moved:
That, in the opinion of this House, the government should withdraw the measure to reduce the age credit that it introduced in its most recent budget, and retain the Old Age Security Program and the Canada Pension Plan in their present forms.
Mr. Speaker, Motion M-289 which I am presenting in this House today brings out the expectations of seniors throughout the country. Groups of seniors from Vanier, Les Saules, Limoilou, Neufchâtel, Ancienne-Lorette and Duberger in my riding told me about their concerns for the future and I fully share these concerns in light of recent events.
The present Liberal government displays a serious lack of social equity and economic justice. Instead of reducing its shameless waste and administrative duplication or even requiring the 90,000 corporations that do not pay tax to contribute their fair share, the government is attacking the poor, the middle class, the disadvantaged, the unemployed and the elderly.
On the pretext of reducing its deficit, the Liberal government is attacking defenceless groups in society which are already in a precarious financial situation, because these Liberals are a heartless government.
In the last budget, we saw how $5.5 billion was taken from the unemployed in unemployment insurance programs. We just voted on this measure in this House.
As for seniors, the first thing the government did in this same budget was to reduce the age credit. I say the first thing the government did because other equally harmful measures were introduced and are still to come from the Liberal government. The age credit reduced federal income tax by about $610 a year for all taxable seniors. The amendment reduces this credit by 15 per cent for all seniors whose taxable income exceeds $25,921 and it is totally eliminated for incomes over $49,100.
Thus the Liberal government intends to save $490 million by 1997 on the backs of seniors. Across the country, 800,000 seniors will be affected by this measure. Does the Liberal government consider that an elderly person with an annual income of $25,000 is a rich taxpayer? Does it consider that with such an amount, which is barely above the poverty level, that person must still give money to the government, after having paid taxes throughout his life and working hard to be able to enjoy a modest income in his retirement years?
The federal government did not stop there as regards cuts made at the expense of seniors. Its latest idea is to set up a centralized answering machine system using voice boxes to answer queries from seniors. This dehumanization of services to the elderly is simply pitiful!
The idea is simple. Offices serving seniors in Val d'Or, Chicoutimi, Gatineau, Rimouski, Sherbrooke, Drummondville, Trois-Rivières and Sept-Îles will be closed. The number of agents in Quebec City will be considerably reduced, since at least 123 of the current 347 positions across the province will be abolished.
In fact, the number of jobs eliminated could reach 50 per cent of the current strength and all these positions will be replaced by a single telephone exchange in Montreal, a recorded questionnaire for touch-tone telephones for seniors across the province.
From now on, the elderly will talk to a pre-recorded voice. They will talk to a machine to get the information they need. To make things worse, if the lines are overloaded at the Montreal exchange, the calls will be transferred to another province. Is this not a perfect example of how the government holds our elderly in contempt? We can easily imagine the numerous problems which they will encounter with this new system. Indeed, problems related to hearing, eyesight and dexterity are common occurrences in that age group. Talking to a machine will create unavoidable difficulties for seniors. How will they be able to ask that machine to explain something they do not understand? How will they be able to explain particular circumstances? How can the machine understand all the subtleties of a case and know in which category to find the information required by the person?
Such recordings are already being used in several locations and they never provide the information required. I myself have a lot of problems with the touch-tone system requiring you to press one for English, two for French, three for general informa-
tion, and four for specific information. The question we want to ask never falls in the proposed categories.
This is not to mention the fact that many elderly do not even have a touch-tone telephone. These people, and those who will not have managed to get an answer, will be able to talk to an agent. But how long will they have to wait? The staff of people manning the phones has been cut by nearly 50 per cent. And do you think the government bothered to consult senior citizens, the group concerned here, or their associations or federations? Certainly not! They did not consult seniors to find out whether the system met their needs.
Liberal members will tell us that the system will provide faster and more efficient service. We know that the new system will get on a lot of people's nerves. Using speed and efficiency as an excuse, the Liberal government will manage to cut down on the amount of money paid to seniors, since many seniors will give up trying to claim what they are entitled to, because it is so hard to get the information they need.
Misinformation of its senior clients as a result of a dehumanized system will help the Liberals save money at the expense of seniors, who did not file the requisite applications or were unable to use this so-called speedy and effective system correctly. Effective for whom?
Many pensioners will forgo their right to the guaranteed income supplement, for instance, because of lack of a information. The Liberal government prefers to dehumanize the system and not inform to its senior clients, so that seniors themselves will give up on the service. I think this is sufficient proof that the Liberal government is ruthless. Instead of attacking seniors, instead of reducing their tax credit or changing the way they receive services, the government should pull up its socks and cut where cuts are really necessary.
Family trusts, for instance. We talked about these in the House today during Question Period, to show how the Liberals caved in to pressure by lobbyists who wanted to maintain family trusts. These family trusts make it possible for rich families to put billions of dollars in a tax shelter. We know these trusts contain at least $100 billion, and we know who benefits.
Is cutting money for seniors and the unemployed and maintaining family trusts the kind of equity the Liberals had in mind? A tax of only 20 per cent on the $100 billion in family trusts would mean $20 billion, and that kind of measure is worthwhile, to reduce the deficit.
Abolishing the many tax shelters and loopholes in corporate tax would also give the government a chance to show it is serious about attacking the deficit. Meanwhile, cutting fat in the public service and getting rid of duplication would raise several more billion.
We should also get rid of historic institutions that are symbolic and have become too costly for a country like Canada, such as the Senate, on which the government wastes $500 million annually, and the Governor General, the Lieutenant-Governors and the Queen. We also have 90,000 Canadian corporations that do not pay a cent of income tax, and hundreds of millionaires who paid less than $100 in taxes last year. They should also contribute towards putting Canada's finances back on track, instead of leaving this to our seniors and unemployed.
There are many other measures I could suggest, if I had more time. To paraphrase the Bible: The government giveth and the government taketh away. It takes money from us all and gives only to a chosen few.
Before we make cuts in the Old Age Security Program or the Canada Pension Plan, we have to remember that the government made some moral commitments when it created these two programs. The OAS Program was built with the sweat of our senior citizens. In 1952, when this program was introduced, a majority of 81 per cent of MPs decided that this program would be universal, that is to say that it would be paid to everyone reaching the age of eligibility, regardless of their income.
When it started, 41 years ago, the OAS Program was being financed by a special tax called Old Age Security Tax. The government collected this tax with the personal income tax, the corporate income tax and the sales tax. The revenues were transferred to a special account, the Old Age Security Fund.
In 1972, as part of a fiscal reform, the Old Age Security Tax was integrated with the general tax. In 1975, the Old Age Security Fund was transferred to the Consolidated Revenue Fund. Since then, we have all forgotten that people had paid all their lives into this program, hoping to receive payments in their older years. They planned their retirement with that money in mind and, despite the heartless people across the floor, private pension plans negotiated with employers took this into consideration. The rate of taxation for this program which was 2 per cent in 1952 had risen to 4 per cent in 1972 and, according to established taxation policies, higher income earners have paid proportionally more into the plan.
This is why the decision taken in 1989 to tax-back the OAS payments of senior citizens having an income over $50,000 outraged those who had contributed to the program, in good faith, for almost 40 years.
Taxpayers who have been paying and are still paying specific and visible taxes in preparation for their retirement feel that they are entitled to get them back. Old age pension is not a privilege nor a handout, it is the repayment of a debt society owes them.
People over 65 are far from being a privileged and rich group. Forty per cent of them are eligible to receive the guaranteed income supplement which keeps them at the poverty level. For 72 per cent of female seniors and 50 per cent of male seniors,
old age pension benefits and the guaranteed income supplement become an essential source of income.
I will say for the benefit of members opposite that, in 1991, 47 per cent of women over 65 and 18 per cent of men in that same age group had an income of less than $10,000. Since the poverty line is set at $17,000, one must conclude that nearly half the female seniors in this beautiful country live below the poverty line. Only 5 per cent of senior citizens make over $50,000 a year.
It is time to dispel the myth that senior citizens are rich and have a grandiose and opulent lifestyle. Only a very happy few can afford it. For the vast majority of seniors, old age pension and the guaranteed income supplement are the only source of income they have.
Thanks to such support measures, the quality of life and the situation of senior citizens have been greatly improved, even though they are far from perfect. Year after year, senior citizens are making up an increasingly larger portion of the population. It is estimated that the elderly population will increase by 40 per cent in the next 15 years. The government would be better off focusing on the health and welfare of our seniors, instead of shunting them aside, as this Liberal government seems to want to do.
Such a move would prove costly to society. By cutting assistance to seniors, the government will only ensure that hospitals fill up faster and that health care costs increase. The government must respect senior citizens and recognize their contributions to our society.
Instead of seeing them as an ideal scapegoat for its deficit reduction aims, the Liberal government should view them as an untouchable group.
Forty years ago, the government signed a social contract, agreeing to redistribute the moneys collected from contributors once they reached 65 years of age. Now this Liberal government is trying to get out of this contract by channelling the funds elsewhere, all because it has mismanaged its own affairs.
Seniors worked hard all their lives, secure in the knowledge that part of their income was being set aside for their golden years. Senior citizens are the pioneers who built our country, who made sacrifices and who suffered to give us what we now enjoy today.
Quebec owes its system of caisses populaires, one of the best in the world, to its seniors who were there from the very beginning and who believed and participated in this venture. We owe a great deal to these courageous people who were also visionaries. Our seniors were the ones who raised the children who now, as adults, are running our businesses. They are the ones who fought the battles, and won the victories on which we can build today for the future.
Canada owes a lot to seniors for their efforts. The least the Liberal government should do is respect them and maintain the benefits they have earned.
That is why I tabled so far in this House petitions signed by almost 3,000 seniors from the Quebec City region who strongly deplore the recent measures taken by the Liberal government. I ask, as stated in Motion No. 289 that I presented today, that the government withdraw the measure to reduce the age credit that it introduced in its most recent budget, and retain the Old Age Security Program and the Canada Pension Plan in their present forms.
