Rob Nicholson

[The Budget, March 7th, 2005]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to answer some of the comments raised by the hon. member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell.

I thought he was going to get into it. He has a pretty good memory but he forgot to talk about the father of the Canadian deficit, Pierre Trudeau. The hon. member has a good memory. He will remember that in 1984 the Liberals' good friend the Auditor General was helping out, pointing out things for the Liberal Party even back then. The Auditor General does not just point out the mistakes they make now. The Auditor General back then said that the government of Mr. Trudeau was in danger of losing control of the government spending. That is how bad it was.

I appreciate all the attention the hon. member has given me for being a member of that government. Only modesty would tell him I did not run the government all by myself during those nine years. There were a few other people who helped me. Not all the decisions were mine, but I am certainly pleased and proud with the decisions that were made.

In answer to some of the specific items the hon. member mentioned about the CAIS program, if the hon. member's government knows this is a problem, why has it not called its friends in the provincial government to sit down and do something about it? The federal government should get on the phone with its good friend, Dalton McGuinty, who has been helping the federal Liberals out for the last year or so. Members will remember during the election that Mr. McGuinty helped them out. The federal Liberals should get on the phone to their friends, sit down and renegotiate these things.

It is just like the helicopters. How long ago was it the government announced that new helicopters were needed? Yes, the military needs them and the government has announced that again and the member has said it is going to take another couple of years. He knows as well as I do that those helicopters and all the other equipment for military defence should have been in place 10 years ago.

[The Budget, March 7th, 2005]

Madam Speaker, I would like to pick up for a second on the whole question of surpluses. I cannot believe there is anyone left in the country who is going to buy into any of the predictions by the Liberal Party. It is a little joke that the Liberals have on Canadians, if it were not so tragic in terms of overtaxation. The same nonsense goes on every year. The Liberals predicted $1.9 billion and then lo and behold in the hallways they stumbled over another $7 billion. I never believed any of that nonsense.

During the election the Liberals said that the numbers did not add up, that the Bank of Montreal was overpredicting the surplus. I never bought into it. If they think they fooled some of their constituents, I do not think they will be able to do it again. I think it has been shown what they truly are. This whole business of trying to fool Canadians and continue to overtax them is something Canadians have had enough of. All their projections we take with a grain of salt, as do most Canadians. Canadians are not buying into it.

There are a couple of other things I do not think Canadians are going to buy into. We hear announcement after announcement. For example, the Liberal day care policy has been a part of every election campaign for the last 12 years. The Liberals keep making the announcement and no one ever sees a dime from these announcements.

It is like the announcement on the gas tax rebate for the cities. A couple of years ago the current Prime Minister was in Winnipeg speaking to a gathering of municipal politicians. He made this grand announcement, that the Liberals were going to move forward on the gas tax rebate for municipalities. For heaven's sake, that was over two years ago and the municipalities are still waiting for it.

Now the Liberals have taken it to a new level. Part of the logic of the Liberals must be that if they make the announcement enough times then somehow it has happened. On the weekend, I heard the Prime Minister say on a couple of these things, “Promises kept”.

Good heavens above, the municipalities are still waiting for their cheques. I say to him, skip the announcement. How many times is he going to announce some of these things? Could he please send the cheques? That is what the cities want.

The Liberals have taken it to another level. They do not just keep announcing it. Now they say that the promises have been kept. The hon. members across heard all that and they must have been chuckling to themselves. It is a whole new spin on the idea of government announcements.

The budget is not all bad. There are some positive things in it. Interestingly enough, a number of the positive things in the budget came from members of the Conservative Party.

The member for Prince George--Peace River, my seatmate the House leader for the Conservative Party, should take a great deal of pride and satisfaction that his proposal for a new non-refundable $10,000 credit for expenses that couples incur in child adoption was in the budget. He should be very proud of that. I was pleased to see that in the budget.

I flipped through the budget. I looked for things like expenditures on border security and infrastructure and I see references to those. The government acknowledges that it has a responsibility in the whole question of border security.

I was asked by the local press in my riding whether $400 million was enough. It is enough when the job is done efficiently and the borders operate in an effective manner, when goods and services move across Canada's borders and at the same time Canada's security is maintained. Whatever that amount is, is what the country must commit itself to. I am pleased that there are references to that in the budget.

There is one thing I did not see in the budget and it is a glaring oversight. This was raised by one of my colleagues after he heard the budget speech and had a chance to look at the budget. He thinks there is a misprint in the budget. He asked where the chapter is on agriculture. That is a good question. Where is the chapter on agriculture?

I looked at the budget plan 2005 because I thought it must be there somewhere. One has to look real hard. It is hard to find because it does not get its own chapter and there is very little provided. It covers a couple of pages and is very inadequate.

The budget talks about the Canadian agricultural income stabilization program, a program that is of interest to the farmers in my area. The government talks about good intentions, that the government will work with its provincial partners, that it realizes there is a problem. That is an announcement that the Liberals want to do something about it. We had a debate on this issue about a month ago. I say to the government to get on with it. If the government realizes there is a problem with the program, it should get going and do something about it.

What disappointed me the most is the whole issue with respect to the federal excise tax as it applies to the wine industry and small breweries. It had been recommended to the government that it reduce or eliminate that tax. There was considerable hope within those industries. It would make a big difference to them. It would affect the smaller wineries and breweries. The federal government's budget does not sink or swim, the finances of the country do not depend on the relatively small amount of money collected from that tax. Representatives of the wine industry were optimistic that something would be done. I was very disappointed to read on page 158:

With respect to beer and wine, the Committee acknowledged that limited fiscal resources narrow the range of tax relief that can be funded. The recommendations with respect to beer and wine will remain under consideration.

Is that not wonderful. It is under consideration. That is a real shame. I ask the government even at this point to please bring in something, a separate bill. It would be of tremendous help to those industries that are so important to the country. I know the members of my party would welcome and support that.

The Minister of Transport has to be a very disappointed individual. I believe his comments that he would like to see airport rents reduced. It is false economy to try to make our airports as expensive as possible because the costs are passed on to the travelling public. It makes air transport, which is critical for the country's transportation infrastructure, more expensive. I know the minister joins with me and other members of the transport committee and the transport critic in saying it would have been wonderful to see that.

The Minister of Finance will say that these things are under consideration, but that is like a lot of other things. Everything is under consideration and we only get announcements. When does it finally happen? The Minister of Transport must be very disappointed about that.

Quite frankly, I was initially encouraged by comments with respect to defence spending. Defence has been terribly underfunded by the present government. The Liberals have continued this pattern for their 11 and one-half years in office. It is wrong. It is a bad idea. It hurts Canada. When there was all the foofaraw in the Minister of Finance's speech about all this money for defence, I was very pleased.

I went to the budget plan and again, this is not something cooked up by the Conservative Party or other opposition parties; the government puts these things out. If we flip to page 222, we will see defence funding. The fascinating thing is the category “New medium capacity helicopters, logistics trucks, utility aircraft and JTF2 facility”, all great things for Canada's military. Is this not a great idea? As we say in the legal profession, never mind the big print, always look for the small print. What does the government plan to spend on those categories for fiscal year 2005-06? Zero. What about next year, 2006-07? Zero. Like so much of the budget, it is all back-end loaded.

The government cannot get straight how much money it has to spend for the present year. It cannot seem to come up with the right numbers to predict the present year's surplus, so try and figure out how good its predictions are for what it will do in 2007, 2008 and 2009. That is in the area of fiscal never-never land for the government. It is very disappointing.

[The Budget, March 7th, 2005]

Madam Speaker, perhaps the hon. member could clarify something. It is quite correct that the chief of defence said that he welcomed new expenditures in defence. It seems to me the hon. member is going much too far. He somehow then equates that the military is happy. I think those were his words. I am sure the military is a long way from being happy. I do not think the hon. member would like to leave that impression with the House.

The neglect of Canada's military is a national disgrace. I am sure that if we asked anybody in the military if they wanted to see another 50 bucks going into the military, they would say, “Yes, of course, $50, $50 million, $5 billion”. They want to see billions of dollars.

It is going too far for this hon. member to say the military is happy. Putting the general on the spot when he makes himself available to the press, of course, he is going to say he wants to see new funding for the military, but what the Liberals have done to the military in the past and what the military might expect from the Liberals in the future, I think goes way beyond that. I would like him to comment on that.

I would also like him to comment on articles that are starting to appear in the newspapers on this whole subject of clawbacks. This is a classic Liberal trick. The government announces $100. If we look closely enough, we would find out that the $50 has been announced any number of times. So, that is part of the $100 announcement. Then there is something called efficiencies, where we are expected to find savings within the $100.

I want to give the member some time to comment on both. Are they pleased, and tell me about the clawback in the federal proposals on defence?

[Petitions, February 23rd, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition signed by over 100 people from the city of Niagara Falls and the greater Fort Erie area, including Stevensville, Wainfleet, Port Colborne, St. Catharines and Welland.

The petitioners state that marriage is a sacred institution that forms the basis of the family unit and that Parliament overwhelmingly affirmed its understanding of marriage as a union between a single man and a single woman to the exclusion of all others.

They call upon Parliament to reaffirm the heterosexual nature of marriage and to evoke section 33 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

[Department of Foreign Affairs Act, February 15th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, on Bill C-32 members of the Conservative Party will vote against the motion.

[Department of International Trade Act, February 15th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, Conservative members will be voting against this motion.

[Airports, February 15th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, there is a report from Transport Canada indicating that the government thinks it needs a private air terminal for cabinet ministers to keep them comfortable and isolated from the public. Besides keeping them isolated, the new terminal would also provide “a drop-off point for catering or flowers”. Is that not a beautiful thing?

How bad is it that ministers cannot mix with ordinary Canadians? Would the minister not be better off scrapping this idea and telling his colleagues that if they do not want to talk to ordinary Canadians, they should lock themselves in their offices until the next election?

[Border Security, February 10th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, the Niagara Regional Police Service patrols one of the largest geographical areas of any municipal police service. It provides policing and public safety for 12 municipalities and 430,000 people.

What most people will find surprising is that the Niagara Regional Police Service also has the primary responsibility for patrolling 120 kilometres of international border and this cost is picked up by municipal taxpayers. This is wrong.

The federal government should have another look at the Canadian Constitution. Border security is a federal responsibility. How big does the federal surplus have to get before the federal government starts living up to its obligations and starts paying for the protection of Canadians?

It is not that complicated. The federal government should do what the federal government is supposed to do: pay for international security.

[Income Tax Act, February 4th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate the member for Essex. He is picking up on a real injustice that has taken place in Canada and that affects about 85,000 Canadians. I want to point out that a lot of those Canadians live in border communities. The hon. member is from the Windsor area. Hundreds of those individuals live in the Niagara Falls, Fort Erie and Niagara-on-the-Lake area. They are very much disadvantaged and hard done by.

What the parliamentary secretary did not point out was that those social security premiums those individuals paid all those years were not tax deductible against their American income tax. In fact, Canadians working in the United States were taxed at the very highest rate, much higher than if they had been residents of the United States. They were taxed at the highest rate. They did not get a deduction for the social security premiums, unlike his example of the individual who collects Canada pension plan. That individual did get those deductions all the way through. The 50% inclusion rate was a matter of being fair. What was unfair, was that it was changed.

He and all members of the Liberal Party know that this was very unfair to people who had planned their lives and their retirement upon getting American social security and then the tax changed from 50% to 85%. This is why I applaud and completely support the initiatives by the member for Essex. These people should not have to wait until there is a Conservative government. It should be done now. It should be done in this Parliament. This should be rectified. They do not have to wait until the Conservatives are the government of the country again.

[Supply, February 3rd, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I am a little surprised that the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell spent most of his time praising the Minister of Agriculture and the parliamentary secretaries and telling us how hard they work. Would it not have been better if he had spent his time finding out what it is they are working at? He must have heard of the problems with this particular program from the farmers in his area.

He would be aware as well that farmers in my area are into the tender fruit business and grape production. They, too, have a great concern about this. I do not think they are that dissimilar from farmers anywhere in this country. They have serious problems with this program.

The member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell would know that the CAIS program succeeded the NISA program and that there were problems with that. It was not perfect and this program replaced it. The ironic part about this is that all the farmers I talked to said that they wished they had NISA back. NISA was better than the one that replaced it.

I think there is an identity of interest among farmers right across this country. They have identified problems with this program. Would the member not be better off not being an apologist for the members of his own government and making excuses by saying that they work hard? Good heavens, he should find out what they are working at and tell them to get working on some of these problems, because he must have heard about the problems from farmers. I hear from farmers in the Niagara areas that this program is not working and that it should be fixed.

We in the Conservative Party are prepared to do that. Where are the suggestions from the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell? Why does he not tell his friend, the Minister of Agriculture, and all those parliamentary secretaries to get working on something that will help farmers because this is not doing the trick and he knows it. Why does he not do that for a change?