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.

Civil Marriage Act

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Athabasca, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the answer, in short, is no, I was not part of that decision making process. No, I did not agree to having those witnesses shoved through committee so quickly and the procedural unfairness that went forward.

I would like to read a letter from the clerk of the committee as a result of that decision. The letter reads:

As a result of this decision, I had to contact 57 witnesses for the hearings, right after the end of the May 30th meeting. Based on that final list, I called the witnesses to invite them to appear on May 31st and the subsequent meetings and because of the committee's decision to hear those 57 witnesses in a short period of time, some of the witnesses had less time to prepare, especially those who appeared on May 31st, June 1st and June 2nd.

How many witnesses were not able to appear before the committee that were invited to testify?

On the final list, 7 persons or organizations declined our invitation....

They could not appear because they did not have time to prepare. It was procedurally a joke. I would use the example of Bill C-48 last week. We knew it was on the agenda but all of a sudden a fast one was pulled and we were called in from airports and everywhere else around the country in order to vote on something with half an hour or an hour's notice.

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

[Roy Cullen, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to enter the third reading debate on Bill C-48. I congratulate my colleague from Madawaska--Restigouche for making some very salient points. He took many of the points that I was going to make and he made them very strongly. I will try to recover from that and comment on some features of this budget. I think I should start by laying out some of the things that we do know, some of the background to this budget.

First, we know that Canadians do not want an election right now. Second, we know they do not want the Conservative Party in power. Third, we know the Conservative Party members at one point in time were supporting the federal budget, Bill C-43 but then suddenly they saw the polls and heard the daily testimony at the Gomery inquiry and tried to bring that to the floor of the House of Commons. They thought that maybe they should not support the budget bill after all because it might be a great opportunity to try and force an election.

However, knowing that Canadians did not want an election, the government went to the NDP to see if we could form some consensus around building a better budget and how we could get this Parliament to work. Canadians want this Parliament to work notwithstanding the antics of Conservative members opposite.

What was accomplished? What was accomplished was very important. With the support of the NDP and against the coalition of the Conservative Party and the separatists, we were able to pass Bill C-43 and now we are now debating third reading of the second prong of that legislation, Bill C-48.

Members opposite talk about the government moving forward and how that will eat into all the surpluses. They seem to forget that the government has demonstrated that it can generate surpluses each and every year. This will be our eighth consecutive surplus.

The fact that parties opposite have failed to recognize is that we have turned the economics of this country upside down. We have made the sound financial circumstances that allow us to build on some of the initiatives that we have already started in terms of the environment, affordable housing, foreign aid, training and post-secondary education.

Those were not initiatives that we pulled out of the air, as members opposite would have Canadians believe. Bill C-48 builds on the very initiatives of the government. I am very proud that we are able to do that. We are able to do that because our economy is strong and the government's fiscal capacity is intact after many years of under-performance and of deficits and a deplorable fiscal situation that the Conservative Party created after its eight years in power.

If I could indulge the House, it might be useful to talk about some of the backdrop to this budget. For example, I talked about this being the eighth consecutive budgetary surplus. Within the OECD countries, Canada is considered an economic miracle. As a country, we have consistently performed at about 3% gross. We have unemployment around 6.8%, which is the lowest level in about four or five years. Of course we can do better and we will do better, but 6.8% is pretty sound stuff.

We have low interest rates because of a sound monetary policy of the Bank of Canada that is creating the environment for low interest rates. What does that mean? It means that average Canadians can buy a home and take on a mortgage. We all see that, if we are honest, in our own ridings. People are getting out of rental units and going out and buying a home for the first time. That is what the Canadian dream is all about, and that is possible because the government took the action that was necessary to turn this nation's finances around.

What else has the government done? I will lay out another fact. Because of the budgetary surpluses, we have been able to pay down in excess of $55 billion against the national debt. Is that an end in itself? Of course not. What does that mean? It means that each and every year into the future, not just today, we are saving over $3 billion a year in money that has been used to service our debt. We are going to do even better than that. Our government has set a debt to GDP target of 25%. In fact we are now at around 40%. We came from a position of roughly 75%.

That is what this government has done. While Canadians have set the economic climate, we have set the policies in motion to create the environment for sound economic growth, sound fiscal and monetary policy.

The debt to GDP is the amount of debt in relation to the size of our economy and it is a very relevant figure. In a nutshell, the country has demonstrated strong, sound fiscal and economic performance. The government is committed to moving in that direction. That is why we are able to deal with Bill C-48. It was not hatched in a hotel room on a napkin. It is based on building upon initiatives to which the government is committed.

Let me start with just one of those, affordable housing. The government has committed itself to spending money to help people with their housing needs.

In my riding of Etobicoke North, I visit people in high-rise apartments. They tell me that they spend 30% to 40%, sometimes 50%, of their income on rent for an apartment in a building that is not properly maintained. We have to do something and we are doing something. We also are doing something about the homeless. That is all part of the continuing program already in place and we are building upon that with Bill C-48.

We have many projects as a result of the Canada-Ontario affordable housing agreement in my province and city. We have a number of projects underway that will help with affordable housing for seniors and for people with low and modest incomes.

Then we have the environment. This is not a new concept for this government. Our government has consistently built a program to deal with our environmental performance. Bill C-48, does exactly that. It puts about $900 million to help with public transit and clean air.

I represent the city of Toronto. We have urban sprawl. We need to get higher living densities around public transit. We need to clean our air, reduce the smog and deal with the greenhouse gases.

All we have to do is pick up the newspaper every day and read about the impact of climate change. It is hurting our farmers and a number of people. It is hurting people in the north. We have to deal with that. We cannot put our head in the sand any longer. We have to deal with greenhouse gases.

The budget puts $1.5 billion into training programs and post-secondary education. However, this is not a new concept for the government. We have recognized for a long time that this is a new economy, it is a high tech economy. We have to build the skill sets and knowledge for the people of Canada to participate in our economy.

Finally, this budget puts another $500 million into foreign aid to help those who need our help, particularly in places like Africa. We will continue to do that.

We are committed to help countries around the world, those that are committed to good governance. We will help them show the world that they offer good governance. If they do that, Canada will be there to support them, to help them build their states and nations.

[Jean-Claude D'Amours, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak this evening to Bill C-48, which proposes further investments from unplanned surplus funds.

Not so long ago, less than a year ago, the citizens of Canada asked us to work together here in Parliament. They asked us to make sure that Parliament worked and to make sure that we did a good job.

I want to mention that I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Etobicoke North in a few minutes.

As I was saying, we have been working the way the public asked us to. They told us to work together, in partnership, and that is precisely what we have done. We have worked on making sure that the people of this country can receive excellent services. We have also worked on ensuring that their quality of life can improve.

Canada's social foundations are key to our Canadian identity. The Government of Canada has invested heavily in these social priorities in past budgets.

This bill is a natural extension of those initiatives. Nonetheless, before addressing the measures in this bill, I want to briefly explain how the government is able to make these important investments today.

As you know, Canada reported its eighth consecutive surplus in 2004-05, the first time this ever happened since Confederation. I think it is very important to point that out. The members opposite often forget that they put us into a deficit position lasting many years and that it was our government that reinstated surpluses for the Government of Canada. Who did we do that for? The people of Canada.

Canada was the only country in the G7 to show a surplus, considering all administrations, during this fiscal year. The net improvement in the Government of Canada's financial situation allowed the government to invest heavily in the priorities of Canadians.

However, our financial outlook was not always so encouraging.

When we came to power in 1993, as I just mentioned, we had to deal with an annual deficit of over $40 billion. I am not talking about a $40 billion debt. I mean that, in one fiscal year, the then government was in the hole to the tune of $40 billion. This is unacceptable. This mortgaged not only my generation's future but also the future of generations to come, including the generation to which my new daughter belongs and that of millions of other Canadians. We must do whatever it takes to ensure we never generate another deficit. In addition to this, the unemployment rate was high, economic growth was weak and consumer and business confidence was low.

We realized that we needed to act in order to protect the future of generations to follow. And we acted. The government adopted a number of measures reducing spending and restoring fiscal order. As a result, we eliminated the deficit in 1997-98.

Obviously, as athletes know, success takes work. We worked hard. Canadians worked hard. They made sacrifices to help the government improve its fiscal situation. Everyone's hard work paid off big time.

Canada's financial recovery is quite simply remarkable, and the countries that point to us as an example of what to do have clearly noted how we achieved this.

Thanks to these sacrifices by Canadians, consumer and business confidence has been restored, economic growth has picked up and, better still, so has job creation in this vast and beautiful country of ours.

With its finances in order, the government gave more money to individuals and families by introducing the biggest federal tax cuts in Canadian history. It also made major investments in the priorities identified by Canadians, such as health care. As we know, our government has invested $41 billion in order to improve health care for Canadians. Also, we have done work in education, infrastructure, research and innovation, national security and the environment.

The bill we are introducing and ultimately want adopted today, builds on these investments in a number of key areas that are priorities for Canadians. The government shares these priorities.

More specifically, Bill C-48 creates a framework for new investment in important sectors, such as social housing, post-secondary education, the environment and foreign aid.

I can assure you, however, that these measures will not eliminate the old budget deficit rut.

When the government makes decisions, they must be solid and fair. The government must have a financial framework to prevent a return to a deficit, as has been the case for many years in this country.

We also have to pay down the debt, because each dollar of debt we have costs us in interest. Each dollar of interest we pay costs the public in terms of reduced services.

The government has promised to invest $4.6 billion in these areas. These investments will come from the surplus in excess of $2 billion in 2005-06 and 2006-07. According to the estimates, we will also have the means to continue, as I mentioned earlier, repaying our national debt to make sure we can deliver the best possible services to future generations.

I would now like to summarize the investments I mentioned previously that we are proposing for the Canada of tomorrow.

First, for affordable housing, which is social housing, there is $1.6 billion of new money.

I have a very hard time imagining the people on the other side of the House coming to my riding, when we have made very important announcements on affordable housing, and telling the people of Madawaska—Restigouche and the rest of Canada, that it is not important for families to have housing. It is very hard to imagine that there are members in this place, and, worse yet, parties, that think people do not deserve affordable housing.

We, as a responsible government, are working to make sure that as many Canadians as possible get services and housing in keeping with their ability to better manage their personal finances.

Second, as mentioned earlier, the government recognizes that Canadian communities are the social and economic foundation of this country. Be they vast metropolitan areas, cities or hamlets, the communities Canadians choose as their home have a considerable effect on their quality of life and the opportunities for socio-economic success available to them.

The reality, however, is that at the heart and in the disadvantaged neighbourhoods of many cities, poverty creates a demand for affordable housing.

In recent years the government has made a number of investments totalling $2 billion in the area of affordable housing and homelessness. These programs are still being rolled out and in most cases the funding will continue to ramp up over the next year.

We have done the following. In 1999 the government launched a three year national homelessness initiative. A key element of that was the supporting communities partnership initiative, which provided $305 million for local community groups to offer supportive services and facilities for the homeless. Budget 2003 provided a further three year extension to the SCPI initiative at $135 million per year.

Furthermore, budget 2001 announced $680 million over five years for the affordable housing initiative to help stimulate the creation of more affordable housing. Bilateral cost sharing agreements were subsequently signed with all 13 provincial and territorial governments.

I do not have very much time left, so I will now say a few words about post-secondary education.

I graduated from university in 1997. I continue to pursue my studies to ensure the best possible future for myself in terms of training.

To help young people and the not so young in our society, we implement systems, better places to study, facilities to allow young people—not the wealthiest—to get the help they need the most.

Bill C-48 will provide $1.5 billion more for post-secondary education.

In closing, I call on all the members of this House to vote in favour of Bill C-48, which is in the best interest of our constituents and will improve their quality of life.

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the whole concept of clawing back was developed by the Conservative Government of Ontario. Actually, I have never heard the phrase “champions of the poor” associated with the Conservative Party. Certainly not in recent decades. It is a bit of a puzzle, given that all of the evidence suggests that the policies advocated by the Conservative Party and implemented by the Conservative Party have increased poverty and made life easier for those who already have a great deal. The question, frankly, is a bit of a puzzle and therefore, I am going to stick with my support for Bill C-48 which is where most Canadians are.

[Leon Benoit, Conservative, Vegreville—Wainwright, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member had connected it to Bill C-48 already. Liberals do not want to hear about this, but they are going to hear about this.

These 30 Liberal MPs will not, because they do not have the courage, vote against Bill C-48 and defeat the government, so we can go to an election and through an election decide the outcome of the marriage bill. Because they do not have the courage, Bill C-38 will certainly pass. Many members of the government will not even have a free vote on the issue. There are 30 MPs who will not take a stand for their constituents. They will be responsible for same sex marriage coming into place in this country in spite of them saying exactly the opposite.

Then we have the whole two front rows in the government who do not have a free vote. They are not allowed to represent their constituents. For these reasons, Bill C-38 will pass. It is on their heads.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. We have been debating Bill C-48 for a week and that is what we are on now. We are not on Bill C-38.

[Leon Benoit, Conservative, Vegreville—Wainwright, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have been a member of Parliament for 12 years and I have worked very hard to represent my constituents in those 12 years. Today is the saddest day that I have ever experienced in the House of Commons. One hour of debate will be allowed for a bill worth $4.5 billion of my children's money and other people's children's hard earned money.

That is important, but what is most important about Bill C-48 and the third reading vote that we are about to take is that if the bill is not defeated then Bill C-38, the same sex bill, will certainly pass in this House.

We have had 30 members of the Liberal Party who have said they would do everything they could to defeat Bill C-38, the marriage bill. They are the member for Scarborough—Guildwood, the member for Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, the member for Mississauga South, the member for Huron—Bruce, and the member for Pickering—Scarborough East. They are 30 in total--

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege for me to stand and speak on this improved budget bill this evening and to share a few thoughts about it.

First, I want to thank all of my caucus colleagues for the work they have put forward over the last number of months since the election in order to be able to advance the propositions that we have put forward in Bill C-48. I particularly want to single out our House leader, our finance critic, our whip and our deputy leader, who have been intimately involved in this entire project.

There is something more that needs to be said in terms of thanks. Actually, the propositions in Bill C-48 do not really come from any particular individual or even a political party, I would say. They have emerged from Canadians.

Let us take a look, for example, at education. The student organizations across the country, the professors and teachers across the country, those involved in trying to help us understand that education and training are vital for the 21st century economy but who have by and large not been heard for the last number of years across this country, they need to be thanked, because this budget is in response to what they have been calling for.

Those in the labour movement who have been emphasizing the importance of training so the training is available for Canadian workers to take on the jobs of the 21st century, they need to be thanked, because that is are why we are dealing with this budget today.

When we look at the expenditure on housing, I certainly think back to Eugene Upper, who lost his life one block from my house when he froze to death. It was a statement of shame that Canada was not providing housing to its citizens. Since that time, groups across the country have formed and have urged all of us in all parties to take action and to get back to building affordable housing again.

It was a great tragedy when the best affordable housing program in the world, as recognized by the United Nations, was cancelled in the mid-1990s and we saw homelessness grow. Now we are seeing a turnaround. We are seeing an investment that brings federal dollars to the construction of affordable housing.

We must thank organizations such as FRAPRU that have long demanded investments in social housing. We now have funding that in no way requires matching funds. So this is important.

Organizations like the Toronto Disaster Relief Committee, the Co-operative Housing Federation of Canada and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, all of these organizations, have pressed us to take this kind of action.

We could say the same thing about the gas tax. I recall meeting with the Prime Minister years ago when he was the finance minister and debates were under way about this going way back. Through the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, mayors, heads of transit commissions and environmental groups were calling for us to invest in the solutions that would help us address the rising pollution that is killing our citizens. In this budget we finally have that investment coming forward.

All those people and groups need to be thanked, because in the end our action is in response to what the citizens are calling on us to do. I think this budget really reflects that. My thanks go out to all those organizations.

There is the initiative to start retrofitting low income housing so that we can create jobs, reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants and provide more affordable housing, all at the same time. Organizations like Green Communities and the Better Buildings Partnership, along with the building trades, have all been pushing us in this direction.

This is only a start. There is so much more that we can do and need to do if we are to achieve our Kyoto commitment, but there is no question that this bill, if it passes here tonight, as I hope it will, will take us a further step down that road.

Let me turn finally to the whole question of foreign aid, which is very much in our minds at the present time. We are facing a G-8 meeting. We are facing an unprecedented mobilization around the world in the Make Poverty History campaign. I think all of us are looking for Canada to play a leadership role, and in the context of the balanced budget framework, this bill adds some additional funds.

In the end it will not be enough to have Canada meet its commitment to the world, which Prime Minister Trudeau signed and which Prime Minister Pearson defined. It is a commitment that Canadians have made. We are in the process now of finding reasons why we, one of the most affluent countries in the world, will somehow try to explain to the world that we will not meet our commitment to the most needy.

I think there is where we are moving away from Canadians' views. I think Canadians want us to meet that goal. Do they know it will be painful? Do they know it will mean something from their pockets at the end of the day? We are talking about their tax dollars here, dollars they worked hard to earn, and they want us to use them wisely.

I can tell members that we saw Canadians respond to the tsunami with unprecedented generosity. They wanted us here to join with them in that effort. They want to be contributors to the ending of poverty, globally and here in Canada.

Once again Canadians are pushing us. I think the half a billion dollars in Bill C-48 is a response to that fundamental moral impetus that comes from Canadians and the privilege they feel they have been given and want to give back. They understand that these things represent opportunities for us to aid and assist around the world.

This is a budget that was crafted carefully. This proposal suggested that a tax cut to the large corporations, which was never discussed in the election but emerged in the first version of the budget, bringing on support from the Conservatives, was something we could not afford if we were to make the investments we needed to make, responding to what Canadians have called upon us to do. We proposed to the Prime Minister a carefully calibrated replacement of that tax cut to the largest corporations with, instead, a group of investments, also including a wage protection package for workers who find themselves in a bankruptcy situation through no fault of their own.

Those elements were proposed. I do thank the Prime Minister for having taken the time to discuss with me the possibility of such an amendment to the budget and for having decided to move forward. I think that kind of working together on a project such as this represents what Canadians would like to see the House of Commons do from time to time, maybe all the time, although that might be too much to ask, but certainly more than we were seeing.

If we remember the context here, when the first version of the budget emerged, it was supported by the Conservatives, or at least not opposed. It was welcomed because of the large corporate tax cut that was awarded. Then the government began to become involved in political games back and forth with the removal of opposition days and challenging the democratic procedures here. That provoked a reaction.

We came forward with a strategy to help this Parliament to continue to work toward some positive objectives before we deal with the election that will be inevitably coming based on the findings of the Gomery commission and all of the other issues that are emerging.

We in the New Democratic Party have attempted to do our job here, thinking about what people wanted us to do when they voted for us across the country. They wanted us to produce some results, initiatives that responded to their needs, and that would actually have an impact on the lives of their families. Canadians want us to use their tax dollars that they work hard for to create a better society instead of for those who had already had so much.

It is with some element of humility that we are here. We are not the largest group in the House quite clearly, but we looked for the way in which we could have the most positive impact. I am very pleased that we have been able to bring it to this point and that there will be funds flowing to public transit, education and training to deal with the debts and costs of students, et cetera, and to build some affordable housing.

If there is some affordable housing built, and I have no doubt there will be as a result of Bill C-48, the New Democrats will sleep well at night knowing that we came here to do a job, not on behalf of ourselves but on behalf of Canadians by using their funds to produce the consequences, the results, and the kind of society that Canadians believe in, dream of, work for, and count on us to deliver.

In conclusion, I want to say that this is an important budget bill, which allocates funding in accordance with people's needs. We hope it will be adopted this evening.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member just gave his voice to the House of Commons. I think there is a bit of a contradiction there.

I think it is important to note the past irresponsibility of the Conservatives and the fiscal record we saw under Mulroney. We saw the social deficit under the Liberals and that is what the NDP is trying to correct, but under Mulroney we saw record financial deficits at the federal level.

Last year we saw the most expensive political platform in Canadian history at $86 billion. That was before the Conservatives threw in the aircraft carrier, the HMS Mulroney . They threw that in with no idea of how to pay for it. There were all those assorted promises.

We definitely have a different approach than the Conservatives. We believe in a balanced budget and we believe in addressing the social deficit. That is what we are doing tonight with Bill C-48.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr.Speaker, first I would like to implore members to think about this important bill as we are getting very close to the vote. I implore them to think about public transit, clean air, foreign aid for poor children overseas, housing for families that cannot afford it, and post-secondary education for our youth.

I would like to implore all the members across the way, the Bloc and the Conservatives, to think individually about their constituents and also about what they would like to have on their record, on their principles. I implore them to vote for it and then hopefully they can sleep well.

Before I ask the question of the member, I would like to make sure that people remember how long this plan has been in place. When the Prime Minister first became leader of the party he put in his vision for the country, his vision of foreign policy, Canada's place in the world, rebuilding Canada's social foundations, lifelong learning and a new deal for cities. He has carried this on with integrity through the throne speech and into the various budgets. Then, in this agreement with the NDP, Bill C-48, we have added another 1% to Bill C-43 to extend the funding for those elements.

Here is what I would like to ask the hon. member about. If we lose this vote, which will of course cause us to go to an election, how does he think the Bloc and the Conservative candidates would feel going door to door telling people that they caused an election by voting against clean air, foreign aid for children overseas, housing for people who cannot afford it and lower tuition fees for our children going to universities?

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud to speak about this important document because the NDP's balanced budget document brings hope to Canadians.

Over the past 10 years the number of homeless has been growing in the cities across the country. We have seen the growing number of poor children. We know that the NDP's balanced budget document is going to start addressing these issues by allocating $1.6 billion to housing to help poor families.

I am proud to stand for this document because we know that $1.5 billion will be allocated to post-secondary education. We know that over the past number of years it has become a crisis in this country. We need to lower tuition fees. We need to provide affordable education to our youth and young adults. The NDP's balanced budget document does just that.

I am pleased to speak for this document, Bill C-48, because it also addresses the environmental crisis that we are living through. There is $900 million that will go to start addressing the problems that we see across the country, the increasing smog, greenhouse gases and all of those issues. As a result of the NDP's balanced budget document $900 million will now be allocated to that.

We live in an unstable world. There is more and more violence and more instability. We know, and I think it is the shame of members in all four corners of the House, that today 29,000 children will die of hunger and preventable diseases in the world. Tomorrow 29,000 more will die and another 29,000 the day after that.

The NDP's balanced budget document allocates half a billion dollars in foreign aid so that we are finally going to start working around the world to supply fresh water, food and medicine, and health care to people, to start to address that instability. We know full well it is not by providing more guns and weapons that we have more stability on this planet. It is by having safe water, food and housing, education and health for all the world's people.

I am also proud to speak to this document because for too long workers have been at the bottom of the list when a company goes bankrupt. In many case we have seen people lose their life savings. The NDP's better balanced document finally provides $100 million to protect those workers in the event of bankruptcy.

I am very proud to speak to this document because it addresses a whole series of issues that the NDP in this corner of the House have felt for years need to be addressed in this country. Tonight if we adopt this budget, we will be bringing hope to Canadians across the country from coast to coast to coast. In the main streets Canadians see the need for more funding for education. Canadians see the need for more housing to address poverty and the increasing number of poor children. Canadians see the need to address environmental issues. Canadians see the need to provide some stability in the world through governmental funds. The NDP's balanced budget document is addressing all of these critical issues.

It must be said too that this document, which gives Canadians hope, also meets the needs of Quebeckers. This is extremely important. Since the NDP moved passage of this budget, organizations across Quebec have been telling us that it is vital C-48 be passed. FRAPRU and other organizations fighting poverty are calling on Bloc members to pass this budget. Organizations for persons with a disability are telling the Bloc it has to pass this budget. Municipalities in Quebec and environmental organizations are saying yes to the NDP budget. It is extremely important.

Given that organizations and Quebeckers are calling on the four parties in this House to adopt the NDP budget, we hope it will have the support of the Quebec members.

We know there are extremely important matters addressed in this document. However, we also know that the NDP will continue to work on other tasks. We are very concerned about saving our public health care system in Canada.

We saw of course a few weeks ago an indictment, tragically, of Liberal health care policies. It is important to mention that the Supreme Court judgment is not a call for privatization. It is an indictment of the Liberals' policy on health care, I am sorry to say.

We need more action provided to public health care to support public health care. We need to start to address the effectiveness of the system. Members in this corner of the House have called for a more effective system of health care. We have called for the saving money on things like evergreening, where we are simply providing money to pharmaceutical companies, the most profitable industrial sector in North America. We believe we can save money by having a more sane evergreening policy that would allow us to save money, divert it from the pharmaceutical companies to patient care and bring down waiting list times.

We would also continue to work on bringing in a home care policy, because we know that every dollar invested in home care saves $2 in health care costs elsewhere in the system. We are going to continue to work for that in this corner of the House.

We are also going to continue to work to make sure that we build quality jobs for Canadians. Canadians have seen over the past decade continued diminishment in the quality of jobs that are offered. We saw that in the Statistics Canada study that came out in January. Most jobs in Canada now are temporary or part time in nature. Most jobs in Canada now do not have access to pensions. Most jobs in Canada now do not have basic benefits. Because of that, because we have seen that decline in the quality of jobs, we also know that the average Canadian worker is earning 60¢ an hour less than he or she was earning a decade ago. Because of all those facts, we in this corner of the House are going to continue fighting for a jobs policy that makes sense, that makes good quality jobs for Canadians and for Canadian families across the country. We will continue to work on that.

We are pleased to see tonight the opportunity to finally adopt the budget that the member for Toronto—Danforth authored, brought forward and built to improve the lives of Canadians.

There is hope in this country tonight. If we adopt this budget, we can move on to deal with other serious issues that Canadians want us to deal with. They want a better quality of life. They want better health care. They want better education. They want to see homelessness go down and housing go up. They want to see access to education go up and tuition fees go down. They want to see international aid go up and the poverty numbers and the shocking numbers of children who die every day on this planet go down. They want to see all those things. From tonight onward we will be working on these other issues.

We are hoping that tonight this House will adopt the NDP's better balanced budget at third reading and give hope to Canadians from coast to coast to coast.

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

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

As I understand it, there will be no Conservative speakers on this bill tonight. As a consequence, the only party that is opposed to this motion, the only party that is opposed to Bill C-48, will be denied the right to speak and will be shut down. That is--

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-48, a bill that deals with several very important issues.

As hon. members know, the bill contains a commitment to pay down at least $2 billion of debt on an annual basis. With the additional money we will investment in affordable housing, in transit, in foreign aid and in post-secondary education.

The bill has had a lot of debate and discussion and there have been different perspectives on it. However I think all of these areas, it is fair to say, are coherent, complementary and follow the same theme to what was presented in Bill C-43 and preceding budgets, which are investments built on sound fiscal strategy. We can go back to budget 2003 and to budget 2002.

The bill also reflects the priorities of Canadians. When we look at the examples that are in this bill in terms of the types of investments that are made, we look at the investment in affordable housing. Over the past number of budgets the government has put significant sums of money into affordable housing. We think of the significance of the $1.6 billion that will be invested in affordable housing and the fact that in this particular case it is not attached to matching funds and that it also includes aboriginal housing.

We can look at some of the previous funding that has been made with respect to affordable housing. We had a program in place where we had matching funds from the provinces and other entities. Therefore the investment that we are making in Bill C-48 to affordable housing is on top of the previous investments that the government has made in affordable housing. It is very important to ensure that Canadians have an opportunity to have a household and prosper in this great country. It also builds upon the $2 billion that has already been put toward homelessness and affordable housing over the last number of years.

The investments made do a couple of things. They certainly look to address a specific number of challenges and problems that may be faced by people in our society. We think of the additional funds that the bill proposes to put toward an increase in accessibility to post-secondary education, the $1.5 billion, which again builds upon a whole other set of initiatives that have been put in place.

We can think back to previous budgets, budgets that have been called education budgets where there were all types of different incentives and investments for Canadians to receive additional training and to gain further access into post-secondary education and to assist with the cost of that further education. We know that with training and education we can further improve our economy and people have an opportunity to further prosper in this country.

We can think of the $900 million that is being proposed to be invested in public transit and energy retrofit. Again, when we look back to previous budgets, Bill C-48 builds upon Bill C-43 with a number of different initiatives.

Finally, we can look at how the bill contemplates the additional investment of $500 million in international assistance, again a priority of the government and certainly a continued priority and a future priority of the government.

These investments, along with those made in Bill C-43, were made possible not only because of the performance of the economy but also because of the financial management provided by the Minister of Finance in ensuring that we do have the ability to pay down debt and we do run balanced budgets, which is the cornerstone of budget-making, in that the government takes the approach that we need to pay our way.

Like Canadians in their own households who earn money and try to live within their means, governments need to live within their means. It was in the decades previous to 1993 when governments were living beyond their means and saddling citizens of this country with debt, debt interest and debt payments.

The cornerstones of the budgets that the government has put forward going back to 1993 are certainly balanced budgets and looking at continuing to make debt repayment, not because debt repayment is the goal but because debt repayment frees up additional money and reduces the burden on future generations. It frees up additional money to make smart investments to ensure our country can continue to prosper in the future, to ensure Canadians have an opportunity to participate in this economy and to ensure the country can lead the G-7.

As the Minister of Finance said earlier today in question period, while we lead the G-7 in terms of our balanced budgets and our budget making, we need to now focus on leading the G-7 in terms of the productivity of our country. The Minister of Finance has taken some steps and articulated that in his speeches.

I know in the future, in working and speaking with Canadians and working in the House, there will be an opportunity to exchange ideas and focus on initiatives and programs that deal with the productivity question. At the end of the day, it is about ensuring Canadians the opportunity to participate in the economy, to prosper and to create wealth. With that opportunity, we think the country will be a better place.

Providing opportunity for all Canadians at all different socio-economic levels is important. That is why government makes investments in different areas to ensure there are opportunities for people. It is not only an ideology that might exist with certain parties in the House. It also is an approach that benefits Canadians. Canadians need an active government, a government that will support them and enable them to participate in areas of the economy, where they, their children and their children's children can benefit.

I would hope hon. members in the House reflect upon what the bill is looking to accomplish. I hope they know that the bill is in the interests of Canadians and that it will advance those interests.

When members get the opportunity to vote on the bill, I hope they support it. Then they can spend the summer in different parts of the country talking to Canadians about what has been accomplished in passing the bill. They can talk about the investments we have made.

In closing, an agreement has been reached under the provisions of Standing Order 78(2) with respect to the third reading stage of Bill C-48, an act to authorize the Minister of Finance to make certain payments. I move:

That in relation to Bill C-48, an act to authorize the Minister of Finance to make certain payments, not more than one further hour shall be allotted to the consideration of the third reading stage of the said bill and, at the expiry of the time provided for in this order for the consideration of the third reading stage of the said bill, any proceedings before the House shall be interrupted, if required for the purpose of this order, and in turn every question necessary for the disposal of the said stage shall be put and disposed of forthwith and successively without further debate or amendment.

[John McKay, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I think this is the fourth or fifth time that I have spoken on this bill. Apparently the message is not getting through.

The merits of this bill are self-evident. This bill anticipates the spending of something in the order of $4.5 billion in four key areas previously identified by the government where investments of great significance have already been made, namely, affordable housing, post-secondary education, foreign aid and the environment.

Mr. Speaker, I know of your interest in all of these areas, particularly affordable housing. That is an area of investment that currently receives in the order of $1.9 billion on an annual basis. That investment houses something in the order of 640,000 families who are given shelter by virtue of the investment by the Government of Canada on an annual basis of $1.9 billion. This bill proposes to add an additional $1.6 billion to that base funding of $1.9 billion, which in and of itself should contribute to housing many more families.

I know members opposite criticized this bill on account of the fact that it does not specify which house, city or community the money is supposed to go to. I point out to members opposite and those who may be listening that this money is allocated in the same fashion as would any other moneys in any other budget document. I suggest that the level of detail proposed by motions that have been put forward on the floor previously generally do not get incorporated into a budget or a budget implementation bill.

It is rather interesting because in the area of affordable housing once the government turned the ship of state around and broke the back of the deficit, one of the first investments by the government was in the area of affordable housing. I know the area of homelessness was of great interest in particular to those of us in urban ridings. In my case, the riding of Scarborough—Guildwood is at the eastern most part of Toronto. At one point it was the entranceway to Toronto until Highway 401 was built. As a consequence, there are quite a number of motels along Kingston Road. Along the same road, we were sheltering a number of families in housing which frankly was unacceptable.

Mr. Speaker, I wish to inform the House that I will be splitting my time with the member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek.

The moneys that were allocated through the supporting communities partnership initiative, otherwise known as SCPI, have been extremely important to my riding and indeed I know to quite a number of other ridings. They have in fact addressed the issue of affordable housing for homeless people or people who are near homeless. That has resulted in 1,400 homeless people in my riding being reduced to 75 over the course of a number of years, which means now only about 75 people are seeking shelter on a night by night basis as opposed to 1,400. Bill C-48 builds on initiatives such as that.

I know as well, Mr. Speaker, that you are interested in post-secondary education. It is near and dear to your heart because you come from Kingston, which of course is home to the university from which you and I graduated, namely Queen's University. These moneys, the $1.5 billion contemplated in Bill C-48, will be addressed to making that university, along with all of the other great universities in Canada, more accessible to students, so that students may enjoy the benefits of higher education.

As members know, the life and well-being of people who actually seek and obtain higher education is greatly enhanced by post-secondary education and training. I anticipate that these moneys, the $1.5 billion, will be added to the $15.5 billion that the Government of Canada currently puts into post-secondary education and other social grants and programs.

That money is roughly divided evenly between cash and tax points. This will be a significant infusion of cash into that field. As I say, those students at Queen's and other universities around our country will enjoy the benefits of this significant investment, building on the previous investments of the Government of Canada.

I know as well, as do all members, that the environment is something that Canadians probably rank if not first now, certainly second, vis-à-vis health care. Health care and the environment are linked, as the hon. member for Peterborough indicated. We cannot really separate the two. We cannot have good health unless we have a good environment, so I would anticipate that again, members opposite would be very supportive of $900 million that is contemplated as an investment in Bill C-48.

We anticipate that this will build upon the $1 billion over five years in the clean air fund, the $250 million that is in the partnership fund, the $225 million over five years which will quadruple the number of homes retrofitted under the EnerGuide program, the $200 million for the windpower initiatives, $300 million contemplated in Bill C-43 for the green municipal fund, and an equivalent of $5 billion over five years out of the federal gas tax revenues.

All of those are initiatives that have been taken in Bill C-43, the original budget, along with previous budgets have been put forward by the government, voted upon by the House, and have been found by Canadians to be a very acceptable and useful way in which to deploy tax dollars.

The other area where an investment is contemplated is foreign aid. Bill C-48 anticipates something in the order of an additional investment of $500 million in international assistance. Canada's recently released international policy statement put out by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the Minister for CIDA sets out a vision for Canada and its role in the world. This new international policy framework delivers on the government's commitment to invest in the international role which builds our presence around the world.

We had increased international assistance by $3.4 billion over the next five years and we anticipate that we will be doubling levels from 2001-02 through to 2010-11. We anticipate that we will be doubling the aid to Africa from its level in 2003-04 by 2008-09.

This reflects the government's commitment to alleviate the poverty that is in Africa. It reflects the commitment by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance to address those problems in an effective way.

I anticipate that this bill will receive a great deal of favour from members opposite. I cannot imagine why members opposite would vote against investing in foreign affairs, in affordable housing, in the environment and in post-secondary education. I urge all members to support Bill C-48.

Extension of Sitting Period

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Madam Speaker, I definitely was not calling the hon. member opposite who just rose by that name, nor was I calling you by that name, Madam Speaker. Let us make the record clear that I was calling neither the member nor you “Charlie”.

In any case, let me continue. There is the issue of Bill C-38, which the hon. members across say they do not want to vote on. Maybe I should remind members of something that appeared in today's Quorum , I believe, and definitely in a number of newspapers. It is an article written by columnist Don Martin, who gave some advice to the hon. members across about that issue. He said that for their own political good maybe what they should consider is getting the vote over with before they embarrass themselves even further, not only on that issue but on many others.

I say for the hon. members across that whether they agree or disagree with the content of the bill, this issue has been in the public domain for three years. Sixty-two witnesses have been listened to by the legislative committee. The bill has about four clauses. The members across have all spoken at second reading, every single one of them who wanted to, and every single one of them on the amendment as well, and on the subamendment and so on.

We have listened to what they had to say. It is not a matter of the House needing more pearls of wisdom in that regard. In any case, if I listen to what the opposition House leader says, it is not that they want more time. It is that they do not want to do that particular work at all because they do not like it.

I know that Madam Speaker is a teacher by training. Do people have a choice in doing their homework based on whether or not they like it? That is not the criteria.

Let us hear what the opposition House leader said today, June 23, after question period in the foyer of the House of Commons:

We've been consistent in saying right from the beginning that we are strongly opposed to these two bills.

That is all right. They can vote against them. He stated further:

There's not a Canadian left out there in the real world that doesn't understand that.

Of course: they have all spoken two or three times each so every one of us understands what their position is. It does not need to be clarified much further.

I will continue to quote the opposition House leader:

We have no intention and it's not our role, frankly, to make things easy for the government to pass bills that we're opposed to.

There we are. They do not like Bill C-38. They do not like Bill C-48. They do not like the fact that we are going to give more money to social housing. They do not like more money going to the Canadian International Development Agency to help the world's poor.

What is their solution? Is it to vote against that which they do not like? No, it is to not want to do the work. Not wanting to work is the way in which they solve their problems.

Now, not wanting to work just does not cut it with Canadians. Their constituents and mine will not put up with that. They sent us here to do the work.

Let us do the work. The hon. members say they want to go home. Of course they do. Their House leader said that on their behalf and their House leader always says it the way it is, or generally. In any case, if their House leader says they want to go home, I am not opposed to that.

We are going to vote on this motion tonight. We have from now until midnight. Let us vote on the two bills and go home. Canadians will say, “You did your work, Mr. or Ms. MP”. We will all have done our work and we can go home to do all the things that the opposition House leader said we should be doing.

I agree with him that we should be going home, but we should do our work first because when we do not do our work we have to stay in class at recess or after hours to get the work done. We are supposed to do the work before we go away. Those are the rules.

I say this in the presence of a teacher, namely our Acting Speaker, because I know she used to teach for a living and she will know these things in the truly objective manner in which I am sure she sees these matters.

I ask all my colleagues to join together and vote for this motion. After the motion, let us join together again and vote for the bills. Let us get the work done and then we can go home, in that order. That is the way it should be done.