Madam Speaker, I certainly do not see any evidence of unbridled support for municipalities in this. I do not know what the member is talking about.
The fact is that there have been some estimates made as to what would be needed to satisfy that appetite that he talked about. I even said myself that the municipalities were calling for a $2 billion a year investment in infrastructure within five years. To give just some rough figures, at $2 billion a year, if it is a $57 billion deficit, that would be a whole lot less years than the 190 that it would take under the regime being set up by this budget.
We all know that infrastructure replacement and the building of new infrastructure takes time. It is not something that can be done overnight but 190 years is a little long. Maybe trying to meet all the needs that we have identified here and now in the course of the next decade or two might be more reasonable, and that would require funding by the federal government.
The member says that we do not want the federal government to just intervene over and above or interfere with some sort of jurisdictional realities. It did not bother the federal government elsewhere. It did not bother the Prime Minister when he wanted to set up the millennium fund and direct money to students in provinces, in spite of provincial jurisdiction over education. It did not bother the Prime Minister then, so why would it bother him now?
We have real needs that need to be met. Surely the federal government could use its spending power to make that money directly available to municipalities. Instead of trying to leverage money out of the municipalities it should recognize that particular needs exist and fund those needs.
I think the member is creating a false anxiety. The real anxiety is that if the federal government does not step in the municipalities will increasingly have to do these things themselves because they know they have to be done. They will do it on the backs of property taxpayers. Property taxpayers tend to be working class folks and they are the ones who will be driven out of their homes or, as a result of high property taxes, will be more vulnerable to arguments about the need to privatize everything. Then everything will be private.
This is all part of a grander strategy that I do not think the member across the way sees, because if he did, I would hope he would not be in favour of it.