Bill C-48 (Historical)

An Act to authorize the Minister of Finance to make certain payments

This enactment authorizes the Minister of Finance to make certain payments out of the annual surplus in excess of $2 billion in respect of the fiscal years 2005-2006 and 2006-2007 for the purposes and in the aggregate amount specified. This enactment also provides that, for its purposes, the Governor in Council may authorize a minister to undertake a specified measure.

An Act to Authorize the Minister of Finance to Make Certain Payments

[Russ Powers, Liberal, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Westdale, ON]

Madam Speaker, I commend the hon. member for his comments in this debate. Perhaps he will be able to explain to the House something which I find difficult to understand. All the dialogue that we have had led to the successful vote that was participated in by all last week on Bill C-43. There clearly was a positive contribution from the Conservative Party, the NDP and the Liberal Party in support of Bill C-43 and all the elements that are associated with it. There is the infusion of money for cities and communities, the movement toward the project green and the Kyoto protocol. There are so many good things, including the Atlantic accord which benefits certainly the hon. member and the area that he represents.

If Bill C-43 was so good for the members of his party just the other week, why are they having a problem with the enhancement to Bill C-43 that is contained in Bill C-48?

[Norman Doyle, Conservative, St. John's North, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to make a few comments on Bill C-48, a bill which the government calls the companion bill but which many of us call the NDP budget bill.

The Conservative Party is not against a better deal for post-secondary education. We are not against giving municipalities across the nation better access to funds for the provision of infrastructure such as water and sewer or urban transit facilities. We are not against the provision of additional social housing for the disadvantaged.

On the contrary, we see a Canada where our young people can receive an affordable education, get a well-paying job, buy a house and raise a family and so on. We believe in the Canadian dream and the right of every citizen to have access to that dream. This bill is less about the Canadian dream than it is about the Liberals' dream of staying in power forever. It is also about the NDP dream of being a bigger player in the parliamentary process.

The bill, as we are all aware, was scratched on the back of an old envelope in a backroom in the middle of the night. It is not about good government at all. It is about political expediency. It was the price of the NDP for propping up a corrupt government which is determined to cling to power at any cost. It is long on promises and short on detail, just the sort of bill that the NDP knew that the Liberals would like. The NDP has sold its soul to the Liberal Party. The NDP members are accomplices now to corruption, scandal and to ever bad spending decision that the government has made over the last year since the election campaign.

If the items in the bill are so important to the Liberals, why did they not include them in the original budget bill, Bill C-43? Given the government's cuts in transfers to the provinces in its effort to balance the national budget, it is no secret that students, health care, services at the municipal level, and the unemployed have been hard hit. Simply put, the Liberals balanced the budget in the nineties by passing the deficit down the line to municipalities and the NDP knew that.

Many times in the past eight year period since I have been here, I have supported NDP motions that called attention to the devastation that had been wreaked by the government over the decades. The NDP knows that the Liberals have been in power too long, long enough for the rot of corruption to set in, yet the NDP made a deal with the Liberals and it is not a deal of which it should be proud.

As part of its deal the NDP insisted that tax cuts for business be dropped from Bill C-43, the main budget bill. The tax cuts were designed to make Canadian business more competitive in the global economy. These tax cuts were aimed at allowing businesses to expand and create more jobs. We supported the tax cuts.

Why has the NDP refused to support tax cuts which create more jobs for the unemployed is beyond me. We in the Conservative Party are not against creating more and better jobs all across the land. Neither would I suspect are the tens of thousands of people from all over Atlantic Canada who have had to leave their homes for jobs in Ontario and Alberta.

The NDP portrays itself as the workers' party, but I ask, what is more important to a worker today than a good job? The business sector is the greatest creator of jobs in this country and why the NDP cannot support that is beyond me.

When the Liberals came to power in the early nineties, they gutted the employment insurance system. They made it more difficult for workers in seasonal industries to qualify for EI benefits and when they did qualify, it was for fewer benefits for a shorter period of time. In other words, the Liberals used the EI system and the moneys that they generated on extra premiums to amass a massive surplus which they used on things like the sponsorship scandal. These are the kinds of policies that the NDP is now supporting.

I asked earlier, what is more important to a worker than a good job? I would further ask, what is more important to an unemployed worker than a good EI system, a system that can carry a seasonal worker over until he or she gets back to his or her place of employment again? This is where the NDP fell down on the job. Not only did its budget deal strike out against job creation, it did not use the leverage with the Liberals to get much needed improvements to the EI system.

How can the NDP call itself as a socialist party and then forget about the workers in its deal with the government? It was in a position to really do something good for the workers of this nation and it failed.

Then there is the Atlantic accord. The first Atlantic accord was signed back in 1985. It gave the province of Newfoundland and Labrador about 70% of its revenues. Then all these revenues were clawed back under equalization. During the election campaign, the Conservative Party committed to the province to give it 100% of its offshore resources.

The Liberals had to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into a deal with the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador. We made numerous attempts when that deal was passed to have the accord split from the main budget bill and introduced as a standalone bill for speedy passage.

The Liberals constantly refused. The NDP supported us in that regard but yet, when it was cutting a deal with the Liberals, did it insist on a standalone Atlantic accord bill? No. Did it insist on that being part of the budgetary package? No. The NDP abandoned the Atlantic accord just like it abandoned the workers and the people of Atlantic Canada. It did not use the position it was in to get better benefits on EI for Atlantic Canadians who have a big seasonal workforce. It abandoned the people of Atlantic Canada when it came to the Atlantic accord by not insisting on standalone legislation.

If the NDP were to win power at the ballot box, I would not, and I am sure no one in this nation would not, begrudge it to right the priorities around the budget when it came to introducing a budget. I might disagree and others might disagree with some of the spending priorities, but if the NDP had the people's mandate, it would have every right to bring this kind of budget forward that it is bringing forward now.

However, the NDP did not win power. Indeed I remember in the latter stages of last year's election campaign the Liberals crushed the NDP by telling the people that a vote for the NDP was a vote for the Conservative Party of Canada. They were not too anxious to prop up the NDP at that time, but still, the NDP remained so anxious to prop up a corrupt, scandal-ridden government. I believe that in the long run the NDP will pay big time at the polls in the next election campaign.

We stand here today debating a budget bill that came about as the result of a backroom deal between the NDP and the Liberals. The deal was scratched on the back of an envelope, probably at 2 a.m., and is worth $4.6 billion. Is this any way to run a country, to have the NDP writing the budget bill in a hotel room in the still of the night on the back of an envelope or an old napkin? Is that any way to run a country?

Bill C-48 is not a budget bill in its own right. It is a bunch of loose promises made, as I said, in a backroom in the middle of the night, when the Prime Minister was in his bleakest political moments. It is not about honour. It is about political expediency. It is about a place at the table of power. Canadians deserve much better.

International Aid

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, we have obviously indicated that we wish to reach the objective and we are prepared to make a timeline commitment when we are confident that Canada can in fact keep that promise.

I would note that we have in the meantime invested $3.4 billion in new foreign aid. We have invested $342 million in the fight against deadly diseases in Africa. We have been leading the world in debt relief, and in Bill C-48 there is an incremental $500 million which that party is proposing to vote against.

An Act to Authorize the Minister of Finance to Make Certain Payments

[James Moore, Conservative, Port Moody—Westwood—Port Coquitlam, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am speaking on behalf of my constituents today on Bill C-48, an agreement to increase spending in a way that I think is unhealthy. This agreement is bad for Canada's economy, for my constituents, and represents a missed opportunity for the House and the government to improve the lives of Canadians.

Bill C-48 enacts $4.5 billion of the $4.6 billion deal struck by the Liberals with the NDP to make payments in fiscal years 2005-06 and 2006-07, and takes away the tax relief that was promised by the Prime Minister in the original budget that was presented to Canadians in the House on February 23. The bill is heavy on the public purse but light on details. It commits hundreds of millions of dollars under broad areas without any concrete plans as to how that money would be spent.

The bill authorizes cabinet to design and implement programs under the vague policy framework of the bill and to make payments in any manner. The bill contains an open-ended statement:

The Governor in Council may specify the particular purposes for which payments referred to in subsection (1) may be made and the amounts of those payments for the relevant fiscal year.

Put another way, the legislation creates an undefined multibillion dollar slush fund for the Liberal cabinet members to spend in the way that they see fit as we head into an election campaign. This is economically and democratically unacceptable.

Condemnation of the NDP-Liberal budget is not just mine. In a letter to the finance minister and the Prime Minister, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce wrote:

Bill C-48, the budget amendment that fulfills the terms of the Liberal-NDP agreement at the expense of corporate tax rate cuts, was concluded quickly and with little effort to determine whether the new spending initiatives are effective in boosting productivity and fostering long-term economic growth. This politically motivated action showed a clear lack of planning and long-term strategic thinking on the part of the federal government.

Nancy Hughes Anthony, president and CEO of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, added:

The government has shown a total lack of respect for the budget process by reneging on its commitment to provide future tax reductions for all businesses.

Garth Whyte of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business has also slammed the legislation and the way the Liberals are managing our finances. In his open letter to the Prime Minister, Mr. Whyte wrote:

Elimination of the corporate tax cuts would be a slap in the face to all small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) owners who create most of the new jobs in every community across Canada. Prior to last year’s federal election, both the Liberal and NDP parties expressed support for creating a fair taxation system for small businesses in recognition of the important role it plays in economic growth and job creation.

We believe that these tax measures are far too important to be used as political bargaining chips for political purposes. That is precisely what the Liberal-NDP bill does.

As a young Canadian representing one of the youngest ridings in the country, and one of the fastest growing areas of Canada, the budget is of great concern to me, in particular the growth of program spending over the past few years. Federal program spending is estimated to reach $163.7 billion this year. Just two years ago program spending was $141 billion. That is an increase of 15.8% in just two years, which far outpaces the growth of our economy and our population, according to economists.

What makes the growth in spending really problematic for me as a British Columbian is that it is being steered by the NDP. As a British Columbian, I have seen and experienced first hand the realities of NDP fiscal and economic policies and I can report to the House, and to all Canadians, that NDP economic policies are something we should always shy away from. Actually, we should run away from.

In British Columbia on the NDP watch, the uncontrolled tax and spend approach was disastrous for my province. In the decade from 1991 to its defeat in 2001, the NDP imposed $2 billion worth of new taxes on everything from personal to corporate income. Fees and taxes grew 50% faster than the pre-tax incomes of British Columbians. If we think that a $2 billion tax increase is hefty, it was eclipsed by a $5 billion spending increase in just five years between 1992 and 1997 and as a consequence the B.C. NDP ran eight consecutive budget deficits and in the process doubled B.C.'s debt.

As a result of that uncontrolled tax and spend philosophy, taxes were raised, spending was dramatically increased, deficits were run, and new debt was incurred. Worse, the bonding rating agencies that rate the credit of companies and governments were shocked by the reckless management style and reacted by downgrading B.C.'s credit rating which in turn raised the amount of interest B.C. had to pay on its rapidly growing debt.

The ongoing result of a disastrous NDP decade is that B.C. today has to spend roughly $2.6 billion a year on interest on the provincial debt. This is a problem because if we have to spend $2.6 billion a year on interest, it is $2.6 billion that can not go toward other priorities and programs for Canadians and for British Columbians.

In the case of B.C., that $2.6 billion a year works out to $672 for every man, woman and child in my province or nearly $1,700 a year for every B.C. family. In other words, the ongoing cost of just 10 years of NDP economics is a $1,700 annual tax for every B.C. family. I am raising this provincial example of the impact of NDP economics in British Columbia to this federal House because I am hoping that there are some Liberal members who do care about fiscal responsibility, as they bragged about in the last election campaign. Consider the facts of the NDP economics and consider the facts of the NDP partnership with which they are getting in bed.

In British Columbia the NDP introduced five separate fiscal management plans. Not one targeted outline was ever met. In nearly every category, deficits, debt management and spending, the NDP missed its promises every year in terms of targets. It introduced eight consecutive budget deficits, including two fudge-it budgets where it misled the public. The NDP took British Columbia from a have to a have not province during the nineties, a decade of robust economic growth across North America. The NDP doubled taxpayer supported debt in less than a decade. B.C.'s debt to GDP ratio increased dramatically by 20% in less than a decade. The NDP left B.C. with the highest personal income taxes in Canada. Fees, royalties and taxes had increased one and a half times faster than British Columbia's pre-tax incomes.

In the 1992 to 1999 period, the government increased spending from $17 billion to $22.2 billion, over a 30% increase. Spending increased faster than the ability to pay for programs. Under the NDP, B.C. had two credit rating downgrades, the worst fiscal record in Canada during the 1990s.

My constituents do not want to face the same disastrous NDP economics here in Ottawa. The budget is a missed opportunity and at every step of the way, the Conservative Party, the official opposition, has stood up and said “no” to the tax and spending priorities of the Liberals, “no” to the tax and spend priorities of the NDP. We will continue to fight this fight in the House, at committee and through the coming election campaign in the spring, which the Prime Minister has called.

We believe in lower taxes, less government and more freedom. We believe in personal responsibility and democratic reform. We believe in ensuring that Canadians have more money in their pockets so they can choose how they want to live their lives rather than having more money in the hands of Liberals and a $4.6 billion slush fund that it can throw money around, prior to an election campaign being started, for their own political purposes.

We believe in empowering families and putting money back into the hands of individuals so people have choice in how they live their lives and taking away the power of cabinet to politically manipulate a budget so it can buy votes in the House and then buy votes in the next election campaign, having no regard for the future economic health of our country.

We will be voting against this budget proudly. When the new Conservative government is formed, we will bring this country back to some sane fiscal management.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, I wanted to address the last comment that the member made. I believe he may have misled the House and Canadians by suggesting that the passage of Bill C-48 would mean that Canadians would have to pay more.

I would be happy to show him in the bill where any amounts payable under Bill C-48 are only payable to the extent that there would be a surplus in excess of $2 billion. Indeed his own member has put forward an amendment to make it $3.5 billion.

I wonder if the member would answer just a short question about the existence of surpluses. Many of his colleagues have said that the existence of a surplus means that there is overtaxing. Does that mean that the member and his party are opposed to any surpluses and are therefore opposed to any repayment of the national debt?

[Kevin Sorenson, Conservative, Crowfoot, AB]

Madam Speaker, again it is a pleasure to speak in the House to Bill C-48, the NDP supplementary budget to the government.

I think all Canadians have certain days they want to commemorate, such as birthdays, anniversaries and special occasions. In politics, we remember days of elections and times when budgets or policy documents are brought forward. Those are the days we remember.

This past spring the government brought down a long anticipated budget, Bill C-43. After the budget came down I had the opportunity to host five or six town hall meetings in different areas of my constituency, such as Oyen, Drumheller, Strathmore, Camrose, Stettler and Hanna. I hosted these town hall meetings to explain what the 2005 budget contained. I can say that coming from a rural riding in Alberta, an area that has been devastated by droughts, BSE and other various elements, the budget was a tough sell. Then again I am certainly not much of a salesman when it comes to trying to sell Liberal budgets in Conservative ridings.

However in the town hall meetings I commented on a fairly recent speech that the Alberta minister of health had given. In that speech she noted in the public forum that mental health issues were on the rise as Albertans attempted to balance their work and family commitments and struggle with ensuing financial hardships. In her speech she made reference to the turbulent times, such as drought and BSE, mainly in rural settings. No one knows more about those financial hardships and the stress of dealing with those burdens than our farmers.

At the time I conducted these town hall meetings throughout the constituency, the NDP had not made its deal with the Liberal government, the deal to prop up the corrupt government. That April 26 deal resulted in the legislation that we are discussing today, Bill C-48. Bill C-48 provides the legal framework for the outlandish NDP spending measures that we in this party adamantly oppose, measures that total up to $4.6 billion over two years.

I do not have a copy of Bill C-43 but it was a thick document. Bill C-48, amounting to $4.6 billion, is one double-sided page, half English and half French. Someone has already made reference to the fact that it contains 400 words but just like that spends $4.6 billion. Bill C-43, the first budget, spent $193 billion. Bill C-48 spends an additional $4.6 billion. That is big government. The deal that the NDP made with the Liberals made the spending even bigger.

That goes against what Conservatives believe. Conservatives believe that the people who earn the money, who go out and work for their paycheques, who are putting the crop in and taking the crop out, are the ones who are best able to spend the money. The Liberals say no. They believe they need more money to spend, and the NDP is right there with them. They say they want to build a larger bureaucracy so they can spend the money.

Where does the extra $4.6 billion come from? It comes from all hardworking Canadians who basically trade their time for the paycheque. They go out every week and give up the 40 hours or 50 hours of work and at the end of it they get a paycheque. The government now says that it wants to take that time and the money they received and control how it is spent and where it goes.

We in the Conservative Party believe in smaller government, in lower taxes and we believe the private sector is the main engine of economic productivity, growth and prosperity.

What did we not see in the 2005 budget? What we did not see in that budget and in the companion budget we are discussing today was any type of financial commitment to farmers who are undergoing terrible conditions.

The budget speech delivered on February 23 by the finance minister was very long and detailed but lost in those details was the fact that farm incomes in this country have been in a negative position for a number of years. We all know why. Those living in Crowfoot and throughout Canada, specifically in some parts of rural Canada, understand that there have been successive years of drought and BSE. Now, in much of my constituency and in constituencies in southern Alberta, we see unrelenting rain and flooding.

As I speak here today, in part of my constituency in the area of Drumheller, 2,700 people were told to get out of their houses because the river was swelling and there would be certain flood damage. I could go on and talk about Drumheller because it is a great community. It is a great tourist centre and a great place to visit. I hope everyone here will take the opportunity to go there.

Drumheller, which is a good area for farming and agriculture, if we were to go south of Calgary we would see that many fields are now under water. The member for Macleod told me that 80 acres out of 160 acres, or a quarter section of land, are now under water. A lot of these farmers are looking at flood damage and another year of negative growth.

In 2003, farmers had negative farm incomes for the first time since the great depression. Today grain and oilseeds prices are even worse. They have fallen through the floor. We are still suffering from the mad cow crisis.

To be frank, I was disappointed at the continued lack of respect and attention that agriculture producers and hardworking families received in this 2005 budget. Farmers will get no more cash in their pockets because of this budget. Despite Agriculture Canada's forecast of another year of negative farm income, there was little mention of agriculture. When the NDP decided to prop up this corrupt government and talked about the four areas, there was not one mention of agriculture. It is no wonder that the NDP in Saskatchewan have been basically shut out. It has forgotten about agriculture and about rural Canada.

In a question earlier, the member for Prince George talked about the CAIS program. One day the Liberal government was telling us it could not take away the cash deposit requirement. It said that it was not able to set that aside because farmers could not afford to put it into the CAIS program. A few days later, after it was voted on, it came out in the budget. I will give the government credit because what it said it could not do, it did. We applaud it for that even though it is what the Conservative Party of Canada had stood up for as we were defending farmers. The government accepted that and we applaud it for that.

However, with regard to the total new funding for agriculture, the first budget only had $130 million in it. It is important for Canadians to know that money did not get to the kitchen table of farm producers. It was not for the producers. It was there to build a bigger bureaucracy and to add consultants. It did not put dollars on the kitchen table. It was not designed for producers.

Programs that were brought out by the government in the spring in some cases forgot about a whole sector of agriculture. They forgot about some of the new farmers who have come on, some of the new farmers who have allowed their farms to grow.

Don Drummond, a former deputy minister of finance and now an economist for the TD Bank, said it is time that Canadians have a pay increase. He said Canadians need lower taxes and in effect that will give them a pay increase. We could not agree with him more. Bill C-48 would make people pay more because we are going to spend more, make government bigger, and have larger bureaucracies. Bill C-48 is a bad piece of legislation and we will be voting against it.

[James Lunney, Conservative, Nanaimo—Alberni, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise to enter this rather interesting debate in the House today on the subject of Bill C-48.

It surprises me that the member for Winnipeg Centre, who was speaking a moment ago, was again attacking the Conservative Party and trying to defend the NDP record on the bill. A few moments ago in his intervention, he seemed to equate business tax cuts with spending, suggesting that somehow the NDP took money that was going to be spent anyway on business tax cuts and instead spent it on social programs, as if it is the same money.

I do not know what it is about that party that does not understand a very basic principle: tax cuts stimulate the economy. That is well understood all over the world. Let us look at a country like Ireland, which took some decisive work in that direction and made the country very competitive. Unemployment is down, the Irish economy is up and Ireland is booming worldwide.

What is it that the NDP does not understand about this? When we spend, spend, spend, and especially when we tax, tax, tax, it affects our productivity. “Productivity” is a simple word. We are in a very competitive world and Canada is falling behind.

Then we heard the Liberal member from Yukon say a moment ago that we are not debating the substance of the bill, but the whole point is that there is no substance in the bill except a very big price tag attached to something that is basically an empty promise. It is a two page bill, and with the cover pages we could add a little more to that, but there is no substance here. The substance of the bill is only two pages and there are approximately 400 words to describe spending that would amount to $4.6 billion.

Others have said before me that the procedure done with the bill is unprecedented. It is basically a blank cheque for cabinet to decide how, if and when the money will be spent. Of course in order to come across as being fiscally responsible somehow, it is labelled as contingency spending. I wonder if Canadians expect that as soon as this bill passes, if it should pass the vote that will be coming up shortly, the money is going to flow immediately.

However, of course, this is contingent upon maintaining a budget surplus of about $2 billion. That is before any of the money will be spent. I wonder if the NDP has not bought a bill of goods and is trying, along with the Liberals, to sell it to Canadians in a desperate move to prop up the government and keep it afloat. It is not likely that even a penny of that money will be spent before an ensuing election, when Canadians will be offered the same promise again, the recycled promise that if Canadians vote for the Liberals then they will get the money.

Spending without a plan is a formula for waste and mismanagement. We have seen a bit of that around here lately. In fact, that is very much an understatement. We have seen a lot of problems due to spending without a plan. For the record, since 1999 program spending has gone from $109.6 billion to $158.1 billion, for an increase of 44.3%. That is annual growth of 7.6% while the economy managed to grow in the same period by 31.6% or a compounded annual growth rate of 5.6%. Spending has been exceeding our economic growth.

What happens when we spend without a plan? The government seems to think the answer to every problem is spending. A few years ago, for example, we saw a very tragic event happen involving guns in Montreal in the massacre that took place at the university there. It was a tragedy, but suddenly the government responded by saying it would fix that by spending a pile of money, taxing the duck hunters and the farmers in the country, to somehow deal with a problem created either by criminals with illegal firearms or a man who was clearly mentally unstable.

How can we have a program budgeted to cost $2 million that ends up costing us $2 billion, with the price tag still increasing? We probably need another inquiry to try to figure out where that $2 billion went. I know that many people are concerned about how all that money can be spent on a rather useless firearms registry.

It has cost $2 billion and it is estimated that 80% of the registrations have errors, which in itself probably needs an inquiry. How could there be so many errors? For example, people in my own riding were told to send in their registrations for four firearms and they got back five licences. That is interesting: they got an extra registration. When they called the firearms centre to say that there had been a mistake, that they had an extra licence and did not own a fifth firearm, they were told to just tear it up.

My constituent said he could not do that. Let us just imagine that. We tear it up, the registry says it has an extra firearm and someday a police office will be at the door looking for that firearm; if we cannot produce it, we are in big trouble.

I cannot tell members how many people have come to me about the errors in this program. That itself probably could be the subject of an inquiry.

As intelligent people we should be able to come up with programs that actually address what they are purporting to accomplish. On this side of the House we are concerned about spending without a plan or spending that creates an illusion of action when it is actually misdirected.

We saw another example of this prior to the election in 2000 with the HRDC boondoggle. Money was spent without any accountability mechanisms being put in place. It was very wasteful spending that went into programs in the hands of government friends, Liberal friends or patronage friends. They got money for programs to produce something, programs that in essence did not accomplish what they purported to. Those people declared bankruptcy a few years later and came back to the purse with another proposed idea to get more money. There was no accountability and there were no objectives and no measurements of whether they were actually accomplishing what they headed out to do.

A short time ago we had a very big concern about a problem in Davis Inlet with the Inuit situation there. It was a tragic situation for many young people because they had very little vision for life and were involved in substance abuse. It was a tragedy. The government had the bright idea to move the settlement a few miles away at a cost of some $400,000 a person. We might wonder how it could possibly cost that much. We know that housing costs are high in remote areas and building and construction costs are high, but how could it possibly cost $400,000 per person to relocate this small number of people in a program that has apparently not solved the problem?

Then, of course, just a short time ago we saw the government's approach to the threat to federalism and the very close vote we had on the Quebec sovereignty issue. The government decided to solve that with money. The government decided to spend $250 million to solve the problem. We all know through the Gomery inquiry what a tragedy that turned out to be, with nearly $100 million misdirected and a lot of the money going back not only into the hands of Liberal friendly firms but into the hands of big donors to the party, with money itself going back into the Liberal Party coffers to run an election. Thus, spending without a plan creates problems.

We have had record surpluses and that is a very good thing in the country. It is a good thing when a government runs a surplus, but we also have a very large debt. We are still carrying about $510 billion of accumulated debt. It costs the country about $29 billion a year to service that debt.

At a time when the government has surpluses, that is a time when prudent financial management would say we have to pay down the debt so that we are not continuing to pay those very high costs into the future. Those costs are a mortgage on our own future and on our children's future.

We do not know if our economic prosperity is going to continue at the same unprecedented levels that we have had in these last few years. In fact, the evidence is that we are falling behind. If we do not increase our productivity, our economic future is going to be threatened. That is clear.

I have with me a recent article from the June 13 edition of The Economist , a very prestigious magazine. The economic elite likes to read The Economist . Some members of Parliament might occasionally read it. Perhaps there are some regular readers in the House, particularly those who are economists, such as the Leader of the Opposition. This magazine has a global readership. The article is about the indecisiveness of Mr. Dithers last winter. As well, in last week's edition, our Prime Minister was derided as Canada's drunken sailor thanks to his recent spending spree.

I am concerned for Canada's international reputation. This is a magazine that only 18 months ago in a cover story called Canada “cool” for the way we were managing our economy. On the edge of an election, suddenly things have become uncool. This magazine, read by leaders and politicians around the world, takes a jaundiced look at the Prime Minister's administration, which has devoted billions of unbudgeted dollars to staying alive as a besieged minority Liberal government.

We also have the Canadian chambers of commerce talking about this deal, saying that:

--the Liberal government's spending promises made in anticipation of a spring election, coupled with a $4.6 billion NDP budget deal, leave it with little or no financial room to focus on productivity enhancing initiatives.

Canada is now 18th out of 24 industrialized countries in terms of average productivity and growth.

There are many priorities that need to be addressed in the budget, but creating an illusion by offering to spend money that likely will not be spent before an election is not sound fiscal management.

[Jim Abbott, Conservative, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

Madam Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to rise today to speak to Bill C-48, the Liberal-NDP budget bill.

I want to make it clear at the outset to all Canadians that we are debating a bill that is two pages long and contains 400 words, yet the spending proposed as a result of this legislation is $4.5 billion. The bill was brought here at the expense of the Canadian taxpayer in order for the Liberal government to buy the 19 NDP votes. This has been the pattern of desperation as the Prime Minister has begged, pleaded, cajoled, bought votes, and sold positions, while hanging on with his fingertips, doing anything he needs to do to cling to power.

Canadians need to ask themselves how the Liberals and NDP could support a bill which would spend $4.5 billion of their money while nobody seems to know where or when it would be spent.

The Conservative Party has fought to bring attention to this fiscally reckless piece of legislation. The Conservative Party will continue with its principled, fiscally responsible position on the reckless economic policy of the Liberal-NDP government. The Liberal-NDP coalition wants the House to hand it a blank cheque. These are the finances of the nation we are dealing with, and the government is treating them as though they were its own personal bank account.

This legislation represents the kind of free for all spending which led to previous and ongoing Liberal spending fiascos, such as the gun registry and the sponsorship scandal.

In response to other amendments the Conservatives put forward at committee, how the NDP voted clearly showed that the Liberals are not the only party compromising its core values to keep this unholy socialist alliance alive.

At report stage we have tried once again to move amendments to make the spending in Bill C-48 more accountable to Canadians. We want a prudent fiscal approach to managing Canadian taxpayers' money.

For example, our amendment to Motion No. 1 would raise the amount of surplus set aside to pay down the debt. The unholy Liberal-NDP alliance refuse to open its eyes and see the impending demographic crunch. There is a giant train entering the station at full speed. The locomotive is 40, 50 and 60 year old Canadians who will require medical and social services, and pension assistance over the next 20 to 30 years. Where will the money come from if we continue to be saddled with a national debt? We cannot pay interest without cutting into the future dollars required to fund social programs for an aging population. Canada's NDP finance minister refuses to consider the concept of prudent forecasting.

The Conservative amendment to Motion No. 2 would force the government to table a plan by the end of each year outlining how it intends to spend the money in the bill. Spending it without a plan is a recipe for waste and mismanagement. We need to ensure there are accountability and transparency mechanisms in place.

More telling than anything is the Liberal-NDP refusal to protect matrimonial property rights of aboriginal women. I know that is hard to believe, especially of the NDP when it professes to be the party of conscience in the House. So I ask, how far will the NDP go to prop up this corrupt establishment? As the Leader of the Opposition has said, leaving the Liberals in charge is like keeping the executives of Enron in charge while their court case proceeds.

The Conservative Party is not alone in our damning criticism of this unholy NDP-Liberal union and the creation of this budget bill. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce, representing 170,000 members including local chambers of commerce, boards of trade, business associations and businesses of all sizes and from all sectors and all regions of Canada, in a letter to the finance minister said, “To say that program spending is out of control would be an understatement. It is time for the government to take the steps necessary to put Canada's fiscal reputation back on track”.

In the latest issue of The Economist is this headline regarding the Prime Minister's fiscal recklessness, “From deficit slayer...to drunken spender?” The article goes on to say, “He ended a quarter-century of federal overspending, turning the public finances from red to black. But as the Prime Minister of a tottering Liberal minority government since last year, he appears to have thrown fiscal restraint to the wind”.

As noted, the NDP members themselves have a strange rationale for their support of this legislation. On May 19, 2005 in the House of Commons, I challenged the member for Winnipeg Centre by stating:

It is an absolutely amazing, outstanding event that the NDP would actually come to the House and exert its influence to prop up the establishment.

The MP for Winnipeg Centre said:

It is my personal belief that the Liberal Party of Canada is institutionally psychopathic. Its members do not know the difference between right and wrong and I condemn them from the highest rooftops.

But before the last Liberal is led away in handcuffs, we want to extract some benefit from this Parliament and that means getting some of the money delivered to our ridings before this government collapses.

Does this make any sense? By their own admission the NDP members are prepared to prop up a tired old discredited establishment for a crack at some dollars that may or may not flow at some time in the future. The Liberal MP for Victoria questioned the Prime Minister's judgment for agreeing to $4.5 billion in new social spending concessions to ink a deal with the NDP. He said, “The agreement between the Prime Minister and the NDP leader concerns me as it appears we have taken...away money for debt reduction. It is debt our children will have to deal with”.

A Toronto Liberal MP, the former finance committee chair, had some words of caution for his boss. He said that the Liberals should not be taking advice from the NDP and cautioned against agreeing to the NDP's demands. He said: “I would be very careful to take advice from the NDP when it comes to growing the Canadian economy”.

The Conservative Party and some Liberal MPs are not alone in their criticism of this flawed legislation.

Jayson Myers, chief economist with Manufacturers and Exporters Canada added, “It is a little difficult to boost productivity with one arm tied behind your back with some of the highest tax rates on investment in new equipment and technology”.

Nancy Hughes Anthony, president of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce said, “Without a fiscal update, we are flying blind when it comes to Canada's finances with only vague assurances from the government that it will be able to balance budgets in the future. Until Canadians are given all the facts and figures, we have every right to fear we are flirting with future budget deficits given the government's excessive spending”.

On June 16 the Bank of Nova Scotia said in a report, “The $4.5 billion New Democrat budget deal, new provincial health care and side deals, changes to equalization payments and a surge in program spending under the Liberals have led to a crazy-quilt of programs and blurred the lines between federal and provincial responsibilities”.

“The billions in extra spending on top of the finance minister's budget will so stimulate the economy that it will push the central bank to raise its interest rates more quickly”, said Marc Levesque, the chief fixed income strategist at Toronto Dominion Securities.

“Inflation is up and major investment firm Nesbitt Burns is warning that interest rates could follow as a result of the passage of the free-spending Liberal-NDP budget. The combination of rising prices and an inflation rate that is above the Bank of Canada's two per cent target, plus a hefty dose of additional federal spending, will prompt the Bank of Canada to resume raising interest rates by July”, Nesbitt Burns predicted in an analysis of the impact of the budget spending increases and an inflation report by Statistics Canada.

The OECD took note of the Prime Minister's spending spree in its latest forecast and concluded that the Bank of Canada would have to hike interest rates by 1.5% before the end of 2006 to forestall any inflationary build up.

What does that mean for the average Canadian? If mortgage rates were to rise 1.5%, Canadians taking out or renewing a $100,000 mortgage with a 20 year amortization would pay an extra $85 per month. Over the course of a five year term they would pay an extra $6,929 in interest. If the increase was permanent, then over the course of the 20 year loan, they would pay an extra $20,525 which is enough for a brand new car in their driveway. A Canadian taking out a $20,000 five year car loan, by the way, with the same increase in rates, would pay an extra $859 in interest over five years on that new car.

According to the government's rule of thumb for its own borrowing costs, 1% translates into $1 billion in added debt service costs after one year. That adds up to $84 per man, woman and child, or $336 a year for a family of four with this grossly irresponsible budget.

Already on the hook for the $4.5 billion in taxpayers' money that the Prime Minister has used to secure the support of the NDP, Canadians now have to worry about the fallout from this deal and the extra costs it will mean for them in their daily lives.

This budget is a disaster.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, this theme has come out a few times and I would like to hear the member's answer to it. It has to do with the issue about bringing in Bill C-48 simply as a matter for keeping. power. That is what the Conservatives have said. However, Canadians also said that they did not want an election.

We have not had a minority situation since the Joe Clark government of 1979. It is going to take collaboration and cooperation among all parties in the House to show that Parliament can work.

The member is speaking against Bill C-48. Would he say he speaking against Parliament working and that he really wants to go to an election right now?

[Lee Richardson, Conservative, Calgary South Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, if the hon. member had been paying attention, he would have realized that I was simply quoting from a newspaper article from this morning.

Many people here know in fact who the Prime Minister is as well as the leader of the opposition. We will not have to repeat that for the hon. member.

In any event, the Prime Minister said that it was time for the Conservative Party to stop playing politics and help pass amendments to the federal budget to ensure municipalities would get millions of badly needed funding. The coverage pointed out, however, that in fact the budget, which includes a phased in 5% share of gasoline tax for municipalities over five years, passed last Thursday.

Without naming the Prime Minister, I would point out that he was a little confused, as well as many people might be with having two budgets, an original budget and a new non-budget. For clarity, I wanted to point that out. I appreciate the hon. member's note that it is not just members such as himself, but even the Prime Minister who is a little confused about the budget to which we now are speaking. It is the amendments negotiated with the NDP for an additional $4.6 billion in spending which have yet to pass.

We are talking today about Bill C-48, the NDP budget, which is the non-budget, or the absence of a budget. It is in addition to the original budget which was passed last Thursday and which our party supported. This addition of $4.6 billion is simply an NDP promissory note to buy votes. It is more socialist spending to prop up a failing Liberal government clinging to power.

The so-called budget, Bill C-48, is heavy on the public purse but light on details. It commits hundreds of millions of dollars under broad areas without any concrete plans of how that money will be spent, as the member for Wild Rose mentioned moments ago. We have seen the damage that can be done by spending without a plan.

Bill C-48 would authorize the cabinet to design and implement programs under the vague policy framework of the bill and to make payments in any manner it would see fit. It is $4.6 billion in less than two pages. It is very vague and general and it has no plan.

The government has reserved the right to use the first $2 billion in the 2005-06 and 2006-07 from the federal surplus presumably for federal debt reduction. Any surplus that exceeds $2 billion could be used to fund programs related to the NDP sponsored bill.

The government would need to post $8.5 billion in surpluses over the next two fiscal years to fully implement the budget. The point is there is no money. It is all talk. The reason it is vague is these promises to the NDP for this additional budget, Bill C-48, to Bill C-43 will never see the light of day. The money simply is not there.

In order to have sufficient funds and the surpluses, the Minister of Finance would have to have another phoney budget, as he has had before, declaring a surplus every year. There is only one reason to declare a surplus and that is because the people have been taxed too much. It is just bad accounting and bad budgeting. It is not budgeting. It is an absence of budgeting. It is bad management. It is a lack of a plan.

The government has a lack of planning in everything it does. We are still waiting for Kyoto. I see the member for Red Deer is here. He is the Conservative environment critic. He has explained to the House time and again that we have been eight years without a plan on Kyoto. We are eight years without a fiscal plan from the government.

The government has a broad plan. It asks people what they want today do buy votes? Today we are spending $4.6 billion buying the votes of the NDP.

I mentioned the news comments this morning and the Prime Minister's confusion over legislation in the House; that is what bills have or have not been passed. I see the Department of Finance has done a poll on behalf of the government to determine what people think of the budget. Is that not a great expenditure of taxpayer money? “Let's go out and poll and see how we're doing so far”.

This is a government that spends tax dollars polling and running ads with taxpayer money. It is a constant election campaign funded by taxpayers, whether it is through ad scam, the sponsorship scandals, or running polls through various government departments, the Privy Council Office or the Prime Minister's Office and now the Department of Finance to find out what the people think. It wants to find out the current consensus of Canadians. The government then runs around to the front of the parade and says to the people to follow it. That is how to govern our country? I do not think so. Again, it is done without a plan, it is expensive and it is taxpayer money.

Canada could have and should have more better paying jobs and a much higher standard of living. However, Ottawa taxes and spends too much. Since 1999-2000, program spending has gone up from $109.6 billion to $158.1 billion, an increase of 44%. In the last five years, spending has gone up 44% in our country, a compound annual growth of 7.6%, when the economy itself managed to grow by only 31%, a compound annual growth of 5.6%.

Once the Liberals had our money, they could not resist spending it even faster than the economy was growing. It is not surprising there is so much waste in this government.

Often the government responds to problems in a knee-jerk way by throwing money at problems. The Liberals confuse spending money with getting results. Let me list some examples. They have thrown money at the firearms registry as way of dealing with the criminal misuse of firearms, with no explanation of how this would prevent criminals from getting and using guns. The registry was to cost $2 million. Media reports say that the actual cost is around $2 billion. How could they possibly spend $2 billion on a simple gun registry?

[Myron Thompson, Conservative, Wild Rose, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this two to three page document, although three pages may be stretching it a little, which would authorize the spending of 4.5 billion taxpayer dollars. I understand that it took up the back of a napkin under the leadership of the leader of the New Democratic Party and his finance minister, Buzz Hargrove, along with the Prime Minister who managed to put this little document together with no plan.

I have been listening to the speeches and I do not want to repeat a lot of things. I just want to say how pleased and proud I am of the member for Medicine Hat, the member from Peace River and our finance crew who worked on the finance committee and who talked about changing and raising the standard of living.

I have visited with several families in my riding. Some families have four kids and the mom and dad are struggling like one would not believe just to make ends meet. These families are trying to keep up a standard of living that is steadily going down and down. It is a real problem. Surely at this time of the year, following the income tax payments, members must realize how many constituents they have in their riding who are in serious trouble with Revenue Canada because they cannot come up with the extra money required to pay the taxes.

Taxes are killing us in this country. It is killing small business. It is hurting like crazy. It is slowing down that standard of living. I am proud of our boys who work in the finance committee. I am also very proud of our member from Red Deer who works on the environment committee and who has solid plans to present as to how to deal with these situations.

The government wants to spend up to $10 billion but I do not think it has a solid plan in place on where it is going to spend that. That is amazing. The Liberals talk about Kyoto and other things but it has no definite plan laid out as to how the money will be spent. They talk about throwing money toward the military. I am extremely proud of our critic on the military who just spoke.

I have been here 12 years and I look at the justice issues. For 12 years we have talked about a shortage of RCMP officers. I have 16 RCMP detachments in my rural riding and all of them are short of people. The penitentiaries in my area and in other places outside of my area are always short of personnel to take care of the penitentiaries. It is getting completely out of hand. Drugs and prisoners are in control of penitentiaries. Guards and personnel are slowly losing the battle. We do not seem to be interested in improving the situation with more personnel, better equipment and so on.

We have had very testy situations at border crossings since 9/11. How do we deal with this? The border closures made absolutely no sense at the ports. We know containers are coming in without being inspected. When I was at the Port Erie border crossing I watched trucks coming through and no one could tell me at the crossing what was on the trucks. They were coming into Ontario and being unloaded. A tracer was put on the truck but when the truck was found it was empty. They would issue a fine of $400 and send the truck back to the states.

We really have a shortage of people at our border and yet we are talking about protecting Canadians and the safety and security of our nation. One of the most elementary duties of our job in this place is to ensure we provide the country with laws that protect those very things.

I have been here for 12 years and we continue to talk about our children. Every year it comes up at budget time on how we are going to improve the situation. Child porn has been talked about since I came here in 1994. It has been a topic of conversation for nearly 12 years. It is improving somewhat but it is not because of what happens in this place. It is improving because of our dedicated police officers who are fighting it tooth and nail and doing an excellent job of it. I am very pleased with those people who are working in that category but we are not helping. We do not even have a national strategy with another international program to deal with child pornography. It is not getting better.

Age of consent is something that has been brought up in the House a number of times over the last 12 years. We want to raise the age of consent. They know that these are the things Canadians are looking for to happen. Why does it not happen? We are still debating this whole issue year after year.

Without a doubt, I do not think there is any member who would not believe it for a moment that drug abuse across the country is completely out of touch with reality. We have a number of people who are engaged in crystal meth. Very dangerous drugs are spreading like mad. Yet we still have no national drug strategy of any kind to battle this thing.

Our answer is to set up stations where persons can get their drugs, clean needles and everything so we can help them with their habit. Instead of helping them get out of the habit, we help them through bleach programs in penitentiaries.

I find it amazing when we look at the policies of Correctional Service Canada. It is zero tolerance for drugs. Yet every penitentiary in this country has more drugs in it than any street in any city in our country. We have talked about it for 12 years, but we do not accomplish anything.

We have come up with Bill C-48, the budget bill from the wonderful NDP which also has no plan. It is going to do something about education, housing, and correcting the situation on the reserves. These are good ideas and good things to do. I certainly support them and they are the top priority on our list. However, the members in my party, who work on these committees, have a concrete plan that they are trying to push forward. I see no plan coming out Bill C-48. I see $4.6 billion be spent.

Every year in the budget, we hear about money going toward education, housing, correcting the situation on the reserves, and the environment, but it is not any better today. It is still just as bad as ever. Where does all that money go? Where is the planning? Where are the procedures? Lay it out for me. Do I want people to live with a roof over their heads? Absolutely. Who would not want that?

I look at the waste. My goodness, there was a committee going around the world, and I think that has been stopped, spending lots of taxpayers' dollars trying to figure out what to do about prostitution.

Look at the gun registry. It has nearly a $2 billion expenditure and we do not have an accounting of exactly where that money went. Wait until that audit comes out. Do we think ad scam was bad? Wait until we get the audit of the gun registry. All of this has been going on for 12 years. Budget after budget have said the same things over and over, but it is no different. Out we come with another budget saying the same things and the NDP is trying to enhance it by saying the same things that have been said for 12 years.

Where is the concrete plan? When are we going to buckle down and use the money to get the job done instead of spending it on more bureaucracy? When are we going to get to the mean and potatoes, and start getting the job done? We cannot do it the way we are operating.

I just came back from my riding. I was even evacuated from my own house because of the floods. The flooding in Alberta is horrendous. Farms and ranches are under water. They are facing a real tragedy. What did I hear on the news this morning? The government is considering help. Considering, my eye. It should be an automatic thing. These are Canadians who are hurting. There is nothing to consider. It is time to sit down and determine what we are going to do for these people, but the government does not do that.

I went through four years of drought with the farmers in my riding. Not one penny ever reached them. They have gone through all kinds of BSE problems. The government comes up with program after program, but too many are not benefiting from anything.

Promises are going out and the bureaucracy is working to instigate these promises, but there is nothing happening. The agriculture industry is really in trouble, now that it is all under water, not just in Alberta but in Manitoba. The member from the NDP who spoke ought to be talking about the flooding and the tragedies that are happening.

I am so proud that the leader of my party has a vision for this country. That vision is loud and clear. That message will get out. One of these days every Canadian will see that planned vision. When they vote for Stephen Harper, it will be the best vote they ever cast in Canadian history.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Lanark, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the four initiatives identified in the NDP add-on are good initiatives. However when the Liberal government formed its budget, which we now know as Bill C-43, it chose not to include these initiatives. After consulting Canadians, businesses, labour, think tanks, et cetera on what the appropriate balance should be in the budget, the government chose not to put these $4.5 billion of add-ons into its budget.

The member asked me if we appreciate the investments in these areas. My answer is yes we do. However it is like asking me if I love my mother or if I love apple pie. Of course I do. However I also love my father and I love blueberry pie. It is a matter of choice. The government's choices are in Bill C-43. Bill C-48 is merely an add on to maintain power. The government needed to get the 19 votes of the NDP so it could stay in power. It was never the government's intention to spend moneys in those areas.

In addition, the $4.5 billion is essentially a pot of money. There are no programs. The government's record has shown that even when it had programs in place, the money was still wasted. Authorizing the government to spend another $4.5 billion at the whim of the governor in council gives it too much money.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I now have a chance to make my point on the amendment by the member for Medicine Hat. It ties in directly with the member's statements.

As members know, Bill C-48 prescribes spending of up to $4.5 billion but it is subject to achieving a $2 billion surplus. The amendment by the member for Medicine Hat increases that to $3.5 billion. Ultimately, what it means is that the intent and the areas of interest of Bill C-48, being foreign aid, the environment, post-secondary education and housing, continue to be issues which the Conservative Party chooses not to support.

Could the member explain to the House why he is opposed to, for example, increased investment in affordable housing so that more Canadians can have the dignity of a roof over their heads?

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Lanark, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as Conservatives we believe in a balance among fiscal responsibility, progressive social policy and individual rights and responsibilities. We also believe in the rule of law and the Constitution, especially the division of powers between the federal level of government and the provincial level of government.

In particular, we believe that the federal government should attend to federal responsibilities like trade, defence, immigration, the economic levers of the economy, et cetera. The provincial government should look after the delivery of health care, education, welfare, the issues of cities, et cetera. This conditions our approach to budgeting.

For too long, the Liberals, supported by the NDP, have interfered in the responsibilities of the provinces. They seem more interested in provincial matters than in federal responsibilities. That is why the management of immigration is such a mess, the armed forces have been allowed to decay, trade issues never get resolved, the fish have disappeared, air pollution never gets better, taxes remain high and our place in the world continues to diminish.

If the federal government attended to its own responsibilities rather than those of the provinces, perhaps it would deliver the efficient government the people of Canada need and want. If it continues on the current track of provincial and municipal interference, we will soon see the Liberal government delivering pizza to our doors.

The Liberals want to endlessly interfere in our lives and tell us what to say and what to do. Every problem is solved by a big, central, government-managed program. Their most recent idea is a national day care system that will cost between $10 billion and $13 billion annually.

I do not know how we will be able to pay for this, especially with the massive unsolved challenges of medicare. Why does the government not ensure that medicare is on a stable footing before committing us to another mismanaged government program? Why does the government not strive to improve the standard of living, which has not fundamentally changed for 10 years?

The Conservative Party of Canada believes in focusing on the federal challenges. Our vision of Canada is a country with the highest standard of living in the world, where every Canadian who wants a job should be able to get a job and where every region of the country enjoys economic growth and there are new opportunities for the people of those regions.

Our goal is to make Canada the economic envy of the world. The Conservative Party has consistently opposed the Liberal approach to spending without an adequate plan, which is reflected in Bill C-48. The Liberal approach is cruel not only to taxpayers, but more important, to those who depend upon the promised services. The Liberals are willing to spend billions of taxpayers' dollars to fund their addiction to power. This is a direct result of the loss of their moral authority to govern.

If we look at Bill C-48, a document of a mere two pages, we will see that it essentially seeks authority for the government to spend $4.5 billion without identifying any particular program that will justify the spending. This is reminiscent of the $9 billion in trust funds set up by the Prime Minister when he was finance minister. Members may recall that these funds are beyond the review of the Auditor General. We have no independent knowledge of how these funds are being spent.

Given the problems that arose because of the sponsorship program, we can only imagine what potential disasters await Canadians when some day in the future we are provided with all the details. That is why we as Conservatives are worried about authorizing the government to spend $4.5 billion without any identified program. Who knows where the money will be actually spent and how much of it will be wasted?

As well as worrying about waste, we also wonder why the government dramatically amended its budget, Bill C-43, which had been developed over many months. In fact, when it was briefed in Parliament we were told that it could not be changed. It was described as something like the rock of Gibraltar. The government considered any suggestion of change unacceptable and a matter of parliamentary confidence. However, when the NDP offered a lifeline to the government, the budget was dramatically changed, without the blink of an eye. It is obvious that for the Liberals power trumps principle any day.

As part of the hotel room deal, the government promised the NDP its $4.5 billion wish list and agreed to remove corporate tax cuts from the previously unchangeable Bill C-43 budget. Both of these actions are unfortunate because it reflects that the government did not have any real commitment to its own budget and, therefore, the credibility of the finance minister has certainly been diminished.

As well, the deletion of corporate tax cuts, while maintaining a pitiful $16 personal tax cut, shows a government that is not interested in improving productivity. It is only interested in maintaining power regardless of the consequences to the economy.

However the government's commitment to the NDP wish list is less than complete. Members will notice that rather than amending Bill C-43 further, the government chose to create a new budget called Bill C-48. I assume this was done because the government did not have complete confidence that the NDP wish list would ever be implemented and that the government did not want to impair its budget, Bill C-43, with these add-ons.

Bill C-48 looks like it was written on the back of a cigarette package. The lack of details regarding specific programs, combined with the Liberals' poor record on delivering value for money, provides little guarantee that the objectives of the bill would be met, that taxpayer money would be spent properly or that Canadians would be better off.

It would be irresponsible and cruel to Canadians in need to throw more money at programs that are not meeting their objectives. The responsible approach would be for the government to first ensure that the money is spent effectively to improve existing programs and services to ensure that nobody is left behind.

The government has reverted to its type, tax and spend. For years it has taken in far more revenue than it needed. Year after year it overtaxed Canadians claiming that having large surpluses was somehow something wonderful. It is not wonderful. It means that every Canadian is paying more in taxes than is required to provide government services.

Since the Prime Minister assumed power he has been looking for ways to spend surpluses rather than transferring tax points to the provinces or reducing corporate and personal taxes. It is as if he and the finance minister believe that overtaxing citizens is one of our national values.

The change in approach of the Prime Minister toward the budget is quite dramatic. He and his government keep touting their efforts during the Chrétien years. Since he has moved from finance minister to Prime Minister, I believe we are seeing his real attitude toward governing. He believes in big government and big bureaucracies. He believes that government should spend the maximum amount of Canadians' hard-earned money. Canadians are overtaxed and that overtaxation is sucking jobs and initiative out of our economy.

The federal government is growing at about 6% to 7% per year while the economy is only growing at about 3%. The five year budget projection of the Liberal government, including the NDP add-on, continues this excessive expansion into the future. Anyone with a basic knowledge of economics knows that it will either drive the federal government into deficit or will require ever increasing income and corporate taxes from Canadians.

While the government is spending at obscene rates, the provinces and the cities are starving for revenues. If the government needs to find additional ways to spend its excessive revenues, like the current NDP $4.5 billion add-on, perhaps it could transfer tax points to the provinces so they can do the job more effectively.

If this country is to have a bright future, the government has to stop wasting money. It has to tighten the tax burden on all Canadians, especially those at the bottom of the economic ladder. It has to let Canadians spend their own money on things they need rather than the government spending it to buy power.

I believe that Bill C-48 is unfocused and potentially wasteful spending. For that reason, I will vote against it when it is presented for approval.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I do not want to have to shout to be heard over the caterwauling and the gnashing of teeth and the rending of garments by my colleagues with the Conservative Party, but I will point out that the Conservatives have the worst track record in history: the deficit went from $100 billion to $500 billion. It is a good thing that Mulroney was booted out when he was or this country would have been irreversibly bankrupt.

It is a huge contradiction and it is a tragic irony for us to have these guys suggesting fiscal management policy to those of us who actually know what balanced budgets are all about. It is part of our policy, for heaven's sake.

All the spending in Bill C-48 is within the context of a balanced budget that includes $2 billion to debt repayment as well and tax breaks to small and medium sized businesses. There is very little to criticize here, which is why the Conservatives find themselves with very little to say. They are sitting on the sidelines. They are irrelevant, more irrelevant than they have ever been in Canadian history, because in actual fact the issues that they stand for are out of vogue. Neo-conservatism has had its heyday and now it is yesterday's news.

In actual fact, the very things that the NDP was created to fight for are the top of mind issues of most Canadians: security, pensions and poverty reduction. All of them are issues about which Canadians now are asking. What about our quality of life and what about our environment, they are saying. Frankly, those are the things that we stand for and that our party was created to fight for.

The Conservatives are irrelevant because the things they were created to do in their most recent incarnations are no longer in vogue and they have abandoned their grassroots policy. They now have embraced 35 senators and Bay Street to the point where they are really just corporate shills. I cannot tell the difference between a Conservative corporate shill and a Liberal corporate shill. There is no difference: Liberal, Tory, same old story, right? It rhymes.