health care one time, it does not bring confidence. The government has taken more since it came into power in 1993 than what it is putting back in.

The province of Ontario is going into an election. The Progressive Conservative Party has come up with its platform for the election. One of the points in its platform is it is going to uncouple its taxation system from the federal government. What does this do? This is the second province to do that. Alberta has already given its intention to do that and now Ontario is going to do it. Why? Neither of those governments have any confidence and do not see that the federal government is doing enough to reduce taxes. They want to get those taxes.

One of the reasons the provincial government was not initially reducing taxes was the fear that if it reduced taxes the federal government would increase taxes because it was tied into the system. Now the provincial government is uncoupling so it can address the concerns of its own citizens. It is uncoupling from the federal government so that it has the freedom to do what the federal government is refusing to do.

The other factor is both Alberta and Ontario have come up with tax reductions for their citizens. Yet Alberta is in the same situation as the federal government where there is no operating deficit. Why is the federal government unable to do that? It will claim it has done something. It will claim it has taken away the 3% surtax. The surtax is for whom? It is for those who earn high incomes. They pay the 3% surtax.

However even any relief that the government has put in this budget will not kick in this year. It will kick in starting in the year 2000. And the government claims it is giving Canadians tax relief now. The Liberals say they are giving tax relief now. No. Their own documents say when they are giving tax relief. It is next year.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:10 p.m.

An hon. member

Do not give me indigestion.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:10 p.m.

Reform

Deepak Obhrai Reform Calgary East, AB

I will give the hon. member some tablets for his indigestion.

The central theme of what I have been saying is that the federal government will have to address the issue of tax relief. It will have to address the issue of smaller government. Get off our backs. That is the bottom line. That is what Canadians are saying. Get off our backs. Become efficient. We have had enough big government and enough high taxes. Now it is time to stop.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:10 p.m.

Liberal

John Richardson Liberal Perth—Middlesex, ON

Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member before he gets up to speak had better check the facts. It was about 90% hot air, nothing on target.

Education is a provincial responsibility. The provinces spend the money, they set the costs. That is who is responsible. We give them money but we do not float it all.

On the deficit, who got to the deficit? It was one of our platforms and this government reduced the deficit. This government put money against the debt. This government will not borrow to lower taxes, not like the Ontario government that has had to borrow $2 billion to $3 billion, that has had to borrow money. There is one fundamental rule in public policy. Do not borrow money to give tax cuts because we never get back on it. The provincial government is off track and it will be tough to get back on track.

The government has put money against the surplus. No other government has hit its target in a more systematic, well planned fashion than this federal government. It is getting praise around the world for the prudent approach to the finances of this country.

Let the stay at home mothers and the working mothers make that decision. It is not up to us to interfere and tell them to go to work or not to go to work.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

An hon. member

Give them tax relief.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

An hon. member

Borrow it.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

Liberal

John Richardson Liberal Perth—Middlesex, ON

They want us to borrow it. That is typical coming from members of the Reform Party, which is supposed to be prudent. It will be a laugh if they ever make it to government.

The surplus that we have accumulated in the last two years has been put against the debt, and that is the right way to go. We will continue to bring down the mountain of debt. We did not put it there. It was created over a number of years. Slowly we will bring it down. For every $10 billion we put against it we will probably save up to $1.5 billion in expenses, which will accrue to the revenue side for the next year because we will not have to pay out that money.

This is an exaggeration by the Reform Party. It takes half truths and talks about unfounded economic policies of borrowing to give tax breaks. I cannot believe it.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

An hon. member

Rubbish.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

Liberal

John Richardson Liberal Perth—Middlesex, ON

That is exactly it. There is no government that would take that on. All tax policies say that we should not borrow to give a tax break.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

Reform

Deepak Obhrai Reform Calgary East, AB

Mr. Speaker, talk about the hot air that just blew over from the other corner. He just stood to ask anything. He did not say a single word about what I was talking about.

He talked about deficit reduction. The deficit was reduced on the backs of Canadians. Government did not clean it up. It was cleaned up by high taxes.

He talked about the Ontario Conservatives borrowing money. Let me tell him this. There is no Canadian law, but there is a law in Alberta that governments can no longer have deficits. Do that over there and then we will talk about it.

He talked about being praised around the world. Let us ask the people who are leaving Canada to work in other parts of the world about this business of being praised around the world. Where is this hot air coming from?

He talked about giving mothers a choice. Yes, we should give them a choice. But the government's tax system has created no choice for them. That is the problem. Even I agree that they should be given a choice, but the government has not done that. We know where this hot air is coming from.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

Reform

Dale Johnston Reform Wetaskiwin, AB

Mr. Speaker, I note that the member across the way said that it is simply against government policy to borrow in order to reduce taxation.

I would like to ask my colleague if, in his opinion, this has ever been done before. Have Liberal governments in the past ever borrowed money? Or has the member for Calgary East heard that at least 35% of Canadians are forced to borrow money to pay their federal taxes? Has he heard those figures?

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:15 p.m.

Reform

Deepak Obhrai Reform Calgary East, AB

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for asking that question. It is a good question.

Where did this deficit come from? Was it not started by a Liberal government? It initiated this business of deficit spending and the Tories followed. It started over there. Now the Conservative governments are bringing in legislation to stop deficit spending.

My colleague talked about Canadians borrowing money. I forgot that point. He is absolutely right. I have had people in my riding come to me and say that they had to borrow money to pay their taxes. The tax burden on Canadians is pretty high.

Let me cite some statistics. And I will give them statistics, not hot air. The statistics are very simple. Each Canadian taxpayer will be paying $2,020 more in taxes in 1999 than they did in 1993 when the Liberals came into power. Canadian taxpayers will pay $42.1 billion more in taxes than they did when the Liberals came into power. Let us talk about facts.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:20 p.m.

Bloc

Réal Ménard Bloc Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC

Mr. Speaker, I want you to know that in no way did I intend to usurp your authority. I am well aware of the great influence you have on the House. I accept your leadership without question. If I had had the opportunity I would even have voted for you.

This being said, we now have to deal with less pleasant issues. I would ask government members to pay attention. We have many complaints about the budget.

I want to stress again how important it is to vigorously fight poverty. I will benefit from the presence in the House of all my Bloc Quebecois colleagues, since I believe those who are the most sensitive to the issue are here today. It is a quirk of scheduling. It was not planned, it just happened that way. I therefore feel all the more comfortable talking about this issue.

Last year, I went on a tour of Quebec to promote community reinvestment by banks. This idea is gathering a fair amount of support.

I have some support from the Progressive Conservative Party. I have some support from the New Democratic Party. I know there is some fragile support among government members, but it is bound to get stronger.

As a matter of fact, in his report the Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board reviewed the whole issue of bank involvement in the community.

Since 1977, the United States have had the Community Reinvestment Act. It provides no constraint. It sets no quotas. It simply requires banks to become involved in the community.

The strength of the U.S. legislation, which appeals to a number of my colleagues—whom I thank for welcoming me in their region—is that it provides for a yearly assessment of what the banks are doing in underprivileged communities.

Banks can get involved in underprivileged communities in a variety of ways. They can do it by supporting community groups, by providing lower income people with a range of financial services at preferential rates and by making mortgage loans. All this is called community reinvestment.

Community reinvestment by the banks is a matter of balance since they make profits from the money deposited by individual investors. It has to do with the multiplier theory.

I think Canada needs a legislation to assess what the banks are doing in their communities, and that assessment should be made available to consumers. That is what made the success of the American formula. Once a year, in June, the assessment of the banks' involvement in the community is disclosed in what is appropriately called the disclosure process. Naturally, consumers are better informed when they have to make choices.

I do not understand why the government never proposed anything similar in the budget or elsewhere over the years.

This brings me to talk about poverty. I think members of the House are very sensitive to the issue of poverty.

We, on this side of the House, do see a paradox in having an increasingly rich society, which is able to produce and has gained access to export markets like never before, yet a society where the number of poor people has never been higher.

For example, the National Council of Welfare estimates that one out of five Canadians lives in poverty. In certain communities, the ratio is two out of five, and among certain groups, particularly young people, it is three out of five.

What are we talking about when we speak of poverty? We are talking about people who have to spend more than 55% of their income on basic necessities, like clothing, housing and food.

Our colleague, the member for Shefford, has embarked on an antipoverty fight—this the kind of word we should use when we talk about poverty—and she has suggested what could be part of the solution. Nobody thinks there can be one single solution to the problem of poverty. We all know we need a whole range of measures.

But the hon. member for Shefford did suggest one idea that could be part of the solution and that got a great deal of attention in the House and a lot of support from the Bloc Quebecois, from me as the member for Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, from the hon. member for Québec, who has also joined us in this fight, and from the hon. member for Laval East. We did not ask the government for a budgetary measure, but for something that could make a difference for underprivileged citizens.

In a spirit of honesty and camaraderie, we have asked the government to add social condition as a prohibited ground of discrimination in the Canadian Human Rights Act, but not in the charter, because it is obvious we cannot reopen and amend it without new constitutional negotiations.

Hard to believe as it may be, this despicable government has rejected the consensus reached by the main opposition parties. What would have been the impact of including social condition in the Canadian Human Rights Act? It would have given a remedy to all those who receive federal services, or who work in companies under federal jurisdiction. All those who have been victims of discrimination on the basis of their fortune or their wealth could have taken their case to a human rights tribunal to obtain redress.

As members know, Quebec has no choice but to become a country. It is a matter of time, of months, but Quebec will become a country as, indeed, the case should be for any nation. Quebec, which will be a sovereign country, has a lot of expertise in the area of human rights. Since 1977, the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms forbids discrimination on that ground. With what result? It has allowed us to take three major steps forward in matters of law, in particular for single parents, who are often women.

For instance, a landlord refuses to rent an apartment to a single parent, on the ground that income may be inadequate, there can be a legal challenge. A human rights tribunal has ruled on this issue. Discrimination against a recipient of income security is not allowed. A landlord cannot refuse to rent an apartment to a recipient of income security in Quebec.

This is an example of what lawmakers can do to support less fortunate people, who are often victims of discrimination.

There was a similar case regarding financial services. For instance, there is the case of a credit union near Quebec City, one I will not identify because it would not be relevant to my argument.

A credit union had refused a mortgage to a single parent, despite the fact that the person clearly had the means to meet the terms of the mortgage. Again, because the Quebec Charter of Rights and Freedoms allowed that person to take her case before a tribunal—

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:30 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. McClelland)

On a point of order, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:30 p.m.

Liberal

Tony Valeri Liberal Stoney Creek, ON

Mr. Speaker, I am always reluctant to rise on a point of order when a member is in the middle of his speech, but I find it somewhat difficult to sit here and listen to comments about the CRA and other matters that do not have anything to do with the particular bill.

I know that under your guidance you offer that kind of latitude, Mr. Speaker, but I wonder if you could ask the hon. member to speak to the bill rather than everything under the sun except the bill.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:30 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. McClelland)

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance has asked through the Chair that members be relevant. We do have a responsibility to be relevant when speaking to the bill. I would ask the hon. member for Hochelaga—Maisonneuve to keep that in mind.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:30 p.m.

Bloc

Réal Ménard Bloc Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC

Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary may have had trouble concentrating. I remind him that we are talking about poverty here. We are talking about the budget. If the parliamentary secretary cannot see the link between the budget and poverty, he may not be fit to sit in the House of Commons. On this side of the House, we do see the link between poverty and the budget.

My colleague's remark is totally uncalled for. He should remain seated and steer clear of such irrelevant comments.

Having said that, I want to come back to the fact that we have asked the government several times to commit to an anti-poverty agenda. I think the government could have done a lot more with the budget surplus.

Let me give the House some examples. The government has more room to manoeuvre, because they literally stole from the provinces. We have to realize that. When we go over the budget, because we are debating its implementation today, we see a lot of measures taken in areas where the federal government has absolutely no right to interfere.

First, there is the millennium scholarship fund. If government members could just look at the Constitution of Canada, they would have a hard time explaining how the federal government can interfere in education. And yet, that is what they are getting ready to do.

It was decided that money could be made available, through a program called the millennium scholarship fund, for some of our fellow citizens who wanted to get a post-secondary education.

Why is the government making money available for this when it has absolutely no constitutional authority to do so? The federal government doesnot have the constitutional power to do so and, furthermore, since 1966, Quebec has benn offering the most generous loan and scholarship program in Canada.

The federal government worries about training and says “We think that it is important for people to make a commitment to stay in school for at least 11, 12 or 13 years”.

It is believed that men and women, in the 21st century, will change careers four or five times during their active life. So, they will be involved in a process of lifelong learning. Of course, the governments have the responsibility to give them access to the money that will allow them to acquire greater skills. However, it is not up to the federal government to give that money directly.

The Bloc Quebecois has often asked the Minister of Human Resources Development to negotiate with the National Assembly, which is the only parliament Quebecers can truly identify with in America, to find a way to give them access to the money the federal government intends to invest in millennium scholarships. There has to be a single program, one managed by the Quebec government.

Did the federal government listen? Of course not. It cannot shed its old attitude of interventionism and its lack of respect for provincial jurisdictions.

I could go on and on. I will address the whole issue of the Youth Employment Strategy. We all know that the Youth Employment Strategy deals with an area over which the federal government really has no jurisdiction. It is so true that, in the whole job training repatriation process leading to the manpower agreement concluded between Minister Harel and the federal minister responsible for human resources development, Minister Harel, on behalf of the government of Quebec, asked that the Youth Employment Strategy be included.

The Youth Employment Strategy is one of the tools available to the labour force to upgrade their skills on the job market. The federal government did not include it, which leaves us in a rather paradoxical situation.

The paradox comes from the government developing a program that does not make any sense because it is determined to interfere in areas like job training. This program does not make sense because it tells people that they cannot be unemployed, they cannot be studying and they cannot be on the job market in order to qualify for and participate in this program administered by the federal government under the Youth Employment Strategy.

The program is therefore geared toward a very specific clientele mainly comprised of dropouts. We certainly do not want to suggest that we should not help these people.

For example, in my riding of Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, there are 200 community organisations. These are instrumental in making my riding such a great place to live. Very few organizations are interested in the Canadian Youth Strategy because they are not the clients mainly targeted by the strategy.

This program is ill-conceived. It does not make sense. It would make more sense to be able to ask that this program and the money spent on it be transferred to the provinces.

I would also have much to say about the interference by the federal government in the field of health. The federal government's interference in this area is now a well-known fact.

Canadian institutes for health research have been established. They will constitute virtual networks bringing together researchers and institutes to co-ordinate and target research efforts in Canada.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:35 p.m.

Some hon. members

Oh, oh.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:35 p.m.

Bloc

Réal Ménard Bloc Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC

Mr. Speaker, the august backbenchers are going about their daily ritual of making noises barely loud enough to be heard in this civilized world.

Still, I want to tell them that if they really want to help the Canadian government and their fellow citizens, they should add their voices to that of the Bloc in order to have the funds available for education and health transferred to the provinces. Under the Constitution, the provinces are primarily responsible for providing these services to our fellow citizens.

In closing, I would like to remind the House that there is another issue where we were entitled to expect the federal government to act, namely the Palais des congrès. Members know that Montreal is a hub in the tourist industry.

Budget Implementation Act, 1999Government Orders

1:35 p.m.

An hon. members

Oh, oh.