Bill C-9 (Historical)

Jobs and Economic Growth Act

An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures

Part 1 of this enactment implements income tax measures proposed in the March 4, 2010 Budget. In particular, it
(a) introduces amendments to allow a recipient of Universal Child Care Benefit amounts to designate that the amounts be included in the income of the dependant in respect of whom the recipient has claimed an Eligible Dependant Credit, or if the credit is not claimed by the recipient, a child of the recipient who is a qualified dependant under the Universal Child Care Benefit Act;
(b) clarifies rules relating to the Medical Expense Tax Credit to exclude expenses for purely cosmetic procedures;
(c) clarifies rules relating to payments made to a Registered Education Savings Plan or a Registered Disability Savings Plan through a program funded, directly or indirectly, by a province or administered by a province;
(d) implements amendments to the family income thresholds used to determine eligibility for Canada Education Savings Grants, Canada Disability Savings Grants and Canada Disability Savings Bonds;
(e) reinstates the 50% inclusion rate for Canadian residents who have been in receipt of U.S. social security benefits since before January 1, 1996;
(f) extends the mineral exploration tax credit for one year;
(g) reduces the rate of interest payable by the Minister of National Revenue on tax overpayments made by corporations;
(h) modifies the definition “taxable Canadian property” to exclude certain shares and other interests that do not derive their value principally from real or immovable property situated in Canada, Canadian resource property, or timber resource property;
(i) introduces amendments to allow the issuance of a refund of an overpayment of tax under Part I of the Income Tax Act to certain non-residents in circumstances where an assessment of such amounts has been made outside the usual period during which a refund may be made;
(j) repeals the exclusion for indictable tax offences from the proceeds of crime and money laundering regime; and
(k) increases the pension surplus threshold for employer contributions to registered pension plans to 25%.
Part 2 amends the Excise Act, 2001 and the Customs Act to implement an enhanced stamping regime for tobacco products by introducing new controls over the production, distribution and possession of a new excise stamp for tobacco products.
Part 2 also amends the Excise Tax Act and certain related regulations in respect of the Goods and Services Tax/Harmonized Sales Tax (GST/HST) to:
(a) simplify the operation of the GST/HST for the direct selling industry using a commission-based model;
(b) clarify the application of the GST/HST to purely cosmetic procedures and to devices or other goods used or provided with cosmetic procedures, and to services related to cosmetic procedures;
(c) reaffirm the policy intent and provide certainty respecting the scope of the definition of “financial service” in respect of certain administrative, management and promotional services;
(d) address advantages that currently exist in favour of imported financial services over comparable domestic services;
(e) streamline the application of the input tax credit rules to financial institutions;
(f) provide a new, uniform GST/HST rebate system that will apply fairly and equitably to employer-sponsored pension plans;
(g) introduce a new annual information return for financial institutions to improve GST/HST reporting in the financial services sector; and
(h) extend the due date for filing annual GST/HST returns from three months to six months after year-end for certain financial institutions.
In addition, Part 2 amends regulations made under the Excise Tax Act and the Excise Act, 2001 to reduce the interest rate payable by the Minister of National Revenue in respect of overpaid taxes and duties by corporations.
Part 3 amends the Air Travellers Security Charge Act to increase the air travellers security charge that is applicable to air travel that includes a chargeable emplanement on or after April 1, 2010 and for which any payment is made on or after that date. It also reduces the interest payable by the Minister of National Revenue to corporations under that Act.
Part 4 amends the Softwood Lumber Products Export Charge Act, 2006 to provide for a higher rate of charge on the export of certain softwood lumber products from the regions of Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba or Saskatchewan. It also amends that Act to reduce the rate of interest payable by the Minister of National Revenue on tax overpayments made by corporations.
Part 5 amends the Customs Tariff to implement measures announced in the March 4, 2010 Budget to reduce Most-Favoured-Nation rates of duty and, if applicable, rates of duty under other tariff treatments on a number of tariff items relating to manufacturing inputs and machinery and equipment imported on or after March 5, 2010.
Part 6 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act to provide additional payments to certain provinces and to correct a cross-reference in that Act.
Part 7 amends the Expenditure Restraint Act to impose a freeze on the allowances and salaries to be paid to members of the Senate and the House of Commons for the 2010–2011, 2011–2012 and 2012–2013 fiscal years.
Part 8 amends a number of Acts to reduce or eliminate Governor in Council appointments, including the North American Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act. This Part also amends that Act to establish the Canadian Section of the NAFTA Secretariat within the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade. In addition, this Part repeals The Intercolonial and Prince Edward Island Railways Employees’ Provident Fund Act. Finally, this Part makes consequential and related amendments to other Acts.
Part 9 amends the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985. In particular, the Act is amended to
(a) require an employer to fully fund benefits if the whole of a pension plan is terminated;
(b) authorize an employer to use a letter of credit, if certain conditions are met, to satisfy solvency funding obligations in respect of a pension plan that has not been terminated in whole;
(c) permit a pension plan to provide for variable benefits, similar to those paid out of a Life Income Fund, in respect of a defined contribution provision of the pension plan;
(d) establish a distressed pension plan workout scheme, under which the employer and representatives of members and retirees may negotiate changes to the plan’s funding requirements, subject to the approval of the Minister of Finance;
(e) permit the Superintendent of Financial Institutions to replace an actuary if the Superintendent is of the opinion that it is in the best interests of members or retirees;
(f) provide that only the Superintendent may declare a pension plan to be partially terminated;
(g) provide for the immediate vesting of members’ benefits;
(h) require the administrator to make additional information available to members and retirees following the termination of a pension plan; and
(i) repeal spent provisions.
Part 10 provides for the retroactive coming into force in Canada of the Agreement on Social Security between Canada and the Republic of Poland.
Part 11 amends the Export Development Act to grant Export Development Canada the authority to establish offices outside Canada. It also clarifies that Corporation’s authority with respect to asset management and the forgiveness of certain debts and obligations.
Part 12 enacts the Payment Card Networks Act, the purpose of which is to regulate national payment card networks and the commercial practices of payment card network operators. Among other things, that Act confers a number of regulation-making powers. This Part also makes related amendments to the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act to expand the mandate of the Agency so that it may supervise payment card network operators to determine whether they are in compliance with the provisions of the Payment Card Networks Act and its regulations and monitor the implementation of voluntary codes of conduct.
Part 13 amends the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada Act to provide the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada with a broader oversight role to allow it to verify compliance with ministerial undertakings and directions. The amendments also increase the Agency’s ability to undertake research, including research on trends and emerging consumer protection issues. Finally, the Part makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Part 14 amends the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act to confer on the Minister of Finance the power to issue directives imposing measures with respect to certain financial transactions. The amendments also confer on the Governor in Council the power to make regulations that limit or prohibit certain financial transactions. This Part also makes a consequential amendment to another Act.
Part 15 amends the Canada Post Corporation Act to modify the exclusive privilege of the Canada Post Corporation so as to permit letter exporters to collect letters in Canada for transmittal and delivery outside Canada.
Part 16 amends the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation Act to allow the Governor in Council to specify when a bridge institution will assume a federal member institution’s deposit liabilities and allow the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation to make by-laws with respect to information and capabilities it can require of its member institutions. This Part also amends that Act to establish the rules that apply to the assignment, by the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation to a bridge institution, of eligible financial contracts to which a federal member institution is a party.
Part 17 amends the Bank Act and other related statutes to provide a framework enabling credit unions to incorporate and continue as banks. The model is based on the framework applicable to other federally regulated financial institutions, adjusted to give effect to cooperative principles and governance.
Part 18 authorizes the taking of a number of measures with respect to the reorganization and divestiture of all or any part of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited’s business.
Part 19 amends the National Energy Board Act in order to give the National Energy Board the power to create a participant funding program to facilitate the participation of the public in hearings that are held under section 24 of that Act. It also amends the Nuclear Safety and Control Act to give the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission the power to create a participant funding program to facilitate the participation of the public in proceedings under that Act and the power to prescribe fees for that program.
Part 20 amends the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act to streamline certain process requirements for comprehensive studies, to give the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency authority to conduct most comprehensive studies and to give the Minister of the Environment the power to establish the scope of any project in relation to which an environmental assessment is to be conducted. It also amends that Act to provide, in legislation rather than by regulations, that an environmental assessment is not required for certain federally funded infrastructure projects and repeals sunset clauses in the Regulations Amending the Exclusion List Regulations, 2007.
Part 21 amends the Canada Labour Code with respect to the appointment of appeals officers and the appeal hearing procedures.
Part 22 authorizes payments to be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund for various purposes.
Part 23 amends the Telecommunications Act to make a carrier that is not a Canadian-owned and controlled corporation eligible to operate as a telecommunications common carrier if it owns or operates certain transmission facilities.
Part 24 amends the Employment Insurance Act to establish an account in the accounts of Canada to be known as the Employment Insurance Operating Account and to close the Employment Insurance Account and remove it from the accounts of Canada. It also repeals sections 76 and 80 of that Act and makes consequential amendments in relation to the creation of the new Account. This Part also makes technical amendments to clarify provisions of the Budget Implementation Act, 2008 and the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board Act that deal with the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board.

The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee.

Speaker's Ruling

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

There are 62 motions in amendment standing on the notice paper for the report stage of Bill C-9. The motions will be grouped as follows.

Group No. 1 is Motions 1, 2 and 16 to 62; Group No. 2 is Motions 3 to 15.

The voting patterns for the motions within each group are available at the table and the Chair will remind the House of each pattern at the time of voting.

I shall now propose Motions Nos. 1, 2 and 16 to 62 in Group No. 1 to the House.

Motions in Amendment

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

moved:

Motion No. 1

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 96.

Motion No. 2

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 97.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

moved:

Motion No. 16

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2149.

Motion No. 17

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2150.

Motion No. 18

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2151.

Motion No. 19

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2152.

Motion No. 20

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2153.

Motion No. 21

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2154.

Motion No. 22

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2155.

Motion No. 23

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2156.

Motion No. 24

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2157.

Motion No. 25

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2158.

Motion No. 26

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2159.

Motion No. 27

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2160.

Motion No. 28

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2161.

Motion No. 29

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2162.

Motion No. 30

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2163.

Motion No. 31

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2164.

Motion No. 32

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2165.

Motion No. 33

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2166.

Motion No. 34

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2167.

Motion No. 35

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2168.

Motion No. 36

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2169.

Motion No. 37

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2170.

Motion No. 38

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2171.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

moved:

Motion No. 39

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2185.

Motion No. 40

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2186.

Motion No. 41

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2187.

Motion No. 42

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2188.

Motion No. 43

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2189.

Motion No. 44

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2190.

Motion No. 45

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2191.

Motion No. 46

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2192.

Motion No. 47

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2193.

Motion No. 48

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2194.

Motion No. 49

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2195

Motion No. 50

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2196.

Motion No. 51

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2197.

Motion No. 52

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2198.

Motion No. 53

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2199.

Motion No. 54

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2200.

Motion No. 55

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2201.

Motion No. 56

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2202.

Motion No. 57

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2203.

Motion No. 58

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2204.

Motion No. 59

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2205.

Motion No. 60

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2206

Motion No. 61

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2207

Motion No. 62

That Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2208.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate on the motions before us today. Mr. Speaker, as you just read out, there are 62 motions and now I find myself in the position where 49 of them are grouped into one slot of debate. I only have 10 minutes to speak this afternoon, so I will restrict my speech to two clauses in particular, clauses 96 and 97 of the bill, and I will let my colleagues speak to some of the others.

Clauses 96 and 97 of Bill C-9 before us today must be deleted because they pave the way for a massive increase in the air travellers security charge, the ATSC. Together they form just one of six pieces of business that have absolutely no place in this bill.

The omnibus budget bill is almost 900 pages long. It includes 24 parts with more than 2,200 sections. It is subject to one debate at second reading, another at third reading in each house, plus scrutiny by only one committee in each house. Those limitations mean that members of this House cannot possibly do justice to the varied, far-reaching and fundamental changes proposed in this legislation.

The inescapable conclusion is that the government is trying to bury deep in its budget legislation all manner of nefarious, unwise and unpopular pet projects. In bundling these unrelated measures into just one bill, the government's propensity to stifle debate and silence its critics reaches a new low. The huge and indefensible increases to the air travellers security charge included in this omnibus bill is another example of bad public policy being rushed through the House with as little scrutiny as possible.

Canada's security charge was extraordinarily high even before this proposed increase. In 2008 the Air Transport Association of Canada conducted a survey to rank the security fees charged by 175 governments at airports worldwide and found that Canada's security charge was the second highest, second only to that in the Netherlands. It is widely believed that with these increases we will have the dubious distinction of having the highest costs in the world and yet there is absolutely no evidence that we will be any safer.

The international fee alone is set to increase a whopping 52%, from $17 to $25.91. In the United States, the international security charge is $5. It is a simple question. On what basis can the government justify imposing the highest costs in the world on Canadian air travellers? What can possibly justify a 50% increase in the air travellers security charge when the existing tax is already yielding a surplus?

Let me add that while it seems clear the existing security charge yields a surplus, we cannot know for certain what is happening to those tax dollars because the audited information that Canadians are entitled to is simply not available. The last report by the Auditor General on the security charge dates back to 2004-05. The lack of accountability for taxpayer dollars is unacceptable.

However, the Air Transport Association of Canada has conducted its own study in the absence of audited information. Let me quote from ATAC president and CEO John McKenna's recent testimony before the Standing Committee on Finance:

We looked at the numbers supplied by CATSA [the Canadian Air Transportation Security Agency] and Statistics Canada.

Our estimates are based on the 48 million passengers screened by CATSA in 89 Canadian airports during fiscal year 2008-09. The numbers put forth by CATSA concur with Statistics Canada reports of 108 million passengers emplaned or deplaned during calendar year 2008, with some 54 million departing passengers, CATSA's clientele. Statistics Canada indicates that 62.9% of these passengers were on domestic flights, 19.5% were on transborder flights, and 17.6% were on international flights.

Based on these numbers, it becomes a simple exercise to estimate the revenues generated by the ATSC [the air travellers security charge]. The spreadsheet that we handed out suggests that revenues generated by the ATSC well exceed CATSA appropriation, even before the increase [in the ATSC]. Based on these calculations, [what the ATSC collected in 2008-09] more than $70 million was retained as general revenue by the Government of Canada and not used to fund CATSA.

Once the increases in the ATSC have been factored in, and considering the budget allocation for CATSA of $1.5 billion over the next five years, the revenues generated by the ATSC will produce an annual surplus of over $330 million.

That is 330 million taxpayers' dollars every year for five years quite unaccounted for.

Where is the surplus? Is the surplus being quietly moved to general revenue? Why is the government imposing a massive tax hike on the travelling public when the fund is already in surplus? How does the government intend to spend the burgeoning surplus it is now asking Canadians to finance? Is the government seriously trying to tell Canadians that it has delivered a no new taxes budget when it in fact includes a massive and unnecessary tax increase for the travelling public?

CATSA is responsible for implementing new security measures but does not do any threat assessment whatsoever. That is the purview of either the RCMP or CSIS. How much of the security charge generated revenues go to Transport Canada? How much goes to the RCMP or CSIS? Canadians have a right to know. As the Air Transport Association of Canada pointed out to the Standing Committee on Finance, Canadians do not need more layers of security; they need more effective security, better security.

Is the government simply going to increase the security charge every time a security loophole is discovered, or is it going to make air travel safer for Canadians by taking a comprehensive look at security procedures? Will security measures simply accumulate, or will the government look to developing and implementing a more efficient single step screening process aimed at improving security, reducing the number of screening stages and the time and personnel required to process passengers?

Anyone who has travelled by air knows that the inefficiency of current security practices is a serious problem, but the government continues to take a piecemeal approach to security, adding ad hoc security measures in response to isolated incidents. New Democrats believe that Canadian aviation security planning should include a comprehensive security assessment that is informed by past incidents but also looks forward. We must identify sensitive areas that could be subject to attack and implement proper security measures and response procedures to address these threats.

We must review our response systems and airport architectural design to allow security to efficiently and effectively deal with security threats with a lesser impact on airport operations.

We must develop better coordination and information sharing between intelligence agencies and airport security that would allow security personnel to actively search for potential threats and prepare response scenarios while at the same time protecting privacy rights.

Canadians want the government to develop a security system that truly protects travellers, that is designed specifically for the Canadian context, and that reflects our own needs in light of the security threat in this country.

As well, CATSA's performance must be measured against agencies that perform the same work in other jurisdictions. How does CATSA's performance stack up from an economic perspective? Are we getting value for our money? If we are, how does the government know that? What evidence has been gathered to evaluate CATSA's performance and where can the public get that information? Where is the public review of CATSA and its finances that the government promised last year?

Rather than visit massive tax increases on Canadian travellers for little or no discernible benefit, the government would have been well advised to support the private member's bill introduced by my colleague from Elmwood—Transcona. The act to provide certain rights to air passengers included a passengers' bill of rights and introduced measures on compensation for over-booked flights, unreasonable tarmac delays, cancelled flights, the concern for late and misplaced luggage, and addressed all-inclusive pricing by airline companies in their advertising.

The legislation was inspired by a European Union law where overbookings have dropped significantly. Air Canada is already operating under the European laws for its flights in Europe. Why should an Air Canada customer receive better treatment in Europe than in Canada?

The bill of rights would have ensured that passengers were kept informed of flight changes, whether they were delays or cancellations. The new rules would have been posted in the airports, and airlines would have had to inform passengers of their rights and the process to file for compensation.

These are the types of changes Canadian consumers want from their government. Instead, we have a tax hike with no commensurate increase in safety, security or convenience.

The government is asking us to approve a massive tax increase when it promised there would be none. The government offers no rationale for that increase, no explanation of why we should move from the second highest cost security charge jurisdiction on the planet to the first. There appears to be a huge surplus in the security charge fund, but we cannot be sure exactly how much, where it goes, or how it is spent.

Canadians have no idea whether the agency responsible for their safety operates efficiently or effectively. Canadians are being asked to pay more with no indication of better service. All this is buried in a budget bill that, because of the government's almost paranoid fear of scrutiny, will not see the oversight and review that Canadians need and want.

It is for all of those reasons that I was proud, on behalf of the entire NDP caucus, to move the deletion of all sections in Bill C-9 that deal with the air travellers security charge.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for trying to deal with a whole grouping of report stage motions.

The point here and I am sure we are going to hear a lot about it, is that the budget implementation bill, Bill C-9, includes a large number of items which were not in the budget speech nor in the budget document itself. There were some concerns expressed at the presentation the finance officials gave on Bill C-9. The air travellers security charge was one as was the elimination of the need for environmental assessments. The one that caught my eye, and I know the finance committee looked at it, deals with the possibility of privatizing some of AECL's assets.

In addition to the concerns regarding the air travellers security charge which the member has very legitimately raised, I wonder whether she could inform the House of approximately how many items in Bill C-9 are add-ons or have been slipped in outside of what was presented to the House in the budget. Were these items given due consideration at the finance committee when Bill C-9 was being considered?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a fabulous question. We just moved 62 motions to deal with parts of the bill that must be deleted. The member is quite right in that there is no way that due diligence has been done on any of the six of them. There may even be more and I would be interested to know whether the Liberal Party moved amendments as well.

There are six parts that are of particular concern to us. I have spoken to one of them this afternoon and that is the air travellers security charge. Other ones that are profoundly troubling for us are the start down the road to deregulation of Canada Post, the National Energy Board, environmental assessments, and employment insurance.

My goodness, the employment insurance fund had a surplus of $57 billion before successive Liberal and Conservative governments started taking that money out of a fund that was there to protect the most vulnerable workers in our country who had just lost their jobs, to keep them above the poverty line. The government took their money, put it into the consolidated revenue fund and now is putting the final nail in the coffin by depleting the EI account to its bare bones.

Those are all things that merit much further attention, which is why we are moving these report stage motions so that we can do in the House what the committee was not able to do.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to commend the member for Hamilton Mountain and the other good members of the NDP for taking a look at and analyzing such a comprehensive document. There are a lot of things we are concerned about in the bill, but there are things that are not in the bill that we were hoping would be there.

Being the critic for seniors and pensions and knowing the member for Hamilton Mountain's very strong interest in that area, there was no increase for seniors living in poverty. Over 260,000 seniors are living below the poverty line. One would have thought that the government would have put something in for seniors.

There is nothing to follow up on the statement in the throne speech in regard to the government making changes to the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act to protect pensions when a company goes under.

Could the member comment on why she thinks those items might have been left out?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I hope people at home are watching and they can see the size of this document. The member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek is quite right in that there is nothing in this budget for seniors. What is in the budget of course is $6 billion in continued corporate tax cuts for the wealthiest corporations in our country, $6 billion, when every member in the House knows that by comparison with a measly $700 million, we could have lifted every single Canadian senior out of poverty. That should have been the priority in this budget.

Pension reform is crucially important. Here we have a budget bill which is almost 900 pages with nothing on bankruptcy protection. I hope all members of the House will be joining us at the corner of Wellington and Metcalfe streets this afternoon to talk to workers who are losing their jobs, whose plants are closing down. There will be steelworkers from all over the country. Members should come and talk to them. They should ask them whether they are pleased that there has been absolutely no progress on pension reform in this country. I can tell everyone the answer at that corner tonight will be a resounding “no”.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise in the House today to ask for the deletion of part 19 and part 20 of Bill C-9. Those make up our Motions Nos. 16 to 18 and 19 to 38.

I bring forward this motion for the deletion of those parts of the bill for twofold reasons, which I have spoken to previously in the House. The twofold reasons are both for process of the making of law in this nation and on the substantive measures.

We have heard from Canadians from community to community and ocean to ocean opposing this measure. We have heard it from farm communities, environmental organizations and a long list of first nations organizations. They are absolutely appalled that for the second time the government has chosen, through a budget bill, to make substantive changes to the long-treasured Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.

There was absolutely no consultation in advance, despite the fact that for almost three decades the government has had in place a regulatory advisory committee on the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. This group has not even been convened for a year and a half, so the government chose to completely ignore a long-established committee, actually established by the Conservatives, and chose to do it through a budget bill to make it a non-confidence vote. It then referred the matter to the wrong committee, not that many members of the finance committee are not fully capable of reviewing any statute. However, as the House is well advised, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act already requires by law that it be reviewed at a set date, and that matter is already scheduled before the parliamentary committee on environment and sustainable development.

The government made a decision to completely short-circuit public consultation, violate its own legal provisions and show complete disrespect for the committee that had already made itself apprised of the matter and was trying to move forward as expeditiously as possible. Why is that? It is because this act has been before the parliamentary committee on environment and sustainable development before. Therefore, to ensure a consistent review, it made sense, since the committee looked at the act at its inception, to give it the opportunity to continuously do the review and to accord the opportunity to any stakeholder from industry, the public or the first nations to come forward and give their opinions on the proposed amendments.

First and foremost, Canadians have come out strongly in the same way they did in last year's budget bill, where the government emasculated the Navigable Waters Protection Act. Last time, it took a knife to federal environmental law. This time, it took an axe. It swung an axe on an act that all Canadians, from industry, provincial governments, territorial governments, first nations governments, environmental organizations, community-based organizations, farm organizations and fishery organizations, have had a say for many years in developing what they consider to be a strong act, which governments after governments have lauded around the world.

In one fell swoop, the government decided to go against due process, against the democratic process, which the government is bound by and committed to under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, to provide advance notice and an opportunity to comment by any person in North America to any new environmental law policy. It completely ignored a document it is bound by.

The government talks all the time about how it is working in common with North America and how we should look at things in North America and yet it has completely violated the very agreement it has signed and decided just to throw it into a budget bill.

I have had submissions from a number of people. The finance committee heard submissions from a number of people across the country castigating the government for doing this and asking that the finance committee move these measures over to the environment committee.

As far as substance, what is done in this bill is absolutely reprehensible. Contrary to what the minister has firmly asserted in the House, equal rights are not provided to the public who may have concerns and want to intervene in the review of major projects.

In part 19, the National Energy Board and the Nuclear Safety and Control Act are given the discretion to think about whether they might provide participant funding if somebody asks. That completely goes against what is provided for in the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act where, if they are going ahead with a comprehensive review, they must provide intervenor funding. That is not equal treatment under the law. It is giving lesser rights to those who are dealing with major nuclear facilities and major oil and gas activity.

On the substantive measures, the government has taken the Supreme Court of Canada ruling and completely undermined it by giving the Minister of the Environment total discretion to decide to narrow the scope of the review of a project. This goes against the understanding around the world of why we do environmental assessments and, if we are doing a comprehensive review, why we need to look at the whole scope of a project. It unilaterally gives complete discretion to the minister to decide to narrow the scope, overturning the Supreme Court of Canada decision.

What this part of Bill C-9 would also do is exempt a vast number of projects that would be funded by Infrastructure Canada before the government even undertakes the process of deciding whether there will be any significant environmental impacts. It gives a little option to the minister after the fact to say that maybe the minister will unexempt the exemption if he or she find there are significant environmental impacts, but how would the minister to do that if he or she has already exempted them all.

Huge concerns have been raised about this project. I want to share with the House some of the testimony by the people who have come before the finance committee to object to this matter being reviewed by the finance committee and being put through in the budget bill.

Mrs. Arlene Kwasniak, who is a respected environmental law scholar at the University of Calgary law school, said:

I would like to suggest that there has been a recent demise in consultations having to do with the CEAA and an avoidance of the legislative requirement for consultations for substantive changes.

...this provision opens the door for uneven and unfair application of the CEAA. There are no statutory conditions governing the exercise of the minister's discretion....

In the Speech from the Throne and the budget bill this year, the government said that the very reason it was going to streamline environmental regulation and environmental assessments was to provide legal certainty and we have these legal scholars saying that the last thing the bill would do is provide legal certainty.

Mr. Richard Lindgren, counsel for the Canadian Environmental Law Association, said:

Based on our experience and our public interest perspective, we have very serious and fundamental concerns about the Bill C-9 proposals to amend CEAA. [...] CELA objects to the process that's being used to enact these amendments. In our opinion, proposed changes to CEAA should not be buried in a budget bill. Instead, any proposed amendments to the act should be brought forward and proceeded with as stand-alone legislation that's subject to full parliamentary debate and meaningful public consultation, neither of which has occurred in this case to this point.

The second objection was the timing of the proposed amendments. He goes on to describe it and said:

As the committee is aware, these amendments have been introduced just as the mandatory seven-year review of CEAA is about to commence.

I could also quote from the letter from Mr. Ron Plain, the Aamjiwnaang First Nation and about 20 other first nations from across the country. They are requesting that the government withdraw part 20 of Bill C-9 which deals with CEAA until they have engaged in a meaningful consultation process to address first nations interests in maintaining a rigorous environmental assessment process federally that will ensure proper consultation and accommodation of their constitutionally protected interests.

They wish to stress that the lack of consultation on Bill C-9 to date is inconsistent with article 19 of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which requires:

States shall consult and cooperate in good faith with the indigenous peoples...to obtain their free, prior and informed consent before adopting and implementing legislative or administrative measures that may affect them.

They state that many industrial and infrastructure projects impact aboriginal interests and, given that the federal government has a fiduciary relationship with first nations people, it is questionable that the government would seek power to scope industrial projects narrowly and to entirely exempt infrastructure projects without first consulting aboriginal peoples. The honour of the Crown's duty needs to be fulfilled through a meaningful consultation process on this critical portion of Bill C-9 before it is enacted.

All of those people have said that they want to have these provisions removed from the budget bill.

Even the Senate committee, which reviewed this bill, recommended that the government not do this kind of process a second time, that budget bills should deal with financial matters and that they should not be the mechanism for dealing with substantive major amendments to federal laws. That was also endorsed by a majority recommendation of the parliamentary finance committee on reviewing the last bill.

It is critical that the House support my motion to separate out and delete parts 19 and 20 so we can have a proper review in consultation with all affected groups.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, during the presentation by the officials on Bill C-9, the question was raised about whether there was a move that would place economic objectives ahead of environmental objectives. That point was raised in the context that the provisions in Bill C-9 would permit the currently required environmental assessments to be waived or not be done simply because of the timing of other economic activity going on that the government would like to have proceed. That is what spawned the question about whether this was an issue where economic priorities trumped environmental priorities, and it is very troubling to me.

I am not sure what it says about government accountability, transparency, openness, public consultation, due process and matters like due diligence that we are required to have, but it would appear to me that the member's arguments are quite valid. I would be interested to know whether she feels there has been due diligence in the finance committee by members of Parliament.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I particularly appreciate the first part of the member's question but I do not have time to answer both.

I do not see it as a case of the government putting economic interests before environmental interests. I see it as the government completely missing the boat on the interaction between economic and environmental interests. It is taking a very short-sighted perspective on costs that may be incurred by a project.

We must remember that the whole purpose for an environmental impact assessment is to identify in advance what the major impacts might be so they can be mitigated or avoided and the proponent will pay those costs. That is what the polluter pays principle is all about.

The government is simply telling people that a major project will be going on in their community but that it will not assess it and tough luck if down the line they incur major costs. It is telling people that they will be saddled with the costs because it will not make the proponent do that. In other words, it has completely undermined the whole essence of what environmental assessment is. It has signed on to agreements around the world that it will undertake to do effective environmental assessment, including under the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation.

I hope I have answered the member's question.

[Roger Pomerleau, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I was listening to my two colleagues who talked about Bill C-9. It is clear that this is an omnibus bill in which we find a million completely different elements lumped together that should each be presented individually. When my colleague talked about security taxes, she pointed out—quite well in fact—the unbelievable number of unanswered questions in this bill.

My colleague who just spoke raised some extremely controversial things in this bill that need to be thoroughly examined. However, they are tucked into a bill that has to do with the budget, which automatically requires a confidence vote. For that reason, many people will hesitate to vote against it. In short, the bill might not be good, but it will be hard to vote against. That is not so for us, but it may be for others.

Is this not completely anti-democratic? Should the elected members not have enough room to manoeuvre and the necessary information to determine the value of the bill? Could my colleague say a few words about that?

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, if I could sum it up I would agree that it is extremely undemocratic. The entire process of putting parts 19 and 20 through the budget bill is nothing less than undemocratic. The government ran on a platform of accountability and transparency, and yet the very act of what it has done, including these measures in the budget bill, completely runs against that kind of a presence.

As I mentioned, the government is accountable already under international law and agreements, including with the United States of America and Mexico, whose leader will be speaking to us tomorrow, to fully provide Canadians the opportunity to participate in decision-making. The government has completely violated those very measures to ensure--

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Resuming debate. The hon. member for Skeena--Bulkley Valley will have about four minutes before the end of government orders.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I wish I could say it is a pleasure to speak to Bill C-9, but unfortunately we are looking at nearly 900 pages that represent a travesty of justice, and a basic and fundamental attack on the democratic principles on which this place is built.

We find within these pages what some have called a Trojan Horse of a bill. We find everything in the way of a laundry list that the Conservatives want to move through but cannot, in part because they keep shutting down the House and killing their own legislation, and partly because the measures rammed into this bill are unpopular. The Conservatives have threatened an election and have told Canadians to just stick it. They have not provided the option of a democratic and open debate about some of the most fundamental things in front of us.

We know that in this cloak of secrecy the government is going to be raising taxes for the travelling public at airports. It is seeking to gut environmental legislation, which my hon. colleague from Edmonton so eloquently spoke of just recently.

The government is seeking in an omnibus format to cobble together whatever it has at hand to give the Minister of the Environment discretionary, almost divine powers, to decide what deserves an environmental assessment and what does not. Somehow he will know in advance what is going to cause environmental damage and what will not, ignoring the fact that the idea behind an environmental assessment is the understanding of what the damage may or may not be. That is why we put the criteria in there in the first place.

We are paying for industrial projects that went wrong years ago: old mines, abandoned oil shafts. We said that we would learn from all of these things, that we would take account of all of these things before we built, so we would know what the effects would actually be on the environment.

What is in the budget affects real lives and has real consequences for our country. It is a shame and a sham that the government pretends to be accountable, pretends to care about the principles of democracy, while on the other hand does this.

Just recently, more than 130 workers from AECL came to this place to be recognized, to ask government members if they would be allowed a free and democratic debate and vote on the sale of AECL, Canada's largest crown corporation, and into which the Canadian public has put more than $22 billion over the years. Instead, where do we find the sale of AECL? We find it buried in the pages of this Trojan Horse, buried in this omnibus bill. We are allowed no debate, no discussion. There is no democracy from the government.

I sat with those 130 workers after question period. I talked to them and listened to their questions. They are worried, concerned, fearful, and most of all, they disbelieve that a government that ran on such principles as transparency and accountability and the fundamentals of democracy could be so opposed to them in practise. Words do not match the actual actions of the government.

It is often said that the best disinfectant is sun light. We need to bring this out in to the light. That is why New Democrats are proposing today to split this bill, expose it, have the debate, have the parliamentary discussion, and bring democracy back to the House of Commons.

The House resumed from May 26 consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.

Jobs and Economic Growth Act

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

When the matter was last before the House, the hon. member for Skeena-Bulkley Valley had the floor. There are seven minutes left in the time allotted for his remarks. I therefore call upon the hon. member for Skeena--Bulkley Valley.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, unfortunately it is seven minutes. We are always in a deficit of time here, particularly when dealing with something as outrageous and undemocratic as what we have contained in these near 900 pages of Bill C-9.

I say undemocratic because within this Trojan Horse of a bill, the government has conspired to lump in just about everything it found to be too distasteful to see the light of day. Rather than have a fair debate about each of these important measures, and there are two or three that are actually laudable but the vast majority are not, the government has decided to make a Trojan Horse, an omnibus bill in which everything is crammed, and then point the gun of an election at the opposition to force a vote on something that probably many members in the official opposition, the Liberals, find distasteful as well, but will obviously cave into once the vote actually comes, because that has become a call-in response from the government almost since time immemorial. The government suggests something, the Liberal Party says that it does not like it, the government dares it to go to an election, and the Liberal Party gets out of the way as fast as it can and votes with the government again. It is a coalition by default and by any other name and function.

I will list for Canadians what is in this bill that we find so outrageous. One thing on the list is the sale of AECL. Yesterday 130 workers from AECL were here in Parliament, in the galleries watching the debate, demanding some sort of fairness. What struck me most in meeting with the workers after question period was how abandoned they felt by their government that would not even allow a fair and free democratic vote on the idea of selling their corporation. It is the largest crown corporation in Canada. It has received more money than any other crown corporation in history, some $22 billion of Canadian taxpayer dollars. The legislation says that when the government seeks to sell it, it must bring it before Parliament in a separate bill.

What did the government do? It went around the rules and the legislation and rammed it into Bill C-9 so there can be no debate about the sale of AECL. There can be no bringing of witnesses to hear whether it is a good thing for Canadians or this is in fact a fire sale of a crown asset.

The government, of course, will not get that $22 billion back. It will get far less, but maybe what is worse is that with no debate, no discussion and no evidence, the government presents nothing about the likely brain drain of the experts who work around AECL to competitors who do not support the Candu reactor system. This was expressed clearly by the workers who were here recently. What are they going to do and who will do the upkeep on the Candus that Canada currently has on the books? That is just one piece of this outrageous and offensive bill.

Another piece of the bill is the raising of airport security taxes. This is from a government that says that it is into lowering taxes while at the same time it increases them. If raising taxes for the travelling public were not enough, it is also seeking to finish off the completion of the hated HST for Ontario and British Columbia, thereby putting it on any duties or any transactions that Canadians have when dealing with brokers. Buying mutual funds will now see further taxation from the government.

Is there any debate allowed about this? Is there any free and standing vote on this particular issue? Of course not, because it is a take-it-or-leave-it bill. It is 900 pages of a threat from the government, 900 pages saying to the Parliament of Canada and the people of Canada that if we do not like the idea of selling AECL without a debate, that is too bad for us, if we do not like an increase in taxes when buying a plane ticket, that is tough for us, and if we do not like the HST in Ontario or British Columbia, that is tough.

We see that type of political arrogance even within British Columbia right now. We are finding out today that every provincial riding in British Columbia have signed up enough citizens to a petition to revoke the HST. What is the arrogant response from the government and that in British Columbia? They do not care. They simply do not care about the functioning of democracy.

We have recall legislation in British Columbia that allows citizens to stand up, and it is a very high threshold, a very high bar to achieve, and British Columbians appear to be achieving it. Now that they have gone through all that work and all the volunteers out canvassing, and I am one of them who goes out and asks people to sign on, we find out that the government does not care about something called democracy, it does not care about representation and our voice mattering because it will ram the HST through anyway with no debate, no discussion, no voice for common people.

It has often been said that the best disinfectant is sunlight and we believe that to be very true when it comes to Bill C-9. We New Democrats have a proposition. With Democrat built right into our name, we like democracy. We like the idea of debate and free votes. We have said that we should take out the parts that need to be taken out and then have a debate about them. We implore other members in this House to see the wisdom of having a fair and free discussion on the elements of this bill.

Ramming everything it could think of into 900 pages of one bill and then making an election threat is not an accountable, transparent and humble government. That is a government that says that the will of the people matters little or not at all. That is disastrous, not just for the political fortunes of its party, which concerns me not, but for the fundamentals of how this place is meant to operate, which is that when we have a debate about something, we put it in legislation and bring it before the House. The government could do that with any of these pieces that it feels so proud of that it has to hide behind in Bill C-9.

We have simply said that, whether it comes to employment insurance, environmental protections, the National Energy Board, the airport tax, the HST and all of the other things rammed into this bill, the government must do the right thing and separate them out.

My last point is around the National Energy Board.

At a time when we are seeing a disaster taking place in the gulf, the President of the United States today saying that deregulation had failed them, that companies monitoring themselves was a bad idea, we see in Bill C-9 that the government is moving in the opposite direction, moving to more deregulation. It would give the Minister of the Environment the divine powers to decide what, if any, projects in the country get an environmental assessment at all. The minister can simply, by writ, decide that there is no environmental risk posed, in his or her own fictional or imaginary world, and, therefore, no environmental assessment happens.

We have learned that we need environmental protections, not just to save the environment but also to protect the communities and the economies on which we rely. This is not an economy versus environment debate and the government needs to realize that. It should allow the breakage of this bill, allow it to be separated so we can have a true and honest discussion, with witnesses and evidence, and allow the vote to stand freely and fairly. That is what a democratic government should do and that is what the government should do.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague really laid out for people back home what is so wrong with what is happening here. It is about the abuse of Parliament, the abuse of process and contempt for the systems that have been put in place in this Parliament going back right to the beginning. What we see time and time again with the government are the actions of the schoolyard bully, which is that it is the government's way or the highway. The Prime Minister has these tantrums if he does not get his way. We saw this when we were promised that we would have someone who would actually vet the appointments but thePrime Minister did not get his buddy, so he tore it up.

Now we see with this budget bill an absolute abuse of process where the Conservatives are trying to push through stuff that will help their friends in the oil industry by ripping up environmental regulations.

What does my hon. colleague think the opposition should be doing in order to stand up for the rights of parliamentarians and the rights of due process and to ensure a full study of some of these very controversial and bizarre plans that are hidden in the budget bill? What should we be doing, as Liberals, as Bloc and as New Democrats?

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, what the opposition members should be doing is their job. Our job, when we see irresponsibility and an unaccountable government, is to stand up and oppose that on behalf of Canadians who sent us here to do this.

We saw the Liberals at committee sneak one of their members out the back door to ensure that the vote would pass to allow Bill C-9 to come back to the House. We suspect that the same thing will happen here when the final vote on this outrageous bill comes.

We have seen this pattern of shutting down committees through the monkey-wrench manual the Conservatives produced. We saw it on the Afghan detainee documents. We saw it with the government's abuse of prorogation, shutting down the entire Parliament when questions arose that the government did not like.

Just the other day we finally had it confirmed where the Conservatives learned it from. They justified this bill, this outrageous abuse of democracy, by saying that the Liberals did it. They learned too well at the feet of the Liberals when they were in power and said that they did not like all the debate business, the discussions, the counterpoints and the views so they just rammed things through. That is not a lesson the Conservatives should have learned from the previous government and they should unlearn it quickly.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his presentation on Bill C-9, an 880 page omnibus bill, which is very rare in politics but not so rare when dealing with this particular Parliament and the present government.

While I do not agree with the nuclear option, the fact is that we have interests in nuclear development in Saskatchewan and in Ontario, and worldwide there is a big demand for nuclear power. Therefore, at a time when the future is looking rosy for the nuclear industry, why in the world would a government want to sell off the largest crown corporation in the country, a corporation in which we have invested $22 billion in subsidies in its history? In some ways it seems like a repeat almost of the Avro Arrow of the Diefenbaker years.

I would like to know what the member's comments would be on those observations.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, here is the mismanagement of this particular industry by the government. We are aware of 120 new nuclear builds right now around the world and zero of them are coming to Canada and zero of them are being made by Canadian operations. That is 0 out of 120.

We would imagine that the government will address this bill this afternoon but I will make a prediction that it has no rationalization because it has presented no evidence and no reason to sell AECL right now and no reason to sell it this way. I will make a prediction that this afternoon, in the parliamentary secretary's speech, the government will continue to offer nothing to Canadians, nothing to the workers and nothing to those families who will be affected by this fire sale because it does not have any evidence. It does not have a process put in place to say that now is the best time to sell AECL for these following reasons: it studied it and asked around and this is the best deal for Canadians.

The government is doing it as a matter of convenience. The entire bill is about political expediency and convenience, ramming everything that it could not get individually through, put it all in one bill, hold up the threat of an election to the opposition and watch the Liberals cave again.

This is no way to run a country. It is undemocratic. If there is nothing more fundamental than that, I beg the government to reconsider the bill, break it up and allow us to have a debate.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to take part in this afternoon's debate on Bill C-9 concerning the government's budget.

We have amendments to part 24, which changes the Employment Insurance Act by establishing an account in the accounts of Canada to be known as the employment insurance operating account and closing the employment insurance account and removing it from the accounts of Canada. It also repeals sections 76 and 80 of that act and makes consequential amendments in relation to the creation of the new account. This part also makes technical amendments to clarify provisions of the Budget Implementation Act, 2008 and the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board Act that deal with the board.

As members will recall, in 1986, the Auditor General said that the employment insurance account should be integrated into the government's consolidated revenue fund. At the time, the government, companies and employees were contributing money to the employment insurance fund.

In 1988, after the employment insurance fund was integrated into the consolidated revenue fund, the Mulroney government started to chip away at employment insurance.

As I recall, that is when things started to change. Brian Mulroney's Conservative government was in power, and the Liberals were the official opposition. I remember that in 1989, in one of the papers—this is not the first time I have brought this up in the House—my predecessor, Doug Young, who was his party's employment insurance critic at the time, urged all New Brunswickers to fight changes to employment insurance because such changes would be disastrous for New Brunswick. That is why I said this is not the first time I have talked about this issue. I want to remind the House about the Liberals' attitude at the time.

In the spring of 1993—even at the end of winter that year—Jean Chrétien was the opposition leader. He then became prime minister. He sent a letter to a group of women in Rivière-du-Loup, Quebec, who were working to stop changes to employment insurance. As opposition leader, Jean Chrétien wrote that the government should not take action against victims, people and workers. He wrote that the government should focus on economic development. The country needed economic development to create jobs for people.

To everyone's great surprise, when the Liberals were elected in the fall of 1993, they continued along the same course. We cannot say they were any worse than the Conservatives because the Conservatives had begun employment insurance reform. We do not know how far they would have gone. The Liberals had taken over the ship. They had taken over the tiller and started focusing on employment insurance. They also started thinking that what was in place was not so bad. Former Prime Minister Brian Mulroney had agreed to the Auditor General's recommendation to put the money into the consolidated revenue fund. The Liberals realized that this gave them more money and that employment insurance contributions gave them more money.

The Conservative government had increased premiums to roughly $3.08 or $3.20 for every $100 and the employer paid 1.3 or 1.5 times that amount. In other words, this represented roughly $8. It was a cash cow.

Money was coming in and cuts were being made to employment insurance. The worst cuts came in 1996: the number of hours to qualify was increased to 910; 420 hours were required in areas where the unemployment rate was greater than 13%; new entrants had to accumulate 910 hours; 700 hours were required in areas with low unemployment; 700 hours were required for a person who was sick or disabled to be granted special leave; 700 hours were required for maternity and parental leave. So much money was flowing into the employment insurance fund that it could not be ignored. The federal government was running a $565 billion deficit. It reduced the deficit by $92 billion, $57 billion of which came from the employment insurance fund.

Paul Martin, who was the finance minister at the time, told Canadians to tighten their belts to eliminate the deficit and pay down the debt. He robbed the employment insurance fund to pay down the debt and achieve a zero deficit.

At the time, the Conservatives, who make up the new Conservative government, condemned the theft from the employment insurance fund. Surprise, surprise, they returned to power in 2006 and this continued on into 2010. Now, they have presented Bill C-9, which is some 900 pages about the budget, and in which the government legalizes this theft from the employment insurance fund. That is what is going on here. By creating this new board, by creating a new fund and putting only $2 billion in it, the government is legalizing the biggest national and federal theft in the history of Canada.

I am calling it a theft, because workers pay employment insurance premiums out of their paycheques as security in case they lose their jobs. It is not meant to be used to pay down the government's debt. Now, people are in need.

We have just been through a serious economic crisis. Some people have used up their employment insurance benefits and do not have a job. We could increase the number of benefit weeks. We could base the calculation on the best 12 weeks instead of the best 14 weeks. We could eliminate the divisor of 14, which would give the best 12 weeks. We could also increase benefits from 55% to 60%. We could give these workers a chance.

In other countries, like France, for example, workers receive 75% of their income. When I brought up the idea of increasing the amount people receive, when we asked the government to increase the number of weeks, all the Conservative government could think to say was that if we were to do that, people would work 10 weeks and would receive 52 weeks of employment insurance benefits. They would work only 360 hours and would receive EI the rest of the year. The Conservatives have no faith in Canadian workers. That is the problem. They have no faith in our fellow citizens.

I asked a member of the French national assembly if paying benefits of up to 75% of wages made people want to receive employment insurance benefits rather than work. His response was altogether different. He said that he truly believes in workers and citizens, and added that they are very hard-working and that they want to work. They pay into the employment insurance program, which protects them in the event they lose their jobs. He added that if these workers want to pay themselves a wage while they are unemployed, it is good for the economy and good for everyone. It is good for the regions and it is good for small and medium-sized businesses. When a citizen receives benefits, he does not take off the next morning for a sunny spot such as Florida.

Instead, he goes grocery shopping. He buys something, or pays his bills. It is good for our economy, for our local economy.

It is unfortunate to see that the government has included all sorts of things in Bill C-9. And the first thing it will say is that we voted against it, that we voted against the huge monster it has created. We cannot support this omnibus Bill C-9.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the points raised by my colleague. He said that this 888-page bill containing close to 3,000 clauses refers to a budget almost 500 pages long. On page 176, we see all the employment insurance contributions from businesses and workers, and on page 180 we see the employment insurance benefits that will be paid out to unemployed people. Nowhere in the 500 pages of the budget, the 888 pages of the bill or the 3,000 clauses do they do the math. They will steal $19.2 billion over four years. That means that employers and employees will have contributed $19.2 billion more than the amount of benefits paid out.

I would like to know what my colleague thinks about this and how he would describe it. Is there a word that comes to mind to describe this move?

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, only one word comes to mind: taking without asking is stealing. That is what is unfortunate. Workers, men and women who get up every morning, have built our country. They have families to support and they want to send their children to school, but poverty has reached the point where 1.4 million children in Canada are hungry. We do not need to go to Africa. Right here in Canada there are 1.4 million hungry children, while 800,000 people do not qualify for employment insurance. How can we vote for the budget this government is serving up?

What is sad is that the theft started in 1996 with the Liberals and today it will be sanctioned by the Liberals and the Conservatives. It is unfortunate to, once again, see the coalition between the Conservatives and the Liberals, with its ties to Bay Street in Toronto. That is the problem.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-9 is an abuse of the public. The government is forcing through major changes without giving the public even a chance to sense what is happening. Nowhere is it clearer than with the $57 billion that is being stolen from the EI fund.

The government cannot be honest with the public and neither can the Minister of Human Resources. When we asked the minister about her plan to shut down 15 of the 18 EI processing centres across Ontario, she could not even stand in the House and give an honest answer.

However, we know that Owen Sound, Orillia, Kenora, Belleville, North Bay, Timmins, Sault Ste. Marie, Brantford, Etobicoke, Barrie, Peterborough, Hamilton, Niagara Falls, Thunder Bay, Kitchener and Oshawa centres are being closed. Why are they being closed? Because the government is stealing the money from EI. It is running out of money because it is giving $1.7 billion in corporate tax cuts.

Why is the government unable to give an honest answer to Canadian workers? Why can is the minister not stand in the House and explain what she is doing by robbing workers of access to EI, robbing them of the kind of processing for their EI claims, which they need at this time of recession?

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, it is very simple. Workers have always been the slaves of big industry. It is not the Conservative government that will support them. Workers pay into the programs so if they lose their jobs, they can get the money when they need it.

Other countries around the world look after their workers if they lose their jobs, especially if they pay into a program. In Canada our government takes the money and puts it toward the debt. It has had a deficit balance how many times because of the money from employment insurance. Of the $92 billion paid down on the debt, $57 billion came from the workers, from the hard-working men and women. The government took it away from them.

The only reason is because the Conservative government is reporting to Bay Street instead of reporting to the citizens of our country, the men and women who get up in the morning and do the work to build this good country in which we live. The government does not care about the workers. It has never cared about them. Instead it says that if it gives workers money, they will stay home.

The problem is the government has no respect for our workers, the men and women who get up in the morning and do the hard work.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the President of the Treasury Board]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to speak against this ill-advised NDP motion, which is clearly a delaying tactic, and to speak for supporting jobs and Canada's economic recovery. Like my colleagues on the government side of the aisle, I am opposed to this motion.

I oppose this motion, because delaying or threatening to gut budget 2010 and the jobs and economic growth act would only threaten the economic security of Canadians. I oppose delaying over $500 million in transfer protection payments to the provinces. I oppose delaying funding for organizations, such as the $75 million for Genome Canada, the $20 million for Pathways to Education Canada to provide support for disadvantaged youth, and the $13.5 million for the Rick Hansen Foundation.

I oppose delaying important reforms to protect federally regulated pension plans, such as requiring an employer to fully fund benefits if the whole of a pension plan is terminated. I oppose delaying legislative authority to enforce the code of conduct for the debit and credit industry. I oppose delaying crucial tax changes to revitalize Canada's venture capital industry and much more.

I oppose delaying Canada's economic action plan. It is important that we stay the course and do what we must as legislators to ensure that we implement year two of Canada's economic action plan, as outlined in budget 2010, in a timely manner so as to best assist Canadians. Our government, through the jobs and economic growth act, is working to address the long-term opportunities and challenges our country will be confronting in the years ahead.

One of these key challenges is ensuring that our companies remain competitive in the global marketplace. We are determined to assist our hard-working manufacturers in meeting this objective. The jobs and economic growth act proposes to bring forward a series of economic measures to contribute to Canada's advantage now and in the future. One of these measures is the action we have taken to eliminate tariffs on manufacturing inputs, machinery, and equipment, which would make Canada a tariff-free zone for manufacturing.

Some have charged that the act is too ambitious, too large. However, if you were to carefully review the actual act, you would soon realize that because of the technical and legal requirements, the bold action to make Canada a tariff-free zone for manufacturing actually makes up over half of the act. In other words, half the pages in the jobs and economic growth act are the result of that one single measure.

Clearly, as suggested by its size, this measure has immense short-term and long-term benefits for our economy. This has been recognized by the Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters, who were clear that in their view, budget 2010 and the jobs and economic growth act will help Canada's manufacturers and exporters compete. They said:

We worked with the government directly to reduce tariffs for manufacturing and I believe this is an important cost-savings mechanism for companies....[I]t is a bottom-line boost to cash flow for manufacturers at a time when it is needed the most.

By lowering production costs for manufacturing, this initiative increases the competitiveness of our manufacturers, which will help them better compete with foreign suppliers, both in Canada and abroad. By reducing the cost of importing key factors of production, this measure also encourages innovation and allows businesses to enhance their stock of capital equipment. This is very important for improving productivity.

Equally important is the positive impact this measure is expected to have on employment. All in all, it is estimated that our move to make Canada a tariff-free zone for industrial manufacturers will create 12,000 new, good-quality jobs in the years ahead. This will certainly help strengthen our economy. That is why measures such as tariff elimination have been so widely applauded.

We have heard from business leaders, such as like Dani Reiss, CEO of that popular Arctic Canadian coat manufacturer, Canada Goose. He heralded it as “a great move” and said, “tariffs only made it more expensive to be a Canadian manufacturer. I think this move by the government will make 'Made in Canada' viable for more apparel companies”.

However, the jobs and economic growth act does so much more. For instance, the targeted measures include the provisions in part 7 and part 8 of the bill that are part of budget 2010's actions for containing growth in government spending and ensuring that the government lives within its means. In particular, part 7 implements the budget 2010 commitment to freeze the salaries of the Prime Minister, ministers, members of Parliament, and senators for the 2010 through 2013 fiscal years.

By putting forward the salary freeze for the Prime Minister, ministers, MPs, and senators, the government is leading by example in budget 2010.

This initiative has been welcomed by Canadians. The opposition has also reacted positively to the proposed salary freeze, at least initially.

Before concluding, let me directly address those who have been critical of the jobs and economic growth act. They seem to have randomly pointed to select measures and for singularly political reasons have deemed them unnecessary. They would, it seems, delay or defeat the act to prevent these measures from going forward.

Many of these individuals, spurred on by vested interests, have used as their partisan punching bag the provisions that would allow competition in the outgoing international-mail marketplace. This is a measure that we know will directly save thousands of Canadian jobs. I ask those individuals to put partisanship aside and read the frank testimony the finance committee heard from a witness who spoke on this measure, a witness who pointed out that this competition has already been occurring for decades.

Barry Sikora is a small businessman from British Columbia. Mr. Sikora has been involved in the international mail industry for over 30 years. He has been employing people for over 30 years and contributing to his community for over 30 years. He was that witness, and he had a simple message: pass this act. In his own words, and I quote, he said:

...[M]y company employed 31 people. We're not a huge corporation; we're an average business in the printing industry. Now, because of this situation, we're down to 17 employees. Many of our customers have left us...[and] they have taken their business to another country. They have forced our industry to lay off long-time employees, and that's not a pleasant thing to do...Already we've lost a significant amount of business. We're hoping that it will come back, but...if this [act] doesn't pass, I'm out of business.

For those individuals who are spurred on by vested interests and their ideological, procedural, and partisan narrow casting, remember Mr. Sikora and the Canadians he employs and the Canadian jobs he would like to add. Think about those jobs lost and the families impacted if we delay or defeat this act.

Clearly, Canadians are looking to all members of this House to take action to support jobs and economic growth. We cannot afford to delay the implementation of budget 2010.

This motion by the NDP is simply a tactic to delay House consideration of measures that are urgently needed to ensure that Canada's economic recovery continues. That is why the government does not support the motion. Instead, we will continue to work with the opposition to ensure that this act is adopted by Parliament as quickly as possible for the benefit of all Canadians.

I therefore call on all members of this House to oppose this motion.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I find it hard to believe that the member could actually make that speech with a straight face.

The reality is that we have no objection to the government introducing its budget implementation bill. However, we object to the government introducing an 880-page omnibus bill that goes way, way beyond budget implementation.

It throws in a privatization process involving the post office that it could not get through in the last two years under two successive bills. The government knows that it cannot get it through, so it throws it into the budget implementation bill knowing that the Liberals have no choice but to adopt the whole bill.

The government has just thrown a whole hodge-podge of things into this bill to try to force it through on the threat of an election. That is totally unfair.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the government is acting to save thousands of Canadian jobs by enabling competition within the outgoing international-mail marketplace. Canadian businesses will have more choice and opportunity for their outbound international mail if this legislation passes.

What we are really talking about today is delaying implementation of key elements of budget 2010, a budget designed to stimulate the economy and create jobs so that Canadians can go back to work.

The jobs and economic growth act is a testament to the proactive and ambitious actions our Conservative government has taken to ensure that Canada was not only protected from the worst of the global economic storm but will lead the global economic recovery.

The NDP claims to try to help workers, but has failed to give any suggestions or a plan to get more people back to work or create jobs. That is what year two of Canada's economic action plan is about: helping Canadians emerge from economic hardship.

Instead of helping workers, the NDP is too busy playing political games. It is delaying the implementation of a bill designed to help Canadians and continue the fragile recovery that is already taking place.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very surprised to hear the Conservative member talking about this issue. When we discussed it in committee with the businessman he just quoted, it was pointed out that this had absolutely nothing to do with the budget. It should have been discussed in the appropriate standing committee, where interested parties with the appropriate expertise could have asked questions. We had only a few hours to review 888 pages or around 3,000 clauses.

I really have to wonder why this member suddenly feels like this concerns him, because I do not recall him showing any interest in this matter at the Standing Committee on Finance.

[Andrew Saxton, Conservative, North Vancouver, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I remind my hon. colleague that this bill passed through committee unamended.

Here are some of the provisions the NDP members are delaying with their political games: eliminating tariffs on manufacturing imports of machinery and equipment; narrowing the definition of taxable Canadian property; implementing important changes to strengthen federally regulated private pension plans; implementing the one-time transfer protection payment to the provinces; regulating national payment card networks and their operators; enabling credit unions to incorporate federally and to act as banks; stimulating the mining industry by extending the mineral exploration credit; creating greater fairness between single-parent and two-parent families with respect to claiming universal child care benefits; and implementing an enhanced stamping regime for tobacco products to deter contraband.

These are just some of the wonderful things in this budget bill. I ask the opposition members to get together and pass it so that we can get Canadians back to work and on track.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate on the budget implementation bill at report stage.

I will try to keep my remarks focused on the first group of amendments proposed here today and yesterday.

As the vice-chairman of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance, I have gone through the bill. I have heard testimony from expert witnesses on the bill. I have spoken to Canadians from all walks of life about the implications of the bill, and I have debated the merits of the bill with my colleagues.

One theme keeps surfacing over and over again: the lack of direction of the bill.

It is indicative of the fact that this Conservative government has no vision for Canada going forward.

The bill lacks vision and ambition, and shows a clear distaste for what a government can and must do to help its citizens and the country prepare for an uncertain future.

Also, the bill is so massive that it makes a mockery of the budget process and is a direct attack on our ability as parliamentarians to perform our due diligence.

There are countless items included in the bill that should be tabled in separate legislation so that MPs can properly study them and arrive at informed decisions about them.

The only reason I can think of to explain why the Conservatives have chosen to produce such a bulky and incoherent bill is that the Conservative government does not want us to be able to honestly and effectively debate in the open, because it obviously has something to hide.

This is the reason we are here at report stage having to debate all these extras piece by piece instead of in separate bills. One of those extra pieces that should be separated is the amendment to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, one of our most important pieces of environmental legislation. It is being gutted by the budget bill. It gives the environment minister unilateral power to avoid doing detailed environmental assessments on large projects by breaking the projects up into smaller pieces. The minister can establish the scope of the environmental assessment as broadly or as narrowly as he or she sees fit, whereas current legislation provides for public consultation.

This is a trend that occurs far too often with the government. There is no public input, no parliamentary oversight, and all decisions are made under a shroud of secrecy so it can advance its secret, hidden agenda.

Incidentally, the Supreme Court has already ruled on the matter of the Red Chris project, which involved allegations that the government had broken the law by giving the Minister of the Environment and any other responsible authority the power to change projects as they saw fit, without taking into account developers' proposals.

Furthermore, for the second year in a row, the government is using the budget implementation bill to weaken environmental laws. These amendments have nothing to do with the budget implementation. They constitute a direct attack on Parliament.

Another item in the report stage amendments is the increase in the airport travellers security tax. The problem here is that while this airport tax probably belongs in the budget, the fact the government is not calling it a tax probably means that it should not be included.

We are told that the fee is to cover the costs of purchasing new high-tech scanners. If this is the case, then it would not be asking too much to request that such a tax dedicated for a specific purpose be separated from general revenues. Instead, the moneys collected are going to go directly into the general revenues of the government and are therefore considered a tax increase.

However, when we ask how the amount of the tax to be levied was determined, we get no studies or facts to back up the request. No evidence is provided to prove that the costs will be offset by the additional tax or, vice versa, that the revenues from this new tax will offset the additional costs. This is what we call a hidden tax increase, which is why the Tourism Industry Association of Canada is against this tax.

Tourism is already down in every region of the country, and this tax would further dissuade people from travelling to and from Canada. Canadian airport authorities are already complaining that they are losing passengers, who are choosing to fly out of U.S. destinations. While Canada is struggling with its productivity, airports and travellers will be stuck paying more, while in the U.S. the government pays for airport security directly from its general revenues.

Another aspect of this bill that should be separate is the fact that this bill will close the former employment insurance account and change some of the provisions dealing with the new employment insurance financing board.

In other words, the government appoints a board to establish employment insurance rates, and then in typical Conservative fashion, the board is not consulted and the government does what it wants anyway in setting the EI rate, as we saw in the budget. The finance minister has already booked the revenues from the EI premiums using the maximum rate increases allowable, that is, 15¢ per $100 of wages of the employees and an additional tax of 21¢ per $100 of wages paid by employers.

Those who will be most affected by this tax increase will be small and medium size businesses and any worker out there. Not only is this tax increase permanent, but it will also increase exponentially every single year.

This bill does not address the need to create jobs now. Instead, it basically provides a framework for the Conservatives to raise employment insurance premiums by 35%.

After four years, an extra $6 billion a year in revenues will be collected from a source that cannot afford to be taxed any more: the everyday hard-working Canadian.

Again, here we are. As I have said in the past, everything this government does is based on no public input, no parliamentary oversight, and all decisions are made under a shroud of secrecy to advance the government's secret and hidden agenda. This is unacceptable.

At a time when Canadians are demanding more openness and transparency from elected officials, the government has tabled a budget that is so bloated and incoherent that ordinary Canadians cannot possibly be expected to determine whether this budget actually addresses their needs. In order to meet the needs and expectations of Canadians, it is critical that we take stock of where we stand.

We do not really see how this budget will make Canada more competitive and more prosperous, or better prepare it to create jobs or protect workers' pensions. Budget 2010 is a failure not only because it does not prepare Canada for the challenges that lie ahead in the short and medium term, but also because it ignores their very existence.

When Canadians and parliamentarians are distracted from the real budget numbers, we forget to ask questions about these numbers, but we need to look at them because, after all, this is a budget bill and the numbers put forward by the minister in this budget do not look good. This budget will cost Canadians $238 billion this year alone and add $24 billion to our national debt. These numbers are troubling, but the government will try to argue that short-term pain is necessary to achieve long-term gain. The problem is that its long-term projections are even more troubling. This budget will add over $100 billion to our national debt over the next five years.

I cannot, in good conscience, vote in favour of this budget because it spends too much and achieves too little, and because critical areas of concern have gone completely unaddressed while others have been covertly attacked because they do not fall into line with the government's radical right-wing ideology. I cannot vote in favour of this budget because it does nothing to get Canadians back to work, does nothing to protect the jobs that still exist, and does nothing to position Canada to succeed in the future.

Ultimately, I cannot vote in favour of this budget because I love Canada and this budget is bad for Canada.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the hon. member what he thinks about the $57 billion the government is taking from the pockets of working women and men of this country, something this government is now rubber stamping via this budget.

I would like to know what the hon. member thinks about this $57 billion the government is spending.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, that is an excellent question.

When the Liberals were in power, they obviously made sure that we were in a healthy position. The money was always put aside and properly accounted for, and now the government is turning around and trying to hide it.

Actually, it is very easy to determine what happened to the money. The Conservatives took the money and spent it last year. They spent $57 billion just last year, so the hon. member could ask them where the money is. They have answers for the hon. member.

The money was not only taken from individuals but was also taken from small businesses and medium size businesses. That money belongs to Canadians.

Tell the Conservatives to give it back.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in 1995, when, in the midst of an economic recession, the Liberals started pillaging the employment insurance fund—if not stealing—they created a sort of precedent by reducing the number of benefits and access to employment insurance. Then, they just took the money that belonged to the unemployed and used it to pay down the deficit. The Conservatives picked up where the Liberals left off.

I would ask our hon. colleague what the Liberals will do if they take power. Will they give back the money they took from the unemployed, or will they turn a blind eye and keep on pillaging the EI fund just as they used to do?

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my Bloc colleague for that very good question. I also want to thank him for the support the Bloc gave us during the recession, when we had to make some very hard choices.

He sees that the Conservative government is incapable of managing public funds. When the Liberal government was in power during the recession, money was invested in labour and in job re-entry and other programs. When the recession ended, there was still a surplus, which was always accounted for. What will this budget do? It will wipe the money from the books, and we will lose our oversight.

When we take power, we will decide what we are going to do. But I can say that we will not steal money, as the Conservatives have been doing for two years.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like the hon. member to comment on the tax increases the government is bringing in on the security fees paid by air travellers. We are talking about a 50% increase. This is coming from a government that prides itself on lowering taxes, on reducing corporate taxes to 15%, and here it is hitting Canadian travellers with 50% increases.

[Massimo Pacetti, Liberal, Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the government does not decrease taxes. The government has been the highest spending government year after year in the last four years. Never in the history of Canada has any government spent so much money as this government has.

The Conservatives are finding ways to increase taxes. The air travellers tax is a tax. The hon. member need not ask me how to substantiate it. We asked the witnesses who came before committee about this, but no one was able to present a single fact on how they came to that number.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, just now I heard a common refrain. I would have liked to have asked the member for Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel, whose riding is next to mine, a question. I was thrilled by my Liberal neighbour, who ended his speech by stating that he will vote against it for such and such a reason. I am certain that he will be there to vote against this bill. I did not have time to ask him why all members of his party will not be there to vote against this bill. He tells me they will be there. I hope they will have the courage to show up and to do as Bloc members do, to stand up and tell the House what they think. I have a great deal of respect for my colleague who is vice-chair of the Standing Committee on Finance, as am I.

As for the amendments proposed by our colleague from Outremont and his party, I take this opportunity to denounce Bill C-9 as unparliamentary. I had the honour of serving my fellow citizens at the National Assembly of Quebec fifteen years ago. Adopting budgets, presenting amendments, sitting on parliamentary committees is all part of the British tradition of the National Assembly and of this Parliament.

There used to be two major speeches in a parliamentary year: the throne speech and the budget speech. The budget speech was read and then there would be a myriad of laws sponsored by the Department of Revenue, Natural Resources and other laws that implemented what the finance minister had set out in his budget speech. There might be a specific bill to increase or decrease the sales tax. Or a bill to create a business tax, or various taxes, charges, and other economic measures. That was done properly by parliament, bill after bill, parliamentary committee after parliamentary committee. There was time to address questions to public servants, heads of crown corporations or ministers such as the Minister of Revenue, the Minister of Energy, and ministers with this type of expertise.

Today, we are dealing with an omnibus bill. There are thousands of clauses in its 887 pages. They have thrown in everything, including the kitchen sink. This bill contains items that were not even mentioned in the budget speech. We have never seen them. They have appeared from nowhere and suddenly are found in the budget implementation bill.

Some changes were proposed by the NDP. It would delete part 3 because it does not agree with this section that increases the air travellers security charge. There is an increase in the charge. This government says it never increases taxes, but there are proposals and parts of legislation that mention increasing charges. The Conservatives are either naive or incompetent. I will leave that up to them. This charge is for “air travellers security”. However, there is no travellers protection fund. The government will take the money and put it in the consolidated revenue fund. If money is ever needed for traveller protection, it will just be taken from the fund and given to whoever needs it. I fail to see how one equates with the other.

It is the same as with other parts. There are motions to delete part 24, which amends the Employment Insurance Act. Our colleague from Acadie—Bathurst gave a very fine speech on this. I asked him some questions and his answers were clear and to the point. He said that this was stealing—those are his words—and I agree with him. Again, what is the government doing? It is increasing the costs and shifting the burden to the employers and employees, and decreasing benefits as much as possible. But its bottom line does not suffer. These proposed amendments should be referred to a standing committee that is equipped to study these types of issues.

Then there is an amendment to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, which includes an exception for federally funded infrastructure projects. That is quite a mouthful and nothing is very clear. All this was included in an omnibus bill.

Let us not forget the National Energy Board. What does this have to do with the Standing Committee on Finance or with a budget bill? That is why we agree with the NDP that these practically unreadable parts of the bill should be deleted.

The Speaker ruled that we would study the bill in two parts because the other two parts deal with Canada Post and Atomic Energy Canada, two crown corporations that are unrelated to program budgets, revenues, taxes and charges. However, we will look at this later and we will say that we are in favour of removing this type of thing because it is unrelated.

I listened closely to the Conservative members opposite who came to oppose deleting certain parts, as the NDP is proposing. I have seen these members a bit in the House, but I have never seen them at the Standing Committee on Finance. Where were they? I do not know.

Parliamentary functions need to be taken seriously. We have to know what we are talking about. We cannot come here and read a speech that we have never seen before that was written by someone else. We have to have the confidence to state our opinions because we are competent enough to do so.

What we have seen today is shameful from a parliamentary standpoint. Members are reading speeches and quoting people. They quoted someone today that they have never seen or heard because they were not at the Standing Committee on Finance. But we were there. We were forced to study the issue when we felt that it should have been studied elsewhere.

The Bloc Québécois, which continues to work hard to defend Quebec's interests and to do its parliamentary job well, will vote in favour of the amendments put forward by the NDP. Once again, I hope that all of the Liberal Party members will hear the heartfelt appeal from the member for Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel and will vote against this infamous budget.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the hon. Bloc Québécois member regarding the $57 billion that will disappear from the budget, if it passes. We could use that $57 billion to help many people get out of poverty, including seniors, young people who are still in school and are hungry, and parents who are unemployed and cannot receive EI benefits because there is not enough money in the EI fund. I would like to hear the hon. Bloc Québécois member's thoughts on this.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it can be difficult for people to grasp the meaning of billions of dollars, since it is such an astronomical amount. One billion dollars is the equivalent of $1 million for every work day, five days a week, 50 weeks a year, for four years. And that is just $1 billion.

Now imagine $57 billion. The Conservatives are going to steal $19.2 billion from Quebec and Canadian workers and businesses. Today we heard about the $1 billion that is going to be spent on security for the G8 and G20 meetings, for just 72 hours. How much is that? That equals $14 million an hour. Who in this House earns $14 million an hour? No one. Who spends $14 million an hour? The Conservatives.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague a question. I congratulate him on his excellent speech. He has been our finance critic since he joined us, and he is doing an excellent job.

Naturally, I find it shameful that the government has plundered the employment insurance fund, but at the same time, since 2004, when I became an MP, both the Liberals and the Conservatives have opposed bills that would improve the employment insurance system. They have opposed giving workers access to EI after 360 hours of work, and they have opposed eliminating the waiting period. While the government is stealing billions of dollars from the unemployed, it is denying them access to EI and refusing to improve the system. I think it is a real shame, and I would like to hear what my colleague has to say about this.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is absolutely right. Let us imagine that for the next four years, the surplus in the employment insurance fund, the money that comes from the pockets of employers and employees, will be around $400 million.

Add that to the $3.8 billion, and we have $4.2 billion. If we add that $4.2 billion to the $6.8 billion, we have $11 billion. Then, if we add $8.2 billion, the total is $19.2 billion. They got embarrassed and stopped there.

Imagine what we could do with that kind of money. Think about the waiting period. Workers are being told that they have lost their job, that there is no more overtime and that they have been the victims of cutbacks. A worker loses his job and we no longer have faith in him. He will have to live two weeks without an income. Absolutely nothing. Then, it can take a long time for the first cheque to arrive. We see that in our ridings, but they do not see that. It would be great to dream a bit and to imagine that this government could one day decide to be more social-minded and more supportive of the least fortunate. It has the money to do so.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a particular interest in taking part in the debate today on Bill C-9 at report stage and the amendments that have been proposed. This bill would implement various initiatives the Conservative government included in its March 4 budget.

As many of my Bloc Québécois colleagues have already said, we are opposed to this bill for many reasons.

The measures in this budget do not meet Quebeckers' needs. None of the major priorities of our region and Quebec as a whole—improving employment insurance and the guaranteed income supplement, helping our manufacturing and forestry industries, harmonizing the QST with the GST and introducing a real plan to help the furniture industry, which is going through its share of problems—is addressed in this budget.

We also oppose Bill C-9 because it is blatantly undemocratic. It is an omnibus bill, as a number of speakers have pointed out. It includes the privatization of Canada Post, for example, and measures that have nothing to do with a budget. Our finance critic mentioned that in his speech. The bill contains a number of things that have never even been discussed by the Standing Committee on Finance.

The government is trying to put measures in the bill that the House would not approve otherwise. The Conservatives know that the Liberals, who are weak politically, will support them. The Conservatives will be able to implement these measures and ram them down Quebeckers' and Canadians' throats.

Among the many amendments we are discussing today, I would like to talk about part 24 of Bill C-9.

This part closes the separate Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board's account and opens a new account called the employment insurance operating account. It eliminates, once and for all, the surplus accumulated thanks to unemployed workers who kept contributing as the government tightened access to employment insurance. Employers and employees contributed over $57 billion to the employment insurance fund. This omnibus bill eliminates for all time the accumulated surplus and starts over at zero. That is a real shame.

Once again, we proposed numerous initiatives to support unemployed workers, from eliminating the waiting period to improving the system. At the height of the economic crisis, 50% of the population did not even have access to EI. During that time, huge surpluses were building up in the employment insurance fund. This theft from the people of Canada and Quebec is sanctioned in Bill C-9, an omnibus bill.

Unemployed workers do not have access to employment insurance, and the government got billions of dollars out of them to finance other measures. Those workers paid taxes. They contributed to the government's treasury. That same government found another way to attack the poorest members of society by stealing money from the employment insurance fund.

As I explained, the government wants the middle class and workers to foot the bill for the deficit, while banks, oil companies and the rich get off scot free. It gives tax breaks to banks that hide huge amounts of money in tax shelters. It gives tax breaks to oil companies and, as we know, it supported the auto industry while neglecting Quebec's unemployed workers and its forestry and manufacturing industries.

Unfortunately, the budget implementation act officially sanctions the federal government's embezzlement of money from the employment insurance fund, which started when the Liberal Party was in power in the 1990s. Embezzlement is exactly what it was. The government took money held in reserve for unemployed workers, money contributed by employers and employees, and put it in another fund to be spent elsewhere. That is what I call embezzlement. Over the course of 14 years, they stole $57 billion. That is shameful. I am appalled.

Since 2004, the Bloc Québécois has been fighting here in this House to improve the guaranteed income supplement for seniors. That is another example of how the government stealing money, from seniors in that case. They have taken money from the unemployed. They refused to improve the employment insurance program. They have refused to use the guaranteed income supplement to support the seniors who did not receive this supplement for a number of years. Those seniors are not being reimbursed. The government always manages to support the banks and the rich to the detriment of the poorest in our society. That is what is happening in this House and it is shameful.

It is as though the 14 years of misappropriation never happened, thanks to this omnibus legislation. The debt is erased. They took $57 billion from the unemployed and now they turn the page. They act as though nothing happened. It is shameful. It is like a magic trick. We know that the Liberals' weakness means that they will vote with the Conservatives and support this bill. But they will still have to live with their guilt because they also dipped into the fund. The Liberals and Conservatives will erase it all in the hope that people will have forgotten in a couple of years. But the Bloc Québécois will not forget. We will continue to denounce this Conservative government manoeuvre, which was supported by the Liberals, to misappropriate money from the employment insurance fund.

It is unbelievable if you think about it. They want to pretend the misappropriation of $57 billion never happened and on top of that, help themselves to more money in the future, because the EI fund is accumulating another surplus with employers' and employees' premiums. Additional surpluses of $19 billion are expected for the next three years. With that money alone, we could resolve the issue of the two-week waiting period for unemployed workers. In my riding, over 4,000 people have signed a petition on this issue, calling on the government to eliminate the two-week waiting period. We could improve the employment insurance system and make it more accessible for all workers.

But, no, what we see here instead is more of the same old story. The government stole $57 billion from unemployed workers. It is going to help itself to another $19 billion from them over the next few years and will do nothing to improve the employment insurance system to allow workers to live more comfortably in a difficult situation, because many workers are losing their jobs. The government is still misappropriating money from the fund.

The Bloc Québécois would like the government to present a plan to pay back the money it misappropriated from the EI fund.

We call on the government to improve the employment insurance system, help unemployed workers and stimulate the economy. If we help the unemployed, people who are temporarily out of work could continue buying goods, paying their rent or mortgage and making car payments. They could continue paying their bills and supporting their families. This is good for the economy, for families and for many other things.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, the Budget; the hon. member for Vancouver Kingsway, Justice; the hon. member for Labrador, Vale Inco.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend for his presentation today on Bill C-9. In Canada the banks made $15.9 billion in 2009. We have a government that is bent on reducing corporate taxation to as low as 15% over the next three years. And all the while that has been happening, the bank presidents are earning as high as $10.4 million a year. While this is going on, we have in this omnibus bill increases to the air security tax, which is going to be paid by all Canadians. Those airport security taxes are going up by 50% making them and Canada the highest tax jurisdiction in the world, exceeding Holland which was the highest up until last year.

Would the member comment on how it is the government can get away with saying it is reducing taxes when it is actually increasing taxes for the vast majority of Canadians?

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will answer part of the questions raised by my colleague from the NDP. We know that the banks have amassed enormous surpluses. I mentioned that in my speech. We have even heard of banks that use tax havens. There are bankers who earn enormous salaries to the tune of $3 million, $4 million, $5 million, $6 million or even $7 million a year. There are people who leave those banks with a pension of between $500,000 and $600,000. And then there is the employment insurance fund.

People today no longer trust their institutions. That is serious. When we see a poor worker lose his job and see that the government is not supporting the company, or when an unemployed person opens the paper and sees that these bankers are pocketing huge profits, we understand where this lack of trust is coming from. The government is giving these bankers tax relief to boot. People end up no longer having any confidence in these institutions.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Berthier—Maskinongé, who is doing an excellent job. Bill C-9 has a full chapter on Canada Post and the removal of its exclusive privilege over letters for delivery outside Canada.

The president of Canada Post, who I just heard is leaving her job, told the committee that, in 2007, Canada Post lost $80 million because of these businesses. They were freely dipping into and encroaching on the exclusive privilege of Canada Post, even though they did not have the right. We can only imagine the massive amounts of money that Canada Post will lose if this bill passes.

I know that my colleague is very sensitive to the loss in revenues for Canada Post, because lost revenues lead to lost services. In rural regions, like my riding and the communities my colleague serves, there are concerns. Is my colleague worried about this bill that puts an end to Canada Post's exclusive privilege over international mail?

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

The hon. member for Berthier—Maskinongé only has time for a brief response.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his excellent question.

The government is actually privatizing part of Canada Post in a so-called budget implementation bill. This budget contains a measure regarding Canada Post that should not be there.

International mail is Canada Post's cash cow. The Canada Post Corporation is losing money, and the government is giving the profits to the private sector and the losses to the public sector. Cuts are often made in rural areas and not in major centres. In recent years, a number of post offices have been closed—

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

Order. Resuming debate. The hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise again to speak to Bill C-9. The bill has now come out of committee and our party has had to introduce several motions to attempt to make deletions to the bill. The bill is so massive, at 880 pages, it must be a record, certainly by weight.

We have 60 some motions covered by these resolutions. The other members who have spoken today have essentially explained how and why the bill has come to us the way it has. It has been quite a number of years since I can recall a similar approach being taken by a government, which takes me back to 1889-90 in a minority government in Manitoba when the Filmon Conservatives did similar omnibus bills over a two year period, I believe. Not only did we have the budget implementation measures put into a bill, but we had extra items thrown in. One was the privatization of a business in Brandon that had absolutely nothing to do with the bill at hand.

If we fast forward to the present, this is the type of frustration with which the members of the House are dealing. The government has taken not only the budget implementation act, which we all agree is something that should be dealt with, but it has thrown in many extra measures, which rightly belong as separate legislation.

The best example of this is the issue of the Canada Post remailers. The government over the last two years, or perhaps longer, has attempted to get Bill C-14 and Bill C-44 through Parliament, which would remove Canada Post's legal monopoly on outgoing international letters. This is the thin edge of the wedge to start to privatize Canada Post.

The government introduced that bill as two separate bill numbers in past years, brought it into a minority Parliament and found the opposition so strong that it could not get it through. Therefore, the government has taken that legislation and added into this omnibus bill.

The government has added in the sale of AECL, which the member for Skeena—Bulkley Valley has rightfully pointed out has cost the Canadian taxpayers perhaps $22 billion in subsidies over its history. At the present time, nuclear looks like it is making a comeback. As the member indicated, we are looking at perhaps 120 new nuclear builds around the world. What the government is attempting to do is sell off this crown corporation, probably at fire sale rates and probably to foreign investors and American investors. They will then buy an asset, at a fire sale price, paid for by the Canadian taxpayer and will make a success of the company by building nuclear plants around the world.

This is what is being suggested. The fact is this element of Bill C-9 does not belong there. This is rightfully a subject for a different bill, a different day and a totally different subject for debate.

We want the Canadian people to understand what is going on here. A government that cannot get its way one way simply circumvents the process and attempts to bring it in through an omnibus bill.

After the second prorogation of the House, the opposition parties attempted to bring in motions and resolutions to put some qualifications on any future prorogations by the Prime Minister. It is high time the House adopt some rules on when the Prime Minister can prorogue the House.

Likewise, there should be some attempt made by parties to come up with some guidelines that the government should be able to follow for budget implementation legislation such as this. An independent panel of people, or an independent group of people, or any of our constituents, and I think my colleague, the member for Sudbury, would probably agree with me, will know the difference between what should be in a budget implementation bill and what is in this 880-page omnibus bill.

The privatization of Canada Post and the selling of AECL have absolutely nothing to do with traditional budget implementation. We only have to look at the environmental assessment issues. Our member from Edmonton spoke to this yesterday. The government is weakening the environmental assessment regulations. Once again, if it cannot get something through the House, it goes around to the back door.

It would take hours to deal with all of the issues in the bill, but I will talk for a couple of minutes about the taxation policy of the government. The government is reducing taxes on corporations, particularly on the banks. It is reducing the corporate tax rate to 15% at a time when it is already lower than the United States. It is doing it at a time when the banks made $15 billion in 2009. It is doing it at a time when the presidents of those banks made up to $10 million a year.

We have the highest paid CEOs in Canada. Gordon Nixon of the Royal Bank and Edmund Clark of the Toronto-Dominion Bank were granted about $10.4 million in 2009. The CEO of CIBC was granted $6.2 million. All of these presidents are in the stratosphere in terms of salaries.

What is the government doing while this is happening? It is sneaking through a huge increase in air travel taxes being paid by all air travellers in Canada. In fact, the increases are going up 50% on security fees paid on flights.

Representatives of the Air Transport Association of Canada, an organization that the government is very familiar with, provided testimony regarding the bill. The observations they made are these. In 2008, only two years ago, ATAC conducted a survey which ranked the security fees charged by governments and airports worldwide. Guess what it found? Canada's security charges, just two years ago, were the second highest in the world. Only the Netherlands was higher.

Guess what the government did? It increased those same taxes by 50%. After this tax announced in February, the Canadian security charges will be the highest in the world, having increased by 52% from $17 to $25 U.S. In the U.S. the charge is only $5.

For a government that wants to be competitive with the United States, it has just made itself uncompetitive. Its taxes are much higher.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the hon. member. The budget allows the Minister of the Environment to dictate the scope of environmental assessments. It allows the sale of all or any part of Atomic Energy of Canada. Could the hon. member tell me why these two articles are in a budget bill?

Second, putting Atomic Energy of Canada in the hands of private industries and allowing the minister to decide the scope of the environmental assessments, is that not like putting the fox in charge of the henhouse?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, one would think the government would have learned by now, particularly with the food inspection process and the cases of listeria in the last couple of years and with the privatization of air inspections. The whole idea that somehow we could follow the Reagan blueprint and simply deregulate companies to the point where they could simply regulate and police themselves does not hold water and does not stand up under scrutiny.

We only have to look at the United States and the financial deregulation that has occurred over the last 10 years and the mess we have had. The world economy almost fell flat because of the deregulation that went on during Ronald Reagan's days. This is now being followed now by the neo-Conservatives, neo-Reaganites.

In terms of the environmental assessments, the member is absolutely right. How could the government simply take away the vetting process for projects when we see what has happened recently in the Gulf of Mexico. Because there is no proper supervision over oil wells, the U.S. now has an environmental disaster on its hands. This is what we will see in Canada, in spades, if the government follows this deregulation process.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague a question about a clause in Bill C-9, one that is completely unrelated to anything budgetary. It is the clause that moves to privatize Canada Post, specifically the removal of Canada Post's legal monopoly on outgoing international letters or the remailer program.

My colleague from Elmwood—Transcona and I come from the same province. Both of us, as well as our other colleagues in the NDP, are concerned about other ways in which Canada Post is being privatized, for example, the closure of one of the four national call centres in Winnipeg, leading to the loss of dozens of jobs. The government has refused to do anything about it. We are clearly seeing a move by the government to chip away at an institution that we are so proud of as Canadians, an institution that provides a vital service, which is that of connecting us, of sharing communication.

Could I hear my colleague's thoughts on the injustice, and that is the privatization of Canada Post?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, if this is the type of activity and direction we see from a minority Conservative government, imagine what sort of direction we would get if we had a majority Conservative government, or if we were to get one in the future.

If the Conservatives are this brazen to put a clause into an omnibus bill to privatize parts of Canada Post when they could not do it through legitimate means by bringing in Bill C-14 and Bill C-44 over the last couple of years, imagine how dangerous they would be if they were ever in a majority situation. I think people would agree with that.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, here we are at report stage for Bill C-9, the budget implementation bill. The Bloc Québécois obviously voted against this Conservative budget at second reading because, once again, it does not meet the economic, social, environmental and financial needs of Quebec.

Nevertheless, with the complicity of the Liberal opposition, the bill was adopted at second reading and referred to the Standing Committee on Finance for thorough study.

What I find grievous is that the bill goes against two unanimous votes of the National Assembly of Quebec. We must remember that the Quebec nation was recognized, here in the House, and that this Prime Minister promised that there would be open federalism.

Quebec's unanimous request to the government for $2.2 billion in financial compensation for harmonizing the sales tax was met with refusal even though agreements totalling $6.86 billion were signed with five other provinces .

What can we say about the government's desire to meddle in the jurisdictions of the provinces and of Quebec by creating its national securities commission, even though Quebec voted unanimously against it? Quebec's entire financial sector is mobilizing against this power grab. An editorial in La Presse, a paper owned by the Power Corporation and dedicated to defending federalism in Quebec, stated: “The expression 'predatory federalism' is overused but that is what this comes down to.”

What I find appalling is that the government is using this bill to make significant amendments to other laws. It does not have the courage to introduce and defend these amendments by introducing separate bills according to our democratic parliamentary rules.

At report stage, the NDP is proposing amendments in order to remove six parts of this bill. It makes sense and it is important that we support these amendments.

In the few minutes available to them, the witnesses that we heard in committee told us that they were dismayed by the lack of consideration given to such important matters as Canada Post's exclusive privilege, the privatization of AECL, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act and the Employment Insurance Act.

Part 15 of the bill is entitled Canada Post Corporation Act, and it would allow Canada Post's competitors to collect mail in Canada and Quebec and ship it abroad. The fact that this measure is included in the bill shows the insidious way the Conservative government works and how it wants to completely deregulate the crown corporation.

The Bloc Québécois is strongly opposed to privatizing Canada Post, even partially. This crown corporation must remain a public agency and maintain universal services with uniform rates throughout Canada.

Many Quebeckers are concerned about part 18, which would privatize Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. There are no assurances in part 18 that the federal government will keep doing its duty and providing a supply of medical isotopes. The federal government must keep looking for suppliers of medical isotopes.

Part 24 of the bill amends the Employment Insurance Act. The Bloc Québécois called for substantial improvements to the system, including increasing the program's wage replacement rate to 60% of maximum insurable earnings, eliminating the waiting period, standardizing the qualification requirements at 360 hours of work, basing benefits on the 12 best weeks of insurable earnings and making self-employed workers eligible for regular benefits.

More generally, the government should submit a plan for reimbursing the funds diverted to its own accounts from the employment insurance fund. It should also drop its obvious intention to loot this fund once again; the fund does not belong to the government.

Instead, the current bill imposes the following measures.

The Conservatives' 2008 budget created a new crown corporation, the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board, reporting to the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development.

This board's duties included administering a separate bank account. Any annual surpluses in the employment insurance fund were supposed to be retained and invested until needed to cover the costs of the program.

Budget 2010 closes the board's separate bank account, the EI account, and creates a new one, the employment insurance operating account.

The government is permanently eliminating the accumulated surplus in the EI account, effective retroactively to January 1, 2009.

This account will therefore no longer exist and will be replaced by the employment insurance operating account, which will start from zero. Magically, the EI surplus, which amounted to more than $57 billion on March 31, 2009, according to the Public Accounts of Canada for 2008-09, will disappear for good. I should point out that the money came from employers' and employees' contributions.

That part of the bill absolutely must be removed. It would be scandalous to penalize workers in Quebec and Canada like that.

The Bloc Québécois has a number of reservations about other provisions in the Conservatives' budget implementation bill.

For example, with respect to part 1 of the bill, which covers tax measures for individuals and corporations, the Bloc Québécois is particularly concerned about corporate tax strategies, specifically those involving tax havens.

We must eliminate access to tax havens. The six big Canadian banks reported net profits of $5.3 billion in the first quarter of 2010. That is all very well, but why should they continue to avoid billions in taxes thanks to their subsidiaries in tax havens? The Bloc Québécois wants to eliminate this practice and make the banks pay their fair share of taxes.

Companies use tax havens to evade taxes too. According to the Auditor General's data, companies save up to $600 million per year by doing business in tax havens.

The Bloc Québécois is calling on the government to walk the walk instead of proposing pseudo-solutions made up of nothing but words.

Still on the subject of banking, the Bloc Québécois has serious reservations about Ottawa's centralizing agenda with respect to credit unions.

Part 17 of the bill would amend the Bank Act to enable credit unions to incorporate as banks. This measure amends the Bank Act to create a framework allowing credit unions to incorporate as banks. The model is based on the framework applicable to other federally regulated financial institutions.

Although it is presented as optional, the Bloc Québécois is concerned that the amendment might actually reflect the government's hidden agenda to force credit unions to come under federal jurisdiction.

Once again, the federal government is demonstrating its desire to centralize power and decision-making at Quebec's expense.

The Bloc Québécois will therefore support the amendments proposed by the NDP, but the rest of the bill will still be unacceptable to Quebec.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the Bloc Québécois member on his speech. Bill C-9 contains a clause on the environment that allows the Minister of the Environment to establish the scope of environmental assessments.

What does the Bloc member think about that clause? Does he think it belongs in a budget bill?

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his question. I do believe that is one of the parts that the NDP has suggested we remove. I did not discuss it because I only had so much time. I completely agree with him because, if we were to give that discretionary authority to the minister, we would end up in the same boat as the United States, with the oil well in the Gulf of Mexico. Some studies were not carried out after political pressure was put on the former government in Washington.

I do not think such a measure belongs in a budget implementation bill, and certainly should have been the subject of its own bill, so that we could call witnesses to confirm our concerns about protecting the environment.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague on his excellent speech. I have a question. Over the course of the years, $57 billion has been taken from the employment insurance fund. But this omnibus bill would erase all of that. It will not be erased from our memory, though, because we know very well that this money was taken from unemployed workers.

The employment insurance fund is expected to have a surplus of $19 billion over the next few years. How does my colleague think the government could invest this $19 billion to better serve our workers?

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague from Berthier—Maskinongé for such a relevant question. The fact that the employment insurance fund will be turned back to zero and the accumulated surplus all but forgotten is a real scandal for our workers who worked so hard to establish that surplus. The worst part is that according to a clause in the budget implementation bill the government will be able to get its hands on any surplus that accumulates in the coming years.

We have to look at the financial needs of the entire Canadian population. In particular, I am thinking about seniors who are not receiving the guaranteed income supplement. It seems as though the government does not have the money to authorize an increase to the guaranteed income supplement. That is just one example of what they could do with the surplus in the fund.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

The hon. member for Nickel Belt may ask a brief question.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is another intriguing provision in Bill C-9, and it relates to deregulating Canada Post's monopoly. This is the second time the Conservatives have raised this issue in Parliament, and they were not successful the first time. So they are incorporating it into a budget bill.

Why does the Bloc Québécois member think that they have included this issue in this bill? Is it because their friends are waiting in the wings, wanting to buy up a piece of Canada Post?

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would again like to thank my colleague for his question. The partial deregulation of Canada Post to allow private remailing companies already exists, and that has been established. Numerous remailing companies are currently in business illegally, which the government is not really contesting.

This bill would allow them to continue operating, which must surely be quite profitable. Canada Post would lose revenue, thus endangering the universality of the services offered by our Canadian postal service.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to stand tonight on behalf of the people of Timmins--James Bay to speak to Bill C-9 and to set the record very clearly on what we are discussing here.

This is not a normal budget implementation bill where in the past we would debate whether we supported a certain vision of the government going forward. Of course, under a budget bill, this is a matter of confidence. What we are discussing tonight is the abuse of parliamentary process. When we look at the Conservative government, we are looking at a government whose only track record is abuse of public process and abuse of parliamentary process.

We could go through the issues of prorogation where it ran legislation. not once but twice. through the House and then flushed that legislation down the toilet because it was politically inconvenient to have to answer questions in the House of Commons, and then had to start the whole process over again, a completely staggering waste of taxpayer dollars.

We see the culture of secrecy that surrounds the PMO and all the offices of Parliament now and the inability of the public, the media and politicians to get answers from the government. We see it in the government's decision to create a manual to subvert the work of parliamentary committees, monkeywrenching committees so that work could not be done. This was handed out to the committee chairs to subvert the work of Parliament.

Now we see other examples of abuse of office. We see the industry minister, a minister of the Crown who is there to represent the interests of Canada on the international stage, acting like a cheap ShamWow salesman for some cleaning products in his riding. When that guy did not have a seat, would anybody have paid him to sell cleaning products? I do not think so. Maybe they would have hired him as a floor cleaner but not to sell cleaning products, yet he is standing there in front of a camera saying that he represents the Government of Canada and he is hocking products for buddies of his. This is a staggering abuse of the public process.

How does that tie into this bill? The government has taken numerous issues that should be scrutinized by the public and slipped them into the budget. It has insisted that we pass it right away or it will force an election. It will huff and puff and blow the House down if it does not get its way.

I am showing the people back home how big this budget bill is and telling them about all the hidden booby prizes that are left within this budget. One example is the decision to slip the HST into the bill to force it down the throat of senior citizens and people on fixed incomes in British Columbia and Ontario without debate. The government did not allow any hearings on this.

We see the decision, not surprising from a government that has become little more than the government of the tar sands, to strip more environmental assessment protections away from the Canadian public and from the environment. It does not have the guts to bring it into the House in a standard bill. No, it slips it into a budget bill and says that it is a matter of confidence.

We see the plan to sell off the AECL, our nuclear power agency, on the private market. Maybe it will get 10¢ on the dollar, who knows? That is a staggering decision to take but, again, it is not willing to bring this before the public. It just wants to slip it in and hide it away. It is an abuse of process.

Another serious issue is the destabilization of Canada Post that is under way with its privatization efforts. I represent a region that is larger than the United Kingdom. Mail is essential and mail has become more and more challenged over the years as more and more people are going online. For mail service in rural areas to survive, we need the balance and the income, and the income that it relies upon is being cut up, divided off and sold off to the private sector.

Another issue is softwood lumber. This is the government that sold out community after community to get a quick deal with the Bush Republicans, who are very much like the Conservative Party. Now we see another plan to raise lumber tariffs in Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba and Saskatchewan by 10%. Our sawmills are staggering, what is left of them. They are barely able to keep going. Most of them are shut and the government is going to slip another 10% cost on that.

This is process after process of abuse. I am very shocked that what the government would do at the height of a recession is raid the EI fund and steal $57 billion from the EI fund. That is not the government's money. This is money that was paid by Canadian workers as an insurance fund.

The government has bled red ink throughout the recession. Why? It is because it gave one corporate tax break after another. There was no fiscal prudence. The government came in with a surplus and immediately started giving it away in massive corporate tax cuts. For the folks back home, to get one of these tax breaks one has to be profitable. Who was making money in the recession? The banks and the big oil companies were making money so they got the lion's share of these tax breaks.

Further and further we see this country slipping into the red and what does the government do? It decides to take it off the backs of working families. In some areas, up to 60% of the people who pay into EI are not even allowed to collect it. $57 billion of the EI fund is being stolen from workers, money that could retrain families and that could be used to help our people in communities who have been hit hard by the economy.

Just this past month, 1,000 jobs were lost in my riding. We not only lost the jobs but we also lost all the refining capacity of Ontario in copper and zinc, thanks, in large part, to the government's lack of a national vision in terms of dealing with companies like XStrata and Vale Inco. We now have 1,000 workers in Timmins who have been laid off or have lost their jobs permanently because of the government's boneheaded mismanagement of the base metal industries in Canada.

Now, just as these workers are needing EI, the government is shutting down the EI processing centres across Ontario. It is not doing this publicly. It is doing it in secret. When we ask the Minister of Human Resources a straightforward, straight-up question about why she is choosing, at this time in a recession, to shut 15 of the 18 EI processing centres in Ontario, she says that we are fearmongering. She cannot even stand up and say what her own department is doing. She cannot own up.

Those are the things that are being slipped through and hidden away from people. We see right now the EI processing operations in Owen Sound, Orillia, Kenora, Belleville, North Bay, Timmins, Sault Ste. Marie, Ottawa, Brantford, Etobicoke, Barrie, Peterborough, Hamilton, Niagara Falls, Thunder Bay, Kitchener and Oshawa. It reads like a bus route to nowhere. All of these offices are being closed by the government at a time when access to EI processing is needed.

Why is it closing these centres? It is because it never did believe in maintaining a balance. The minister herself said that she did not want people to get fair benefits when they are unemployed because that might stop them from leaving the province and going to Fort McMurray to work in the tar sands.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Hear, hear!

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

I hear the members cheering. They are cheering for the fact that when people lose their jobs and they cannot maintain their way of life, they have to go work for dirty oil in Alberta. This is what the government's plan has been all along. It has cut the EI processing operations. It does not even have the guts to stand up in the House and say that it is shutting down EI processing.

This is what this bill is about. This is a massive abuse of public process. It is forcing through the gutting of the environmental assessment processes, the gutting of the EI fund, the gutting of the ability of the forestry industry to get back on its feet because it is going after it with softwood tariffs, and, of course, it is gutting Canada Post.

I do not think anybody back home should be surprised because Tory times are always hard times. That is the history of the party. Whenever the Conservatives get in, they look after their buddies and abuse everyone else.

The New Democrats have brought forward amendments to call the government back to account. We are taking out the things that do not belong in this bill. We need to vote on a straight-up budget one way or the other, but we will not sit back and allow the government to abuse process. Maybe the non-existent Liberal Party, which has already left on vacation, will support them but we will not. We will continue to act as the opposition to the government which is taking Canada on such a wrong track.

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

It being 5:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

The House resumed from May 27, consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as members know, the NDP, for a long period of time, has been calling upon the government to turn away from its agenda of tax breaks for the big corporations. In the throne speech, in the budget and now in Bill C-9, the government had choices to make and these choices should have been to favour the needs of Canadians. I believe the government had the option to stop the reckless de-funding of the government by way of corporate tax breaks that have taken away the fiscal capacity of the government.

On two occasions, the NDP has provided motions to the House concerning the needs of seniors and in Bill C-9 we do not see a response to either one of those bills. Our motions during the last Parliament set out the original seniors charter that recognized older Canadians are not only creative and active, but they are valued members of our society. The seniors charter would have enshrined the right of every senior in Canada to income security, accessible and affordable housing, wellness through health promotion and preventive care, health care through secure and publicly accessible health care, dental care, home care, palliative care, geriatric care and, of course, pharmacare. All of those things were laid out in the charter more than two years ago, again, a road map for the government as it moved forward and made plans for the future of seniors in this country.

In June of last year we set out another road map for the retirement security of seniors. It proposed an immediate increase of $700 million to GIS to help those seniors who live below the low income cutoff. They seem like nice words, “low income cutoff”, but those are seniors who live in poverty and there is no other word for it.

We also proposed a doubling of the CPP because today in Canada 63% of working Canadians have no pension and no savings and we must prepare them for the future. Doubling CPP over the next 40 years would ensure they have dignity in their retirement years. We also proposed in the same motion a national pension insurance plan paid for by the sponsors. Our motion was adopted unanimously by the House, so we were encouraged that perhaps the government was about to respond and give real consideration to the future of our seniors.

The government could have chosen to follow the will of Parliament on these two motions but what did it do? It chose the banks and the big oil and gas companies over the seniors of this country.

Throughout the winter of 2008-09, our party looked at the situation of pensions and we held round tables. As members have heard me report to the House before, as the critic for the NDP for seniors and pensions, I travelled to 31 communities asking seniors what they needed. They all took us back to the same discussion that we have been having about retirement income security.

Through the member for Outremont, we moved a motion to have the finance committee do studies on the pensions of Canadians and we have had people from all walks of life come before us.

My point is that, as a party, we have been out there for over a year on pensions and doing the due diligence that is important to this issue. However, as I said a moment ago, with Bill C-9, the government has confirmed its support for the tax breaks for the big corporations and the banks. It has taken $15 billion a year out of the fiscal capacity of the government to do those things that Canadians want done.

While the NDP has been saying that we should stop corporate tax breaks, I find it ironic that members of the Liberal Party rise in this House and talk about stopping these corporate tax breaks when they promoted them for years. This deathbed conversion happened following their conference in Montreal in February. Literally for years the leader of the NDP, the member for Toronto—Danforth, has been calling for the cessation of these particular tax breaks.

Many people in my riding of Hamilton East--Stoney Creek have raised concerns with me regarding Bill C-9 when they hear how broad, comprehensive and how large it is and the things contained in it. They wonder what it is all about, why it is such an omnibus bill and why it is necessary.

I know it sounds strange to some people to think that the NDP actually has conversations with the good folks in the financial services sector but we certainly do and they are really concerned about the sudden proposition that GST will be retroactive on commissions paid for their financial services. They are concerned about what it will do to the costs in their particular sector.

Hamilton is well known across this country as a working town with a lot of good, strong, healthy unions and a lot of working people who have contributed to the EI fund all of their working lives and have had the good fortune of never having had to use it. These people have heard the stories of how under the Liberal administration $57 billion went into the black hole of the budget and was paid down on the debt. They were counting on the Conservative government to do something about that. What happened in Bill C-9 just confirms the government's abuse of trust that took place under the Liberal government.

There is a grave sense in Hamilton East--Stoney Creek that the Conservative government is reckless when they hear about the astounding $1 billion for the G8 and G20 conferences. Our riding is a very diverse community and people are well aware of the number of new Canadians who are in this country. Good Muslims and good Sikhs are their neighbours and they do not fear these people. Is it fear that has driven the government to take hundreds of times the cost of other countries for this, and there is no other word for it, boondoggle? Security will amount to $1 billion. I note that there has been conversation about the Auditor General taking a look at these expenses. I would suggest that they be looked at before the money is spent.

The good citizens of Hamilton East--Stoney Creek lived through the Mike Harris years of government. They are starting to look upon the federal government as a Mike Harris-style government that is prepared to sell off anything and everything. Members may recall that the Mike Harris government in Ontario sold off the ETR Highway 407. We just need to look at the value that highway could have offered the government financially during this time.

Canadians are concerned about the potential sell-off of Atomic Energy of Canada, which the Conservatives seem prepared to sell-off for a quick buck.

I want to mention something significant, which I have said in this House before. Writer, Kris Kristofferson, said in one of his songs, The Law is for Protection of the People. Bill C-9 proposes to remove environmental assessments and proposes to give the scope of the assessments to the minister. Even if we are satisfied with the minister who is in the House today, we do not know who future ministers will be so we do not know what their competency will be in this area. The government is prepared to give up Canada Post's right on outgoing letters. What will be next within Canada Post or within the CBC? What else will come up for sale?

The Canadian people trust their government to protect their interests. I would suggest to all parties in this House that this is the time to take those items out of this bill that are problematic, items such as those that deal with the environment, AECL and others, and deal with them separately.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to make a couple of comments with regard to the EI fund.

It is concerning, but I think the member may have misspoken. In fact, it was during the Brian Mulroney years that the Auditor General told the government that since the EI program was operating at a deficit, that deficit had to be included in the consolidated revenue fund on an annual basis so that it was reflecting the program performance of the entire government. It used to be a separate bank account, and then it was rolled in.

That means that when the Liberals took over in 1993 and eliminated the $42 billion deficit that was passed over, 10 years of surpluses started.

The point is that the change was made was at a time when there were deficits. When there were surpluses, we had EI premiums going down each and every year.

However, this year, under Bill C-9, the government in fact is eliminating the liability to employers and employees that they are entitled to, either by premium reductions or by improvement in programs.

I just thought the member would be interested in knowing a bit of the factual history.

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the factual history is that there were three majority Liberal governments with five surplus budgets that did not address the fact that the premiums that belonged to Canadians, that were paid by Canadians for the protection of Canadians, had been abused.

At the end of the day, we had a Conservative government followed by a Liberal government followed by a Conservative government that did not address this.

Prior to this change made by the previous Liberal government, 85% of people who applied for unemployment insurance received it, and received it for up to a year.

Now, there are about 29% who apply and they receive it for a variety of times, some as short as less than 26 weeks.

So there have been significant abuses of the unemployment system, or the employment system, whichever we want to call it, by successive Conservative and Liberal governments. Standing by the people of my riding who have suffered through these changes, I have no problem standing in this House and talking about the abuses of EI by both Liberals and Conservatives.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, as everyone knows, this is an 880-page omnibus bill. It weighs several pounds. There are a lot of things in this bill that go far beyond budget implementation. For example, the post office remailers issue has nothing to do with the budget implementation. As a matter of fact, the government tried to introduce this through Bill C-14 and Bill C-44 twice over the last two or three years in this House. It is a sneaky approach to take bills that they cannot get through the House, put them into a huge omnibus bill such as this, call it a budget implement act, and then threaten an election if we do not pass this bill as is.

However, what I want to ask the member about is that while the current government is reducing taxes for corporations, trying to reduce taxes over the next three years to 15%, when the CEOs of banks are making $10 million, it has brought in an airline tax. The airline tax is going to increase now to about 50%, which is going to make Canada the highest taxed jurisdiction in the world, higher than Holland, and much higher than the United States.

Would the member like to comment about those points?

[Wayne Marston, NDP, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the thing that is really interesting is that prior to this change, at 22%, we were in the midst of the G8 and G20, halfway. We are in a very reasonable position, and the government has taken away fiscal capacity because of that and is now transferring more back onto the shoulders of Canadians.

[Shawn Murphy, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be given an opportunity to rise today in the House to speak to the budget bill.

I want to speak about the budget, but also in connection with the previous four Conservative budgets, and comment generally on the direction in which the government is taking this country. I want to align myself with the majority of Canadians who think this country is going in the wrong direction.

I want to associate myself with those Canadians out there who are of the opinion that there is a positive role for the federal government, that it has been, and it can be again, a positive influence on the lives of Canadians. It can and ought to take further action on a whole host of issues that very much affect our society. I am talking about our rate of productivity, the major demographic transition that the country is presently undergoing, the major issue facing Canadians regarding post-retirement income security, the major issue of family poverty and specifically child poverty. It is my view that we can do more to make us more egalitarian, more prosperous, and more productive, and of course, we can do a lot more than we are presently doing in facing the environment issues that the country is presently facing.

Some may say that we are talking about an either/or situation. The Conservatives say they cannot do anything about poverty, because then they might have to reduce health care, but they fail to mention that there is a direct correlation between poverty and health. They cannot do anything about the environment, because that might in some way prohibit or compromise corporate tax cuts. What they fail to mention is that there is a very close connection, a correlation, between a very healthy environment and a healthy economy.

When we look at some of the challenges facing society, such as child poverty, productivity, the pension issues, the deficit, literacy, and the environment, apart from a few things such as the excellence in research project that was announced a couple of weeks ago, which is excellent, there is very little in the budget that would give any Canadian any optimism for the future.

What are the issues that we have to talk about as a society? We have to start here and talk about the major demographic change that is under way in Canada right now but will get worse and worse every day, every month and every year for at least the next 20 years.

Many of us in the House are part of that cohort, that generation referred to as the baby boomer generation, generally between the ages of 45 and 65, who will begin to retire in large numbers very shortly. It will actually reach the rate of approximately 1,200 people per day. Because of this, we will develop a situation where we will have people without jobs, but more importantly, or worse, more significantly, we will have jobs without people.

Much has been written about the baby boomers, but it is my premise that no generation in the history of mankind cared less about the generations that followed than the baby boomer generation. It does pain me somewhat to say that, because I am very much part of that generation.

We as a society have a fundamental obligation to leave the world a better place than we found it. That is from the view of the country's finances, and we have had much discussion here in the House about the very large, significant and growing deficits that this country is incurring, and from the point of view that every child have an equal opportunity. That starts at early childhood development and continues through education. It continues in post-secondary education, but it does not end there. It continues with lifelong learning.

From the point of view of poverty, literacy, skills-training issues, and most importantly, from the point of view of the horrendously important challenges facing Canada, the best country in the world, on the issue of climate change and other environmental issues. This fact becomes painfully obvious when we read the budget and the previous budgets of the government.

From a financial point of view, the government inherited a $13-billion surplus. It spent like a drunken sailor. There were tax decreases, some wise and some very foolish. As a result, this year and next year, we are left with the largest deficit in the history of this country.

Comparing the amount of the deficit, although large, to other countries, other countries' deficits are larger, but that does not reflect the fact that Canada is not a unitary government. If we add the federal deficit and all the deficits being incurred by the provincial governments, it is horrendous. The question that has to be asked every minute of each day is who is going to pay it back. The answer to that question is our children and generations to come.

Another issue that is not talked about at all in the House is our lagging productivity rate. We are behind the United States and have been for some years. Each and every year we are falling further and further behind. There are a number of reasons for this that are not being addressed by the government. We have to become more competitive.

Some of the root causes are our education system, lack of support for post-secondary education, lack of support for training and education, lack of research and development and innovation, but mainly the lack of innovation, and we see in our business sector some of the infrastructure deficits that were talked about last weekend by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, removing some of the disincentives to work, and of course, one of the most important issues is literacy. We do not hear those issues being talked about in the House.

These are very important issues that affect our productivity, which in turn affects our prosperity, which again affects the future financial health of each and every Canadian. One specific issue regarding productivity I want to mention is the Atlantic gateway project of 2007. It was announced that there would be $2.1 billion, to the government's great credit, over the next five or six years to improve main highways, ports and border crossings throughout all provinces in Atlantic Canada. It would make the region more competitive and it was very much a step in the right direction. The government did this with great fanfare. There were many press releases and press conferences; whatever one can name, the government did.

Specifically, there was $137 million allocated for 2007-08, $221 million for 2008-09, $283 million for 2009-10, and $335 million for 2010-11. Of the 2007-08 money that was actually appropriated, $137 million was untouched; and in the next three years, there was never any mention whatsoever of the $221 million, $283 million and $335 million. In other words, it died on the vine. We have no idea where that project is now. We have no idea where the initiative stands. This is very disappointing to me, as a member of Parliament who comes from Atlantic Canada.

I come back to the issue of child poverty. There is a correlation between child poverty and health, child poverty and education, child poverty and productivity, and child poverty and future interactions with the criminal law system. However, again, that issue will never be mentioned by the government.

Presently, 40% of Canadians do not have the literacy or numeracy skills to compete in today's knowledge economy. If they lose their job, it is with great difficulty that they find another one. Again, that is an issue that we will not hear mentioned in the House.

I would like to spend my last minute talking about the environment. I pulled out the platform of the 2006 government. The promise was that a Conservative government would:

Address the issue of greenhouse gas emissions, such as carbon dioxide (CO₂), with a made-in-Canada plan, emphasizing new technologies, developed in concert with the provinces and in coordination with other major industrial countries.

There is no greater example of intergenerational inequity than that. The government has done absolutely nothing. It replaced that with the “Turning the Corner” regulation. It has done absolutely nothing. Now it is saying that it will be do whatever the United States does, which is basically transferring our sovereignty to our southern neighbour.

In closing, I made some of those points that I think are very important. These are issues that simply should not be left to future generations. Each of these issues should not have been included in this budget.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I wanted to point out that after this budgetary process, Canada will have the highest air security fee taxes in the world.

Every Canadian air passenger in this country will be paying the highest taxes in the world. The Americans are paying in the neighbourhood of a $5 fee, and Canadians will be paying triple or quadruple that. When the Canadian government talks about being competitive with its greatest trading partner, the United States, how can this be an issue of trying to be competitive with the United States when it has now raised our taxes to be the highest in the world?

At a time when the government claims it is reducing taxes for corporations, does the member see some inconsistencies in the government's approach to taxation?

[Shawn Murphy, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly do see many inconsistencies in the government's approach to taxation. I believe I talked about them during my speech.

On the air traffic security charge, it is my position, and I have studied this issue extensively going back to when the $14 charge was initially implemented, that it ought to be a user fee based upon what the actual costs are. Those costs should be very transparent and should be shown to Canadians.

In actual fact, when it came in at $14 I knew it was not $14. I was actually the only MP who blew the whistle on this. I said, “No, this is wrong”. Successive governments admitted that they were wrong with the $14, and it was reduced to something like $6 or $7 per person.

It has come up briefly since then, but again it should be a transparent, user fee based on exactly what the costs are.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate my colleague for his excellent speech.

One of the most sensitive indicators of the health of a population is in childhood health. In our country, unfortunately, over the last three to four years or so we have seen something terrible happen. Our newborn mortality rate has actually increased significantly.

Canada has moved from being sixth in the world, in terms of our newborn mortality rate, and dropped to 22nd in the world. This is a very sensitive indicator of not only the health of our population but also the efficacy of our health care system.

I would like to ask my colleague, does he not think that the current Conservative government has actually been asleep at the switch on one of the most important issues affecting Canadians, and that is the issue of the health care system that we have today and also the health of our population?

[Shawn Murphy, Liberal, Charlottetown, PE]

Mr. Speaker, I am aware of those statistics. I am not going to stand here in the House and pretend I know the complete answer. They are concerning and disappointing, but not knowing the exact causes, I am not going to speak specifically to that.

On the whole issue of health care, this is an issue that deserves a much overdue very public debate as to where we are going on the funding of health care in Canada. The Toronto-Dominion Bank issued what I consider to be an excellent report. I urge everyone to read it. The report was just issued on Friday, setting forth some of the realities of health care funding across Canada. There are 10 points and I agree with perhaps 9 of the 10.

I think this is something that has to be read by members and all Canadians. There has to be a very public and open debate as to the whole funding of our health care system. The report states that if we do not do anything, health care costs will consume 80% of all government funding. In other words, we are going to have to close down universities, schools, roads, ports, and airports to pay for our health care system, which I do not think would be very good for Canadians.

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-9, the budget implementation bill.

This bill is not palatable because it seeks to introduce in an extraordinary way a number of measures that the government wishes to avoid submitting for debate in the House of Commons. Look at the number of measures included in Bill C-9. It touches on 42 different budget items. These measures truly seek to make significant changes in a large number of areas and should be debated.

The bill touches on relations with other countries, tax issues, relations with various organizations, seniors' issues, and so forth. It touches on everything, and in a way that I would say is undemocratic. This is probably the most undemocratic bill I have ever seen in the House, because it seeks to introduce measures that are unacceptable to the public and the groups targeted. I will focus on one of those groups: people who have the misfortune of losing their jobs.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

I do not know whether it is as distracting to you, Mr. Speaker, but I am bothered by people talking in the House.

I will use the example of employment insurance. Since I arrived in the House six years ago, the name of the employment insurance fund has changed four times. When the name is changed so many times, it is because, like anyone who wants to misuse and take funds that do not belong to them, the government is trying to use subterfuge to justify taking this money. Over the last 14 years, a surplus of more than $57 billion has accumulated and been misappropriated from the employment insurance fund. Only employees and employers contribute to this fund, and the surplus that accumulated was misappropriated through cuts to employment insurance benefits. The precise amount taken was $57,170,000,356.

When the Conservative budget was passed in 2008, just two years ago, the name of the employment insurance fund was changed and the Employment Insurance Financing Board was created. That was the third time the name has been changed in order to give this power to the administrators and to be able to continue quietly dipping into the EI fund, to create a separate fund, we were told. A separate fund was not created and it continued accumulating surpluses to be used for other purposes. In this year's budget—and as Bill C-9 is now proposing—this separate fund will henceforth be called the employment insurance account and it will be a separate management account, we are told.

This is when we, as parliamentarians, must intervene. We cannot condone such a thing because, for one thing, that money is not the government's to use for anything other than EI benefits.

For another thing, this constitutes an economic crime that affects the people who need this money, which belongs to them, that is, workers and their employers.

This time, we would have expected the government to present measures to restore the employment insurance system. Not only did it fail to do that, but it is creating the new EI fund. It is thus making sure that it will continue accumulating surpluses so that between 2012 and 2015, another $19 billion will be plundered and used for other purposes.

How could this money be used? Obviously, it could be used to make sure that people who lose their jobs can receive benefits. Some 56% of people who lose their jobs cannot receive employment insurance benefits. The government has made the eligibility requirements so strict that most unemployed workers do not qualify.

We have introduced Bill C-308, standing in my name, which if passed would mean that people applying for employment insurance are presumed to be acting in good faith. Right now the government requires those applying for EI to prove their good faith, which is absolutely reprehensible. When a person loses their job it is an undeniable fact. We also know whether the person has accumulated enough hours. Nevertheless, all sorts of measures are used to prevent people from getting employment insurance.

We want the qualifying period to be 360 hours for everyone and the rate of weekly benefits to be increased to 60% from the current 55%, for an improvement of 5%. It is not a lot, but for people who are receiving very little, it is something.

The measure raising the number of weeks of benefits to 50 should be made permanent. Just a little over a year ago, the government set the number of weeks of benefits at 50 weeks instead of 45, but that measure comes to an end in the fall. It will have to become permanent.

The most appropriate measure would be to have a comprehensive plan to return the money removed. The $57 billion that was taken from the employment insurance fund should be put back. With that money and almost no increase in contributions we could improve employment insurance benefits for workers who have the misfortune of losing their job.

Not only is the government not planning to return the money it removed, but it is planning to continue misappropriating money from the fund. I am calling on my colleagues, whom I believe to be sincere when they make the same arguments we do, the opposition colleagues in particular, to be in the House, when the time comes to vote on Bill C-9, and put their money where their mouth is by voting against the bill.

Of course, there is one party that says we need not go to an election over this. But when should we go to an election? When measures do not help people then we should go to an election in order to have a debate over what is good for the people. They should quit hiding their heads in the sand.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his comments on the employment insurance situation, which he has been a champion of in this place for many years.

I believe the new employment insurance agency called for seed money of some $2 billion. I understand, though, those funds will not be available for the payment of benefits. They are basically the administration capitalization.

With our current situation, the record levels of unemployment, the benefits being paid out now vastly exceed the premiums being collected. Therefore, in recent months we have been operating at a deficit. The separate fund has been operating at a deficit because it is supposed to be stand-alone.

I spoke with the Auditor General and she assured me that at the end of the next fiscal year, if it continues to be in deficit, that would be included in the consolidated recent fund and the government would have to transfer moneys out of the treasury into the separate fund to cover the funding of benefits.

Is the member aware of that?

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Liberal member for his question, which is a very relevant one.

He is right. The fund is currently operating at a deficit, but that is only for a short period of time. By early 2012, things should sort themselves out. Some temporary measures have been put in place and are currently covered by the fund, without an increase in premiums. These measures are expected to be dropped next fall, which means that the current deficit will quickly turn into a surplus. According to the minister's books, between 2012 and 2015, the fund will generate a $19 billion surplus. That will cover the $2 billion deficit, but there will still be a net surplus of over $17 billion by 2015.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the member's speech. He has been a tireless advocate for employment insurance.

Could he comment on the fact that over this last recession we saw a significant number of workers who did not qualify for employment insurance?

Over the last 15 years, that the deficit has been managed by siphoning off the employment insurance funds. I know the member commented on that specifically in his speech.

However, despite the rhetoric about the numbers of job that have been created, a lot of those jobs are part time, seasonal, contract work and many of those workers are not eligible for employment insurance.

What would the member like to see changed to ensure those workers are included in the employment insurance system?

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP member is quite right to raise that question. Earlier, I mentioned the people who are not eligible for employment insurance. Of all these people who contribute to employment insurance, only 46% can hope to be eligible. Of that 46%, only 33% of women and 17% of young people will be eligible for benefits. So there is discrimination against people who have atypical, temporary, seasonable or part time jobs.

We are proposing that we make people who have accumulated 360 hours of employment eligible for EI. That way, people who have worked fewer hours will also qualify. I think that is the best measure, under the circumstances.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this issue. It goes to the heart of the lives of Canadians from coast to coast. Right now we are dealing with the largest deficit we have seen in three decades. Our debt is going up. When the government came into power, it was lucky enough to have a balanced approach between debt reduction, spending and also tax reductions. That was the one-third, one-third, one-third policy when we were in government.

It left the current government in good stead. It gave it a surplus. It also gave it a very solid banking system. The Liberal government of the day refused to adopt a number of initiatives that would have changed banking in Canada and would have enabled us to be much more susceptible to the economic viruses that have destroyed so many banks, banking systems and economies across the globe. However, that did not happen, and we are thankful for it.

The government has to listen. Instead of adopting the ideology that was so destructive south of the border in the time of President Bush and President Reagan, it really has to look at what has worked for Canadians. It needs to ensure we follow a path that is good for our citizens and not adopt an ideological approach that has been proven to be very destructive.

The tax reductions and the absence of spending control south of the border has been incredibly destructive to the U.S. economy, to the degree that I am extremely worried about what will happen there. When the Americans catch a cold, we get pneumonia. Despite the good management and monitoring of our fiscal systems in Canada, we have a very high risk of running into serious problems because of what will happen in the states.

I think all of us in the House would plead with the government and strongly recommend that it not follow the course of action that we saw during the time of those two presidents. It has proven to be very destructive on so many levels. Most important, it hurts the citizens who we serve.

We also have other international storm clouds afoot, including increasing competition, particularly from China and India. China now has foreign reserves in excess of $1 trillion. This is a very powerful lever that the Chinese have on us. In fact, the Chinese are using their foreign and economic policies to secure major sectors of the world that have natural resources, particularly South America, Southeast Asia and Africa. Africa contains more than half of the world's natural resources.

The Conservative government has been missing in action in many of these areas. It has taken a much more narrow view in its foreign policy. This is a much larger game. To look at things in a very parochial fashion takes Canada out of the playing field and it will hurt our citizens. In this globalized world, unless we use all the tools we have, from foreign policy to trade to defence to economics and aid, we will not be in the game.

Not being in the global game will mean that our economy, our workers and our businesses will be at a disadvantage. Therefore, I ask the government to think of using all of those tools in how we enable our country to have a very prominent future. We have ensure that our citizens will have as good a future, if not a better future, than what we have had. One of the great challenges the government has is how to enable that to happen.

Let us look at some of those solutions. I know the leader of my party has been very strong, and wisely so, on investing in education. Although this is a provincial responsibility, nothing prevents the government from using its convening powers to work with the provinces to serve our citizens. The ability of our citizens to acquire the skills they need to garner a well-paying job is crucial for not only their economic future but also for their health.

I strongly recommend that the government work with a coalition of provinces that are willing to look at how we deal with people having access to skills training so it is not a financial burden to them. The movement of people across provincial boundaries is crucial. The recognition of skill sets and removing those boundaries for Canadians to move across provinces is essential. If we remove the barriers to trade and mobility, we will have a much more nimble and successful economy.

Investing in infrastructure and in research and development is crucial, not only in people and infrastructure but also operating costs. Researchers cannot do their job unless they have the tools to pay the operating costs for their research.

I also encourage the government to work with groups like the MaRS Centre in the University of Toronto, the University of British Columbia and other universities to operationalize the our research. The phenomenal research taking place in Canada is exciting. One of the major challenges is to take those discoveries from bench to bedside, to take the research we know and operationalize it.

I attended the pediatric academic sciences conference in Vancouver three weeks ago, which is the largest collection of pediatric scientists in the world, 6,000 were there. When I listened to the great research that had been done, it struck me that there were things we know could save the lives a lot of people. We have all this knowledge, but that knowledge is not getting to the bedside. This was one of the laments that many of the researchers had.

I suggest there is a great opportunity for Canada to be a leader in translational research, and that is getting the research, getting it to bedside, getting what we know and getting it operational on the ground. This is the great challenge and a great opportunity in the future.

Another thing I suggest is we know our economic situation will never be solid unless we can get our health care spending under control. Health care costs are growing at 6.5% per year, revenues at 2.5% to 3% on average in good years. That means we have a delta, a separation between demand for health care and supply resources, so much so that in the next 20 years any province will have 80% of its entire budget consumed by health care. Right now in many provinces it is approaching 50%, which means there is less and less space for education, infrastructure, welfare and other social programs.

The provinces are being squeezed by this huge creature called the health care system, which is gobbling up more and more of their resources. We cannot get away from it. This is the single greatest challenge any government will have. As President Obama's budget officer has said, unless they get their health care costs under control in the U.S., nothing else will make any difference.

In my personal view, the only way to do that is to modernize the Canada Health Act to allow provinces to explore different options. I strongly recommend that the government look at what happened in Europe, where 17 of the top 20 health care systems are. Why do we not look at those mixed systems, the way they fund health care systems in terms of paying for results, for patient services, as opposed to block funding, and better use of IT technologies. There are a lot of things we can do, but, again, the government needs to use its convening powers to work with the provinces to make this happen.

On the prevention side of health care, the average child in Canada sits and watches television or a computer screen for 40 hours a week. That is staggering. As a result, this generation of children will be the first generation in history to have a shorter lifespan than their parents, which means we will have a much higher incidence of chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular problems. This will put a huge pressure on our health care system. Therefore, we need to encourage children to be active, to get out and play, by having them turn off the television sets and video games one night a week. Getting them out is crucially important to enable children to have a better life.

I could talk about pension renewal and reform. The average age when pensions came in was 58. Now the average age is 80 for men and 82 for women in our country. Therefore, I encourage the government to look at pension renewal and reform and allow people to work beyond age 65. There are lots of things we can do with that.

These issues are too important to lie fallow. All of us in the House feel too many issues are being dealt with that are not germane and not important to the average person on the street. We have to tackle these issues of the economy, social programs and have a balanced, effective science-based approach to deal with these challenges. If we do not, people will get hurt and when that happens, we have violated our responsibility to our public.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, in 2008 the hon. member's party came out clearly in favour of the government's $50 billion of corporate tax cuts. Liberals kept that position in 2009 when only the New Democrats stood in the House and said that massive corporate tax cuts in this fiscal economic climate would be irresponsible. I noticed that recently the Liberal Party has seen the light and is now adopting the New Democrat position. I also note that members of his party voted for the last budgets and I anticipate his party will likely vote for the budget this time as well.

Could the hon. member tell Canadians why they should have any faith in the Liberal Party when it campaigned for corporate tax cuts and voted for budgets, yet claims it does not support the principles underlined in those budgets?

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the interesting thing is that the hon. member forgot about the political realities in Canada today. He neglected to mention them.

I do not know if the member has the luxury of voting against the government, but the issue of whether or not there will be an election really falls on the Liberal Party. I would ask the gentleman whether or not he thinks the Canadian public would have liked another election only a few months after we had had an election. The Canadian public said very clearly to us that it did not want an election. The member knows full well that if we had defeated that budget, there would have been an election.

The Liberal Party wants to work with the government, indeed with all parties, with an effective, balanced approach in order to have a strong economy and stable social programs. In fact my seatmate, who happens to be our party's finance critic, has offered many intelligent and constructive solutions to the government, as have many members of my caucus.

I hope the government listens because if it does not, our country is going to get hurt. We will continue to try to work with the government for the betterment of our country.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member knows that the current government inherited about a $13 billion surplus when it took office back in 2006 and it has squandered that. Now we have probably the largest deficit that Canada has ever had. It does not bode well for some of the matters the member rose, such as skills training and all the things related to doing better in the future.

The member has also been a strong advocate for health initiatives. We have an aging society and the costs with respect to our health care system are going to start gobbling up enormous amounts of the government budget. It does not seem to me that the government has even acknowledged these challenges that are hurtling toward us.

I wonder if the member has some thoughts about what responsible governments would do in these times.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is true that one of the untold stories of our times is that the current government was given a $13 billion surplus. When times were good, it actually had the largest spending increase that we had seen in many decades and it burned through that surplus rather than using it more responsibly. That was highly irresponsible. The Prime Minister took Canada to the brink, and then when we faced this economic downturn, it thrust Canada off the cliff. Today we are sustaining this $56 billion deficit, which would have been much less if the government had actually done the responsible thing when times were good and lived within its means. This is not well known in the public but it is the truth.

Although the management of health care is a provincial jurisdiction, unless the government is willing to tackle the issue of health care and health care expenditures, then no matter what it or a province does, the provinces are going to be in a completely unsustainable situation. Patients will suffer and provinces will delist or ration care because they will not be able to meet their budgets.

I remember when I worked in emergency, I had to treat patients in the hallway in the emergency department, which I thought was completely disrespectful to them. But what can I do as the physician when all of the beds are completely filled in the emergency department? I have to treat people in the hallway. That is the cold reality of what doctors and nurses are being faced with across our country today.

The House resumed consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened very intently to the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca as he referenced the economic prowess of his seatmate, the member for Markham—Unionville. No doubt the Liberal Party believes in his economic prowess. I am sure at one point in time that party was absolutely in lockstep with that member's economic prowess when he said we should deregulate the banks. Of course, if the Liberal Party had followed through on what that hon. member wanted to do, we would have been in the same situation as in the U.S. with Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, Goldman Sachs and all the rest of them that went down the great proverbial, and I will refrain from using the word. Needless to say, if that is their economic policy, then clearly the Liberals are still in lockstep with the government.

It is not about the luxury of opposing. It is about working for the people of this country in a democratic fashion. If we believe the government is headed in the wrong direction, then we oppose it. It is not about whether we will lose seats or our party will not be the government in the next election; it is about fundamentally understanding what the government is doing and if we should oppose it, then we do so.

That is what we have done and we suffer the slings and arrows of the government when it says we never vote for any of its budgets, and that is right. We do not vote for its budgets because we fundamentally disagree with its budgets, especially this one. This compendium of some 880 pages contains not only budget items, which of course it would because it is a budget bill, but it also contains numerous other pieces of legislation that should be before us individually in one form or another, especially when we are talking about things like the environment.

There was a national energy program that a previous government brought in which those in the west absolutely abhorred. I lived there at the time, as I went to the University of Alberta, and I understood why they did. But now the government is saying we will do it through the National Energy Board, or the NEB, so just change the last word and all will be well.

We went from something that was abhorred to something that we are supposed to love because we are going to include regulations that this body and this House has built up over time based on the expertise of people who have said that this is what is needed to protect the environment for everyone who lives on this planet, not just those of us who live in this country. We now have a group of folks who say that it is okay to drill another hole in the ground similar to the one in the Gulf of Mexico, but oops, it has sprung a leak and they wonder how they will plug it. They have tried golf balls, shredded tires, mud and cement. Now they are just going to take the cap off the top of it and try something else, but it will leak 20% more.

Is that what we want from the NEB? I would hope not. However, the government, by including it in this bill, has not allowed us to debate critical measures such as that so that we can engage Canadians about what really affects them beyond the budget. This really is not the budget.

In my previous life as a municipal councillor, I was the chair of corporate services and if I decided to put the planning act inside my budget, my constituents and the citizens of the municipality would have been justifiably outraged. Why would I including planning documents in a budget? It does not directly affect their taxes.

The measures the government has included in this bill that are outside of the budget do not directly affect the government's expenditure of moneys, per se. There is one item that involves money, and I will get to it because it is money that parties that are in government actually owe Canadians.

No thought should be spared and no stone should be left unturned when it comes to ensuring that the environment is safe and that we are doing all that we can to protect the environment. We should not simply give things away and allow folks to run with it in an unregulated fashion. That is what I fear will be the case when the NEB takes it over.

However, when we talk about money, one piece the government did put in the bill talks about putting the EI fund into the budget. It would have been nicer if it talked about putting back the money which the previous government and the current government pillaged, to the tune of $57 billion, from the fund. The government should be talking about giving it back to its rightful owners, the workers and their employers. They are the ones who paid it and they are the ones who are meant to use it when needed, but last year when the recession occurred, we found that a good chunk of it was already gone. It had been spent by the previous Liberal government, and the remainder had been spent by the Conservative government. When is either one of them going to give back the $57 billion?

We see in the budget that an account is going to be set up, but no one is going to get any money per se. The money that was taken away will not be given back.

Things could have been done for workers to get through last year and this year. The recession is not over for workers. Those who are unemployed are still unemployed for the most part. There is a great many unemployed workers in this land, especially in my riding where the unemployment rate is still the second highest in this country. The government will say that last month it created x number of jobs, yet we see the unemployment rate has moved only marginally.

The government never speaks to how many people fell off the system. The unemployment rate only counts those who are in the EI system. It does not count those outside the system. The government's own statistics group says it is too hard to count that group.

The U.S. makes that count. If we extrapolate the numbers in the U.S. based on what we do here especially when it suits the government's purpose, we can expect that the unemployment rate, which is 8% plus across the country, will increase another 3%. That becomes the true unemployment rate because we are including people who have either fallen off or have never gotten on the system in the first place. As we saw last year, a great many folks did not qualify for EI because the rules were changed.

It started with the Conservative government under Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, and I see that he is the subject of a report that was tabled today. It continued under the Chrétien Liberals who changed the system as well. Now we are at a point in the House, as I have witnessed over the last 18 months, where there is a hodgepodge of fixes.

We added on a piece by giving a 52-week extension to the members of the armed forces when it comes to parental leave. It is a good piece, but what happened to the RCMP and other police officers who went to Haiti? Oops, we forgot about those folks. It is a good private member's bill that is well worth supporting, but we forgot about another group.

That is what happens when changes are made to big legislation with band-aids. We do not get it right. We miss things. One of the biggest things that is missing in all of this is the $57 billion that is owed to the workers of this country and their employers, who have paid it. Not only are they owed money, but now the government has decided that at the end of this year it will remove the freeze on EI premiums, and will continue to do it. By the government's own calculations in the budget, it will charge Canadian workers and their employers $19 billion beyond what it needs to pay out.

I will give the Conservatives credit. They learned really well from the previous Liberal government. If it adds additional moneys to the EI premiums that have been collected, it could pay down the deficit. That is what the previous government did. The current government has learned the lesson and it is going to do the same thing. It is going to take a third of the $60 billion deficit from workers who have finally found jobs and are getting back on their feet. The government is about to take it off their paycheques. It may even be taking it off the paycheques of folks who were denied employment insurance last year. Talk about rubbing salt in the wounds of the unemployed.

Workers were denied EI last year because the government refused to amend EI so that people could get into the system who deserved to be there because they had paid into it. The government decided it would not change the system and it is about to take money from folks for the next year and the year after that beyond what is needed to run the system in order to pay down a deficit that the government created through its mismanagement. At the end of the day, workers who perhaps did not have the opportunity to collect EI are going to end up paying again.

It is reprehensible that the government will not fix the system. The government has heard time after time over the last 16 to 18 months from New Democrats at this end of the House in private members' bills on how to fix the system. We were imploring the government to fix the entire system, not just made hodgepodge changes to it. The first thing the government ought to do is write a cheque for $57 billion and put it into the employment insurance system.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member is quite right that there have been a large number of private members' initiatives. We know they require royal recommendations and we also know that the Conservative government would certainly not grant them. This reflects the mood of the House, which is extremely important, because the mood of the House reflects the mood of the people.

We have not had a recession since 1993, and no one predicted that, even when the U.S. went into recession. Under the rules of the game, the EI fund was to withhold two years of surplus to pay for a recession and the balance was to be returned by reduced premiums or improved programs, and I think everybody understands that. The real key now is that the obligation to do that will be eliminated by Bill C-9 because that liability will be summarily taken away. The cash will continue to flow whether there is a surplus or a deficit in EI operations, but that liability will be wiped off the books.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is absolutely right. There is a spirit for a change in the system, especially among opposition parties in the House.

As I said today and as I have said in the past, the system is broken. When we try to fix one aspect of the system, we end up inevitably not fixing the system. There were some premium reductions, but $57 billion was in the EI account and it was spent. If we look at the actual new programs that were introduced, some that were called for but were never done, then we did not see either or. We did not see huge premium holidays. We did not see brand new programs that would really mean something. If we had, we would not still be stuck with 15 to 18 weeks of sick benefits.

If somebody has a catastrophic illness and does not have a short-term disability plan through their employer, the only place they can get sick benefits is through the EI system. What do they get? They get less than four months, but they may be sick for 12 months. What do they do for the other eight? They end up on welfare.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the member a question about the air security charges that all air passengers will have to pay. People are asking why these charges are so high compared to other countries. They want to know why the revenue collected far exceeds the amount spent on security and the justification for a 50% increase in this tax.

Canada was the second highest country in the world next to the Netherlands, and after the increase in February, we are now the highest in the world. The international fee alone has been increased 52% from $17 to $25.91, but in the United States that international security fee is only $5. That puts our airfares out of line with those in the United States. How are we supposed to be competitive with the American airline industry when the government is single-handedly making us uncompetitive?

I wonder if the member has any comments on that.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Elmwood—Transcona is absolutely correct about the additional fees. It is one thing to pay the true cost but another thing altogether to pay above and beyond. The government quite clearly has shown that it is over-charging when it comes to security fees.

I congratulate my seatmate, the member for Elmwood—Transcona, for talking about a passengers' bill of rights. When it comes time to protect passengers, where is the government then? The government votes against it.

[An hon. member]

Hiding.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

The government is hiding from the consumer.

The government is quite happy to take money out of the pockets of consumers beyond what is needed to keep them safe, but to give them a bill of rights that would give them some sort of compensation for sitting in a plane on a tarmac for an extended period of time, the answer to that is no.

It seems to me that if we want passengers on airlines to be safe, then we should be able to pay the cost of that and no more than the cost of that. Consumers believe that is fair. To overcharge them to pay down a deficit created by the government is totally unfair and passengers do not want to put up with that.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate on Bill C-9. It is a budget implementation bill and it is a very extensive bill.

It has some interesting aspects to it that have created even more problems than simply the fact that the Conservatives are projecting, in the budget, in excess of a $50 billion surplus.

Bill C-9 is an omnibus bill. Canadians should know that an omnibus bill is one which does many things all in the same package. Normally we would see those in terms of justice legislation, where there are three or four proposed changes to the Criminal Code. They are all changes that have to do with one existing piece of legislation, but relate to different aspects of it.

In this particular case, we have an omnibus bill that does not deal with one other act of Parliament. It in fact deals with a number of acts. It is quite unusual. Theoretically, a government, after winning an election, could walk in here, table a budget which not only laid out the budgetary measures for the session, but it could also put into that budget implementation bill every other promise it had made in an election whether it related to the budget or not.

That is exactly what has happened here. We have a case now where inside the budget implementation bill, Bill C-9, and there is a big debate among parliamentarians and Canadians at large who follow this, there are initiatives which were never mentioned in the budget speech, were not in the budget itself, and which are substantive changes to existing legislation.

They include the privatization of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, AECL. My home backs onto their offices in the Sheridan research centre. A lot of my constituents are engineers and work there. This is causing great grief.

When I went to the briefing on Bill C-9 with the ministerial staff and had an opportunity to ask some questions about this, they were not very many answers, just “We are doing this, this and this”. The policy rationale was never there.

People are asking why we want to privatize AECL and get into public-private arrangements? They want to know if it is going to do something to the integrity of the R and D of AECL, whatever remains. They want to know what it is going to do to the whole model. This problem of AECL has been with us for a long time. This decision of the government to go forward with these discussions has caused great difficulty.

If we had a bill that came forward that called for the privatization of certain aspects and parts of a division of AECL, there would have been substantial debates in this House. There would have been substantial expert witnesses called to comment on the proposal in that bill. There would have been rigorous due diligence done with regard to virtually every aspect of the bill.

When we take a subject matter like that and put it into a budget implementation bill, it is that one big, large omnibus budget implementation bill that is being debated in the House, and reviewed and studied in committee.

It goes to the finance committee. I know the members on the committee. They are excellent colleagues. However, I do not think that they have the expertise in the area of atomic energy. I do not know how they could possibly discuss it. In fact, the people who were coming before committee to talk about it only had a couple of hours to make their case.

If it were a stand-alone bill, it would have had probably a dozen hours or so at second reading. It would have had substantive committee witnesses. It would have had third reading. It would have gone to the Senate. The rigour with which we handle legislation here is very significant, but that has been denied to that aspect.

That is not the only one. There are significant changes to the Environmental Protection Act. There are significant changes which would say that we will have a situation where we can waive the requirement for environmental assessments on major projects if there are certain circumstances in place, like time, where we have to have something done quickly. I remember asking questions of one of the hon. members about putting economic priorities ahead of environmental priorities, and the member quite correctly said we have to look at both. Good environmental policy is good economic policy. The reverse is also true.

We have a significant challenge before us in terms of greenhouse gases, climate change, and preparing ourselves to do our share to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in our country, but when we start playing around with the Environmental Assessment Act, all of a sudden that seems to fly in the face of social and public responsibility. Canadians have already very clearly said how they feel about us doing our share, and after the government embarrassed Canadians at Copenhagen, it is no wonder they are concerned about things like this.

Members have also mentioned the airline tax. The EI fund also, when I was at the briefing with the officials, was just glossed over. I asked the question of the officials there about how it would operate. I did ascertain that there was to be some $2 billion put in as seed money for the administrative part, but that this new separate agency was to be responsible for the operations of employment insurance in Canada. All of the premiums collected from today's workers would go into the fund, and all of the benefits would come out.

Here we are in severe economic difficulty with record unemployment, and it will even rise. It will rise even greater than it is today. We have been operating at a deficit. There has been a deficit there. When I spoke to the Auditor General last, she assured me that the operations of this stand-alone agency will be accounted for in the determination of surplus or deficit of the Government of Canada in terms of its operations of the program, notwithstanding that it is a separate bank account again out there.

I think what annoys all of the opposition parties is the notional surplus, the $57 billion of premiums that were collected in excess of benefits required to be paid out, which were built up over a dozen years of surpluses because Canada's economy was booming, and the lowest unemployment in our history had been achieved. That $57 billion represents a liability to Canadians. It represents a matter of either return the premiums to those who paid them or improve programs that would then be affordable.

The government did neither of them, despite all of the interventions and all of the initiatives of members of Parliament. The Conservatives have summarily said it will disappear. It is basically another indication that the government has refused to be open, transparent, and accountable to Canadians on yet another area of significant public interest.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Mississauga South touched on a number of areas in Bill C-9 where the government is improperly bringing initiatives through the door of this omnibus bill.

I want to go back to the area of security charges. We know that in the United States the international air security charge is $5. In Canada, the international air security charge ranges as high as $25. That is a huge variation. I think Canadians could understand that if the tax money were being used for safety issues it may be justified. However, we know that the revenues collected far exceed the money spent on security.

What is the government using the money for and why did it increase this tax 50%? That is a huge increase at a time when the government says that it is reducing taxes on Canadians. It is doing the opposite.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member has pointed out another example of where the government has not satisfactorily explained to Canadians the basis for its policy decisions. We see this time and time again.

I think Canadians want some assurances that when we are in difficult economic times the government is taking prudent steps to address the challenges that face us. However, it is taxing through the back door with the proposed increases in EI premiums. Now it will have to increase premiums to pay for the deficits that it is accumulating currently, money that it collected once before in the $57 billion.

All of a sudden it is going in circles. It is obfuscation on behalf of the government. It is quite unfortunate, particularly at a time when we have an aging society with so many demands on our health care and social services systems.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I commend my colleague on his speech and especially the spirit of his speech about how much is contained within this bill that it is almost like so much is being brought in under the cover of night. This stealth way of doing it is essentially irresponsible for any legislature to turn its back on this.

I would like to ask the member a question about some of the issues. He mentioned EI and talked about many other issues, but Canada Post will also be a major issue with remailers.

I commend the member for the comments he made that these bills standing alone would give it a fulsome debate in the House. Whether it is a minority or not, it does not matter. What matters is that each would receive a full hearing by all members of the House duly elected by their constituents.

In this particular situation, I will give one prime example that I feel is very important and that is the issue of telecoms. The bill would amend the Telecommunications Act to allow foreign satellite carriers to be considered a common carrier. That is an amazing policy shift that is contained within Bill C-9. It should be a stand alone bill.

I wonder if my hon. colleague has comments about that particular issue and others that he may have missed.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. He is very active in the House and follows the legislation. He knows how rigorous the process is when we deal with any of the varied items in this budget implementation bill, whether it be the remailers, the telecoms, AECL or the EI fund.

Any one of those issues would have had dozens of hours of debate and expert witnesses to ensure that we did our due diligence, so that when we have to vote on bills we do it from knowledge rather than from ignorance. The government has shown contempt for Parliament by not allowing parliamentarians to exercise due diligence.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to stand and debate this particular set of amendments to Bill C-9, the budget bill proposed by the Government of Canada. Quite clearly, we have heard the debate about the nature of this bill being the large omnibus type that the government has favoured in order to put forward very radical changes to Canadian society without the proper input of the parliamentary process, the committees and all of the things that could make any of these things more justifiable, if they are justifiable, in the minds of Canadians.

That is exactly what is going on here today. We are trying to achieve some of the things that were set out here in Parliament to accomplish. As our leader of the New Democratic Party has stated in the challenge he has put down to the other opposition parties, this is not likely the time that the government will call the tune and go to a potential election over these issues.

This is a good time to stand up for Canadians to try to make Parliament work, just as we have tried to make Parliament work with the Afghan detainee issue and a number of those types of issues that focused on how the process should be accomplished and how we should work within the House.

Here we are with another one of those issues. How does Parliament work? How should Parliament work in a minority situation?

In a minority situation, major changes to legislation should be available to the opposition parties and the public to understand completely and not be put forward in this very subversive fashion. It subverts the purpose of Parliament and puts it on an incorrect course. That is why we are all standing up here today and that is what we are working on.

I want to spend a little time on my particular subject, which is the question of aviation security. I am the transport critic for our party and, within the transport committee, a major study on aviation security is going on right now which started back in the days of prorogation. In the depths of winter, I organized a forum on aviation security, which the Liberal Party promptly joined into, and it had a great deal of success. It then moved on to looking at the issue within the committee.

Quite clearly, aviation security should be addressed in all its details before any additional charges are put on our aviation industry and then through to the customer. The aviation industry world-wide is under stress. Within Canada, most of the major carriers have had great difficulty and have lost money consistently over many years. This industry is not healthy. It has had to face up to many severe challenges. This industry supports the economics of Canada and of the world to a great degree with the movement of passengers and freight at a rapid pace around the world. When this industry is under stress, the result is very apparent within the economy. We saw that quite clearly with the volcanic ash cloud descending over Europe and the result of that within the economy of Europe. It was very carefully measured.

We saw that as well at Christmastime with the tremendous overreaction to a security incident in the United States that affected hundreds of millions of people in terms of the reuniting of families and all the things that go along with that. When we look at doing things to the aviation industry, we need to be very careful, which is why we are doing a review right now on aviation security. Most of the experts agree that the knee-jerk reaction we have had to aviation security since 9/11 has to be reviewed. It has to be taken into account.

Transport Canada officials have stated that once they put in place aviation security requirements, they have a very difficult time when they are redundant. They cannot get rid of them and what we see are ever-escalating levels of security costs and no particular review.

I have a fine example of that. Since 9/11, we have very secure, locked cockpit doors, which has taken out some of the threats that we might have had before 9/11 without any requirement for aviation security. Therefore, the threat to aviation has changed and yet the security proceedings have not changed.

With this air travellers' security charge in the bill, it would increase the revenue the government is generating from aviation security without addressing the issues of aviation security and the costs. The charge would add a penalty on to Canadian flyers for something that is not appropriate within the system. It would be far more expensive than most other countries in the world and would leave our aviation industry at a disadvantage. This, of course, would take money out of the taxpayers' pockets and put it into the general revenues of the Government of Canada. In many cases this looks to be considerably more than the cost of aviation security in the country as a whole, even though our aviation security system desperately needs the renovation.

The government has talked about reviewing aviation security to get rid of some of the parts that do not work so well, while at the same time raising the air transport service security charge. This was done not to pay for the costs of this service. This was done to raise more revenue for the government. That is pretty clear when we look at this and that is why this needs further review. Just as the government wants to review aviation security and just as the transport committee is engaged in a study on aviation security right now, we need to do that work before we put extra charges on our already ailing aviation industry. This has been said over and over again.

What we have here is a crass attempt to hide a tax somewhere in the system to add more revenue to the government that does not want to stand up and admit that over the course of the next five years it will have to raise more revenue for government in order to deal with the massive deficit. This is hypocritical and, in real terms to our industry, is rather stupid. What we have is a stupid, hypocritical action here with the air travellers' security charge.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

What do you really think of it?

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, I really do not want to say what I really think of it but that is as close as I will get right now.

We need to go back to square one. We need to examine the threat that now exists within the system. In reality, the threat is mostly about bad people, not about bad things. It is about improving intelligence. Most of the major incidents in aviation in the last 20 years has been because of the failure of intelligence, not the failure of security, and that is what we need to point out over and over again. Intelligence is not a mandate that is solely selective to aviation passengers. It should not be paying for the intelligence that this country collects on terrorists. We should all be paying for that. In some ways, the U.S. charge of $5 recognizes the fact that aviation security is not simply about the traveller but about the overall direction that a country has to take to prevent bad people from doing bad things.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, one of the comments from the government was that it does not seem to see the argument that containing all this within one bill is a bad thing and that it is more or less the normal operation of government.

In 2005, when the Atlantic accord was signed with Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador, it was implemented in the budget bill at the time. Conservatives fought vehemently to carve it out. They used every principle there was to say that this should not be included in the budget bill. It was considered sneaky. It was considered underhanded. All the negative vernacular that could be mustered in this House was used for that situation. Yet now we find ourselves with a lot more contained within the budget.

I would like the member to highlight some of the other issues he may have missed in his speech about some of the major issues that should receive a wholesome debate in the House before it proceeds.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, of course, coming from the Northwest Territories, with our concern about drilling in the Beaufort Sea, a concern that will have even less expression within our environmental legislation if the budget bill goes ahead, I have to agree with the member. There are many other things I could have focused on. I chose to focus on aviation security, because that is my critic area. But when it comes to the issue of environmental protection, this budget goes beyond hypocritical. It goes beyond stupid. It gets to the point of being an act against the people of this country. When environmental protection is taken away under the guise of a budget, it is almost inconceivable that this should take place.

For the Liberals not to support us right now in getting forward this legislation in a fashion that is different is also hypocritical and dangerous to this country. I urge the Liberal Party to get behind this amendment so that we can deal with that particular issue with greater care than what is going to happen with this budget bill.

[Linda Duncan, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the member from the Northwest Territories does an incredible job of representing his constituents and representing the interests of all Canadians on the protection and sustainable development of the north. I wish to thank him for that. I am sure that his constituents are grateful for the good job he does in the House.

The member started his comments on the proposed amendments to the bill by talking generally about the demise of democracy in the House. From my standpoint, being a mover of the motion to divide the bill, that is the very essence of the problem we have with the way the government is conducting itself on its budget bill.

Conservatives ran on a platform of openness and transparency, on providing a new way of democracy in Canada, and on the involvement of the grassroots. Yet it takes major changes to an environmental statute, developed over more than three decades by industry, the public, first nations, and small communities in every corner of Canada, and throws them into a budget bill, therefore limiting the discourse on a statute, by law, that was supposed to come before the parliamentary committee on the environment within months.

I wonder if he can speak to the issue that the very department that received an F grade from the Information Commissioner surely should be providing for better consultation on the bills that are the responsibility of that agency.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, quite clearly, the Minister of the Environment has abrogated his responsibility here. The Minister of the Environment in that cabinet must have understood what was going down here. He must have supported what was going down here with these environmental legislation changes hidden within a budget bill. He is the one who is responsible for this action. That should be made very clear.

How could anyone who calls himself an environment minister in this country consider this kind of action without public debate and without the principles of environmental protection that we hold so closely in this country and have held in the past? For that to be taken away like this without a specific public debate is really quite astounding.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to voice my disappointment with the budget implementation bill.

In this time of economic uncertainty, the government has seen fit to ram through changes to legislation in the budget implementation bill rather than to follow an established democratic process. In our parliamentary democracy, it is customary for government to bring forward changes it wants to make here in the House and then to allow debate for hon. members, the representatives of the people, on their behalf.

The government chose to go another route. It chose to hide substantive policy changes in the implementation of this budget. As members know, this amounts to a kind of democratic blackmail. That is not only undemocratic, it is just plain wrong.

In what has become a disturbing pattern, the government has again, this year, incorporated into its budget implementation bill major changes to environmental safeguards.

Last year's budget bill took a slice out of the federal duty to assess the environmental impact of projects that could have potential impacts on the navigable waters of Canada. It moved to exempt all federal stimulus-funded projects from any assessment previously triggered by waterways impacts and those for which the federal contribution was under $10 million. The beautiful province of British Columbia, my province, has hundreds of rivers, and this change puts them in serious danger.

These are just the sorts of changes Canadians want to see their representatives in this House discuss. That debate is completely eliminated when the government pushes through legislation in the background of a budget implementation bill.

This year's budget bill, however, swings an axe at a crucial environmental law, the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. The axe cuts deeply. What is most disturbing about the process by which this law is being eviscerated is that Parliament has moved that a review of the law be undertaken this year and that recommendations for reform be made. The review is already slated to come before the parliamentary committee on environment and sustainable development within weeks.

The government has chosen to short-circuit this process. Instead of hearing and considering the views of interested stakeholders and other concerned parties, it has chosen to fast-track the changes through this budget bill.

Bill C-9 transfers reviews of major energy projects from the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency to the National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. The effect is the diminishment of public representation. Neither the NEB nor the CNSC are equipped to conduct community consultations, nor do either have previous experience with these sorts of projects.

It also removes from the public clear access to intervenor funds that would allow groups and individuals to make themselves heard, and it lessens the requirements to consider environmental factors when proceeding with a project.

Second, and this is most troubling, the Minister of the Environment will be empowered to narrow the scope of any environmental assessment, which sets a dangerous precedent. This means that at the discretion of the minister, a project can be approved based on an assessment of only part of its overall environmental impact.

In January of this year, the Supreme Court of Canada found that the government failed to follow federal laws by scoping the Red Chris mine in northern B.C. to exclude the mine and the mill in order to avoid a comprehensive assessment and public input. What Bill C-9 therefore means to do is remove from the public any recourse for requiring consultation.

In addition, Bill C-9 removes one of the key triggers for a federal assessment, and that is federal spending. The limit for federal spending that would require an assessment is all but completely removed. Almost all federal stimulus funding projects would be exempted.

The bill will exempt from environmental assessment all projects falling under the building Canada fund, the green infrastructure fund, the recreation infrastructure fund, the border infrastructure fund, the municipal rural infrastructure fund, and many more. Such projects range from transmission lines running thousands of kilometres to road extensions, new bridges, and interchanges.

The New Democrat motion to enable the finance committee to split the bill provides the opportunity to defer study and the vote on the environmental reform measures until the environment committee review has been completed, which is a matter of only a few short months. Regrettably, the government manoeuvred to prevent this constructive solution from proceeding. Addressing long-term environmental or health impacts should not be shunted aside for short-term political gain from fast-tracked project approvals.

Ultimately, it is Canadians who will pay the cost. With these changes, one has to wonder what the future holds for the Enbridge pipeline project. Having just presented the proposal last week, will it be subject to the scrutiny and public consultation that is so needed, or will the minister narrow the scope and allow 225 oil tankers to sail along our coast every year? The people of northern British Columbia want to be consulted, and Bill C-9 effectively silences them.

I know that my time runs short, so let me be brief by saying that the budget still has many shortcomings. It has yet to fund a national transit strategy. In my riding, the Evergreen Line is desperately in need of funds so that it can be completed. In fact, it has not even been built. This is a project that was promised over two decades ago, and we are still waiting for the funds to complete it.

The budget invests over $1 billion in a three-day event instead of putting much-needed police officers on the streets in every Canadian community. There is no money for a real, affordable housing strategy in this country. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans remains underfunded, under-resourced, and understaffed.

I hope that all hon. members will support the motion brought forward by my hon. colleague from Edmonton—Strathcona and will vote these measures out of Bill C-9.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, in his speech, the hon. member talked briefly about Fisheries and Oceans and how a lack of funding is certainly a problem that has existed for quite some time.

I was wondering if he could paint a picture of what was overlooked in this particular budget. We talked about eco-certification and an office therein, but I was wondering if he would also talk about what else should be in it. Since he is the fisheries critic for the New Democratic Party, I was wondering what else he would like to tell us was overlooked in this Bill C-9 budget.

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Speaker, not only did the budget fail to address the real resources of the department, but in the throne speech there was absolutely no mention of salmon. We have an essential element of what makes the Canadian fabric what it is, and there is no mention of how we are going to protect our wild salmon.

For instance, I met with a group today, the Pacific Salmon Foundation, which is looking for funds. It is looking for ways to protect the wild salmon by investing in habitat, in stewardship, and in watershed management, which is badly needed on the west coast. The group is not able to do the job that is needed to protect this magnificent animal, the wild salmon.

A problem emerging on the west coast is sea lice from fish farms. That needs to be addressed.

There are so many issues under the Department of Fisheries and Oceans that could be addressed in the budget, yet the budget fails to address them. I hope we take a greater look at that.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member gave a fine speech. Ironically, today is the 20th anniversary of the Sparrow decision, when the Supreme Court of Canada handed down its decision on treaty negotiations.

With respect to what we see as the complete undermining of the environmental assessment regulations in this omnibus budget implementation bill, how does the member see this kind of regulation impacting on the duty to consult by the government? A number of first nations have spoken out quite strongly, raising concerns around this process and the bill. Could he comment on what he sees as possibly being a looming problem and perhaps future litigation in court cases?

[Fin Donnelly, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is a question of great concern to many first nation communities across the country. When these types of moves happen at the federal level to remove democracy or democratic processes that do not allow groups, organizations, governments like our first nations to be involved with decisions that will impact their very lives and communities, we are very concerned about those.

We do not see the accountability, openness and access that was promised. We see the reverse. We are seeing behind-closed-door decisions and legislation being rammed through at record speeds. We do not see an inclusion of communities like first nations to strengthen the way we do business and operate in our country.

This problem needs to be fixed by separating out these processes so they can be debated and discussed in a democratic way, including first nation communities and many others in our country.

The House resumed consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.

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

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to talk about this bill.

We call it a bill but it is a Trojan Horse. Buried inside this budget bill are a series of measures that the government could simply not have passed had it not put them in the budget bill.

We have a golden opportunity to open up this Trojan Horse and take out the nefarious legislation that is within it and to move ahead with the consideration of those important proposals but it will require the government to split out these pieces of legislation so we can deal with them separately. I would like to address why that is so important. I think the government should do exactly this.

I would like the leader of the official opposition to behave like a real opposition leader and use his power to prevent the Prime Minister from sneaking major legislative changes through by hiding them in this budget bill. Passing bills on the sly like this is a last-resort strategy for a government trying to make changes that do not have unanimous approval. Knowing that Canadians would not support each of these changes individually, the Conservatives tried to sneak them into its budget bill.

Some of the most disturbing changes in Bill C-9 are those to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act giving the Minister of the Environment the power to determine the scope of environmental assessments and to turn responsibility for reviewing power generation proposals over to the National Energy Board, which has close ties to the business sector. This bill includes a hodge-podge of unrelated elements and looks a lot like American budget bills, which tend to include hundreds of clauses added as a result of political manoeuvring.

Some of the most significant provisions buried in the Prime Minister's budget bill are: authorization to sell Atomic Energy of Canada Limited without any public debate or scrutiny; a measure to privatize Canada Post that takes away the crown corporation's exclusive international remailing privilege; and approval for having cleaned out the employment insurance fund, which had a surplus of $57 billion in contributions from employees and employers over the past 10 years. That was one of the largest thefts in this country's history.

We hope that the Leader of the Opposition will stand up for his convictions and vote against the measures in Bill C-9. It is important that he do so.

I want to speak a little further about some of the key elements that are buried in the budget bill. We can agree or disagree with some of these budget measures, but buried in this bill are projects and initiatives that the government could simply never pass through the House of Commons any other way.

The first that we want to discuss here today is the gutting of our environmental assessment process. The environmental assessment process for major projects including major energy projects is absolutely vital. We do not have to look any further than the crisis that is unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico right now to see why an environmental assessment is so important for major projects.

Yet, what is the government proposing to do? The government is proposing to give to the Minister of the Environment, without any accountability to Parliament, the power to simply waive any environmental assessment requirements and to ask the National Energy Board, for heaven's sake, to conduct the environmental assessment such as it might deem fit.

This is exactly the reverse of what our friends the Americans are doing as they realize when there is one agency responsible for getting approvals that ultimately generate revenue to government, that generate business for business, that are related to energy projects, that it has an exclusive focus and jurisdiction, that what is needed is a separate set of eyes and a separate process to deal with the environmental consequences, dangers and issues that can arise from an environmental project, particularly of a major magnitude.

Why empower the minister to limit environmental assessments at a time when Canadians and our neighbours to the south as well are asking governments to be more vigilant when it comes to environmental assessment, not less? This bill will open up greater risk for our Canadian environment and we could see the same kind of disaster unfolding in Canada on one of our coastlines or even in the Arctic as we are seeing unfold in the United States.

Mark my words, I do not want this to come true. I do not want this to be a prediction of something that is actually going to happen. I want us in this chamber to take responsibility to ensure that it does not happen, that it never happens, and that it could not happen here.

That is why I am calling on my colleagues in the other parties of the opposition to stand up and be counted. In fact, I would call on them to stand up and speak because I notice that even though this is a vitally important bill and even though there have been pronouncements on the part of both of the other opposition parties that they oppose some of these measures like the weakening of our environmental assessment process, we find that they are not willing to stand up and speak.

It is only New Democrats now, according to the list we have before us, who are prepared to keep fighting the bill. I call on my colleagues in the opposition, on the opposition leader, and the leader of Bloc Québécois to ensure that the members of Parliament from those parties are speaking to this issue and are standing up for Canadians when it comes to the environment. It is time for us to do our job.

Furthermore, I call upon them to bring their members to the House when the vote comes and to ensure there are sufficient numbers in the House to defeat this clause so that we can protect environmental assessment in Canada.

Some would say, “Oh, that would mean that it would take us into an election”. An election is not going to happen on top of the G8 and G20. Why not? Because the Prime Minister has already spent $1.2 billion to have these international guests come to ensure he can have his photo opportunity. There is no way that an election is going to happen on top of that.

It is time for the opposition parties to use the leverage and power that we have, and that Canadians sent us here to use in order to ensure that the government is kept under control. Conservatives think the opposition is weak. They think the opposition is unwilling to stand up to them.

Prove them wrong, that is what I say to my colleagues in the opposition. Let us stop the gutting of environmental laws here in Canada.

I could make exactly the same case when it comes to another element of the budget bill. This has to do with the sale of AECL.

AECL is a very important public enterprise. If it were to be debated here, I doubt very much there would be support of this chamber for it to be sold off, especially in tough economic times and without any sense of what would happen, in terms of environmental protection, not to mention the future of the jobs.

It is an obnoxious precedent being set here by the government. I call on the opposition parties to stand up and fight.

It also argues that we should privatize Canada Post. That is the wrong direction to go when we are talking about an essential public service. Taking profitable overseas mail distribution and turning it over to big companies that compete with Canada Post would undermine the ability of our public post service to do the job that Canadians expect it to do, and have expected it to do for many decades. It is a vital corporation.

In closing, I call on my colleagues from the opposition parties to understand that we have a key historic moment here to use the leverage given to us by 62% of Canadians who did not vote for the current government to put a stop to what it is trying to do in this budget bill.

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport]

Mr. Speaker, I had an opportunity, in between some of the comments made by the hon. member, to hear him say something about privatization of Canada Post. I can tell members, as the parliamentary secretary to the minister responsible for this for over four years now, there has been no discussion of privatization of Canada Post. Quite frankly, it is ludicrous.

However, what does trouble me is that he spoke of one particular aspect in the bill, which is called remailers. There are at least 10,000 jobs across this country, in Montreal, Vancouver, and Toronto, that rely on something that has been happening for 20 years; that is, remailers, small mom and pop organizations, print shops, across this country that have been operating for 20 to 30 years doing remailers. We have heard evidence about that remailing business going to other countries because Canada Post does not compete. So, it is going to other countries.

What does the member have against the small mom and pop shops and 10,000 employees in Toronto, Calgary, Edmonton, Montreal and Vancouver, who rely on these jobs now? Does he want to close down those small businesses that have been operating for 30 years under this particular aspect?

I want to hear from that member about those small mom and pop businesses that rely on this type of business.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his question because it is a very timely question that he has asked.

Only a very few weeks ago, I held a meeting in my constituency with some of the small businesses which used to give postal service, under contract to Canada Post, that have been shut down because of the very policies of the current government. Some of the citizens from the area, very upset that they have lost their local postal service, were there at that community meeting, as well. It was quite well covered in the newspaper.

The fact is that business has been shunted over to Shoppers Drug Mart. The result is we literally had in front of us in a meeting of 75 people, four or five of these businesses, some of which had operated for years. People were in tears because they were losing their livelihood and their relationships with the community.

So, I do not apologize for a minute for trying to stop the current government from doing what it is doing to Canada Post because it is not doing the right thing.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for Toronto—Danforth for that impassioned speech. I have a very specific question for him.

With the gutting of the environmental regulations, as proposed in this budget implementation bill, first nations across this country have raised some valid concerns about the fact that this process may mean that they are not consulted when large projects are going into their area.

Today is the 20th anniversary of the Sparrow decision, which was all about consultation with first nations, and here we have the current government presenting a proposal that cannot guarantee that appropriate consultation regarding environmental projects would happen.

I wonder whether the member would comment on that.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for her championship of the concerns of first nations, Métis and Inuit people over quite a number of years. She raises a very valid point.

The whole concept of environmental assessment is designed to ensure there is thorough, indepth, informed consultation with citizens who will be affected by projects. That is what it is all about. That is why environmental assessment was invented. It was not invented just for a group of technicians, or special interest groups, or corporate representatives or lobbyists to go off and whitewash a project and say that it would not have any environmental impact or that we should not worry, that they have it handled.

I am sure the representatives of BP said to the American government and some of the officials who were dealing with its approvals that they should not worry, that they had it covered. Now there has been everything from the top hat to the top kill. BP does not have a clue what it is doing now that it has unleashed the power that resides thousands of metres below the earth's crust.

Because environmental assessment is so critical, we know we should apply the most careful and thorough tests on any major engineering project that could produce similar kinds of consequences in Canada. I would bet that if I went out on the streets of the country right now and asked people if they thought it would be a good idea for us to weaken our assessment of major projects from the standpoint of their environmental consequences, they would say no. We say no too.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it has been over 40 days now since the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico started. Wildlife officials report that 491 birds, 227 turtles and 27 mammals, including dolphins, have been collected dead along the U.S. gulf coast. Have we not learned anything from this oil spill?

Those beautiful fish, turtles and dolphins are magnificent species. It is tragic they are now dying and many more will die. The top kill over the weekend did not work. The next thing BP is planning to do is to place a funnel on the leak, but this means that the leak could increase by 20% during this entire process.

How could we possibly not learn that deregulation of any projects, especially when it comes to oil or energy, is a bad idea? Look at what is happening here. This bill is anti-democratic, it is bad for the environment and it is bad for ordinary Canadians.

Why is it anti-democratic? This is supposed to be a budget bill. It is supposed to talk about spending. What does it have to do with deregulation? The bill would—

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I am wondering the relevance of the member's speech. She may be lost in American jargon and American legislation, but we are in Canada. We are not responsible for what happened in the gulf. We have a different legislative system here. We have a different environmental process here. This government is taking care of that issue. What does that have to do with the budget bill? It has nothing to do with it whatsoever.

Let us talk about Canadian legislation. Let us talk about what Canada is doing. We are doing the job here and the member should pay attention to that.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

From the Speaker's hearing, I think the member for Trinity—Spadina was referencing part of the budget bill, which is before the House. I will take a look at the group of amendments before the House. I encourage all members, when they speak, to remain relevant to the amendments or the substance of the motion that is before the House.

The hon. member for Trinity—Spadina.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that is precisely my point. Environmental assessment has nothing to do with the budget bill. Why is it in Bill C-9? I am glad the parliamentary secretary noticed that environmental assessment really should not have anything to do with the budget. While he—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Order, please. It is going to be very difficult for the Speaker to make a judgment call on relevance if he cannot hear what the member is saying. I ask all hon. members to hold off on their questions and comments. There will be a period for questions and comments as soon as the member for Trinity—Spadina is done with her speech.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am quite amazed that my Conservative colleagues actually got my point, that wrecking the environment should not have anything to do with a budget bill, but that is precisely what they are doing. They are taking the environmental assessment on energy projects, oil and gas, from the environmental assessment agencies. They then give the responsibility over to the industry-friendly National Energy Board, or the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

Let me explain the connections between the National Energy Board, the oil industry and the government. The National Energy Board does not have the experience necessary to conduct proper public consultations and environmental assessments. In fact, about 90% of the board's total expenditure is recovered from the companies it regulates under the National Energy Board.

That is like asking someone like BP to decide on whether its oil drilling is safe or not. In fact, 90% of the National Energy Board's expenditures come from the companies it is supposed to regulate. How could that possibly be done? The companies cannot be asked to regulate themselves. The government is supposed to regulate the projects that come in front of it.

Not only are six of the board members longtime veterans of the private oil and gas industry, on top of that, the Conservatives have hand-picked 10 out of the 12 members on the board. Sometimes the board only takes written submissions. There are no public hearings or consultations. Who did the board choose to hear from on one of the projects, the same-season relief well policy? It heard mostly from the big oil companies. No wonder, they are funded by them.

Of the 300 staff at the National Energy Board, only a few dozen of them work on environmental issues. They do not have the expertise. They are not designed to do environmental assessment. It is not their job, yet they are now given the responsibility to look at all our energy projects. It will take away the environmental protection role that the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency is supposed to have. It is set up, under the environment minister, to conduct reviews of projects that may have serious consequences.

When there is an oil leak, whether it is diesel, oil or deep-sea drilling, oil has huge environmental consequences as do nuclear projects. This move is anti-democratic and bad for the environment.

Part of the budget bill has cancelled the eco-energy renewable power program, a project that was quite popular. Now it is gone. After increasing some money for Environment Canada, there will be a $53 million cut.

Also most unacceptable in the bill is the selling of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited. That will have serious consequences. Last year's spending on AECL ended up being more than double what was budgeted, raising questions about what the final figure would be this year. Embedding the sale of AECL in the budget bill makes absolutely no sense.

The other element I want to talk about is the whole Canada Post situation. I have met with quite a few of the postal workers in my riding. My riding actually has four postal stations in its vicinity. The workers are extremely worried that their jobs are on the line. The bill would remove Canada Post's monopoly on outgoing international letters, which means that it would earn less, for example, when they needed to deliver mail to rural Canada. Canada Post runs itself like a business and if it loses this monopoly on international letters, it will earn less and other mail service across Canada will suffer.

This proposal is identical to what was proposed in Bill C-14 and Bill C-44. These two bills were defeated in the House. What the government has done is totally undemocratic. It brought back the bill that it was unable to pass and put it into this enormous Bill C-9, the budget implementation bill, in all types of areas that have nothing to do with the budget.

We ask all members of Parliament, who are not Conservative, to stand and vote against the bill.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we are dealing with the first group of motions in the Group No. 1 list, the air travellers security charge. It has been noted that in the United States right now, on international flights, the security charge is $5. The government, until now, has had the second highest security charges in the world. Now with a 50% increase in the security charge fee, the tax on air travellers, we are now the highest in the world. For an international flight, we would be looking at a security charge up to $25.

The government is inadvertently driving customers to the American air carriers. It is making the Canadian air industry more uncompetitive vis-à-vis the American airlines. As of this spring, rather than pay $5, people will have to pay $25 in air taxes.

Would the member like to comment on why a government that prides itself on trying to be competitive with the United States is doing things that make the Canadian industry uncompetitive?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it was quite interesting this morning to see a private member's bill on competition, to ensure that Canadian companies get more advantages so there would be more business. This does the exact opposite.

The proposal is to charge Canadian airlines, such as Air Canada, $25 for international flights. It used to be about $15, which was already too high. This is after the Minister of Transport refused to pay for police patrols. The government is supposed to protect travellers and airport security, yet it would not pay the cost of police patrols.

The government is downloading it to the passengers and the airlines. As a result, a lot more air travellers will buy tickets from American companies and other companies rather than Canadian companies because they do not want to pay this extra amount. It is bad for the passengers and it is bad for the Canadian airline industry.

[Ed Fast, Conservative, Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for her intervention. However, she is completely off base.

The remailing industry in Canada employs some 10,000 workers. These are ordinary, hard-working Canadians who depend on the remailing business for their livelihoods. That is how they put bread on the table.

For years we have heard the NDP pay lip service to the fact that they claim to be the great defenders of the workers across Canada. However, when it comes to practice, actually getting things done, they do the exact opposite.

For over 20 years it was accepted in Canada that remailers were conducting their business legally in this country. Somewhere along the line, some smart lawyer at Canada Post found out that there was a discrepancy between the English and French versions of the Canada Post Corporation Act. It went all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. The Supreme Court of Canada said it was going to prefer the French version and asserted the right of Canada Post to actually have control over the remailing industry.

Our government is correcting that and continuing the current practice in which remailers can continue to do business, in which 10,000 Canadians have their jobs. My question to the member is, how can she justify voting against hard-working Canadians?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very proud of the smart lawyers at Canada Post.

Canada Post belongs to the people of Canada. They run Canada Post like a business. Of course, they want to make sure that they, as a business, make as much money as possible. They understand that not every Canadian has email.

There is an art to writing letters. Handwritten letters are still very important, especially for a lot of seniors who would like to send get-well cards, birthday cards, and wedding cards. All of those elements are important for people to communicate with each other, especially in rural Canada.

We want Canada Post to be financially viable—

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Order.

Resuming debate. The hon. member for Windsor—Tecumseh.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-9 is a travesty of the democratic process in the House. I know I am not supposed to use the term “hypocrisy” when I am speaking of individual members, but I think I am allowed to do that when I am speaking of the government as a whole. This bill really fits that category.

I have stood in the House repeatedly challenging the government to use omnibus crime bills as opposed to, as it is wont to do repeatedly, repeatedly, repeatedly, individual bills on crime, and of course, taking advantage of all the publicity that it gets, which I find quite repulsive, trotting out victims in each one of these areas just so it can have a photo opportunity.

When we look at the number of crime bills we have had and how many of those could have been incorporated into omnibus bills and then referred to the justice committee where they could have had thorough review, investigations and expert witnesses coming in, hearing from the general public on legislation of that kind, it could have done that in a very efficient way as opposed to what we have seen with regard to the numerous bills we have had. We just had another one today. Bill C-30 came through today. Again, it is a classic example where it could be easily combined with a half dozen other bills that are either outstanding or we know are coming from the government.

Instead of having to waste a great deal of time and debate in the House, we could have had reasonable debate and sent it over to the justice committee where it would have been properly investigated and then come back to the House for further debate and either passage or rejection.

We have seen that pattern by the government repeatedly since it first came to office. Then what we have seen, both in last year's budget and even more so in this year's budget, is an attempt on the government's part to justify that, for efficiency purposes, we should have an omnibus bill.

We have heard from any number of other members the number of provisions, and I am going to come back to this, in this bill that really at their essence have nothing to do with budgetary matters and have everything to do with other serious public policy issues that should be given their due attention as opposed to what has happened with the bill.

When we juxtapose those two positions, all of these crime bills coming through not in the form of omnibus bills, which they should be, and then throwing into a budget bill, which is what Bill C-9 should be, all sorts of other public policy issues that should not be there, it is inevitable to see the inconsistency in those two positions, and as I said in my opening remarks, the shameful way that democracy is being thwarted in this type of approach by the government.

Again, it is not the first time it has done it. It certainly did it quite extensively in last year's budget with the budget implementation bill, but it has gone even significantly further in this one.

We may say, if we have had a reasonable amount of debate on it, is it not justified? As we know, in fact it is not. Any number of those other issues that have been injected into Bill C-9, into this budget implementation bill, are not issues that would call for the government to fail should the provisions not go through the House, whereas the budget bill, as we all know, is a matter of confidence and the government does come down if the vote is against it.

We know that the official opposition is running scared from the government and is not prepared to bring the government down on major policy issues. The government is using that to its advantage with the fear that the Liberals have of having to face the electorate. So the Liberals are certainly guilty to a significant degree when we see these types of bills coming through, because they are being intimidated, they are being bullied, and they are succumbing to that intimidation and bullying by the Conservative government. That again is not a healthy democracy to be functioning within.

That process is bad for democracy and it is bad for good public policy, and let me go to that now. A number of these provisions that have been incorporated into Bill C-9 clearly should not be there, should be stand-alone bills.

Let me deal with the environmental assessment provisions that are in here. The provision in Bill C-9 should be a separate bill. It should be in front of the environment committee, where members of that committee are thoroughly knowledgeable of the necessities we have in this country for environmental assessments. Those committee members have thorough knowledge of what is required with regard to environmental assessments at the national level in this country. They have the ability to thoroughly review the legislation to determine whether in fact it is adequate.

As I think everyone in the House knows, we are opposed to the policy position the government has taken in this regard. Moving the assessments out of the environment department into natural resources, providing almost absolute discretion to the minister as to when assessments are to take place, is clearly not good public policy. It stands out in these circumstances with what has happened in the Gulf of Mexico, the concerns we have of the government being quite willing to be overly friendly with the oil and gas industry, willing to bend the rules. We have seen recently, and I am sure this would have gone through but for what happened in the Gulf of Mexico, a request by the oil and gas industry to further loosen the rules generally with regard to exploration, but specifically with regard to exploration and drilling offshore. That request had been made. But for the Gulf of Mexico, I am quite convinced the government would have been prepared to move on it.

If this bill goes through as is, what will happen is that provision will surface at some point in the future. The government again will be receptive to that kind of approach, claims of poverty by the oil and gas industry that they cannot afford to do full assessments, they cannot afford to meet higher standards, and the government will cave in and allow them to do whatever they want to do. That has certainly been the history, whether it is in Alberta in the oil sands or any number of other places across the country where the oil and gas industry has had its way and we have seen the consequences. That is the kind of abuse that this kind of legislation allows for.

With regard to the other provisions, the provision that is always of particular concern, given the community that I come from, is the stripping out of the $57 billion in the fund that was supposed to be there to take care of workers when they were faced with high levels of chronic unemployment. Stripping that out is something that always stands, in a community such as Windsor—Tecumseh where the labour community is very conscious of that having happened, first under the Liberals and now being finalized under the Conservatives. That bill should be a separate bill. That provision should be a separate provision and we should be voting on it separately so that it is very clear as to who is prepared to stand up in this country to protect workers when they are in that difficulty.

The final point I want to make is what is not in the bill, around pensions. Again, in the community I come from, we have taken some major hits on private pensions going down, on the Canada pension and the OAS not being sufficient to take care of people in their retirement. We owe them that obligation. We have set out in very clear form some of the alternatives that could be followed. None of that is in the bill and is another reason that we are adamantly opposed to it.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask about management systems, because I admire the member's intellect in some of these areas. When he talked about management of the oil and gas industry, he brought up the important point that we have been making as well that recently there was a change in the management system so it became a goals-oriented process, so that some mandatory items were removed. The industry had to set goals and prove that they were going to meet those goals. Their arguments are that if we just required certain goals, if there was an accident and they had followed those goals, they could say they were blameless. Or the other one is that things are changing all the time and there are new technologies that the companies could use.

I would like the member to comment on the new management changes.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question and his kind comments. They were better than what I got from my colleagues back here.

He makes a very good point. With regard to that, some of the news that broke over the weekend was about what went on with the approach taken in the Gulf of Mexico by BP and by their own people, who had told them that the system, the technology, they were going to use was really, seriously questionable. It is the same kind of thing. Even if it was goal-oriented and they had those kinds of standards, they did not meet them.

The initial reports came out from their own staff saying that they had serious doubts about whether this would work, that there were serious problems of risk, and that they should be reconsidering it. A few months later, another report comes out, and all of a sudden, they can now meet them. There was no change in technology.

It is that kind of abuse.

What it is really about, and my friend from the Yukon is very right about this, is that we need government protection in this area. We cannot leave activity as risky as this to be determined by the industry, which is clearly in conflict when it comes to setting those standards. They have to be set by independent arbiters and experts in the field. Those standards then have to be met by the industry in question and have to be enforced.

That is true, certainly, in the oil and gas industry. It is also true in any number of other areas where government has to play the role of protecting their citizens.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I really enjoyed listening to the speech from the member for Windsor—Tecumseh.

Tomorrow is Hunger Awareness Day, which speaks to a whole range of issues, including, of course, issues of poverty, first and foremost.

Employment insurance, for many Canadians, is the last opportunity to stave off a life of poverty when people have been adversely affected because they have lost their jobs. Communities like the member's community of Windsor and my home town of Hamilton Mountain have been just devastated by the tsunami of job losses as a result of the recession we are still in but that we first felt the effects of in 2008.

One of the things in the budget bill, as the member correctly pointed out, is the final nail in the coffin of the $57 billion fund of EI moneys, which the government is now taking for itself and is putting into consolidated revenues. It is basically legalized theft.

I want to ask the member for Windsor—Tecumseh whether his community is facing the same reality as we are in Hamilton, where people now have to rely on social assistance, because EI is no longer there for them. All the costs are now going onto ratepayers, the very people who have lost their jobs in our community.

[Joe Comartin, NDP, Windsor—Tecumseh, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is no question that Windsor and the county governments are faced with a significant increase in the number of people on the social service welfare rolls. There is no question. I have seen a growth in numbers of as much as 17% to 20% over the last two years. It appears to be levelling off at this point. However, the increases are at that level. The Ontario government has made it very clear that across the whole of the province there will be huge increases.

We have seen similar figures, interestingly, in Alberta and British Columbia, with a 20% to 25% growth in the number of people who are receiving welfare benefits. That is a direct result of all that money disappearing out of the EI fund. The federal government is not in a position to expand without taking money out of general revenue, which is what it should have done as opposed to dumping all that money into general revenue over the years.

The fund was there. At a time of crisis, such as we are going through at this period of time and have been going through over the last 18 months, those funds would have made a great difference in ending the poverty level in this country.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am really pleased to stand to speak to Bill C-9, the budget implementation act, because it gives me an opportunity to speak about what I think are two very critical issues in the public governance field. The first is the question of sound, appropriate public policy in government. The second issue, which I think is just as important, has to do with two different visions of an economic development model in this country, one from the government and one from the New Democrats. I would like to point out that I think Bill C-9 highlights this very critical difference for Canadians.

I want to start, first, with the question of sound public policy and the question of accountability and sound budgeting practices.

The bill that has been tabled is approximately 880 pages long. It is what is called an omnibus bill. For any Canadians who might be watching right now, that means that the government has taken items that are normally part of a budget and has added to them legislative proposals on a wide variety of other subjects that are not typically part of a budget bill.

I would respectfully suggest to all my colleagues and to all Canadians that this is an inappropriate practice, and there are some solid reasons for that.

First and foremost is one of respecting the democratic process. When a budget is tabled in the House, of course, members of Parliament debate the items in that budget and determine the proper and appropriate economic blueprint for the year ahead, which is what Canadians have sent them to do. That includes raising revenue and spending revenue and other measures that have to do with the running of our country, fiscally and economically. In order to debate that budget properly, we need to have subjects in that budget that lend themselves to that debate.

When a government, such as the one here, throws into that budgetary process items that have no business being in that budget, it cripples the debate, and it causes parliamentarians to have to vote on items that are not budgetary in nature. We cannot then have a proper, full debate on issues that are very important.

In some ways, I think Bill C-9 is a classic example of one of the major problems of the current government, which is that it has a fundamental disrespect for Parliament and a fundamental disrespect for the institutions of government in this country.

Of course, this is not the first time the current government has illustrated this disrespect. It has prorogued Parliament twice when it has found it inappropriate or uncomfortable to debate the issues Canadians send us here to debate. It has used the budget process before to engage in this kind of inappropriate behaviour.

We all remember back in 2008 that the current government used the budgetary process as a political attack--a political attack on the public service, a political attack on pay equity, a political attack on women, and a political attack on political parties--by trying to ram through a budget in the fall of 2008 that was as much an aggressive document of political ideology as it was one of sound budget.

I want to highlight for Canadians a couple of those inappropriate measures in this budget, and there are many. These are some of the more egregious ones.

First, the current government has seen fit to put in provisions that would seriously and significantly impair the environmental assessment process at the federal level in this country. They are in the budget. Now, Canadians might ask what an environmental assessment process has to do with a budget. If Canadians asked that question, they would be asking an astute question that I think exists on this side of the House, which the government does not seem to want to answer.

I want to briefly summarize this environmental assessment process. It exempts certain federally funded infrastructure projects from environmental assessments, period. It pre-empts a review of the environmental review process in June 2010. It allows the Minister of the Environment to dictate the scope of environmental assessments. It weakens public participation. It enables the removal of the assessment of energy projects from the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency and transfers that jurisdiction to the National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

Let me repeat that. It takes the review of energy projects away from an environmental assessment tribunal and has the projects reviewed by energy agencies. I think Canadians would find that shocking, particularly because, as we speak, there is an oil well in the Gulf of Mexico that is gushing millions of barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. It is creating what will no doubt be a century of environmental degradation and devastation. Why? It is coming out that there were weak regulatory and oversight procedures in the United States. In other words, the fox was in the henhouse.

Canadians, North Americans, and citizens of our world, I would argue, want projects to be analyzed in terms of their environmental sustainability and worth. That is not done by the very agencies whose job it is to try to pass those energy projects. It is a clear conflict of interest.

This budget also includes the privatization of part of the business of Canada Post. One might ask what that has to do with the budget. Why is there any place in this budget for a provision that would send the international mail provision of Canada Post off to the private sector? Again, it is because what the government wants to do is put ideological and political measures into the budgetary process to try to have them passed as a confidence measure. Government members know, as all Canadians know, that the Liberal opposition in this country will pass anything to avoid an election. That is putting narrow political partisan interests ahead of good public policy, and I think it is lamentable.

I want to talk about the budget from a straight budgetary point of view, because there are a lot of bad measures on their own in this budget. For instance, as has been spoken about, $57 billion of EI premiums have been taken from workers and employers in this country—

[Brian Jean, Conservative, Fort McMurray—Athabasca, AB]

That was the Liberals.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, that is a good point. The money started to be taken by the Liberals. It has been finished off by the Conservatives. They took $57 billion and put it into general revenues and have not put the money back.

I hear catcalls of innocence from Conservative members. If they are sincere about that, they will put $57 billion back into the EI account. They will put it back in, because it is not their money. It belongs to the workers and businesses who deducted it and paid it, trusting that the money would be there as insurance money for unemployment, not for funding tax cuts to corporations.

Let me move to that. What is in this bill, as well, and what is odious in this economic time is the momentous tax shift from corporations to individuals. Every Canadian knows that the Conservative government brought in the HST in Ontario and British Columbia and provided $6 billion of bribe money so that the governments in those two provinces would bring in the HST. It will result in hundreds and hundreds and in some cases thousands of dollars in taxes being transferred onto the backs of ordinary people in these two provinces.

We are doing that at a time when the government is running a deficit of over $50 billion. One would think that when we are running a deficit of $50 billion, we would not be giving money to corporations, but the government does. Why? Because it is the triumph of ideology over common sense. No government in its right mind would be transferring money and wealth, going into debt, and borrowing money to give to corporations when it is $50 billion in deficit, but the government has done that.

It is raising the airline tax by 50%. Every time a Canadian goes to the airport in this country, he or she will be paying twice as much as he or she used to.

The government says that it is opposed to tax hikes, but it has raised EI premiums, doubled the airline tax, and brought in the HST. Canadians are not fooled. They know who is taxing them, and they know that they are being taxed unfairly.

What is not in this budget? There is no child care, no national housing policy, and no real help for pensions in this country. In terms of pensions, the country needs an expansion of CPP and an increase in GIS. We need $700 million annually to lift seniors out of poverty in this country. All we need is $700 million. The government will spend $1 billion on security for three days of meetings in Toronto for a photo op for the Prime Minister, when for $700 million, every senior in this country could be lifted out of poverty.

Budgets are a question of soul. When a budget is brought forth, we look into the soul of a government, and I think all Canadians are seeing clearly where the soul resides in this government.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we are dealing with the deletions in group no. 1, specifically the air travellers' security charge, the environmental assessment, and the EI funding.

I am particularly interested in the air travellers' security charge. It has been alleged, and rightly so, that the revenues that are being collected through the air travellers' security charge far exceed the money that the government is actually spending on security.

The government is already raising more money than it is spending on security. Why would it increase the charges by 50%, making Canada the highest taxed jurisdiction in the world, exceeding Holland, and putting us at a competitive disadvantage to the United States? In the United States there is an international security tax of $5. The new Canadian tax is $25.

Before this new change, Canadian airlines were already at a competitive disadvantage with people buying their airfares in the United States through U.S. carriers. Why would a government that is trying to make Canada competitive be making Canada more uncompetitive?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, a government will increase fees on Canadians when it wants to hide the fact that it is raising revenue from ordinary Canadians while trying to fool them into thinking that they are not paying taxes.

Just because a government says it is so does not make it so. The government stands up day and after and says it is not raising taxes. That is what the government says, but it raised the HST, and it is raising the airline taxes and EI premiums. To taxpayers, those all amount to the same thing, it is money out of their pockets.

Worse, the government claims that it is raising the security fee increase in order to pay for security, but the money that would be raised by this tax is not going to aviation security, it is going to consolidated revenues. That tells Canadians quite clearly that the government is raising money off of Canadians every time they go to the airport to help it deal with its $50 billion deficit so that it can give money to corporations in this country that do not need it.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one of the items in this budget bill that perhaps has not gotten nearly as much attention as it should have are the sections that are eviscerating federal environmental assessments.

For people who are maybe watching this debate at home today, that is particularly germane in light of what we are seeing south of the border in the Gulf of Mexico, particularly with respect to the oil spill down there.

We have a government here that, instead of re-examining all aspects of development that have an adverse impact on our environment, is making it easier and is loosening regulations. It is making it possible for people to essentially get around environmental assessment criteria. It is now being put into the budget in a way that formalizes the gutting of our environmental assessments.

I think it is one of the issues that deserves much more detailed attention. It deserves independent study, outside of this budget bill.

I know the member for Vancouver Kingsway is on the west coast. I know he has his own concerns about tanker traffic. I just wonder whether the member could bring a western perspective to that part of the debate, on environmental assessments in particular.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for this opportunity to address this issue.

It is exactly true. We on the west coast have a pristine coastline. We are very aware and sensitive to the fact that we are in a seismically active area. Any drilling that would go on, on the west coast or up in the Arctic, would be subject to particular dangers that are simply not worth it.

I think I can safely speak on behalf of British Columbians when I say that they do not want to see drilling off the west coast. They do not want to see oil tanker traffic in sensitive waters off the west coast. They do not want to see any drilling up in the Arctic, where we all know weather and harsh conditions would make the kind of disaster we are seeing in the Gulf of Mexico utterly incomprehensible.

Moving major industrial projects from an agency that is dedicated to environmental protection and handing it over to an industry-friendly board, like the NEB, is simply irresponsible. It is the kind of issue that should not be in the budget. My friend is quite right that we should be examining that separately because I think members of this House would not want to see such a bad policy move. It is hard to do so when it is enveloped inside an 880-page budget bill.

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, all members of Parliament here in the House of Commons were elected to represent the constituents in their ridings. Representation can and, I believe, should take two forms.

First, we are elected to be the voice of our constituents and represent their interests here in Ottawa. Our constituents write to us, call us and send us emails. They tell us how they feel about certain issues. They chat with us at the farmers' market or at different community events, and they share their perspectives with us.

We have an obligation to take that feedback. We represent our constituents by bringing those perspectives, thoughts and opinions here. It helps guide us in how we vote, what we say in debates, and how we shape the policies of our parties as well as our government.

However, we are also elected to represent ideas and perspectives of our own, to take leadership on issues, to take positions, and to make decisions about the policies facing our country and our citizens. We are elected to take thoughtful and informed positions and even sometimes unpopular positions.

There is a tension here between what the individual constituents are saying and the mandate upon which an MP was elected to move forward. With respect to this budget and this budget speech, I would like to raise thoughts and ideas that come from individual constituents as well as perspectives of my own and perspectives of the NDP. Interestingly enough, the three are very much aligned.

Like many members of Parliament, I solicit feedback from my constituents with mail-back cards that are attached to my MP mail-outs and newsletters. I have a pretty engaged constituency. I am always thrilled to see a stack of cards in my office with feedback that my constituents want to share with me. I would like to share some of their responses with my colleagues here in the House. It is specifically feedback that I received regarding 2010 budget.

Tim Hosford wrote to me. He said, “Megan, we need a law to protect our pensions. As for the economy, we need to continue to put money into it, allocate monies for education and we need a plan for the next 10 years”. A plan sounds like a good idea.

Halifax has the highest density of students of any city in Canada. It is often reflected in comments that I receive in my office. For example, Dustin Joldersma wrote, “University students!!! Make it easier to get student loans, for example, part-time students should be able to get student loans. Also making cuts to foreign aid is not an answer. Government and universities cannot overlook part-time students”.

Another constituent named Burton Coutts wrote that the Prime Minister is “giving us the worst government in my lifetime and I am 87. Recent priorities are return of money to cancelled and reduced women and children's issues, also CIDA and KAIROS, and it appears his cohorts want to cut funding for birth control and abortions here and in countries where women and children are at risk”.

Alan Matte provided great feedback on pharmacare that was pretty straightforward. J. Scott wrote to me and said, “A priority long overdue is better health care. More doctors available for faster and better service. More help to nurses in hospitals, better emergency service--”

M.T. Lynden from my riding has a really great list. It is a pretty big list, starting with free education. The letter continues, “It's important that everyone can access education, regardless of their income. University students often end up with a large debt. Interest should not be charged on their student loans, neither provincially nor federally...and health: dental and medication coverage...for those who don't have a benefits plan”.

That is a little snapshot of the mood of my riding. I am proud to stand here in this great House and share that feedback with my colleagues.

I would like to pick up on the last issue that came through in a couple of letters from my constituents: the issue of health care. As we heard, it is something that my constituents care quite a bit about. We keep hearing from the government about the need to cut spending, the need to trim the fat, and the need to tighten our belts.

However, the government and this budget fail to realize that while spending on health is growing, we can get a handle on health costs if we just turn the corner and start focusing on what Tommy Douglas referred to as phase two of his health care vision. We could actually control and reduce our costs when it comes to health spending.

Tommy Douglas described his original vision for health care. He described Canada as a country “where all can live free from fear, free from crippling debts when we fall ill”. We have seen a lot of that vision implemented since he established medicare in Saskatchewan half a century or so ago, but that vision is eroding due to a lack of leadership, a lack of vision, and neglect. It is time for us to move ahead with a new vision that is suited to our times and that is phase two.

Phase one was universal public insurance for physician and hospital care.

Phase two has two components. First, to extend medicare to cover services that are increasingly delivered outside of a hospital, services that have become an integral part of our modern health care system, such as home care, long-term care, community care, drug therapy, and initiatives that address the social determinants of health. Again, this is about prevention. This is about reducing our costs.

Dennis Raphael, a professor at York University, put out an excellent report on the social determinants of health. The social determinants of health are a better indication of what one's level of health is going to be and how long one will live as compared to the kind of treatment one will get. We could actually save a lot of money by focusing on social determinants of health and things like home care.

The other component of phase two is managing health care better. Let us make better use of health human resources, wait list management, team practice, integration of services, sharing of best practices, evidence-based practice and other innovations.

I am looking forward to the report coming from the health committee about health human resources. The committee heard some amazing testimony about innovative ways to look at exactly how we can manage health care better, how we can make better use of health human resources and save money, and start controlling our health care costs, but perhaps more important, making sure that Canadians are healthy, happy, and doing well in our communities.

I have spoken before in this House about what I see as the failures of this budget, specifically its failure to seize opportunities in the world of science, technology and innovation. The last time I spoke to this bill that was the focus of my speech, particularly in the world of the green economy of the future. This lack of vision carries through the budget. It is not just the failure to grasp science, technology and innovation. It goes right through the budget on all kinds of issues, including health care.

The only vision that I see here is the sell off of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, gutting environmental protection, and killing successful projects like eco-energy renewables. That is quite the vision.

The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives put together a very well researched alternative federal budget and it has a vision in its alternative budget, a vision for health care, something that is missing from this budget. It says that, “Canada's public health care system is a fundamental pillar of our society, and it must be strengthened, especially in the wake of devastation caused by the economic crisis”. Its alternative budget says, “It's time to launch serious discussions with the provinces and territories to cost share pharmacare between the federal and provincial government and employers--”

The centre proposes a royal commission on the establishment and financing of a public drug plan, and funding the pharmacare of low income Canadians.

It also calls for a restoration of federal cash payments for extended health services, including nursing home intermediate care services, adult residential care services, home care services, and outpatient health care services.

It also talks about working with professional regulatory bodies, health care unions, and immigrant rights organizations to facilitate the recognition of international education.

Its plan calls for funding of post-secondary education in health programs, looking at health human resource strategies, innovative strategies.

This is a real plan. It is an alternative federal budget that actually has a vision for health care. It is a vision that is notably absent from Bill C-9 and it is not a bill that I can support.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague had quite a lot of substance in her speech. I just want to talk about two issues.

She spoke about the social determinants of health. Some of the new neuroscience is very compelling in terms of looking at how a child's brain develops, particularly in the first five years going back to the prenatal stage.

I wonder whether or not my colleague feels that a national headstart early learning program would be one of the most powerful things the federal government could do by working with the provinces, and enabling parents and children to have knowledge about the importance of literacy, proper nutrition, proper parenting, and physical activity.

I will reference the work by Dr. Mark Tremblay from Montreal, who did some groundwork research in terms of showing the decline of our children's health and establishing that this is the first generation of children who will actually have a shorter lifespan than their parents.

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, yes, absolutely.

I was so lucky in that during the election campaign I was able to carve out some time to attend a conference and listen to Dr. Charles Coffey talk specifically about this topic.

The age group of zero to five years is exactly when we need to be involved. That is when children's bodies and brains are growing at an incredible rate and they have such an opportunity to learn. They need to be given good, nutritious food in order to grow up to become healthy adults. We need to work with parents. Frankly I do not care what form that kind of program takes, but it is critical. If we expect to have a healthy, vibrant and productive workforce, we need to get involved when kids are in their early years.

I am absolutely in agreement with my colleague.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I was very interested in what the member had to say regarding this file. I would like to ask her about electronic health records.

She probably knows that the United States is light years ahead of us in that area. It has certainly been developing electronic health record systems for the last 10 or 15 years now, and Canada is falling behind.

Another area is the idea of a common computer system where a hospital program is developed once and it is replicated across the country. The Canadian government, since the Paul Martin days, has been approached on that subject and has not done anything about it. For example, there is an SAP program in the member's province of Nova Scotia. The city of Halifax is on SAP. I believe the government is on SAP and the hospitals are on SAP as well. In Manitoba the city of Winnipeg headed off on its own with a different system.

Has the member spent any time looking at this area and what are her observations about getting systems online?

[Megan Leslie, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Elmwood—Transcona has brought up a really good point. This is exactly the kind of role the federal government could play. There are many things that fall under provincial jurisdiction, but the role of the federal government is to provide leadership. The federal government also has the power of taxation; let us be honest.

We are falling behind when it comes to electronic records. We are falling behind when it comes to housing. We are falling behind when it comes to all kinds of things. We have a government that refuses to show leadership and say, “We are going to convene a meeting of federal, provincial, territorial and first nations representatives. We are going to lead and we will carve off money to help bring this forward”.

With respect to first nations, we do not have a TB strategy. We do not have a national housing strategy. There are so many areas in which we need that kind of federal leadership. Where is it? Why are we not moving forward on electronic records, especially when we consider that, again back to the money issue, it could save us money? More importantly, it could save lives.

This is one of the best ways to make sure that we get accurate, up to date information about a person's health status. Why are we not implementing these innovative measures?

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to the amendments that have been proposed by the New Democrats. I specifically want to acknowledge the member for Acadie—Bathurst, the member for Edmonton—Strathcona and the member for Hamilton Mountain, who proposed a series of amendments that would delete some of the more egregious clauses of the budget implementation bill.

Those amendments have been divided into two separate groups. Today we are specifically dealing with the amendments in Group No. 1 with regard to deleting the clauses pertaining to the airport security tax, changes to the easing of the rules for environmental assessments and changes to the EI fund. In the short 10 minutes that I have, I am going to deal with two of those areas.

Listeners might wonder why we are debating deletions to the budget implementation bill. This legislation is an omnibus bill that is over 800 pages long. Buried in the bill are a number of items that normally would be stand-alone legislation. They would normally be bills that would be introduced in the House of Commons. They would have a fulsome debate here in the House. If they passed second reading, they would be referred to a parliamentary standing committee where members of the standing committees would call witnesses and examine the legislation in detail.

Instead, the government has chosen to cram some significant changes into an omnibus bill. That is normally not the way Canadians would expect those legislative agendas to be dealt with. They would expect the democratic process of a full parliamentary debate, that due diligence to ensure there would be no unintended consequences.

The New Democrats have been forced to attempt to amend the budget implementation bill. That is the only avenue open to us. Other members have pointed out for example that the part that deals with Canada Post has been introduced as legislation in the House at least twice before. The government had little hope of ramming that legislation through, so instead, it has buried it in a budget implementation bill and is calling it a matter of confidence.

It flies in the face of what we would consider to be a democratic process. I would urge all opposition members to support our amendments to delete the most egregious parts of the budget implementation bill.

I want to turn to two of these deletions.

What the government has done is essentially enshrined the theft of $57 billion from the employment insurance fund. The Conservatives are continuing along the lines of what the Liberals did previously. They are using the premiums that workers and their employers have paid into the EI fund to pay down the deficit.

When workers and employers paid that money, they fully expected it to support the employment insurance fund but also to support other training initiatives. In these economic times, that would seem to be a reasonable use of that money. By including this in the budget implementation bill, the government is admitting that it has no intention of honouring those commitments to workers and their employers.

Let me tell the House why that is important. An article put out by the Citizens for Public Justice, entitled “Bearing the Brunt: How the 2008-2009 Recession Created Poverty for Canadian Families”, states:

The recession revealed the inadequacy of the EI as a social safety net. Despite a rise in EI coverage, almost half of the unemployed did not receive benefits.

Canadians who did receive EI benefits were living in poverty unless they had other household sources of income.

As many as 500,000 Canadians have exhausted their EI benefits without finding new work.

Many of the Canadian men and women who have exhausted their EI benefits are in my own riding. Forestry workers have faced shutdowns in that industry off and on for the last four or five years and now. They have exhausted their EI benefits and many of them are now facing going on welfare.

The article also speaks about employment and income:

The recession increased the rate of precarious work, as part-time jobs replaced full-time jobs, and temporary jobs replaced permanent jobs.

Growth in average earnings for part-time workers did not keep pace with inflation.

Recessions increase the income gap between high income and low income Canadians. The poorest Canadians lose more of their income during a recession, and do not recover at the same rate between recessions.

Those numbers are being borne out. We often hear government members talk about the jobs they have created, but they fail to say that many of those jobs are part-time seasonal contract work and they simply cannot give a family a living wage. They cannot allow families to send their kids to school. In a country as rich as ours, it is absolutely shameful.

The Canadian Labour Congress made a statement to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance. The Canadian Labour Congress, the New Democrats and other organizations in this country have some meaningful proposals on employment insurance reform. This includes uniform entrance requirements across the country of 360 hours so that more workers will qualify. It also looks at evening out the unemployment regions. I have talked about this in the House before. My region is tied to the Vancouver labour market. Despite the fact that unemployment is much higher in my area than it is in Vancouver, workers in my area exhaust their benefits far sooner than they should given the rate of unemployment. That simply should not happen.

The Canadian Labour Congress suggests that those differing rates of gaining access to benefits should be evened out. There should be longer benefit periods of at least 50 weeks in all regions so that fewer unemployed workers exhaust their claims. It also calls for higher benefit rates. Given that there was $57 billion in the EI fund, it seems reasonable to make sure that workers in these tough times have access to that money.

I want to turn briefly to the changes to the regulations around the environmental assessment process. Today is the 20th anniversary of the Sparrow decision which was handed down by the Supreme Court of Canada. It set the foundation for treaty negotiations in British Columbia. Today, Sophie Pierre, the chief commissioner of the B.C. Treaty Commission was quoted in a news article as saying, “It put an end to 130 years of denial of aboriginal rights by the B.C. government”. The article states:

The case went all the way to the Supreme Court, which ruled on May 31, 1990 that aboriginal rights exist and were not extinguished by federal fisheries regulations....“We recognize that litigation has informed treaty negotiations and continues to do so. But a government-to-government relationship, with all its complexities must be negotiated,” said Pierre. “We understand that First Nations may feel forced to take legal action to protect interests they do not see being addressed at the treaty table. That's a delicate balance. All governments must recognize that relationships cannot be built in court.”

One might wonder why I bring that up in the context of the easing of environmental regulations. I predict that with the easing of environmental regulations, unless the government upholds the honour of the Crown and makes sure that consultation is in place when these major projects come through, we are going to see more court cases. Sadly, the Sparrow decision is an indicator of how many years it took the first nations to get some justice. There are aboriginal groups who have written to the Prime Minister warning him not to weaken those environmental laws.

On May 26, Duncan's First Nation took its case to the Supreme Court of Canada and the Hague. The case concerns the tar sands and the impact that project is having on first nations in Alberta. It is another example of even when there are environmental regulations in place, first nations are still forced to go to the courts, even internationally, to have their cases heard and their rights respected.

It would be lovely if the government would support these amendments, but I would urge the opposition parties to support our proposed amendments and delete these clauses from the budget implementation bill.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to my colleague's comments and I commend her on her speech. I was very pleased that she referenced poverty and specifically the recent report from Citizens for Public Justice which confirms the belief that I and her colleague from Sault Ste. Marie and many others have that the recession has been taking a toll.

The government has talked about reductions in child poverty and poverty, but both poverty and child poverty have gone up 2.5% since the beginning of the recession. It is very serious and the government has not allowed the social infrastructure to be prepared for this.

I want to ask the member if she shares my concern. The poor in Canada received very little of the stimulus benefit. It went to higher income groups instead of to those who need it. The small changes made to EI and even social housing are temporary and are going to run out. Those who need help the most are going to be hurt the most. I wonder if the member shares that view and if she has any ideas about how we could remedy that.

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, Citizens for Public Justice, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and many other organizations have rightly identified the fact that there is a growing income gap in our country. A recent report on first nations noted how first nations people were simply largely left out of the whole infrastructure's economic stimulus package.

We need a comprehensive approach. We need to ensure that the social safety net of employment insurance is in place so working families have access to that money in tough economic times and that it is an adequate amount of money. People cannot live or support a family on approximately $300 a week. That is what the average EI benefit is right now.

We need to ensure that we have affordable housing available. We need to ensure that we are supporting early learning and child care. The list goes on and on. Those are investments in our economy.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we have been debating these amendments to the budget bill for quite some time now, both in committee and now at report stage. It seems to me there are two separate types of issues here. One is a process and the other one is substantive. Substantively, there is a lot at stake, and we have talked about that at great length, whether it is the privatization of Canada Post, the gutting of environmental assessments, the fire sale of AECL, the legalized theft of $57 billion from the EI fund. All those issues are of grave concern to Canadians. However, what is equally of concern to them is they do not have an opportunity to participate in this process because all of these issues have been rolled into this omnibus budget bill.

I recognize we are at report stage, but surely it is not too late to sever those six critical areas from the budget bill, to deal with the budget bill on its own and to deal with these six individual items, if we have to, as stand-alone bills in the House. That would only require the Liberals to vote with us on this. With the Liberals, the Bloc and us, we could give Canadians that opportunity.

First, does the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan see that opportunity as a real one? Second, does she share my optimism that this is something we could do and should do?

[Jean Crowder, NDP, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Hamilton Mountain was also a mover of some of the amendments that we proposed.

If the Conservative government had faith that its suggestions for changes around AECL, employment insurance, easing of environmental rules, Canada Post and the airport tax, it would put those forward in separate legislation. If the government had confidence that Canadians supported that, it would put it forward and allow that kind of debate to happen. If the Conservative had confidence that they were on the right track, they would not be afraid to have a fulsome debate at committee and call in witnesses.

This is an opportunity for the opposition members in the House to demonstrate that they do not agree with where the Conservative government is going and for all members to be present in the House to support the NDP amendments.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to continue to challenge the government regarding its approach to the difficult times we individual families and workers are facing. At the outset, I am alarmed at what seems to be a lack of understanding by the government to what is happening out there, the real challenges we are facing in the economy both nationally and globally.

I suppose it should not surprise me. When the government introduced its action plan back in November of 2008, an action plan that almost brought the House down and might have led to a better, more progressive government holding fort in the country, it did not understand either the depth and breadth of the recession we were in and that it had to deal with, so it brought nothing forward. It prorogued the House, as it has a habit of doing, and then brought forward a plan in January of the following year.

I am surprised that Conservatives have not learned anything. They are not doing as so many other countries are doing, which is looking realistically at what is going on in the economy and in their communities.

Let us look for a second at what is happening in the world. We are now looking at the kind of debt that we have not seen, I would guess, probably for centuries in this world. Every country is struggling with what has happened in the last year and a half, trying to come to terms with it and put in place programs and plans to restructure their economies. They are looking at some pretty significant and frightening levels of debt.

For example, this year Portugal is facing an equivalent of 8.8% of its GDP in debt. For Spain, the figure is 10.4%. In Ireland, the Celtic Tiger many will remember, is looking at a debt of 12.2% of GDP. These are staggering numbers. Yet, because of the global nature of the way the economy works these days and that we have bought into in such a significant way, we are affected and will be affected by this.

If there is in fact, as some economists are predicting, a second dip to this recession, we will be affected. We will have to take action. I wonder, because I do not see it, if Bill C-9 situates us as a country to deal with this very difficult reality. When we put that together with what has happened in our communities and to the families and workers we represent, I would challenge the government to rethink what is before us and the proposals it has put forward.

For example, we are in a time when we should be restructuring and reworking our own domestic economy, not talking about free trade as if nothing happened last year or the year before, as if it is just business as usual. In fact, we should be going back to our communities, going back to that which helped us to become one of the strongest countries in the world and, I would suggest, has situated us to deal with the recession in a more stable and better way than many other jurisdictions have dealt with it.

Believe it or not, some Canadians are running out of EI, if they qualified in the first place. Some of those people are getting work, but it is work at much lower wages, so their standard of living and their ability to look after themselves and their families is in jeopardy. People who have already run out of EI are having to resort to living on welfare.

When the stimulus runs out, as it will in a big hurry, as is indicated in the budget, even the few jobs that now exist, which are paying less than the industrial jobs people had before the recession, will also be gone and we will have more people on unemployment.

I will go back to the point I made earlier. As countries around the world were running up serious debt, many Canadians had no choice but to deal with our very difficult economy. Many are facing the challenges of paying bills, paying rent and feeding their children. Some have gone into debt in a major way. As they have struggled with the difficult challenges, many have maxed out their credit cards and their lines of credit and have used up every bit of credit that is available to them. Now they are at a point where they have to deal with that.

I remember back in the middle of the recession attending a meeting in Sault Ste. Marie. An economist from Export Canada talked about the nature of the recession coming at us. He said that it was like a Tsunami, it would come in waves. He described three of the waves that had already hit, and we all identified with that. However, the wave that concerns me most is the one we are still waiting for, and in some instances it has already hit.

Those folks who have worked hard all their lives and have taken advantage of opportunities in their communities to put bread on the table and earn a decent living have maxed out their credit. Now they will have to default on that. Imagine what will happen when the stimulus money runs out, the jobs it created disappear and the economy still has not recovered and hundreds of thousands of people are unable to find jobs and start to default on their loans and credit. What do we do then? How do we respond to that? How do we help those folks? How do we restructure the financial world institutions that will be impacted in such a major way? It is the backing up of a system that I think we will have a very difficult time managing.

On a global level, countries will find it very difficult to deal with the rising amount of debt, together with much of our industry that is struggling at the moment with massive debt. Individuals and families will no longer be able to deal with the debt they have run up in order to keep body and soul together.

Short of Bill C-9, and I do not see anything in it that indicates any preparedness or even understanding of that reality coming at us, what does the government propose to do when that next wave, that next Tsunami hits, and we find ourselves at the beginning of what some economists have predicted that second dip?

I hope we will hear from the government at some point over the next few days just what its plans are.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague a couple of simple questions on the issue of the government's lack of response to articulate a debt reduction strategy that is credible. The government said that it would cut $17 billion over five years. To me that is voodoo economics in the face of a $56 billion deficit.

Does my colleague accept the government's position that $17 billion over five years will bring us back to a balanced budget, or does he feel the situation is much worse than that and the government will face structural deficit with its inability to deal more effectively with cutting more and elevating taxes a bit in a responsible way? That needs to be done to get us back to balanced budgets.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, at the outset I will confess that I am not an economist, nor am I an expert in financial matters. However, I do understand, from my own experience and from listening to my constituents, the difficulty that they are facing. All of them are heading toward a structural deficit in their life that they have never seen before.

I would suggest that the government needs to get real about what it is that we are facing. There are some things that it could do. We are inviting the Liberal Party caucus members to join us in challenging the government in away that does not allow it to take advantage of the road we are on.

I believe we do have some vehicles that we could use to manage this debt and deficit and to restructure our economy in Canada that would be way better than what is being proposed in Bill C-9.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have had the privilege of working in one capacity or another with the member for Sault Ste. Marie for almost 20 years. In fact, on June 6 he will be coming up to his 20th anniversary in public service.

In all of those years, I can honestly say that I have never met a better advocate for trying to create an anti-poverty strategy, first in Ontario and now, of course, in the federal House. Knowing that record and knowing that deep personal commitment, I can only imagine how deeply disappointed the member for Sault Ste. Marie must be with this federal budget.

I will just focus on one part of it and that is the $57 billion theft from the EI fund. For so many Canadians, EI is the very last defence, the very last hope, the very last income support that keeps them from falling into poverty. We know that 880,000 Canadians are about to run out of EI and the government is not helping those Canadians, even though they lost their jobs through no fault of their own.

It is not because the government does not have the money. There was a $57 billion surplus in the EI fund and yet the government does not allocate a dime of that money to helping people who are losing their jobs. It is the workers' money. It was contributed by them and their employers. It is not the government's money.

I wonder if the member could comment about what an integral part of any poverty prevention strategy an effective EI program is in this country?

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I could not agree with the member from Hamilton Mountain more in that she is absolutely right.

We have just done a two-year study of poverty at the HUMA committee. What we heard over and over again from people across the country was that they needed a number of things, such as a national housing program and a national child care program, but they also needed EI reform. We could do this immediately. We do not need to wait. This could be done tomorrow.

The government could have the support of everybody on this side of the House tomorrow to reform the EI system so that it worked better for people, so more people qualified, so that when they qualified they got more of the money they needed to pay those bills and so they could stay on EI longer, until the economy returns or they get that job that will help them pay the rent and feed their family again.

EI has to be a central part of any anti-poverty strategy the federal government takes on. We encourage the government to take hold of that report when we table it in this House, run with it and do something good for those who are most at risk and marginalized in our communities.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to speak to the report stage of Bill C-9, the budget implementation act. This act may more properly be called the Godzilla act because it is a monster act.

The government has taken a budget implementation act and it has thrown in everything but the kitchen sink to make this monstrous, multi-headed act that it is now trying to bring through the House. Fortunately, in this corner of the House we in the NDP do not stand for bullying and we do not stand for these kinds of incredibly dishonest tactics. We are fighting this and bringing forward amendments that will split things off so that we do not have the Godzilla act in front of us.

As members know, Godzilla is a mythical creature in Japanese movies. At least we thought he was mythical until we saw the Prime Minister at work. Godzilla used to run roughshod over people. These report stage amendments address that running roughshod over people. Coupled in Bill C-9 is the removal of $57 billion in employment insurance moneys that are properly owed to the unemployed workers of this country, the Canadians who paid into the fund.

The government is taking out the EI surplus and basically legalizing that theft. One has to wonder what the Conservatives did to replace that. They gave us the HST. In British Columbia, a record number of British Columbians are signing the referendum initiative. That is something that I believe British Columbians and many people in Ontario simply do not accept.

The other thing that Godzilla did was to be very destructive of institutions and buildings. What we see in the Godzilla act of 2010, Bill C-9, are things like Canada Post and the AECL offered up. They are fine Canadian institutions that are being slowly destroyed by the Conservative government. However, the one thing I should say in Godzilla's defence is that he came out of the sea because of the toxic wastes that were being dumped in the ocean. In this case, I think Godzilla was much more environmentally inclined than the government.

In this Godzilla act, Bill C-9, we see environmental assessment being gutted. That is fundamentally important. People around the world are focused on what is happening in the Gulf of Mexico. We have countries moving forward and saying that we have to tighten our environmental policies and the procedures to ensure this kind of thing never happens again.

What do the Conservatives do? They weaken the environmental assessment process, not strengthen it, in reaction to one of the greatest environmental and ecological catastrophes in human history. They are moving to phase out the kind of important environmental assessments that protect our environment and Canadians. It is absolutely ridiculous.

We are bringing these report stage amendments forward because this Godzilla act needs to be pulled apart so that Parliament can vote in an appropriate fashion on each and every aspect of this Conservative hidden plan that it has tried to introduce with this monster legislation.

I know I will be speaking more on this later in the week but I will add that the idea that this HST would be imposed when British Columbians are saying no and up the taxes that are paid under the softwood lumber sellout is particularly reprehensible to British Columbians—

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

Order, please. The member for Burnaby—New Westminster will have six minutes remaining when we return to this matter.

The House resumed from May 31 consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 1.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

When the bill was last before the House, the hon. member for Burnaby--New Westminster had the floor, and there are six minutes remaining in the time allotted for his remarks on this bill and this group of motions.

I therefore call upon the hon. member for Burnaby--New Westminster.

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

Mr. Speaker, when I was forced to stop a couple of days ago on this issue of Bill C-9 because of the adjournment of debate at the time, I referred to this bill as the Godzilla bill, because this was a monstrous series of elements that were all brought together into one bill, completely improperly.

Mr. Speaker, as you well know, we are seeing progressively a government trying to shift what has been a democratic entity, the House of Commons, one where there is debate on specific issues and bills normally are tied to specific issues, to the kind of case where there is a very clear manipulation of parliamentary procedure.

Here we have a series of bills, environmental bills, bills that sell off other large chunks of Canada and what belongs in common to the Canadian public and do a whole series of other things, such as increase HST levies that certainly in my province of British Columbia, British Columbians have been strongly objecting to. It does this all in one bill. It just throws it all together.

We talked at that time about how Godzilla runs roughshod over individuals, and this bill certainly does that. It destroys institutions and buildings, primarily buildings in Godzilla's case, primarily institutions in the government's case. We also mentioned that the one exception to the difference between the government's monster bill, the Godzilla bill, and Godzilla himself or herself, is that Godzilla at least had some concerns about the dumping of toxic wastes, for those who followed the Godzilla movies. In this case, with the removal of the environmental assessment process, we see that the government has even less concern for the environment than the monster that I spoke of.

This monster bill is totally inappropriate. Why did the government do this? We know full well. We have seen strong objections in British Columbia to the HST. The government wanted to tuck in the increase in HST on financial services because it is hoping that somehow British Columbians will not find out, of course forgetting that there is strong representation in this corner of the House from British Columbia with NDP MPs who have stood up and raised this issue. That is partly why we have now reached the threshold for a referendum on the HST in British Columbia in all 85 ridings. That is cause for celebration.

British Columbians right across B.C., from the Peace River to the lower mainland to Vancouver Island to the Kootenays, are saying that they want to be able to publicly rebuke both the federal Conservative government and the B.C. Liberal government for their secretive, dishonest attempt to bring in the HST, but the government is still trying.

For British Columbians who may have voted Conservative in the past, I believe they certainly will be questioning that vote in the future, because in this very secretive, dishonest way, the federal Conservatives are moving to hike and add the HST onto even more elements around financial services. It is unbelievable. When British Columbians are speaking out unanimously right across the province in every single one of the 85 provincial ridings, that means every single one of the federal ridings, including the ridings that are represented by Conservatives and Liberals who voted for the HST.

For the Conservatives to try to hide this in the budget implementation bill is profoundly dishonest, and that is why they are going to get a kicking in the next election, whenever that comes. British Columbians are not going to forget about this. British Columbians are certainly not going to forgive and forget a government that routinely has been ignoring B.C. and then trying to impose types of actions that British Columbians have very clearly said they do not want.

There has not been a single Conservative MP from British Columbia who has been willing to stand up and say, “We were wrong to try to impose this on British Columbians”. There has not been a single Conservative MP from British Columbia who has stood up and said, “Now that the referendum is coming, now that British Columbians are saying no to the HST, we apologize for doing this”. It would be great just to have the one B.C. Conservative or Liberal MP stand up and say, “We are sorry we did this to you. We were wrong. We apologize. We should not have brought the HST in. We should not, in this massive budget bill, try to increase the HST. We apologize to British Columbians”.

I await that day when a B.C. Conservative MP or a B.C. Liberal MP will actually stand up and apologize for what they have done.

That is just one of the egregious aspects. The other is the whole issue of gutting the environmental assessment process. What planet are these Conservatives on? We are looking at a disaster of monumental ramifications in the Gulf of Mexico that has not been resolved, and they are saying they want to remove environmental assessment and regulations.

They are suggesting that we just go up to the Arctic Ocean and drill anywhere, with no more environmental process, no more environmental assessment, that we just go anywhere and take any risks. British Columbians and other Canadians profoundly reject Bill C-9 and its dishonest pretensions. That is why, in this corner of the House, we are saying the bill needs to be divided up so we can—

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure if my colleague covered this in the first part of his speech. I think we just got the final six minutes of it. He talked about the monster bill, just how large this is and all it encompasses, and he has a valid point. However, I want to talk about something that is lacking in this bill: the issue of pension security.

Earlier, the House endorsed the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act changes that were brought forward by his party. Most of the House certainly supported that, so maybe he can comment on that. Perhaps that was lacking in Bill C-9.

Also, they talked about foreign companies and foreign ownership into telecom. Perhaps he would like to comment on that as well.

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

Mr. Speaker, the member is absolutely right. He just talked about three more elements, which we cannot address in a 10-minute speech. The Conservatives are trying to impose closure on Bill C-9 when there are so many different ramifications from this monster bill that they have thrown in.

He has raised three important questions. I want to raise one more, since I did not have time to do that in the six minutes: They are raising the export tariff on softwood lumber products for Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. This is one of the worst of the very bad legislation that the Conservatives have brought in. We knew the softwood lumber sellout would cost tens of thousands of jobs. We knew it would close dozens of mills right across the country.

Again, because they are so embarrassed that their softwood lumber sellout was even worse than anticipated and predicted, we now have an export tariff tucked into this monster bill that is going to hit the softwood communities that have already been hard hit by the appalling irresponsibility and incompetence of the government on softwood lumber. In four provinces, Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba and Saskatchewan, there will be a 10% export tariff rate.

That is going to kill the thousands of jobs that have managed to survive the Conservative meddling in softwood lumber thus far. Now we see that they have tucked it into the bill. So the member's question is absolutely appropriate. We could be going on for days and days exposing the many ramifications of this toxic bill.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, one of the Group No. 1 deletions that we are dealing with today is the air traveller security charge. When the government talks about reducing corporate taxes to 15%, it is actually increasing taxes on all air travellers in the country by 50%, making us the highest taxed in the world.

Where is this extra money going? We know it is raising far more than it is spending on security. Canadian taxes on foreign flights will be up to $25, while the United States flights are $5. We are already losing Canadian travellers to American carriers. We have been losing them for the last several years. This is going to make the situation worse.

Why is the government helping American airlines at the expense of Canadian airlines?

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

Mr. Speaker, the member for Elmwood—Transcona has been one of the foremost advocates for airline passengers, for consumers who use Canadian airlines. He has been a very, very strong advocate for their rights and better treatment, and the government simply has not been at all on the side of airline passengers across the country. As he mentioned, we are increasing the security fees paid for flights. That is another tax increase if we throw in the HST as well.

The Conservatives are tax cutters when it comes to big corporate CEOs and the banks. They will shovel that tax credit money off the back of a truck to those folks, but the moment we are talking about ordinary Canadians, they just want to punish them. Here is another case where they are increasing security fees paid for airlines.

The other thing I need to mention on this is the same government's wrong-headed intention of bringing in self-service safety in the airline industry and make it more dangerous to travel. Fortunately, the NDP headed that off and we stopped that.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to have this opportunity to speak in the report stage debate on Bill C-9, the budget implementation bill. We are debating the first group of report stage amendments tabled by the New Democrats. I am pleased to say that I seconded all 62 of the amendments the New Democrats proposed to this legislation.

Why did we propose those amendments? We are very concerned about the scope of this bill and the huge size of this piece of this legislation. It includes many issues that should have been debated separately in their own pieces of legislation so that Parliament could give them the kind of scrutiny they deserve.

This is not a small issue for us, as members can tell. It is not often that an opposition party puts forward that many report stage amendments to a piece of legislation, but we feel very strongly that the government is doing something shifty. It is doing something that is inappropriate with this legislation by putting forward this monster bill of well over 800 pages, almost 900 pages, that includes all kinds of issues that should have been proposed, and in the past have even been proposed, as separate pieces of legislation.

This seems to me to be an abandonment of the Conservatives' commitment to accountability and transparency. They came into government claiming that they were going to change things around. They were going to do things differently than the previous government on any number of matters.

One of them we might have expected the Conservatives to take to heart was not proposing this kind of legislation. This is more American-style legislation. We all know of bills in the United States that have a title in one area that have a whole bunch of other measures attached and embedded into them. For instance, a defence bill could have a farm measure included in it. That is the system the Americans have come up with and I think it puzzles most of us here in Canada. It does not seem to be an appropriate way of giving appropriate scrutiny to many issues. That is the kind of bill we have before us today.

Bill C-9 is a huge piece of legislation that includes topics that range from the privatization of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, changes to the mandate of Canada Post, the ultimate depletion of the EI fund, the increase in the security tax that we pay when we fly on airlines, changes to the HST initiative, changes to the softwood lumber tariffs, and changes to environmental assessment in Canada.

Each one of those things and many others in the bill deserve their own piece of legislation. In the past the Conservatives have even proposed legislation separately on some of those issues. The Canada Post issue is one of them. In earlier sessions of this Parliament and the previous Parliament, there was a separate bill dealing with these changes to Canada Post where that issue could get the scrutiny it deserves.

We are standing firm that this is a change in the practices of this House. It is going down a road that we think is totally improper. We think it abandons the Conservatives' commitment once again to accountability and transparency. It is clear that is long gone.

We have seen it in their failure to live up to commitments around access to information and the terrible report card they got, particularly the ministry of foreign affairs for compliance with access to information requests. It was so bad that the Information Commissioner had to invent a new category. It did not fit in her scale of failure and she had to invent a red alert category, saying it was so bad in that department.

We have seen it in the Conservatives' failure and their refusal for such a long time to provide Parliament with access to documents around the Afghan detainee issue, and the concerns that people Canada had captured were being tortured when they were in the custody of Afghan authorities.

We have seen it in the denial of Conservatives to allow their political staff to appear before parliamentary committees and provide information that parliamentary committees need. We have seen it in the actions of cabinet ministers coming uninvited to parliamentary committees and demanding to be heard when they are not on the agenda of committees, disrupting committees and turning those committees into places of total chaos.

None of this goes to an agenda of openness, transparency and accountability. It all dramatically undoes that. It is the exact opposite of those kinds of things.

One of the specific aspects that I want to talk about particularly in this bill is the environmental assessment component. What it amounts to is the gutting of the environmental assessment process that we have in Canada. This bill would exempt certain federally funded infrastructure projects from environmental assessment, going well beyond what was even recommended by the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment to streamline the environmental assessment process.

We all know that environmental assessment is a complicated issue in Canada. It is a process that has the involvement of many jurisdictions. We all want to make sure that we have an efficient and effective process, but we want to make sure that we have a process, a process that works and that offers protection to the environment and to Canadians.

This proposal before us embedded deeply in this bill would say that the building Canada fund, the green infrastructure fund, the recreational infrastructure fund, the border infrastructure fund, the municipal rural infrastructure fund, none of these would have the same requirements around environmental assessment that they currently do.

This bill would also pre-empt a review of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act which is to go to committee this month for a scheduled five-year review. Here we are currently debating a piece of legislation that would change that existing legislation that was scheduled to be reviewed by Parliament where we could come up with suggestions for changes that needed to be made, where the government could present its suggestions for changes that should be made to that legislation. Why is it deeply embedded in this budget bill?

The bill would also allow the Minister of the Environment to dictate the scope of environmental assessments. This new concept called scoping allows for ministerial discretion to appoint someone to decide what should and should not fall within the scope of an environmental assessment. It could mean, for instance, the road leading to the mine needs to be assessed but not the mine itself, or vice versa. There is a huge opening here for discretion and for a deterioration of the kind of environmental assessment process that we currently have.

It also means that the bill would also weaken public participation in terms of environmental assessment processes by making certain exemptions for public notification. It would also contain the first steps to take away energy assessment programs from the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency and give them to the National Energy Board.

These changes are of great concern to people in my riding because these kinds of environmental assessments are crucial to issues that happened in my riding. Burnaby—Douglas is home to the only refinery on the west coast of Canada, the Chevron refinery. That refinery is on the shore of Burrard Inlet. It has been there for almost 60 years. It is also surrounded by residential neighbourhoods. I am sure members can understand that a refinery placed in an environmentally sensitive location is a very serious issue. A refinery that is in a residential neighbourhood is also a very serious issue. Over many years there have been many processes developed for the refinery to work with people who live in that neighbourhood, people who are affected directly by it, environmentalists, and first nations communities that live directly across Burrard Inlet from the Chevron refinery.

Right now we are going through a crisis at that refinery where there is a leak happening. So far about 50 litres of what the refinery calls an oily substance have leaked out of the boundaries of the refinery. The substance has shown up in the ditch running along the Canadian Pacific Railway right-of-way and on the foreshore of Burrard Inlet. Officials do not seem to know what this substance is. They do not seem to know where it is coming from. Many concerns are being raised by folks in the neighbourhood, and rightly so, about this situation.

This is a situation where we need to have effective environmental legislation, where we need to have effective environmental oversight. People depend on that. We all know that we use the products that come out of that refinery, but we also want to make sure that we are mitigating any of the damage the refinery causes to the environment and to the neighbourhood. We are seeing an example right now in Burnaby—Douglas of why that is absolutely crucial. Be assured that the people of Burnaby--Douglas, the people of the Burnaby Heights and Capitol Hill neighbourhoods are going to be keeping a close eye on the situation to ensure it is fully determined as to why the leak is being caused, that the cause is fixed and that the cleanup happens completely and that it never happens again. This is crucial to our neighbourhood, our environment, to Burrard Inlet and to the surrounding area.

People in Burnaby—Douglas do not want any weakening of environmental assessments. That is why this piece of the legislation should be debated separately here in this Parliament.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his eloquent speech and for pointing out what we should do.

I believe it was Yogi Berra who said that it was déjà-vu all over again. The front bench opposite, the Conservative government, for the most part was the front bench in Ontario back in the 1990s when we would see things like this omnibus bill. We know the havoc that wreaked on the province of Ontario when we had all those omnibus bills under the previous premier, Mike Harris, and some of those members on the front bench, including the Minister of Finance who is in the federal government today. They did the same thing then that is being done today. They rammed things through because the provincial Conservatives had a majority government, and the province was the worst for it.

What the federal Conservatives are doing today is going to make Canada the worst for it as well. The pieces that are in that omnibus bill that do not have anything to do with the budget are things that really should be debated before us today. Let me mention the things that are missing.

What is missing is a pension increase for those seniors living in poverty. The Conservatives decided to talk about getting rid of the environmental regulations, instead of increasing the GIS so that seniors could live in dignity and live without poverty. There was no mention of that.

I would ask the hon. member to comment on what he sees is missing here that really should be a budget item instead of all the other bits that make it an omnibus bill.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that if we talk to Canadians about top of mind issues right now, the security of their pensions, their pension income, is probably the top issue that most of them are thinking about. We certainly have not seen the kind of attention to it that is needed.

I am glad that New Democrats have raised constantly in this place questions about that. We have put forward serious suggestions about where we should be going. We have clear policies about what should be done in the area of pension reform to ensure that Canadians have not only pensions they can depend on in their senior years, but also pensions that would support people to live well above the poverty line and live happy, healthy and fruitful years in their retirement. That is an issue many Canadians would like to see given the attention it needs.

We have seen the Canadian Labour Congress take the lead on forums across this country where Canadians have been coming together to talk about pension reform. Our own colleague, the member for Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, our pension critic, has travelled across Canada doing the same thing.

There is clearly a need and a desire by Canadians to see that issue seize this House, seize the government, to make some progress in that area.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there are so many thoughtful ideas in the excellent analysis by the member for Burnaby—Douglas that I could ask many questions, but I will limit myself to one.

Years ago, for many years, I wrote and reviewed environmental assessments. It has been my experience that environmental assessments do not usually stop projects unless they are particularly bad in every possible way. What they usually do is function as part of an expanded business plan that takes all factors into consideration, including economic and ecological sustainability, and they make projects better.

I would like to ask the hon. member how he feels that we can persuade the current government to re-examine its faulty logic on stopping these environmental assessments.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad that the member has raised that important question about the environmental assessment process.

The member is right. In most situations the idea is not to prevent development. The idea is to ensure that development is sustainable, that it respects both the environmental needs and the economic needs of communities in our country. We want to make sure that happens. We want to do that in a way that takes into consideration all of the factors that are part of those kinds of decisions.

People in my own community realize that the Chevron refinery is an important employer in our community. It produces products that we all use. Even though we are seeking ways to reduce our dependence on those kinds of products, right now we do depend on them. At the same time we want to make sure that it functions in a way that respects the neighbourhood it is in and respects the environment where it is located. That means we have to have the participation of government and the leadership of government to ensure it is done in a way that respects people and the environment.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I greatly appreciate the time I will have to speak to Bill C-9.

However, before I speak to Bill C-9, I would like to point out that in game three of the Stanley Cup finals last night, the winning goal was scored by none other than Claude Giroux from Hearst. We are very proud of him.

I am honoured to have the opportunity to speak to the Conservatives' budget implementation bill, Bill C-9. Given that I have only 10 minutes to speak to this unbelievably huge bill, which is hardly enough time to detail all of the significant flaws and errors in judgment present within this 800 page document, I will give the simplified version of what is fundamentally wrong with the government's budgetary plan.

First, I would like to speak to the nature of the bill itself. To put it simply, the bill resembles some of the overly political, opportunistic, pork laden legislation that was the hallmark of the Bush administration. With over 800 pages, 23 separate sections and over 2,000 individual clauses, Bill C-9 has easily become one of the largest pieces of individual legislation ever to pass through these halls.

The sweeping nature of Bill C-9 could perhaps be a little easier to swallow if it were not filled with amendments that seem almost completely out of place in a budget bill. Perhaps that was the plan that the Conservatives wanted to present all along; a bill so massive that it becomes almost impossible to scrutinize in its entirety, something that they expect we, as members of Parliament, would not take the time to scrutinize and simply rubber stamp through.

The people of Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing did not elect me to rubber stamp anything. They elected me to represent their interests and the bill is not in their best interests.

I will take some time to speak specifically to part 20 of the bill, which would amend the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act to give the Minister of the Environment the authority to forgo environmental assessment of federally funded infrastructure projects. I am a steadfast believer that appropriate environmental assessment, now more than ever, is vital in ensuring our natural environment does not take a back seat to handful of special interests who seem to believe that a larger profit margin is more important than preventing an environmental disaster.

This authority should not be given to any single individual. This is particularly dear to me because I actually live in an area and represent an area that has a couple of Great Lakes, lots of rivers and lots of lakes.

The government never misses an opportunity to take away the power of everyday Canadians in order to please those select few special interest groups that it listens to. Who are these special interest groups? Big oil is a good example. We just have to look at the big oil spill with regard to BP. We are quite worried about what will happen here in Canada.

What are the big oil companies getting in this budget? What about corporate tax breaks or perhaps the gutting of Canada's environmental assessment regulations? Those are two examples of the way that the interests of the government's friends win out over the interests of Canadians.

There is a reason environmental assessment is so important. I am certain that the majority of people sitting here today have had a chance to catch the news at some point in the past month or so. Again I will talk about that oil disaster.

The disaster off of the Gulf of Mexico has been monumental. It stands as one of the greatest environmental tragedies of all time. Many argue that the simple drilling of a relief well, which is a standard practice of offshore oil drilling, could have kept the disaster under wraps.

What are we hearing now? We are hearing claims from BP that a relief well is currently being drilled but that it will likely not be finished until some time in August. I realize there will be some contention on this argument, but I will wrap up my thoughts on part 20 of Bill C-9. It is barely what should be considered a budgetary matter. It should given an appropriate forum for discussion in its own right. It should not be part of the bill whatsoever.

The next issue I would like to discuss is part 18 of Bill C-9. The summary of part 18 states that it authorizes the taking of a number of measures with respect to the reorganization and divestiture of all or any part of Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. businesses.

The Conservative government seems confident that selling off Canadian firms and resources is the best way to ensure economic growth in this country. Sure, a few high profile individuals may make a quick buck, but what about the people on the front line, the workers?

Many people within my riding, and particularly those living just outside of my riding in Sudbury, know all too well the damage a sell-off of our companies and resources can be. Just last week a rally was held here in front of Parliament Hill by the United Steelworkers Union, Local 6500. The hard-working men and women of Vale mine have been on the picket line for almost a year now fighting to retain the fair pay and benefits for which they have fought for over a century to gain.

What will happen to the AECL workers if their company gets sold from under their feet, thanks to an amendment that has been crammed into a beast of a budget? Will they end up getting laid off? Will they lose their benefits? Will they be replaced by a cheaper workforce?

I would call on the government to remove part 18 from the budget bill so we, as elected officials, can take the appropriate time to fully discuss how this deal would affect working Canadians. I wish I had more time to debate the nature of this sell-off but my time is short and there is more, I feel, that is needed to be discussed here.

I will now detail some concerns I have with part 15 of the bill. In my riding, we are very worried about the weakening of Canada Post. Again we see the mantra of business first and are being told that a company can provide overseas service more efficiently and make a profit at the same time. How is that possible? To us, this is merely coded language that adds up to paying workers less and demanding that they do more. Efficiency is a good and desirable thing but hoarding wealth in the hands of fewer and fewer people is not.

Increasing the workload stress in job security of the people who actually perform the work so investor can siphon off profits is not the best way to perform this service. Worse, if this is a way for Canada Post to make a few bucks, why would we want them to get rid of it? We need to allow Canada Post to make money so that it can afford to provide postal service to the people of Canada.

There is a situation right now in Constance Lake that I would like to share with the House. In Constance Lake, which is a first nation community, residents have lost their Canada Post outlet. For approximately the past one and a half years, residents have had to make an 80 kilometre round trip detour to Hearst simply to mail a letter. Luckily for Constance Lake, a Canada Post outlet is in the process of being rebuilt, because we have pushed for this, both Constance Lake and myself and the CUPW workers, but this is just an example of the concerns that have been echoed by the rural people living in my riding. Many other communities live with the fear of losing their postal outlets. People in towns like Moonbeam wonder if they are next when the Canada Post axe falls. Chapleau has also approached me on this before.

If Canada Post loses more revenue by cutting out its international mail revenues, how can it provide anything but less service? How is that efficient?

I wish I had another hour to speak to some of the issues I have with the bill. I call on my colleagues throughout the House of Commons to push to have this bill stripped down to its core. Many portions of the bill are out of place. I realize it is part of the Conservative agenda to slide things past the Canadian people without giving them or us, as elected officials, the time it takes to adequately examine the consequences of what is transpiring here.

I would like to finish by quoting one of the Conservatives' own senators, Lowell Murray, but I see my time is up so I will have to do it later.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would be interested in hearing from the member exactly what Senator Murray said because the Conservatives clearly are not listening.

I know the hard work that the hon. member has done on behalf of the labour movement. She has spent a great many years working on behalf of workers in this country and should be commended for that.

Besides the quote by Senator Murray, which I know the hon. member will be happy to give us, there is the stripping out of $57 billion from the EI fund, a fund that was there to protect workers. I would ask her to comment on why the budget bill is setting up an account for EI rather than the real progressive step of the government saying that it will refund the $57 billion to the EI account, funds that are owed to the workers of this country. In that way, if there were another recession or downturn in the future, which we know will occur, workers would be protected, as they should have been protected in the first place, with the very money they paid into that system and which belongs to them but was squandered by the previous Liberal government and now by the Conservative government.

At the very least, the government should have told workers that their sacrifices over the years are respected, that it respects the fact that it collected their money and, with that type of respect owed to workers, the government intends to give it back to them. However, there is no intention to do that.

I am hopeful that my colleague will comment on the stripping of $57 billion from the EI fund and then, of course, quote hon. Senator Lowell Murray.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will read the quote in a second, but my colleague is absolutely right with regard to the EI fund. These are workers' dollars, not government dollars. Yes, it is the former Liberal government's fault as to why the funds are not there anymore.

The Conservative government has a responsibility to ensure the money is refunded. We are not out of the woods yet with regard to the economic crisis in which we found ourselves. We need to continue ensuring there is proper training for workers, access to EI for workers, women being the ones least able to get benefits, and that there is a government in place that respects the rights of workers and the money of those hard workers.

With respect to the comment made by the Conservatives' own senators, Lowell Murray has gone on record stating that, “No self-respecting or Parliament-respecting MP or senator should allow C-9 to go through as is”. If one of their own cannot support this bill, why should we as opposition support it?

It is quite interesting that of the questions being asked in the House, we are not hearing the Liberals or Conservatives speak to this issue. I think the Conservatives have a reason for not wanting to speak. It is because they want to continue hiding what is in the bill.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is hard to believe that in the recession in 2009 the banks made $15.9 billion profits and yet the federal government is rewarding them with a reduction in corporate taxes to 15%. This is at a time when the government is increasing the air travellers tax by over 50%, making Canada the highest taxed country in the world.

I would like to know what the member has to say about that.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Elmwood—Transcona is an advocate for air travel passengers and the bills that he has put forward need to be passed in order to protect travellers here in Canada. What the government is doing really speaks volumes to whether people will want to travel either in or out of the country.

I appreciate the fact that he brought this forward. We do not need people being taxed more and we need to ensure that the money they are paying out is being used wisely. Based on this bill, we can see that the government is again putting its friends at the forefront.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to join the debate on Bill C-9.

I will start by talking about a visitor who came to Parliament a few weeks ago, Dr. Jane Goodall, and her remarks. Dr. Goodall is a world renowned primatologist and also a leader in thinking about the kind of world we want for the future. In her remarks she said that some say we inherit the earth and the world from our parents and some say we borrow it from our children. Dr. Goodall is concerned that we are stealing from the next generation because borrowing with no plans to repay is in fact stealing. I share her view that it is time we get together and start to pay back to ensure we create a better world for future generations.

Bill C-9 raises questions for me on issues such as the economy, the environment and democracy and whether we are stealing from future generations in the provisions contained in the budget implementation bill. There certainly is stealth in the bill and I will talk about that in my section on democracy. Major changes are hidden in it in such a way that we are unable to properly debate them. They should be in separate legislation.

Let me start my comments with the economy. This is another budget that borrows significant funds and the funds will need to be repaid in the future. This means the government is borrowing from the future. Are there proper plans for repaying these funds, which would indicate that the government is borrowing and not stealing?

The Parliamentary Budget Officer has raised questions about the competency of the Conservative government in terms of its financial projects and plans, as he has done repeatedly over the past several years. He has publicly stated that Bill C-9 falls short in its assertion that the books will be balanced in five years. He estimates that the government's budget predictions are inaccurate and off by about $10 billion. Mr. Page said that the government's budgetary assumptions were “not a prudent basis for fiscal planning”. The Parliamentary Budget Officer is bringing to light the fact that the government has failed to build in a cushion for the unexpected and failed to plan for tomorrow.

More than being concerned about weakness in the planning, I have huge concerns about the government's priorities. As was brought to light in the budget implementation bill, ideological cuts have been made to women's groups, to poverty alleviation groups and to very important education groups. What we see as the government's priority is its millions of dollars, and some assessments say over $100 million, in self-serving advertising paid by the taxpayer to promote the government's fiscal management. The Parliamentary Budget Officer is a more neutral commentator on plans and budgets.

There are five new tax increases in the budget. When I pointed this out to my constituents, they were very surprised. The Conservatives' expensive advertising campaign by no means suggests transparency with respect to these new tax increases, including $15 billion in payroll taxes, which are counterproductive and aggressive.

Is this budget stealing from the future or are we investing in the future? I am concerned about the funds that are being spent on the upcoming international meetings. Less than six months before these meetings, the venue for the G20 was changed. It is going to cost over $1 billion for a few days of meetings.

I know others have compared the spending for the summits with the spending on the Olympic Games, but it is not only 17 days of Olympic Games. There are also nine days of Paralympic Games, with heads of state and VIP to be secured and protected. To spend over $1 billion on these few days of meetings at a time when budgets are being cut for very important social issues and other issues is a huge mismanagement of public funds.

With respect to the environment, this budget continues the inaction on climate. Unfortunately, there are cuts to the eco-energy home retrofit program that brought homeowners and families into reducing the footprint of their households. There are cuts to climate science. Gordon McBean, the chair of the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences, sums up the effect of budget 2010 on climate change research as follows:

Budget 2010 is basically the nightmare scenario for scientists across the country – our community is gutted.

Are we borrowing from our future generations or are we stealing from them? That is really the question that came to mind as I looked at the provisions in the budget. It weakens the federal oversight of the environment. It removes from the environment department the power to assess environmental projects and moves it into other organizations that have worse records in terms of public participation. It gives the minister power which he or she should not have, because ministers are subject to lobbying.

On the Gulf of Mexico oil leak, we see the ministers deferring to other regulatory bodies and not taking responsibility for answering whether we have strong enough regulations. They are being very evasive on the questions on oil tankers in the Pacific north coast, giving us a range of different answers designed to confuse. It is clear the government is paving the way for that super tanker on our vulnerable Pacific north coast, which we should never allow.

Last, I wanted to touch on democracy. I know some of the other speakers have been eloquent on the issue of combining a lot of different, non-linked policy and legislative changes in an omnibus bill. The Prime Minister commented on this a number of years ago. In 1994 he asked for a ruling to split a budget implementation bill, saying that it was becoming standard practice with governments to bring in omnibus legislation following every budget under what might be called the kitchen sink approach. He described that as improper and said it should be ruled out of order. That was referring to a bill of 20 pages.

What the Prime Minister is putting in front of the House is 900 pages. It is a far larger kitchen sink with far more in it. The hypocrisy is unfortunate. Democracy is impacted when Parliament does not have the opportunity to debate substantive changes around Canada Post, AECL and environmental assessment. This should be 14 different bills according to senior members of the Senate.

This is an abuse. Unfortunately, it is a corruption of Parliament. It brings me back to my question. Are we stealing from future generations? When we undermine democracy, we undermine the role of Parliament. I do not support Bill C-9. It is a very poor example of statespersonship. It is an unfortunate undermining of the Canadian confidence, both economically and environmentally. The government's priority should be to protect and strengthen our democracy.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, my question for my colleague from the Liberal Party is simple. She says in her final wrap-up of her speech that she does not support Bill C-9. I assume if one does not support it, one will vote against it. Certainly the members of the NDP will vote against it.

Is my colleague speaking on behalf of her party, or is she, as in individual, going to vote against it? Will enough Liberal Party members vote for the bill so it will pass? Will the rest of her party share her conviction that Bill C-9 is not worthy of the support of Parliament and vote against it as a group, or will they leave a bunch of their members at home again or tell them to leave the chamber when it comes time to vote?

On the opposition benches, we all need to know what the Liberal Party will do about Bill C-9. Will it force the government to split it? Will it vote against it at the report stage, knowing that this may mean an end to the Conservative rule of our country?

What are her colleagues going to do about voting on the bill?

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, members of the Liberal Party will vote against the bill.

In a way I find it interesting to be scolded by the member of the NDP on this issue. He talked about an end to Conservative Party and the Prime Minister's governing seat. That party, in December 2005, undermined its policies, which it had brought to the fore with the Liberal Party of the day, by ensuring that the government fell before Kelowna and before many of the important policies the Liberal Party was bringing forward in its upcoming budget.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I think Canadians find it hard to believe that in a recession in 2009 the banks made $15.9 billion. The federal government rewarded them by reducing their corporate taxation rate to 15% and this was while the CEO of the Royal Bank, Gordon Nixon, and Toronto Dominion Bank's Edmund Clark were earning around $10.4 million.

What do Canadian citizens get as a reward for this? A 50% increase in the air travellers security charge, making Canada the highest taxed in the world. This is up against an American security charge of only $5. The government is driving Canadian customers to fly on American carriers. How is that smart economics?

Does the member have any comment on these points?

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly do have comments on those points.

The member points out one of five tax increases, and that is to the travelling consumer, at a time when our corporate taxes are far lower than our neighbours to the south. This is the reason the Liberal Party is committed to not do further tax cuts for corporations until such time as we do not have to borrow money.

While the government is adding taxes to workers through payroll tax increases, it is planning to cut the taxes of corporations, which I support when we can afford it. However, I do not support doing that with borrowed money, digging future generations further into debt. This debt will have to be repaid at a time when it will be more difficult than ever, with fewer people in the workforce and other demographic pressures that we will face as Canadian governments.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity on behalf of my constituents of Winnipeg Centre to enter into the debate on Bill C-9 at report stage amendments.

I think it is important to put in perspective what we are doing here at this point in time on Bill C-9 and on behalf of the people I represent.

We should remind Canadians that this is the point in the legislative process where the government of the day comes to Parliament to ask permission to spend the taxpayers' money in a certain way. The government introduces its budget, and then, by virtue of a budget implementation bill, the government outlines the detailed way in which it intends to spend that budget.

The government comes to Parliament for our permission, and it needs our permission to go ahead. This is why there is the urgency with Bill C-9. This is why the government is going to put time allocation on the debate, if it can, to ram this thing through by the end of June when Parliament adjourns for the summer recess.

Technically, the government does not have permission to spend the money it proposes to spend. It is coming to us. I wish the government would show a little bit more humility when it comes to us, because it does not even have a majority. It cannot force anything in this Parliament. It needs the co-operation of the members on this side of the House to get permission to spend that money.

A lot of Canadians would like to believe that members of Parliament could work together in between elections to paddle our canoe in the same direction, as it were, to do what is best for the country. I think if people sought it, they would find a fair amount of goodwill in the House towards that, because we all recognize we have been going through difficult economic times. The opposition parties did not try to interfere, block or stop the massive stimulus spending. We accepted that this was what was going on in the world.

What is mean-spirited about this and what is wrong with the way the Conservatives are handling this is that rather than seeking the co-operation of the House for the implementation of the budget this year, they tried to insert a bunch of things that do not properly belong in a budget implementation bill. Canadians should understand that.

It is deceit of the highest order to ram this bill through. For the necessary spending, or at least giving permission for the government to spend, they are including a bunch things that do not belong here. It is a very American-style thing to do. Those of us who are observers of politics in other countries will recognize this as earmarking, as they call it in the United States, where a budget bill will start out at, say, 30 pages, and by the time every senator adds their special spending bill that they trade their support for, it will be 200 pages long. There will be all kinds of irrelevant additional material rammed into that bill.

This is what is happening here today. In terms of implementation of the budget, I do not think there would be great opposition to some parts of the bill. We are clearly against other things that deserve debate. However, there are some things that clearly should not be in this bill at all, and that is what speaker after speaker on the part of the NDP have been trying to point out.

I know the people in my riding would be disappointed in a number of the aspects of this budget implementation bill. In its current form, it does not deserve our support. Any opposition member worth his or her salt would vote against this bill.

My colleague from Hamilton is exactly right in saying that we should not only be opposed to this bill, we should be willing to stand in our place and be opposed to this bill and be counted in our opposition to this bill.

Believe me, we will be counting the heads on those vacant benches over there when it comes time to vote against this bill. It is unworthy of our support. Never mind the merits of the bill or the faults of the bill, by principle we should be voting against this bill because it sets a dangerous precedent that they are trying to insert a number of things that clearly do not belong here.

In the brief time I had to research the part 1 amendments, I counted up a number of tax grabs in Bill C-9, the current budget implementation bill, that should be of grave concern as well. They are clearly contrary to what the Conservative government would have us believe, that they are all about tax cuts and not tax grabs.

Clearly, a lot of these measures are tax grabs in no uncertain terms, yet the Conservatives have left opportunities for revenue without any comment at all. For instance, a budget implementation bill or a budget itself is the opportunity to finally plug the outrageous tax loopholes that exist for offshore tax havens. This is money left on the table that the Minister of Finance does not see fit to pick up and put in his pocket.

I cannot understand it, because I used to hear Conservative MPs, when they were in opposition, rail about the outrageous tax havens, rail against the former prime minister, Paul Martin, for shielding a lot of his assets in offshore tax havens with his 13 shell companies to hide the profits of Canada Steamship Lines, but they have not taken any active steps to deal with this.

I forget what the chartered accountants call it, but it has a fancy name in terms of hiring a tax avoidance lawyer; “tax-motivated expatriation”, those are the words I was groping for. It sounds like a legitimate move that a tax consultant would advise. In the cocktail party circuit, it almost sounds respectable. For people to say they are going to take part in some tax-motivated expatriation almost sounds as though they are going on a holiday to some warm country. In actual fact, it is a sleazy tax-cheating loophole that the Conservatives are afraid to close because it is their friends who avail themselves of it. So they do not want to offend their friends.

In the U.S., an estimated $100 billion a year in revenue is lost through its tax haven regime. Other experts have taken that money down with our economy and it would be a minimum of $7 billion per year of lost revenue that our tax havens are costing the taxpayer. So as we are offloading this tax burden with tax grabs from ordinary Canadians, we are leaving this money on the table. It is incomprehensible to me and it is contrary to what we were led to believe about the policies of the Conservatives.

The other thing that should be pointed out, and again the people in my riding of Winnipeg Centre deserve to know that someone is raising this in the House of Commons, is the very valid and legitimate point that my colleague from Elmwood—Transcona made, that the current round of corporate tax cuts that the Conservatives have not only contemplated but are implementing are going to cost the general revenues in the neighbourhood of $7 billion to $10 billion. I have heard as high as $15 billion. We do not have that money. That is money we have to borrow. We are going to be borrowing money to give to already profitable corporations in terms of yet another handout. This is what is incomprehensible to ordinary Canadians.

It is not as though we are giving a struggling industry some kind of helping hand up. That is one thing. We can talk about whether that is corporate welfare, but we are not opposed.

For instance, if it were the shipbuilding industry and we wanted Canada to get back into shipbuilding, some kind of help to get the industry back on its feet can be justified, but the already most profitable industries, the oil industry, as well as the big banks who are showing record profits, are now going to get another gratuitous handout of up to $15 billion of money we do not have. So we are going to be raising taxes of ordinary Canadians to give a handout to the banks who in turn gouge those ordinary Canadians and have both hands in their pockets.

There is something fundamentally wrong with the mindset of anyone who would craft a financial instrument such as Bill C-9. It should be rejected, it should be opposed, and every member of the New Democratic Party can be counted on to oppose the bill and send it back where it came from for a complete rewrite, I would hope.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, given the fact that the member for Winnipeg Centre is a former labour leader who I believe was the president of the carpenters in his province, which is a huge responsibility, and of course, representing workers who have seasonal work, EI matters large. Given not only his experience as a long-term veteran MP but also as a former labour leader of his entire province, what does the member think about the idea that $57 billion is literally being stolen from the pockets of unemployed workers?

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Hamilton Centre for giving me the opportunity to touch on something that time did not permit me to deal with in my original speech.

It is quite true. As a former labour leader, I have a great deal of working knowledge of the EI fund. I can tell members that when the original cuts to the unemployment insurance program were made by the Liberals in 1995 and 1996, those changes in eligibility rules took $20 million per year of federal transfers out of just my riding of Winnipeg Centre alone. It is no wonder the fund went into surplus.That money, we should remember, is only money from the employer and the employee. The federal government pays nothing into the EI fund. Brian Mulroney stopped doing that in the mid-1980s.

Can members imagine taking $20 million a year of income maintenance from the federal government out of one of the poorest ridings in Canada? That would be like losing the payroll of two major factories of 2,000 employees each. That was the net effect of the Liberals' cuts to EI.

But then the surpluses started building up, because they created an unemployment insurance system where nobody qualified any more. So it is no wonder. The Liberals milked it like a cash cow. There was a $57 billion surplus that was spent on everything except income maintenance, and now the Conservatives have driven the final stake through the heart of the unemployment insurance program by saying that reserve is gone, that we have to start from scratch and raise premiums.

Clearly there is no working-class consciousness on that side of the House.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the member for an excellent speech on Bill C-9.

He talked about tax havens. I guess it points to the power of one individual. When a low-level computer worker, two years ago, in a Liechtenstein bank, rose up and sold a computer diskette with the information of thousands of tax evaders to the German government, the Canadian government got onto this, and guess what? Now across Canada we have these tax evaders running to Revenue Canada locations to take advantage of our tax amnesty.

The current government is so tough on tax havens and tax evaders that it says to people, “Go ahead and put your money in the tax havens, because if we catch you, all you have to do is go down to Revenue Canada and take advantage of our amnesty and pay the tax and you're scot-free”.

That is our tough approach.

I would like to ask the member if he has any comments on that.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it does speak to a larger problem. It is an attitude problem, I suppose. The government is willing to forgo this lost revenue to tax havens. Even Diane Francis, not exactly a left-wing author, did a five-part series in the National Post, calling on the Conservative government to plug egregious tax loopholes that are just fundamentally wrong, that no decent person would avail themselves of if they had any conscience or any pride in being a Canadian.

One of those was the family trust loophole where we give a one-time payment of 25% and that gives us permission to send the whole family trust of billions of dollars offshore, and from that day on, all the revenue from that investment comes back into the country tax-free. We can have all of our family and friends living on these tax-free earnings offshore for the rest of their lives for generations.

Why would anybody craft such a thing that is clearly against the best interests of all Canadians except for that one billionaire? Why would we tolerate giving money away like that? Can we really afford to be so generous?

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the chance to comment on the bill.

I have to say that in large part this is very much like a trip down memory lane for me because I have been here before with a Conservative government in the province of Ontario, and interestingly, who was the chief of staff to Premier Mike Harris who brought in the infamous omnibus bill 26? Guy Giorno, the same chief of staff to the current Prime Minister.

My colleague from Sault Ste. Marie is nodding his head. He remembers what went on when we had that bill. It was the same sort of thing. Bring in a bill that is meant to be one thing and then load it up with everything else that is problematic, that is going to involve a lot of debate, that is controversial and ideological. Just stuff it all in there and refuse to talk beyond the cover page. The government wanted it to go through. It was massive. It led to a major upheaval, which is putting it mildly, of our health care system. It brought in a massive review. It really set the stage for what became the dark years of the Harris regime in Ontario, years of governance which we are still trying to climb out of in terms of the damage that was done.

One of the things that is interesting and is different in this House from what I experienced the better part of 15 years ago was that the opposition actually stood up and fought. There were two opposition parties, the Liberals and the NDP, in that legislature. Not only did they stand up for the best interests of Ontarians and take on that kind of undemocratic governance, and I definitely use the term “governance” loosely, but we united around that fight. That was a majority house, not a minority where the majority vote is actually on this side of the House. We united and took on that government, head on.

In fact we had filibusters that went on for days. It was the focus of the entire provincial media. People were watching it around the clock, going to sleep while catching what as going on and waking up in the morning and plugging back into it. There were rosters that we had for going around the clock, just like picket duty, 2 a.m. to 5 a.m. could be house duty time. We went around the clock for days on end. We had the same kind of fight for the same kind of reasons against the same kind of undemocratic procedures.

What am I looking at here? I see my NDP colleagues standing up one after another going at this tooth and nail. We are doing everything we can to try to stop the bill. If we had the support of the official opposition, whose job it is to oppose the government of the day, we could do something, particularly since our leader, the member for Toronto—Danforth has made it clear that he is prepared to work with the other two parties to leverage the situation we are in right now, which is that there is still a lack of desire for an election. There is certainly a lack of desire on the part of the opposition even to threaten a possible election. Set that aside, but that is not the circumstance right now.

We know the government does not want an election right now. It might in a month, two months, a year but it does not want one now. The G8 and G20 summits are coming. The Prime Minister is over in Europe lining up the agenda.

Fine, if the Conservatives want to play hardball in terms of the bill they are trying to ram through, we ought to be playing hardball too. We should hold them to account and use that leverage. That is the whole idea of being the official opposition, not the official lapdogs of the country. It is infuriating.

[Gary Goodyear]

I have a headache.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the minister wants me to speak up a little. Okay, I will speak a little louder for the minister so the minister can hear every word of well-deserved criticism for that member and every other member on that side of the House.

Speaking of this side of the House, if there was the leadership that there should be from the leader of the official opposition to work with the other two parties, to use the fact that we on this side represent the majority of Canadians and majority of votes in the House of Commons, as my colleague from Winnipeg Centre has said, without the vote of somebody on this side of the House or MPs staying home, the Conservatives could not pass anything. We have that control. We have that opportunity. The threat of an election momentarily is suspended. Now is the moment to strike.

Instead, we have the Liberals wanting it both ways. They stand up and criticize. Heck, they could be using some of our speaking notes as they make some of the same criticisms we do, which are really good arguments I might add, but they have no intention of really doing anything. They just want to bark a lot. It is not even that much barking because we are the ones who have to put forward the speakers to keep this bill going. If we folded, this debate would be over.

It is as much with sadness as anger that I look at this situation, particularly since we do not have the imminent threat of an election, as the counterpoint to where we are. We do not want a revolution. What we want to do is bring democracy back to the House. We want this bill split. If we had the support of all the opposition members, the bill would be split.

In fact, the bill would not pass if the majority in the House of Commons stood united, but it is not, and so we are doing what we can. I readily acknowledge it is not nearly as much as we would like. We are the fourth party with the smallest caucus but probably with the greatest determination to stand up to this undemocratic budget bill.

If government members want to sigh and roll their eyes at what they think is just a big waste of time, fine. We have already heard from the government. It is the Conservatives' bill; it is their plan. What we would like is for virtually every opposition member to stand in his or her place and not only speak against the bill but commit to march into the House and exercise the greatest right and privilege that members of this place have: their precious vote. Just the threat of doing it would be enough to get the ball rolling to make changes.

However, as long as the official opposition continues to play official lapdog, the government knows that as long as it puts up with all the speeches from the New Democrats, it will ultimately get its way. The Liberals have given a wink and a nod that they will speak against it and some of them will vote against it, but do not worry, not enough to really do anything, not enough to make a difference, not enough to bring some democracy to this process. Theirs is not that kind of commitment, just the kind that they can put on a news release and base some speeches on.

There is very much to be said but I know we will all get another opportunity to go at this again this afternoon. I look forward to that opportunity. More than anything, I am hoping that during the course of this debate I will see a real official opposition acting like an official opposition and joining with the majority of the House to do the right thing for the majority of Canadians that this side of the House represents.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member on a regular basis in Toronto at Queen's Park when Mike Harris was doing the very same thing as the Prime Minister is doing here, which is loading up bills with everything but the kitchen sink and then ramming them through because he has found a way to do that. I remember one of the Conservative deputy speakers of that day referring to omnibus bills as “ominous bills”, and they indeed are ominous.

What worries me is that this is the first real example. It is probably Guy Giorno's first chance to try this tactic in Ottawa. Does the member share the same concern I have, that once this precedent is set here and the government finds a way to ram through these all-encompassing bills with public policy implications all over the place, this may become a trend that we will all regret in the long run?

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I always appreciate the comments of my good friend from Sault Ste. Marie.

We remember those days vividly. He is right, as would be all members on this side of the House at least, and maybe some others also, to be concerned about where this takes us.

I will give people something else to watch out for. The Mike Harris government was big on bringing in legislation that removed the need for more legislation if further changes were wanted. By that I mean the government turned a legislative change that needed to be debated in the House into a regulation change.

It sounds like inside baseball and half of the people who are watching probably are wondering who cares about that, but here is the point. Here is why it matters. When we have to amend a law through legislation, we have to involve this House, all the members and all the processes that are built in to protect democracy. When it is taken out of the legislation and put into regulations, it means that cabinet decides.

I am taking a moment with this because it is really important in terms of democracy. The example I use is a provincial law that says the minister of transportation is empowered to set speed limits on the highways of the province. It is done by regulation so that a new law is not needed every time a change to the speed limit is wanted because of changing traffic patterns. It can be done by regulation and it is fairly straightforward. However, when something critically important is removed from the legislative process, the democratic process is removed, because those regulations are only debated in the cabinet room and cabinet, understandably, is a private, secret meeting in terms of how our system works.

This is another ploy and there are many others that we need to start exposing that deny democracy.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the people watching should know that most of the bills before this House, hundreds a year, are in the neighbourhood of 10 or 20 pages long. This particular bill is 880 pages long. It is basically like vegetable soup.

I have had experience with omnibus bills in the past. Twenty years ago in Manitoba, in a minority government situation, the Filmon Conservative government of the day did the same thing. It brought in its budget implementation bill, but along with that, it put in a provision to eliminate, sell off and privatize Manitoba Data Services. Something it could not do in a minority situation up front it did through the back door.

That is what is going on here with Canada Post. The government could not get Bill C-44 through when the government introduced it last year. It knows it will not get it through so it is sneaking it through the back door.

Would the member like to make some comments about that?

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

There are less than 30 seconds left for the member.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, regarding Canada Post, for which I was the critic until recently, it is clear why the government stuffed it in here because the Liberals are onside with them when it is controversial. The Liberals are playing games with the postal workers by telling them, “Do not worry, we are with you”, and then not providing the votes necessary to stop the government from what it is doing.

This helps the Liberals. Maybe one reason they are not speaking so loudly is that this removes a problem. It is unpopular with the public and unpopular with post office workers, yet now it is in a bill and--

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Churchill.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak in the House today, a day where spirits certainly are a lot calmer than they were yesterday. We certainly got the attention of Canadians and exposed, in many ways, the sorry state of debate, not just in the House but also in our committees and the point that has reached.

It is an honour to rise in the House on behalf of the people of Churchill in northern Manitoba and to speak, as a member of the New Democratic Party, to why we need to oppose Bill C-9 and to the absolutely critical reason that we need to put a stop to the government's destructive agenda for Canada.

I speak as a member of Parliament representing my constituency. I have the honour of being one of the youngest members of Parliament in the House and in history as well. In many ways, that is a testament to where I come from, which is a part of Canada that is very young. Northern Canada is known as being the youngest part of our country, which is very much the same as where I come from. What comes hand in hand with that is the idea that we need to be looking out for that young population, which is my generation and the next generation.

Today I would like to speak to Bill C-9 in terms of how it stands against my generation and the improvement of the quality of life for my generation. It truly takes away the benefits, supports, the spirit of co-operation for which Canada is so well-known and the system that has truly made Canada one of the best countries in the world in which to live.

We are slipping and we have been slipping for years in a downward direction that started in the mid-nineties under the direction of the federal finance minister of the time, Paul Martin, who systematically decided to pay off the debt of this country on the backs of all Canadians, but mostly Canadians who, in many ways, were living not just on the margins of society, but who we needed to ensure had the support of our social safety net, whether it was women's organizations, aboriginal organizations, programming when it came to employment insurance or, quite frankly, when it came to health care or post-secondary education.

All of those areas suffered as a result of those cuts, and we have never recovered. In fact, it has become worse. While there has been Band-Aid solutions, a project here, a project there, that social safety net upon which Canada was built, the social safety net that made Canada what it was, certainly after the second world war, began to be broken apart piece by piece.

What we are seeing with the government and with Bill C-9 is the continued erosion of that safety net and, if anything, a speeding up of that process, a move to deregulate, a move to privatize with such vigour, and all of that hidden in a discussion about the budget in the budget.

Many of my colleagues have stood in the House to talk about that exact piece. The Conservatives must know that these are poisonous pills and, for that reason, have stuck them into this larger framework, the budgetary framework, when they are measures that have nothing to do with the budget, quite frankly, and have everything to do with taking away from our country and giving benefit to, one would presume, some of their friends. That tells a sad story when it comes to the future that my generation has to look forward to.

When it comes to our future, Bill C-9 is destructive in many ways. We have stood in the House to speak to many of them but I want to point to the ones that I believe are absolutely critical and have a direct impact on my generation as well.

One of the top issues that young people in Canada are concerned about today is the environment. We have been shamed around the world by the government's lack of leadership when it comes to the environment and dealing with climate change. Here we have yet one more step in that direction, something that I know concerns many people my age, and that is the removal of environmental assessments and deregulation when it comes to looking ahead at federally funded infrastructure projects.

If we do not have the federal government looking out for sustainable infrastructure development, respect for the environment and consultation with appropriate groups, including first nations, aboriginal people and peoples living in the area, who will look after it? Where is that leadership?

I will move on to employment insurance. I have been told by grandparents, elders and seniors across Canada. They remember the days when unemployment insurance, which became employment insurance, was not a system that existed or a system that people could count on when they needed it most. The development of that program, a fundamental piece of our social safety net, was eroded by the Liberals starting in the 1990s and continues to be eroded under the current government.

The employment insurance account was emptied after holding a surplus of $57 billion. This insurance fund was what workers across Canada put their blood, sweat, hard work and money into to have that peace of mind and support when times were tough. The money was taken away previously by the Liberals and it continues to be mandated in such a way today. Where is the money going? It is going toward corporate tax cuts for the oil and gas industry and the banks. Those are the dollars of the hard-working Canadians who the government claims to speak out for. It looks like theft to me.

Another item is the privatization of important institutions across our country, such as AECL. I had the honour of stopping in Winnipeg last weekend for a mine rescue competition. I met with individuals working with AECL in southern Manitoba and we talked about their concerns, the future of AECL and what will happen. I talked with people who, as a result of reduced programming, will be losing their jobs, good paying government jobs, jobs that have the safety record in a very dangerous industry.

Here we have a government that is willing to sell off AECL at the worst possible time for a bargain basement price. It is an institution in our country that must be regulated and supported by government.

I want to speak to the actions in terms of the softwood lumber industry which is being sold off in many ways. The government's softwood sellout deal, as we call it back home, has deeply impacted my region. Communities like The Pas, Opaskwayak Cree Nation, Wabowden and communities all across northern Manitoba depend on forestry. These measures in the budget have nothing to do with budgetary measures. The interest owed to corporations is being lowered by 2% but, most important, an export tariff on softwood lumber products for Ontario, Quebec, Manitoba and Saskatchewan is being raised by 10%

Many of these mills are non-existent, but many of them are operating at bare bones and yet these industries are being asked to deal with this increased tariff. People in my communities, who have been asked to make so many concession, are being asked to put up with this because their government is unwilling to stand up and protect them.

One area that I find to be the most disturbing and perhaps the saddest in terms of its completely shameless positioning in this budget is the significant measure to privatize Canada Post and remove its legal monopoly on outgoing international letters, or the remailer program.

Canada Post, as are many crown corporations that we are so proud of, is a corporation that Canadians depend on. While we talk every day about average Canadians, it is these kinds of crown corporations and these kinds of programs that we need to protect. That is why we call on--

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Questions and comments. The hon. member for Hamilton Centre.

[David Christopherson, NDP, Hamilton Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I compliment my colleague from Churchill for an excellent analysis of this critical issue. I would also point out that I think any arm's-length observer in this place will recognize a rising star in the making. I want to publicly state what a phenomenal job the member is doing, not only for her constituents but for her generation.

On the generational issue, one of the big concerns that a lot of us have is the number of young people who are not voting, who are saying “a pox on all our houses”, and just checking right out of the whole political process because they do not think it is democratic, meaningful or that it helps them in any way.

With something as cynical as this document is, which plays all these democratic games and denies democracy, I wonder if the member for Churchill sees a concern in terms of how this will affect younger people and their cynicism toward the whole democratic process and the things that we do here.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Hamilton Centre for his kind words. It is an honour to work with such a fantastic team made up of himself and members of the NDP who for years have fought for my generation and generations of Canadians coming up.

I could not agree more with my colleague's point. We are dealing with some of the highest rates of electoral disenfranchisement, young people pulling out of the system entirely, a cynicism like we have never seen before. I have heard members of the Conservative caucus talk about that and ask that question. If they want an answer, this bill is an exact example of why young people tune out.

This budget has poison pills in it that have nothing to do with a budget. If anything, they take away the role of government whose fundamental role is to look out for our well-being. When we see government break away, give favours to its friends, take away good paying jobs that mean so much to my generation and fails to look at the priorities of young people, whether it is on the environment or post-secondary education, then, no kidding, young people will be cynical.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, one of the many things that Bill C-9 would do is remove the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency from reviewing energy projects and instead substituting the National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. This would remove a review of major industrial projects from an agency that is dedicated to environmental protection and instead hand it job over to an industry-friendly board. That is typical of Conservative governments, not only here but anywhere in the world.

The NEB does not have the experience necessary to conduct proper public consultations and environmental assessments. Of the over 300 staff at the board, only a few dozen work on environmental issues. When the NEB held hearings about lifting the same-season relief well policy, only written submissions were accepted. No public hearings or consultations took place. With the exception of a single Inuit group, the board only heard from the big oil companies.

The Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency was specifically designed and set up to conduct reviews of projects that may have serious consequences. The Conservatives are trying to fast-track the expansion of the tar sands and building oil pipelines by handing over the oversight to the industry-friendly NEB. This is classic Conservative thinking; let the industry regulate itself.

I would like to ask the member whether she has any further comments on these observations.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Elmwood—Transcona, who further makes light of just how shameful the removal of environmental assessment is and how truly this has no place in a budget bill. It is extremely destructive when it comes to how we are moving forward.

I just want to note that there is hope here. There is the ability of the opposition to stand united in its opposition to Bill C-9, to listen to our calls, and to stand up and say that these poison pills have no room in this budget bill. They have nothing to do with this budget bill. They have everything to do with weakening our country and taking away from the well-being of Canadians, and we have to oppose it.

[Glenn Thibeault, NDP, Sudbury, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am proud to stand up today to support the set of amendments to Bill C-9 brought forward by my colleague from Hamilton Mountain.

I would like to reiterate that we in the NDP find it disheartening that the government would include so many policies in its budget document that would never be passed had they been introduced as stand-alone legislation. If the government were serious about its desire to be more transparent and accountable, it would not have attached these policies to the budget.

One of the most objectionable policies hidden in this budget relates to the current environmental assessment process. In keeping with our party's concerns about the oil sands, the measures contained within Bill C-9 are very worrisome. If passed, the bill would exempt certain federally funded infrastructure projects from environmental assessment, which goes well beyond efforts by the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment to streamline the environmental assessment process.

It also allows the Minister of the Environment to dictate the scope of environmental assessments. It weakens public participation, and it enables the removal of assessments of energy projects from the Environmental Assessment Agency and moves them to the National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

The notion of saddling our children and our grandchildren with debt is regrettable. That we should also bequeath them an environmental liability on their natural heritage through this process is reprehensible.

That our Conservative minority government should, with the complicity of the Liberal Party, seek to make environmental protection a matter of ministerial discretion is a demonstration of the worst sort of shortsightedness. The notion that to help make building projects shovel ready we should make the application of environmental law optional is something that no elected official will ever be able to justify.

Eighteen months ago, the Conservatives came out with their now infamous economic and fiscal update. Within this update they gutted the Navigable Waters Protection Act, which had been in place for 100 years, and our Liberal colleagues supported them.

Now the Conservatives are trying to finish what they started by doing away with environmental assessments for most projects that receive federal funding. Several provinces have rather weak legislation and no way to conduct real inspections and/or assessments. The Navigable Waters Protection Act was the only way some provinces could have assessments done.

Last Friday we debated a motion brought forward by the member for Edmonton—Strathcona that called for a review of all laws, regulations, and policies related to deepwater oil and gas drilling. It followed the disaster that is currently ongoing in the Gulf of Mexico. This disaster shows exactly why environmental assessment is so vitally important.

All too often it is impossible to stop permanent or long-lasting environmental degradation once spills or other events have taken place. What this means is very simple. As difficult as it is to stop all environmental disasters, it is much easier to fight these causes than it is to try to rectify the catastrophic consequences.

Sometimes the consequences of environmental damage are not as visible as those images we are currently seeing from the Gulf of Mexico. In many ways, these consequences are even more dangerous. They are slowly poisoning our environment without the global calls for action that we see today. If we do not have a thorough environmental assessment system in place, we have no way to stop these disasters from taking place.

We live in a democratic society, but these provisions erode any notion of accountable government. Environmental assessments will exist only at the whim of the Minister of the Environment.

As the Minister of the Environment is able to dictate the scope of any environmental assessment, the minister can effectively kill any assessment by narrowing, broadening, or changing the scope of the assessment to such a degree as to make the assessment meaningless. The view of anyone who stands opposed to a project can be ruled out of scope, meaning that the government can simply silence the critics of any development.

There is also the worrying provision to move the assessment of energy projects from the Environmental Assessment Agency to the National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. The mandate of the Environmental Assessment Agency is, according to its website, and I quote:

To provide Canadians with high-quality federal environmental assessments that contribute to informed decision making in support of sustainable development.

Why would the government want to move environmental assessments away from an agency whose sole purpose is to carry them out? If the government is worried about duplicating work between agencies and departments, surely it should have the Environmental Assessment Agency, with all the skills, tools, and resources it has, carry out the assessments for the National Energy Board and the Nuclear Safety Commission. Where is the efficiency in trying to duplicate these roles at the National Energy Board and the Nuclear Safety Commission? The only possible explanation I can see for moving these assessments is to weaken them by passing them on to agencies whose mandates are not so explicitly related to environmental assessment.

Looking forward, people can count on Canada's New Democrats to continue working against the false dichotomy that claims that we cannot stimulate the economy while we also protect the environment. After all, $1 billion invested in Obama-style green infrastructure creates twice as many jobs as $1 billion spent on tax cuts and injects $2 billion into the broader economy.

The NDP has long called for investment in renewable energy and support for public transport, policies that would add value to our communities, protect the environment, and create new jobs. However, the government simply is not interested. This is the same shortsighted view of the economy that left the government cutting the eco-energy retrofit program. This program encouraged people to increase the energy efficiency of their homes while it sustained and created new jobs. When we think about the whole economic cycle, these jobs increased the tax base and lowered the amount the government had to pay in social welfare, so the program had a positive effect on the economy as a whole. Yet the program was quietly cancelled just before Easter weekend. The government was clearly hoping that the cancellation would be missed by the media and the Canadian public.

Environmental protection is a duty we owe to future generations. I have two young daughters, Trinity, who is six, and Thea, who is two, and I certainly do not want to have to tell them or their children that I stood by and watched as the government decimated Canada's environmental assessment procedures.

If parliamentarians do not stand up to ensure that this measure does not sneak through in the budget, who will? Rest assured, the New Democrats will continue to do so.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, as the member has ably pointed out, Bill C-9 is going to remove the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency from reviewing all the energy projects and will substitute the National Energy Board and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. We know that this is a body, basically, of self-regulation. Not only are six of the board's members long-time veterans of the private oil and gas industry, the board gets all its funding from the companies it regulates. Clearly, it is almost a conflict. Approximately 90% of the National Energy Board's total expenditures are recovered from the companies it regulates. Think of that in terms of what is happening in the Gulf right now, where we are finding that they are almost bereft of any kind of real regulation.

The Conservatives hand-picked 10 of the 12 members of the board. They are hoping to bypass the oversight of major industrial projects, which would have consequences for generations to come. As I indicated, the disaster that is unfolding in the Gulf is clearly tied to the fact that there is not proper oversight and there are not proper regulations in force. The industry is basically self-regulated. This is what happens any time industries regulate themselves.

Does the member have any further comments to make on these points?

[Glenn Thibeault, NDP, Sudbury, ON]

Madam Speaker, I had the opportunity to go to New Orleans with my colleague as part of the Canada-U.S. Interparliamentary Group. We had a briefing from one of the individuals who was involved with the oil spill that is happening right now in the Gulf of Mexico. One of the things we heard very clearly was that there were not enough of these relief valves being put into place. That was very scary, because as my hon. colleague mentioned, they were policing themselves. What is to say what happens next time? If another unfortunate accident like this happens, we would have two drilled areas gushing oil into the Gulf of Mexico.

That is why it is so important that we ensure that there is an environmental assessment piece here in Canada to ensure that we monitor our Arctic and our beautiful coastlines to ensure that something like that never happens here.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague for his intervention on Bill C-9. He has articulated very admirably what we see wrong with an omnibus bill that takes a collection of things that really are non-budget related and makes them part of a budget.

I know that he comes from Sudbury, an area that is experiencing a difficult strike at a foreign multinational corporation that does not respect workers.

I wonder what his position would be on whether we should have seen in the budget not only the restoration of the $57 billion in the EI account, but indeed, as one other private member's bill has called for, employment insurance benefits for those who are involved in prolonged labour disputes. Does he see that if we saw restored in the budget what really is budget money—that $57 billion from the EI account—it could have helped those workers in Sudbury who have been on strike for nearly a year?

[Glenn Thibeault, NDP, Sudbury, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has asked an important question.

If I look at how my riding specifically is being impacted by this strike, we have 3,000 workers at Vale Inco, which has changed its name to Vale, who have been on strike now for almost a year. Those families are suffering.

We also have one of the best mining supply and services sectors in the world, in my opinion. There are 17,000 people who work in that sector in Sudbury. Many of those people used to have 40-hour-a-week jobs that paid decent wages. Those jobs have now been reduced to 10 hours a week at minimum wage. I have men and women coming into my office crying, because they do not know how they are actually going to make their mortgage payments. They cannot qualify for EI, and there is no money there for some of them.

We actually needed, in this budget, to bring back that $57 billion to ensure that the money the workers paid to ensure that they had insurance when they needed it was there. Unfortunately, right now, this bill is continuing to move forward and is not bringing forward any transparency or accountability for workers.

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, first, I thank my colleagues in the NDP caucus for speaking out so forcefully and consistently on Bill C-9, the budget implementation bill.

I wish I could say that we are joined by other members of the House as this debate continues, but it looks like we are pretty well alone, which is very unfortunate. I think of the speech that was made by the member for Toronto—Danforth a couple of days ago on Bill C-9 when he appealed to the official opposition and other members to speak out against the bill because it was a travesty. It is an almost 900 page bill. The process of what is unfolding is something, as parliamentarians, we should all be saying that we do not agree with and we are going to ensure that the bill does not go through.

We have seen the government use the 2010 budget to bring in a budget implementation bill. Under that bill, we are calling it the Trojan horse. It rams through all kinds of other significant public policy measures to do with the environment, with taxes, with privatization. The government is using the cover of a budget bill hoping no one will notice. The NDP wants everyone to notice what is taking place because this is an affront to democratic process.

On the bill itself, as many other NDP members have pointed out, we are completely opposed to many of the provisions in the bill. For example, we are opposed to the 50% increase in airline taxes for security. We are also opposed to the fact that the budget bill contains an enormous public policy issue of the divestiture of AECL, which allows for the sale of all or any part of Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. It is a major issue that should be before the House in a separate bill and debated. Yet it is being rammed through as part of a budget bill. Once it is gone, it is gone and nothing can be done about it. We should all be up in arms and incredibly concerned about this.

There are other provisions in the bill. Probably one of the most significant ones for us is the tax shift from corporations on to ordinary Canadians.

Today I met with representatives of Food Banks Canada. It is so important to get that sense of reality of what is going on in local communities and what is happening to people across the country. They told me that every month 800,000 Canadians relied on food banks. The percentage of people relying on food banks increased 18% from 2008 to 2009. From 2009 to 2010, it is another 11% increase. They know that about 20% of people who use food banks either work or recently worked.

I bring this forward because it is relevant to this massive shift in taxation from corporations on to ordinary people. Because of the program that the Liberal government started, and now escalated by the Conservative government, we have a massive erosion of corporate taxes.

We believe in fair and progressive taxation. We believe everyone should pay their fair share. However, with this tax shift, by 2014, we will see a loss of $60 billion in revenue. It does not take anyone with a math degree to figure out that the loss of this amount of money will impact the kinds of services that can be provided, whether it is for health care, social programs, EI or whatever it is for the kinds of things we need to do to help unemployed workers. We see people having to rely more and more on food banks, and that is what is at the core of the budget. That is what is so wrong about it.

We also know that over the next four years the Conservative government will take in more than $19 billion than it needs to deal with EI. We know the employment insurance program is not paid for by the government. It is paid for by employers and employees. The government takes the money through the premiums. What is the government going to do? It is going to rake in billions more than is needed and then use it to pay for the corporate tax cuts. This is an outrage and we strenuously object to it.

There are also provisions in the budget bill that relate to the HST. As someone from British Columbia, there is a sense of outrage about the HST and the way it has been foisted upon the people there. The Conservative government and the Liberal government in British Columbia are working hand in glove with each other to put this on the people of B.C. The response from people has been absolutely incredible.

We have seen the most historic grassroots initiative take place, where people are signing petitions. They are saying, no, that the governments are not going to do this, that they are not going to run roughshod over democratic practice, negotiate a deal a few days after an election, not tell people about it and think they can get away with it.

This part of the budget bill as well as the tax shift is very much related to what is going on in my province. People are so angry over the Liberal and Conservative members of Parliament from B.C. who did absolutely nothing to stand up for their constituents and say that the HST was a bad tax and that it would come at the wrong time.

There are two other issues with which I want to deal. One is on the environment front.

One of the enormous issues in Bill C-9 is the budget is overwhelmingly negative on the environmental front. There are no provisions to fight climate change. There is no plan to create green jobs, something we have advocated for very strongly in our caucus. We have laid out detailed plans about how we need to move to a greener economy. Instead this budget focuses on facilitating and accelerating the extraction of oil and gas.

In a very dramatic move, it guts environmental protection by taking environmental assessments for energy projects away from the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency and giving that responsibility to the National Energy Board or the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission. Both bodies, particularly the National Energy Board, as we just heard from my colleague from Elmwood—Transcona, are very pro-industry. They are loaded with people who have a vested interest in seeing greater extraction of oil and gas.

It is quite shocking to see that this significant policy change on the environment, on regulations, on environmental assessment is in the budget implementation bill. The consequences of that will be felt for years and decades to come. This is one reason for the amendments before us today. We are at report stage of the bill and the proposed amendments would delete all those aspects from it. We think they have no place in a budget bill.

They should be debated separately. Members of the House should be able to look at those provisions in terms of natural resources and energy and how those assessments are done. If the government wants to change and weaken the procedures in place, then let it have the guts and the courage to do it as a separate legislation. Let it be willing to stand the test of putting that legislation before the House and then seeing whether it has the support to get it through. To do it through a budget bill is unconscionable.

I will focus briefly on the issue of housing. I, along with other members, have worked very hard for in my community for this. One thing that disturbs me very deeply is we rally saw no provisions for an ongoing housing program in the budget.

Over four million Canadians are living in housing insecurity. Up to 300,000 people are homeless in communities across the country. We would think this would be a major priority. It certainly takes us back to the statistics that I read from Food Banks Canada. Yet there is nothing in the budget that addresses this fundamental human right in our society, the right to safe, appropriate, affordable and accessible housing. I have a bill before the House, Bill C-304, that would compel the government to initiate and develop a national housing strategy.

A core requirement of a budget is to ensure people have adequate housing and incomes, whether it is through increasing the Canada pension plan, the guaranteed income supplement or OAS. Those are the fundamentals. Yet everything in the budget is getting away from that and giving greater breaks to corporations. We find that unacceptable and will vote against it.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member did an excellent job talking about the deficiencies in this budget and lack of opportunities in terms of the environment and fighting poverty.

In a parallel move, former Prime Minister Paul Martin said:

Ottawa has a responsibility to put global warming and poverty at the top of the G20 agenda because they threaten the stability of the world just as much as economics.

However, the current Prime Minister said that he would stick with his agenda of fighting taxes for big banks and promoting the economic development of big corporations.

Would the hon. member like to comment on the parallels inside and outside of the House?

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, we all feel it is a bit of an embarrassment in terms of what will happen at the G8 and G20. The Prime Minister is running around chasing down and generating support for banks, when his priorities should really be on helping people. It is an embarrassment in terms of what Canada's position is in the international community.

For Paul Martin to suddenly say that he is concerned about what will happen at the G8 and G20 summits and what the priority should be, I point out that as finance minister he orchestrated the demise of housing programs in Canada. Let us not forget that he cut the deficit on the backs of poor people, people who were most vulnerable in our society. It is easy, after the fact, to say that things are not right, but some of the systemic issues we are dealing with, both domestically and internationally, flow from decisions that were made by the Liberal government of which he was very much a part of as finance minister.

We have been very clear on our position on the G8 and G20 and on maternal and child health. We have said that a full range of programs, including family planning and access to safe legal abortions, should be available. We have pushed the government very hard. Unfortunately the Liberals, even within their own ranks, have been unable to maintain a progressive position on this issue.

We are headed to the G8 and G20 and spending $1 billion in security. We will be no further ahead and yet we still have pressing issues at home that need to be addressed.

[Glenn Thibeault, NDP, Sudbury, ON]

Madam Speaker, one thing the member talked about in her speech, which was ringing true for me, was the lack of a national housing initiative. In my community of Sudbury, in my previous role before coming to this honourable House, I ran the United Way and saw many of the strategies, because of a lack of funding, to help people who were homeless. It was called couch surfing. It was going from one place to the next and to the next. That was how some organizations had to deal with homelessness. They did not get the funding, they lost their SCPI dollars and national homelessness initiative dollars and tracked people going house to house.

How should the government ensure and what should it include in the budget to see some sort of national housing initiative to help those in our country? Could the member comment on that?

[Libby Davies, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Madam Speaker, because the member worked with the United Way, he has a very good grounding in what goes on in local communities. Organizations like the United Way end up at the end of the line trying to help people in a band-aid way because they cannot rely on either sustained provincial or federal programs.

The whole notion of a national housing strategy is to ensure that the federal government is providing leadership to develop a national strategy with the provinces, territories, first nations, municipalities and local communities. There is no such plan in Canada.

Since 1995, when all the programs were taken apart and eliminated by the then Liberal government, we have suffered. People are homeless and suffering today because of a lack of housing security due to that public policy decision. We have to reverse that and ensure it is a basic right that is respected.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, today I have the honour of speaking to our fellow citizens about Bill C-9, and also about the process that brought this omnibus bill, with its range of issues that have absolutely nothing to do with the budget, before the House.

As Montesquieu so aptly put it, the public nature of our laws helps to guarantee our freedoms. But the title of this bill tells people nothing about what it contains. The Conservatives included a series of measures in Bill C-9 because they know perfectly well that the Liberals are now so weak with their current leader that they do not even dare stand up to vote against this bill even though it contains measures that will cripple the environmental assessment process in this country and allow the sale of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited to foreign interests. Measures in this bill will overturn court rulings, such as the one concerning Canada Post.

The title of a bill is part of that bill, and the courts have always said that the people have the right to know what we are doing. Saying that this is a budget bill that deals only with public finances is nothing but a lie. It is a lie to the House and to the people. The government does not have the right to introduce a so-called budget bill that includes all of these other measures, but that is exactly what the Conservatives are doing. The fact that they are a minority government is unusual in our society. This is the third minority government in a row. They are learning how to deal with a situation in which they always need a dance partner.

I want to focus on one aspect of Bill C-9 that is particularly important to me and that really worries me: the environment. I was Quebec's environment minister for several years, and during that time, I realized that one of Canada's biggest problems is its failure to strictly enforce environmental laws.

A team led by David Boyd at the University of Victoria in British Columbia published an excellent book in 2002 or 2003 called Unnatural Law. This book clearly demonstrates that what Canada needs is not necessarily new laws or regulations, but the political will to enforce them.

I sometimes surprise environmentalists when I say, based on my experience as environment minister, that the vast majority of businesses obey environmental laws. That is a fact. First, the vast majority of businesses obey the law. Second, the vast majority of businesses care about their image, and the environment is part of that. Third, breaking the law, any law, is very bad for a business's balance sheet, and therefore the shareholders' equity.

So, the trick is not to find lawyers who can get around the law. The trick these days, and we have seen this with BP in the Gulf of Mexico, is to try to change the legislation. How did BP's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico become the worst disaster of all time? Why were there no safety mechanisms in place, even though they are well known and installing them is relatively simple, albeit costly for the business?

British Petroleum managed to convince the environmental and energy regulators in the U.S. to remove the obligation to drill a lateral relief well that would be relieve the main well in the event of an accident. That is the trick for big corporations.

Thus, they stop at nothing to have legislation changed here in Canada. They are going to find it too expensive to drill in the Arctic, the next frontier they have their eyes on. They say it would have cost them too much to drill relief wells off Newfoundland and Labrador, where Chevron is drilling even deeper.

They are making a major gain with Bill C-9, because the bill will give responsibility for environmental assessments to the National Energy Board, which has no experience or expertise in this area. The board of directors of the Calgary-based NEB is made up mainly of people from the oil industry, as we can discover on its website.

In regulation theory, there is an expression used to describe this situation. It is regulatory capture. In other words, the regulatory authority, whose role is ordinarily to enforce strict standards and protect the public and the environment, is part of the sector it is charged with regulating and therefore tends to look at problems in the same way as the companies it is called on to regulate. This is an absolutely classic situation, and it is one of the two major problems in regulation and legislation.

The other problem is regulatory lag, which means that there is always a time lag in regulation. By the time the Goldman Sachs of the world come up with a new financial product and the government figures it out and tries to regulate it, it is too late. The companies are busy coming up with the next product, so that there is always a time lag.

But regulatory capture—being locked into seeing things in a certain way because of the sector one is in—is the mistake the government is making with Bill C-9. It is giving the National Energy Board responsibility for environmental assessment, which is a very important step. This means that from now on, there will be no real environmental assessment per se in Canada. The industry and its cronies at the National Energy Board will be calling the shots. Not only is this a tragedy like the one that is unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico, but it is a tragedy for future generations.

The government stood up with us this week to vote for a motion made by my colleague from Alberta—a very experienced environmental lawyer—calling on the government to ensure that Canada has the strongest rules in the world.

Yesterday, I was very concerned to hear the Minister of Natural Resources say that the work was already being done by the National Energy Board.

That is the situation in Canada. Since the Conservatives came to power, they have scooped $57 billion from the employment insurance fund to create enough room to give tax cuts to the wealthiest corporations. If a company did not make a profit, it did not pay taxes and therefore a tax cut was of no benefit. Who got the most money? More than $1 billion went to the banks and several billion dollars went to the oil industry.

A company like EnCana got almost $1 billion in tax cuts because the Conservatives would rather tax ordinary citizens than ask corporations to pay their fair share. The oil companies and the Conservatives are kindred spirits. It is not pre-Keynesian economics, it is Precambrian economics. The government is even going so far as to say that companies should no longer be taxed at all. Why make companies pay their fair share?

In the meantime, these same companies are on the move. British Petroleum, which has been making headlines lately, has operations in 130 different countries and has more than 3,500 subsidiaries. It does not pay taxes because, like all major corporations, it moves its money around very quickly from one place to another and takes advantage of the different tax rules in each place. In developing countries where BP has operations—and developed ones as well—are losing revenue that could help their development.

Accounting tricks and today's rapidly fluctuating markets around the world make it possible for these companies to avoid paying their taxes.

In environmental, social and economic terms, we are in crisis and that is why this omnibus bill is an abomination. We are going to stand up and vote against it.

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to remind my colleague from Outremont that, like myself and the members for Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, La Pointe-de-l'Île and Pontiac, he was a minister in the National Assembly of Quebec, and thus at the service of Quebeckers.

I would like to know—and I would have added another “pre” to pre-Keynesian—what he thinks of the Quebec members who are aiding and abetting passage of a bill such as Bill C-9, which he has properly called an omnibus bill.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, I do find it worrisome that a society where, according to survey after survey, the environment is one of the most important issues, perhaps the most important, is represented by people who have surrendered, bound hand and foot, to the big western oil companies without ever considering the adverse effects in this part of the country.

For example, coal-fired power stations are still operating in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Ontario. In Haute-Mauricie, there is such a high concentration of mercury in some lakes that pregnant women cannot eat the fish, even though we believe that we live in one of the most pristine regions. Quebec does absolutely not burn coal. Mercury comes from coal. Everything is interrelated today.

If people truly care about the environment, they should call the Conservative members that have managed to get elected in Quebec and tell them to stop because what they are doing makes no sense and they are being irresponsible.

In today's National Post, there is an excellent article by John Ivison in which he likens people who vote in that way to cyborgs—creatures that are half human, half robot. They do not even think anymore. Just like automatons, they do exactly what the Prime Minister's office tells them to do. I find that tragic because we are supposed to be here to use our experience and our expertise to take action that will protect the public.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the government clearly has a bad case of misplaced priorities. We are talking about banks that made $15 billion in profits during a recession in 2009. We had bank presidents earning $10.4 million during that same period. What does the government do? It simply takes the air traveller security tax and increases it by 50%, making it the highest tax in the world. It is $25 for a foreign flight in Canada and $5 to the United States.

The government is sending Canadian travellers to fly on American airlines. It is helping American airlines at the expense of Canadian airlines. It is forcing people to fly through American airports rather than flying Canadian airlines out of Montreal. Does the member think this is another case of misplaced priorities on the part of the government?

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

Madam Speaker, my colleague used exactly the right word. It is a question of priorities. He chooses his example well. Our banks have made $15 billion in profit since the beginning of the recession. Actually, it is $19 billion today. For the first six months of this year, the Canadian banks have set aside $5 billion for bonuses for their executives.

At the same time, the government is always snapping its suspenders on the world stage and saying how great our banks are. In fact, the only reason they are able to make that money is because they have received $1.3 billion in tax reductions. They are allowed to charge the largest differential that has ever existed between the basic rate and what they are charging on credit cards, on overdrafts, for loans, and especially for mortgages in this country. The spread has never been as great.

Nobody on the government side is reeling in our banks, so for the first six months of this year, the banks have put aside $5 billion for bonuses. Rather than travelling around the world and talking about what a bunch of geniuses they are, in fact, they are not financial geniuses. All they are doing is profiting from a monopoly situation that the Conservatives are giving to them. The Conservatives never reel them in on ATM fees or interest charges and the gouging that is going on. They allow them to pick people's pockets.

That will mean $10 billion for this year. For every man, woman and child with a bank account, that will mean about $1,000 per Canadian just for the bonuses for the bank executives.

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, I wish I could say that it is a pleasure to speak to Bill C-9, the government's bloated budget implementation bill, but it is of great concern to me. We in the NDP are speaking out regarding Bill C-9. The Liberals are notable in their silence; they are missing in inaction.

This bill is the culmination of a really disturbing trend. It is a trend that previous Liberal governments started and the Conservative government is taking to dizzying new heights. All thoughtful Canadians and all thoughtful parliamentarians should be disturbed by Bill C-9 and the process that surrounds it.

That trend is to American-style junk legislation. Everything including the kitchen sink is stuffed into an omnibus budget bill and then it is rammed through without giving members a chance to deliberate and decide on crucial issues independently and without giving Canadians a chance to see what the government is doing.

There is an entire year's legislative agenda in one massive 902 page omnibus monster. Everything unrelated to the budget is in the bill. Let me go through a list of just a few.

For example, the government is granting itself new powers to gut environmental assessments. Let us be clear on what this is about. It is about granting the Minister of the Environment the unilateral authority to be the judge, jury and executioner of entire ecosystems, to tear down the checks built into our system and scrap assessments so it can steamroll ahead with unscrutinized controversial mines and tar sands expansion projects.

We know this is the plot the Conservatives have cooked up because, to quote from the March 14, 2009 issue of the Globe and Mail:

A leaked government document outlining the proposed changes to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act indicates [the] Environment Minister...has asked for a bill “overhauling” the legislation as soon as possible.

Under the new system, the government should “expect to capture perhaps 200-300 projects per year,” the document states. That would represent a more than 95 per cent drop from the roughly 6,000 federal environmental assessments that currently take place each year.

We have seen this before with the gutting of the Navigable Waters Protection Act last year in Bill C-10. Then the official opposition rolled over on changes that gave the transport minister unprecedented powers to define entire classes of development projects on heritage waterways so they no longer need environmental assessments. These powers are not balanced by any public consultation or by transparent disclosure or by parliamentary review.

We saw this in 2008, when regressive immigration reforms were hidden in the budget, and in the 2009 budget which included provisions that denied women in the public service the right to go to the Human Rights Commission to fight for the pay equity they deserve.

Here we are a year later with another bill that goes much, much further in this wrong-headed direction. This bill also introduces an air travel tax as I am sure the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona is aware. It is not surprising that the government would be hiding the security tax hike any way that it can, including inside this bloated bill. This tax is the highest in the world. It wants to be seen as the government that does not tax people. Is that ever a myth. The truth is it does.

Far beyond this tax on air travel, the government has introduced the hated sales tax this year. The finance minister signed the provinces up for it, buried the legislation for it in the budget, and rammed it through this House in an incredible 48 hours.

Earlier this week I was with first nations constituents in Red Rock, Ontario in my riding of Thunder Bay—Superior North. They are very angry about the HST and the violation of their treaty rights. They were not consulted before it was imposed on everybody, including them. We know that often our first nations communities are among the most disadvantaged in our society, and they are worried about the impact the HST is going to have on them.

I have heard no end about this hated sales tax from many of my constituents, many of whom have lost their jobs and are struggling with the cost of living as it is. Then Conservatives and Liberals team up to hit them with the HST, one of the largest sales tax hikes in Canadian history and debate is shut down in the House to get it through.

Let us not forget something else that is in Bill C-9, and that is a huge payroll tax increase. Starting at the end of this year, Conservatives are going to hit workers and employers alike with the maximum EI premium hike allowed under the law, and the maximum payroll tax hike the year after that, and again the year after that, and repeated every year for the foreseeable future.

This tax on work is ridiculous when we consider that there was lots of money in the employment insurance fund, over $57 billion in surplus, way more than enough. But the government raided that money, happily spent it on tax breaks for big oil and big banks and decided to raise payroll taxes to make up for the shortfall. This would cause quite an uproar on its own, but the government is trying to bury it deep inside this huge bill.

Today we are dealing with a motion that would rescind clauses in Bill C-9 dealing with the sale of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited and the privatization of Canada Post mail delivery services. Neither of these things has much to do with actual budgetary measures or a budget. They can and must be debated and decisions made on their own merit.

However, the Prime Minister does not believe in debate. He does not believe in discussion. He does not believe in accountability and he does not seem to believe in democracy.

I would like to talk a bit about Canada Post and the provisions concealed in Bill C-9 that continue the deregulation of our national letter carrier. The government knows it would never be able to pass a bill in the House to do that, so it is taking bites out of Canada Post operations using budgetary bills instead.

What the provisions in Bill C-9 do is to remove the exclusive legal privilege of Canada Post to deliver international mail and to allow foreign national postal services and private companies to take over one of the few profitable revenue streams that Canada Post has, a stream on which the company depends to help offset the costs of our local and rural mail delivery.

Canada Post has been fighting this battle for the last 10 years or more. Several companies, many of which are surrogates of national post administrations, have been collecting letter mail in Canada and bringing it to their countries where it is processed and remailed abroad, creating jobs there and not here in Canada.

Canada Post has tried to resolve this issue diplomatically through the Universal Postal Union and by negotiating directly with the violating remailers. When they still would not respect the law, Canada Post took them to court and it won every time.

Our own member for Ottawa Centre, when he was critic for this file in 2006, wrote to the government expressing concern about changes to Canada Post's exclusive privilege without public consultation and asking for a full debate and a real vote in Parliament. Instead of giving us that debate, that discussion and the vote that New Democrats asked for, the government four years later is doing exactly the opposite.

Instead of backing up our national postal service and supporting it, the government has chosen to help foreign remail raiders poach Canadian letter mail instead. Bill C-9 would make that poaching legal forever.

This threatens the long-term viability of Canada Post itself as a universal service to Canadians. By crippling Canada Post's revenue, the government is attempting to achieve through the back door what it knows it cannot achieve through open and transparent debate on the issue.

What do we have here? We have a massive omnibus bill that needs to be split up so that we can have proper debates and allow democracy to function. As it is, parliamentarians are expected to carefully pore through 2,200 legal clauses and debate the ramifications at only seven debate sessions in the House and even fewer in committee. The House finance committee passed all 2,200 clauses without amendment in just one day. Maybe that is just the point: we are not supposed to carefully study Bill C-9's 23 sections and debate over 2,000 clauses.

If the mission of Parliament is to scrutinize the government, doing legislation this way is nothing but a way to avoid scrutiny. It is the so-called accountability government using yet another gimmick to once again avoid accountability.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, one of our earlier speakers pointed out that we would not be in this situation right now if the Liberals would take a strong stand rather than being doormats for the government.

The member explained the situation regarding Canada Post quite well. We have a budgetary bill that is 880 pages long. Because of the weakness of the opposition, the government saw an opportunity to throw everything into this bill.

The Canada Post part of it is a good example of that. The government introduced Bill C-14 and Bill C-44 over the last couple of years. The government tried to get it through a minority Parliament and could not do it. This has absolutely nothing to do with budget implementation legislation, but the government has thrown it into this bill along with a dozen other things that do not belong and it has driven it to the Liberals who it knows are not going to be here in sufficient numbers to vote to defeat the government. In fact they are not even speaking to this bill. The government is de facto a majority government because of the irresponsible Liberal opposition.

Does the member have any comments on this point?

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Madam Speaker, if we are going to move in the direction of U.S.-style omnibus budget bills, why can we not have bills that have some vision? Why can we not have bills that invest in Canada, that invest in infrastructure for municipalities, that invest in passenger rail, that invest in health care and home care, that invest in education, that invest in sustainable community-based forestry, that invest particularly in sustainable energy? Why can we not have bills like that instead of what the government is doing, which is reducing taxes to big oil and big banks to less than half of the United States' corporate tax rate? There is a 36% marginal tax rate for corporate income taxes for large corporations in the United States. It is 18% in this budget and it is moving toward 15% in the next couple of years.

This is a shame.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would like to thank my hon. colleague for his interventions and congratulate him for making sure that his private member's bill on climate change and accountability was passed here in this House.

If I were not a suspicious person, it would seem as though because of what we did on this side in passing that bill when the government opposed it unanimously, it is taking other regulations that should be the responsibility of the Government of Canada, that should indeed belong to regulatory agencies, and sliding them off to those who are not accountable to government in a lot of ways and will no longer be responsible to us, allowing them to play fast and loose when it comes to environmental regulations.

But this House spoke. I congratulate the member for his leadership and for his bill and for ensuring that it is on its way to the other place where we hope to see it pass very quickly.

Indeed it seems as though there is a vindictive measure here, in the sense of sliding it back into an omnibus bill, after the House clearly spoke about what we need to do on the environment.

Would the hon. member like to comment on that?

[Bruce Hyer, NDP, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we have a government here which either believes that climate change is not real, or if it is real, we did not do it with our large polluting and successful societies.

No matter which the Conservatives believe, individually or collectively what they clearly do not believe is that we should have open debate, open transparency and move forward across party lines on what clearly needs to be a non-partisan issue to invest in the kinds of changes which would not only help to save the world, but would move us toward green jobs, a green economy, a more sustainable economy and make our lives better, not worse.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Madam Speaker, I look forward to this chance to speak to Bill C-9, although I must say quite candidly that I find the bill very troubling.

I am proud to speak today to the amendments to this bill brought forward by the member for Hamilton Mountain. It is very clear that this bill must be amended. It is unconscionable that the government would continue to include in its budget implementation bills the kinds of things that are objectionable not just to the members of this House, but to the people of Canada. I welcome the amendments, and I do hope that, despite their incredible silence, members of the opposition will support these amendments.

I want to start with an observation. The Conservative government claims to be the government of accountability, yet it has proven time and time again that it is anything but. Rather than putting forward individual bills dealing with many of the issues that face this country, the government instead elects to hide issues in its bills. We call these poison pills, and there are a number of poison pills in this budget implementation bill.

Before I speak about the poison pills in Bill C-9, I want to take a few minutes to review the poison pills of the past, because in budget after budget we have seen these poison pills.

The first one that I want to speak about is pay equity. The House will remember that the changes to pay equity were slipped into a budget implementation bill. The government, and the government before it, could have and should have used the 2004 pay equity commission report, an incredible and solid report, to create a pay equity bill that actually worked for the women of this country. Instead, the government chose to put in its place the excuse for pay equity that came forward in its budget implementation bill that stripped away the right of women to be considered as worthy of equal pay for work of equal value.

The government called it the equitable compensation bill or something like that, but the truth is that it was far from equitable. It basically told women that they would have to negotiate at the collective bargaining table whether they deserved equal pay for work of equal value. That is not acceptable.

Pay equity is a human right; it is not something that can be negotiated away. In these troubled times when negotiations are very difficult, it only stands to reason that if issues of women in the workforce are not regarded or taken as seriously as some other issues, such as dental benefits or long-term health benefits, that human right could be negotiated away.

The government is saying to women across this country that it is lovely that they make up 52% of the population and do contribute to the economy, but when it comes to equal pay for work of equal value, when it comes to their human rights, it is just not interested. The government perpetrated this sham on the women of Canada, and that is not the end of the things it has done to the women of Canada.

The Conservative government cancelled the court challenges program. It removed equality from the mandate of the status of women department. The Conservatives did put back the word, because there was a great outcry across the country, but they did not put back the spirit of equality, because they have continued with their draconian measures against women's groups across this country that advocate for women, that stand up for women in regard to the issues that they and their families face.

The Conservatives have also removed research from the mandate of the status of women department. That research was absolutely integral to providing the kind of intelligent policy that would guide us to real equality. Members may have noticed that I used the term “intelligent policy”. That is something that we do not have and are not likely going to see.

Even more to the point, the Conservatives underfunded or defunded groups that were the least bit critical. I am thinking of two: the National Association of Women and the Law and the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women. Why? Because those two groups had the audacity to hold the government and the previous government to account in regard to our CEDAW obligations.

Members will recall that in 1982 this country signed the covenant on the elimination of discrimination against women. This country signed it and this country pledged that it would do something positive for women. This country would make sure that aboriginal women were given opportunities in regard to education and housing and were protected from violence, and infact, that all Canadian women were protected from violence and that women had economic security and the opportunity in regard to pay equity, child care and housing.

All of these things are in CEDAW, and this country signed it in 1982. In the nearly 30 years since that agreement was signed, nothing has been done in terms of advancing women. We do not have a universal housing policy. In fact, we have 1.2 million Canadians who are under-housed, homeless or living in unsafe conditions, Canadians who are living in these unsafe and unacceptable conditions with their children.

We have no national child care program. Since 1984, this Parliament in its various incarnations, whether it was the Mulroney government, the Chrétien government or the Martin government, promised the women of this country that there would be a national child care program, but we do not have one. It is 2010 and there is nothing in sight in terms of how we are going to address the real needs of young families in this country, women being the primary caregivers.

These groups that advocated for women had to be shut down and silenced. The women in this country had to be put on the back burner, as it were, because the government had another agenda. I am saying now and I do believe these words will ring true, the women of Canada will not forget what the government has done to them, nor will they forget that the Liberals aided and abetted in this disgusting behaviour towards the women of Canada.

There were other poison pills, such as immigration changes in Bill C-50. Those immigration changes made it virtually impossible for family reunification. They chose very carefully. They gave the minister the ability to determine who could come into this country. Even if people had been approved, even if they were on a waiting list, if they came from Southeast Asia, if they came from the Middle East, if they came from certain African countries, they were removed from the list because the minister said they were not any longer acceptable. So people who were waiting, who had fulfilled all of their obligations, who would have made wonderful Canadian citizens were told, “Sorry, too bad, you cannot be reunited with your families, because the minister says so”.

Imagine that in a democracy. It is absolutely unthinkable. Of course, the list goes on and on, but I want to address some of the issues in Bill C-9 and the fact that it has a number of poison pills too.

First of all, we have the tax grab such as the airline security tax. That is something that is profoundly concerning. The government claims and claims it shrilly, and claims it at every question period and with all kinds of bravado, that they are the government of tax cuts. That is ludicrous. Conservatives are most certainly not the government of tax cuts. If we look at the HST and what is perpetrated against Canadians, they are the government of tax grabs.

Let us go down the list. In regard to the emptying of the employment insurance account, that $57 billion belongs to the people of this country, who put that money in so that families could be secure in the event of a downturn in the economy. Conservatives are waiving that money and taking it away.

They like to blame it on the Liberals and they are very good at blaming everything on the Liberals, but the truth is that they have done nothing in terms of making sure that Canadian families are safe and secure. They are taking that money away and it is supposed to be for Canadians.

I have much more to say, but I will wait for the questions.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Madam Speaker, I really appreciated the overview of the poison pills that indeed have been before us in the House in previous bills and are indeed in Bill C-9. The member is absolutely correct to bring forward the whole sense that this is a deliberate attempt by the government to continually push legislation that it really does not want to have debated as individual bills, that it incorporates into large omnibus sections and then rams them through with, I must admit that my colleague is correct, the help and complicity of the Liberals who either refuse to come or straight out vote for and allow legislation to pass the House that they then complain about after they have let it go.

If we are going to debate legislation in an honest way for all Canadians, we have to have that legislation before us so we can scrutinize it, so we can help perhaps make it better; or perhaps we should defeat it, depending on what it happens to be.

At all turns, we should have that opportunity. Legislation that is critical to Canadians should not be lumped together.

I know my hon. colleague ran out of time. She is right that there is so much to do and say about the bill. It is almost 900 pages long and there are pieces in it that need to be debated. Obviously that is what we try to do with our amendments.

I know the member wanted to continue on about the $57 billion that was absconded with by both the previous Liberal government and the Conservative government and why she thinks it should be given back to workers.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

I thank my hon. colleague for the question, because quite simply this is money that employers and employees put into a fund. It used to be called the “unemployment insurance fund”, and I think the key here is insurance. It used to be a way of making sure that families were protected when there was a downturn in the economy and breadwinners lost their jobs.

When I was a kid, which was quite a while ago and we will not go into that, every October or November my dad was laid off because that is the time of year that American corporations clawed back their profits. So every November he was out; he was gone.

Christmas was coming. In Canada, December, January and February are very cold months and there were a lot of times when he and my mum did not know how they were going to manage.

There was employment insurance, but it was very limited. However, it was the only thing we had. It was the only thing that got us through those cold months and through Christmas. I have to say, Christmas could be pretty lean.

Now even that is being eroded away by greedy governments who want to say, “Haven't we solved the deficit problem?” I remember back in 1997 the hon. prime minister of the day said that he had ended the deficit problem. He did it on the backs of workers, just like this one.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I think for days now I have been waiting to ask questions to the government representatives. A couple of weeks ago, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism actually stayed in the House and listened to the debate and asked the first question himself. We thought that was a very important and good change on the part of the government.

Now it is back to its old ways of not even putting forward speakers on a bill that is 880 pages in length. We deserve the right to listen to government members and question theMinister of Finance himself on the provisions of the bill.

[Irene Mathyssen, NDP, London—Fanshawe, ON]

Madam Speaker, how on earth can the government possibly put forward members to speak on the bill, because this is indefensible.

If we look at the provisions in the bill, one of the things that the government wants to do is sell off the profitable part of the post office. The truth is that the post office in the last 11 years has been profitable.

In 2005 alone, it made $200 million. That is money that belongs to the Canadian public. It is not money that should be given away to the government's corporate friends. It absolutely astounds me that it has done these things to the people of Canada.

It is no wonder that it is not able to answer for it. Who on earth could stand here and show any kind of sense of shame and speak positively of the bill?

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

Madam Speaker, before I begin I would like to assure my two dynamic assistants, Jen and Gina, that I actually am smiling on camera and hopefully they will see that. The problem is that there is not much to smile about.

The whole principle of this bill, taking a number of different categories, lumping them into one and pushing them through with what I would call blackmail, is wrong for democracy. We have heard many of my colleagues over the last day or so mention a number of things in this bill that should be debated separately, such as Canada Post and the HST. We should be looking at these issues and having a good, democratic debate on both. Instead, we see them all lumped together and it is kind of a take it or leave it.

Today I will concentrate my remarks and my speech on Canada Post because this is an issue that has been very close to my heart over the last while, specifically because it does affect our rural communities.

We have seen, for example, in my community of Castlegar and the surrounding communities of Trail and Rossland, that Canada Post offices in Trail and Rossland have now been designated installations, which means that the mail now comes to my community of Castlegar for sorting before it goes back to those communities, which are approximately 30 or 40 kilometres away, for distribution. This has had the effect of cutting back on some hours and of shifting jobs. The ultimate result is that we will see more shutdowns of our rural post offices if we allow this to continue. The fact that they are a major economic driver is something we need to take into consideration.

We have recently had an absurd situation in my community, a situation that we will be seeing now in communities such as Cranbrook, Grand Forks, Nelson, Oliver, Osoyoos, Penticton, Prince George, Quesnel, Vernon and Williams Lake. As of September 1, if anybody mails a letter in Prince George to someone else in Prince George on Friday, that letter will travel all the way to Vancouver for sorting before it comes back to Prince George for distribution. In my community of Castlegar, that represents a move, for one letter, of roughly over 1,200 kilometres before that letter arrives on the doorstep in my community.

When questioned about this, the officials at Canada Post mentioned that it was in the name of efficiency. They said that they had these big machines in Vancouver that they wanted to use and that trucks were going down there anyway so they could do this. After the letters go to Vancouver, maybe we should send them to Toronto for sorting because the machine in Toronto is more efficient. It goes on and on.

The point is that when all of this is happening, there is an erosion of our rural way of life and an erosion of Canada Post's ability to provide good quality service with well-paid employees who are contributing to their communities. It is important for the government and Canada Post to understand that if a community of 5,000 people loses two or three positions, that represents fewer people in schools, maybe one less car that will be bought at the car lot and maybe fewer dinners purchased that evening by a family. This has a real effect on our communities.

A disturbing fact that I would like to share with this House is something that I found out in my meeting with Canada Post officials. Not only is Canada Post mandated to make a profit, but it must return a certain amount of that profit to general revenue. Here we have a crown corporation that is not only there to break even or make a profit, but part of that profit must come back to general revenue. No wonder Canada Post is under pressure to make various changes and cuts and is scrambling to be as efficient as possible.

I would like to ask the government to reconsider its whole philosophy. Canada Post is there to serve us and, if anything, we should be assisting it in our federal budget to ensure that we maintain good quality services in rural communities rather than cutting them back in the name of putting money into general revenue, which will be used to ensure that we can give more major corporate tax cuts that will be used to beef up the money that has been spent because of giving these tax cuts. I do not believe that is right and I do not think people in rural communities believe that is right.

I was very pleased to find out that Senator Bob Peterson has introduced legislation in the Senate that calls for a strengthening of Canada Post in rural communities. I will quote from his press release in which he states:

In their haste to cut spending and reduce the scope of the federal government, the Tories are leaving millions of rural Canadians in their wake. The government needs to understand that shutting down a post office means taking away a piece of the community. It goes beyond line items to the very core of rural life.

I applaud the senator for taking that stance. I look forward to meeting with him next week to see how I can support him in his position and how we can work together to ensure that our rural quality of life is maintained with a strong Canadian postal system.

According to members of the National Farmers Union, if this part of the bill passes, this will lead to partial deregulation of our post offices and begin a process that will erode both service and affordability, particularly for people living in rural and remote areas.

Allowing international mailers to handle international letters opens the door for further privatization and deregulation of our postal services. Passing part 15 of the bill is likely to accelerate Canada Post's loss of letter mail volumes and revenues to for-profit remailers. This is revenue that our post offices can ill afford to lose. And any further revenue loss will damage service for rural Canadians.

The point is that Canada Post is the backbone of all our rural communities. If we shut down or transfer these services to a large major community or urban community, it makes it difficult for these communities to survive. It is often hard enough for farmers to make a living, to make ends meet and to meet their costs of production. It is hard enough to keep communities going that have an erosion of health care and other services. To take a major economic driver such as Canada Post and depriving it of adequate revenue and consolidating services in major urban communities is simply wrong.

It is important for all of us from all parties who represent rural Canada to come together in a way that we can impress upon the government and Canada Post that we need to retain the services and jobs because this is part of rural life.

It is very important that we do not give up, that we continue to fight for our rural communities and that we continue to demand that this service remain in our communities, for my community and for all rural communities in Canada.

I would reiterate that the idea of putting what many have called poison pills or take-it-or-leave-it provisions in this bill is wrong. It is wrong for the principle of a democratic debate and it wrong for democracy. I only hope that members of other political parties will take a strong stance against this bill so we can show the governing party that what it is doing is contrary to what a good democratic institution should be all about and that what would happen to Canada Post in this bill is not right.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, people watching this debate over the last several days want to know where the government and Liberal speakers are on this bill.

As a matter of fact, we have an 880-page grab bag, Bill C-9, an omnibus bill, and we do not have the appropriate minister listening to the debate so we can ask questions. The Minister of State for Democratic Reform was here for Bill C-10. The Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism was here for his bill and, not only did he listen to the debate, but actually asked the first question, which was appreciated by the House.

We want to know where the finance minister is, why he is not listening to the debates and why he is not here to answer questions on this 880-page bill.

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

Madam Speaker, I wish I knew for sure why government members are not speaking out against this bill. Why is it that in British Columbia, the only party speaking out against the HST is our party when the majority of British Columbians are saying that they do not want the HST?

Why is nobody on that side speaking out to preserve rural Canadian postal service? Why is nobody talking about the airline tax or the changes to employment insurance and the fact that it will be a burden on the majority of Canadians?

That is a good question but I think we have to leave it to that side to answer that question.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Madam Speaker, I know the member from B.C. has been a strong advocate for maintaining rural postal services and the delivery of postal services in that part of the country, but he is also profoundly worried about the job losses that the proposed closure will mean for his communities.

I wonder if he may also be interested in commenting on the other part of the budget bill that speaks to the theft of $57 billion from the EI fund in Canada. The fund had a surplus of $57 billion but the government legally took the money and put it into the consolidated revenue fund.

This is not the government's money. This is money that was contributed by workers and employers and money that would have made a profoundly positive difference to those workers in communities, such as the one the member represents, where postal services are being shut out, people are losing their jobs and where they desperately need sustainable EI, to ensure those residents do not fall into poverty.

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

Madam Speaker, this is what we have come to in our country. We have workers who have paid into the employment insurance fund for years, to a total of $57 billion, and now, when they have lost their jobs, are not able to collect this money and have to go through loops and hoops to try to make ends meets.

People come to my office and say that they are ineligible for employment insurance and cannot get on welfare because their truck is worth over $5,000. It is an absurdity. All of us who have worked in the workforce over the years have paid into this fund, a fund that is there to help people in a time of crisis, and now they cannot access it.

This is a shame to our democratic way of life in Canada and on the way we conduct affairs in this country.

[Malcolm Allen, NDP, Welland, ON]

Madam Speaker, it is hard to be brief when we are dealing with 880 pages because there is so much to choose from that has gone wrong. I thank my hon. colleague for his intervention and his quite eloquent speech about what is wrong in those 880 pages.

In the agriculture sector, for instance, we really needed folks to see something in the budget. Did we see anything that really went to help farmers in this country?

[Alex Atamanenko, NDP, British Columbia Southern Interior, BC]

Madam Speaker, the bottom line is that we have farmers who are struggling and people who need help from this budget and they have not received it.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Resuming debate. Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The question is on Motion No. 1. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

In my opinion the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

The recorded division on the motion stands deferred.

The recorded division will also apply to Motion No. 2.

The next question is on Motion No. 16. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And five or more members having risen:

The recorded division on motion no. 16 is deferred. The division will also apply to Motions Nos. 17 and 18.

The next vote is on Motion No. 19. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denis Savoie), Denise Savoie]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denis Savoie), Denise Savoie]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denis Savoie), Denise Savoie]

In my opinion, the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

The recorded division on the motion stands deferred. The deferred division will also apply to Motions Nos. 20 to 38.

The next vote is on Motion No. 39. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denis Savoie), Denise Savoie]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denis Savoie), Denise Savoie]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Denis Savoie), Denise Savoie]

In my opinion, the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

The recorded division on the motion stands deferred. The deferred division will also apply to Motions Nos. 40 to 62.

I will read the motions in Group No. 2 to the House.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

moved:

Motion No. 3

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 1885.

[Thomas Mulcair, NDP, Outremont, QC]

moved:

Motion No. 4

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2137.

Motion No. 5

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2138.

Motion No. 6

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2139.

Motion No. 7

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2140.

Motion No. 8

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2141.

Motion No. 9

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2142.

Motion No. 10

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2143.

Motion No. 11

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2144.

Motion No. 12

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2145.

Motion No. 13

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2146.

Motion No. 14

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2147.

Motion No. 15

Bill C-9 be amended by deleting Clause 2148.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Madam Speaker, although amendments are an important part of the legislative process, my amendments today would be superfluous if the government had not dumped a number of non-budget items into Bill C-9. However, it did, so I am moving an amendment to delete all sections from C-9 that deal with Canada Post.

As I said, these clauses should never have been in the bill in the first place, and the government knows that. In fact, it made two previous attempts to pass changes to Canada Post in stand-alone legislation. Neither of those attempts, however, succeeded. Instead of respecting the will of Parliament, the Conservatives buried these changes deep within the almost 900-page budget bill, hoping that no one would notice. Well, New Democrats noticed.

In fact, I was the first person to raise the issue in this House. But more important, the 45,000 member of CUPW and Canadian families noticed, and they have been fighting the issue ever since.

Denis Lemelin, the president of CUPW, appeared before the Standing Committee on Finance and clearly explained the impact the proposed changes would have on postal rates and postal service in this country.

I think it is worth repeating some of the more salient points here, because clearly, the government did not listen the first time.

Mr. Lemelin said:

CUPW would like to urge this committee to give this very small part of Bill C-9 a very large amount of attention as it amounts to partial deregulation of our public post office. In Canada, letter mail is regulated for a reason. Canada Post has an exclusive privilege to handle letters so that it is able to generate enough money to provide affordable postal service to everyone, no matter where they live in our huge country. This privilege includes both domestic and international letters. We believe it will become increasingly difficult for Canada Post to provide universal postal service if the government erodes the very mechanism that funds this service—the exclusive privilege.

Canada Post’s exclusive privilege to handle letters has received remarkably little attention over the years. But international mailers, who are currently carrying international letters in violation of the law, have recently taken issue with this privilege and waged a campaign to undermine our post office’s right to handle international letters. Canada Post estimates that international mailers siphon off $60 million to $80 million per year in business. Its concerns with remailers have grown as the international mail business has grown and as remailers have unfairly competed for international mail by exploiting the two-tier terminal dues system adopted by the Universal Postal Union in 1999.

It is our understanding that Canada Post attempted to address its concerns with international mailers through negotiations and finally through legal action against two of the largest companies, Spring and Key Mail. One ruling by the Court of Appeal for Ontario stressed the importance of the exclusive privilege in serving rural and remote communities and noted that international mailers such as Spring Canada are not required to bear the high cost of providing services to the more remote regions of Canada. The corporation won this legal challenge all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada.

After this victory, a coalition of private Canadian and international mail companies, called the Canadian International Mail Association (CIMA), hired a lobbyist in an attempt to convince parliamentarians to remove international letters from Canada Post’s exclusive privilege to handle letters. The government initially defended the importance of the exclusive privilege but it was not long before it started to reconsider its position, presumably because of the CIMA lobby. Nevertheless, the government did promise, in a letter to CUPW, that no changes to Canada Post's exclusive privilege would be considered without thorough policy analysis. We would like to point out that, to date, there has been no serious review or thorough policy analysis of the international mail issue or the impact of removing international letters from Canada Post’s exclusive privilege.

The government’s recent strategic review of Canada Post did not look at these issues. Unfortunately, this did not stop the review’s advisory panel from recommending against deregulation of letter mail, with the exception of international letters. It simply doesn’t make sense to be proposing legislation before you look at the relevant issues. The proposed legislation doesn’t make much sense either. Canada Post’s letter mail volumes declined for the first time in 2008 and again in 2009. The corporation clearly needs international letters as a source of revenue to maintain and improve public postal service. Furthermore, most people in this country are opposed to deregulation of Canada Post. They do not support eroding or eliminating Canada Post's exclusive privilege.

Close to 70% of people oppose postal deregulation according to a 2008 Ipsos Reid poll.

Even the government's strategic review of Canada Post found that there is virtually no support for deregulation. The report from this review states:

There appears to be little public support for the privatization or deregulation of Canada Post, and considerable if not unanimous support for the maintenance of a quality, affordable universal service for all Canadians and communities.

Of course, there is one group that supports partial deregulation of Canada Post, and that group appears to have the ear of the government. International mailers want international letters removed from the corporation's exclusive privilege. They have argued that the English version of the Canada Post Corporation Act currently allows them to handle these letters.

In other words, remailers have argued that the French version of the Canada Post Corporation Act should carry no weight and that the English version should prevail. This argument has been rejected by the courts.

Remailers have also argued that Canada Post's legal action against remailers will effectively kill thousands of Canadian jobs and that they should be allowed to continue to do business to save these jobs. An examination of the evidence indicates that there may be a few hundred jobs at risk, not thousands.

While we take the responsibility of job loss very seriously, we do not think exclusive privilege should be sacrificed to save the jobs of businesses operating in violation of the law, and there may be alternative ways of dealing with the issue of jobs.

Those were the critical points made in the presentation by the Canadian Union of Postal Workers on part 15 of the budget implementation bill.

Our public postal service provides universal and affordable services to all Canadians. It is our role as Canadians and as legislators to preserve this capacity and to prevent the erosion of a service provided to all Canadians, no matter where they live, where they work, or where they do business.

It is precisely because this is an issue of national importance that the Canadian Labour Congress, representing 3.2 million workers in Canada, also intervened on this matter.

Hassan Yussuff, secretary-treasurer of the CLC, appeared before the Standing Committee on Finance and reminded members that as an employer, the postal service offers many job opportunities, many of which are in rural areas and are occupied by women. Canada Post is often one of the few potential employers for women in rural communities. He also said:

To say the least, it is strange for a government to change a law that will have a negative impact on Canadians just because those who are breaking it don't like it and are eager to siphon off even more profits. Don't we count on our governments to enforce our laws?

It is even stranger that the government is attempting to push the legislation through without a thorough review. What's the rush when there is so much at stake?

We do not believe that Canadians want to see the destruction of their postal service. They want a sustainable public post office and reliable, affordable mail delivery. There is no reason to jeopardize a good service that provides good value to Canadians, just because of a desire to satisfy the powerful lobbyists.

We are urging the government to immediately withdraw or sever part 15 of Bill C-9 and reaffirm its support for the exclusive privilege and public ownership of Canada Post.

It is time for members of the House to take a firm stand on this issue. In particular, I hope that the Liberals will find the courage of their convictions. On the one hand, they make eloquent speeches about supporting CUPW in its campaign, but thus far, whenever push has come to shove, they have shown up in insufficient numbers to defeat the government's proposal. It is not too late. I encourage all members to do the right thing and vote in favour of deleting part 15 from Bill C-9.

The House resumed consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 2.

Report stage

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, they are trying to gag us with an undemocratic vote. We on this side of the House will stand firm until the last minute, and we will make sure that this bill does not pass. Despite the fact that some members opposite are behaving like clowns, we will remain serious and ensure that this unbelievable omnibus bill, Bill C-9, that they have unjustifiably tried to put everything into, does not pass.

Earlier, when we were examining the motion to limit debate, I said that what was happening was undemocratic. This bill contains more than 2,200 clauses and close to 800 pages. Earlier, we tried to delete part 3 because it was, for all intents and purposes, a tax increase disguised as an air travellers security charge. I hope that there will be enough members from the official opposition in the House to delete part 3 when we vote on Group No. 1. They claim to be against this bill, but they are not present when we vote.

Group No. 1 deals with the funding program for the National Energy Board. However, there is no mention of it in the budget. This group also deals with part 20, which covers amendments to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. Earlier, we were told that it has nothing to do with the budget. Members from the Bloc and NDP easily demonstrated that this boiled down to a stalling tactic.

Finally, it is shameful to see that one part of Bill C-9, with its amendments to the Employment Insurance Act, deals with a portion of the budget that merely confirms the theft of more than $50 billion by the official opposition when it was in power. Today, there are not enough of these members to ensure that the majority in the House and voters from Quebec and the other provinces are able to assert their rights. Not enough Liberals showed up to allow us to continue debating amendments to the Employment Insurance Act.

The government is condoning the fact that some $50 billion was siphoned out of the employment insurance fund. At the same time, Bill C-9 condones the planned theft, over the next four years, of employee and employer contributions amounting to nearly $20 billion. They are going to take money out every year, just like the official opposition did when it was in power.

The amendments in Group No. 2 concern parts 15 and 18 of Bill C-9, whose scope, thickness and weight we saw earlier. Part 15 would restrict Canada Post's exclusive privilege. The government is using this omnibus bill to withdraw a crown corporation's exclusive privilege to a monopoly in its sector. That kind of thing should not be introduced in an omnibus bill. An accountable and courageous government would have the courage to stand up and tell people that it plans to restrict the Canada Post Corporation's privilege. The Conservatives have the right to think they are right, and we have the right to think they are not.

But the main reason we are against this kind of omnibus bill is that the government is using the budget bill as a disguise and saying that, by the way, it wants to take away the Canada Post Corporation's exclusive privilege.

I would rather have a calm discussion—which is my usual way of doing things—in the House with parliamentarians about whether or not we should take away one of the Canada Post Corporation's exclusive privileges. That is something we need to talk about. In fact, we are here in Parliament to talk about things and then vote on them. In the current situation, if parliamentarians have the courage of their convictions and oppose something, it will not usually pass. But that is not what is happening now, because they are trying to ram this through. They are telling us that we had better accept it or else. They are trying to move it through as though it were a letter in the mail.

The second item in Group No. 2 that we want to remove from Bill C-9—and we agree with our NDP colleagues on this—is the privatization of Atomic Energy of Canada. That kind of thing is way out of bounds in terms of parliamentary procedure. Privatizing a company is a major and serious issue. This involves industrial and science policy because it is about Atomic Energy of Canada. That is something we need to talk about.

Once again, it should be debated openly. We should know why the department and the corporation have hired financial advisors, how much privatization will cost, what they hope to achieve by privatizing the corporation, how Atomic Energy of Canada has performed and how the privatized entity is expected to perform. The government has the right to privatize, but it should first have the House's consent. It has the right to say that we have an asset. Nowhere does it say that we have to keep an asset forever. The government can set economic policy or, in this case, scientific policy and say that this is where we are at. It may be a good idea, but we do not know.

The committee had the opportunity—I know because I was there—to meet with people from the department, not people from the corporation, and ask them what was going on. They answered us in bureaucratese of the finest quality. The people were very eloquent and used big words, but said nothing. They said it will be the policy of the government. The public servants who were there were very good at their jobs, because their job was to say nothing. They were very good at talking a lot, yet saying nothing.

As a new parliamentarian, I would like to come here and talk with the president of the corporation, the board and the Minister of Finance so that they can tell us that they are thinking of selling the corporation, that in return they will receive shares and money and that the money will help pay down the deficit or will be directed elsewhere. But we are being kept in the dark. I cannot ask these questions. Yet for anyone who has ever sold assets, it is interesting to know how the new entity will perform, what the future will hold and what will happen to the corporation's research and contracts. Will the contracts be sold? Will they be liquidated? What will happen to them?

That is why we on this side of the House will be voting in favour of our NDP colleagues' motions in Group No. 2, which would delete parts of Bill C-9.

We hope the Liberals will all be here to vote as a block with us.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we welcome the Bloc member's participation in the debate today on Bill C-9 and we decry the government's attempt at closure when it is clearly incorrect in its analysis of where the Canadian people are at. The Canadian people will never accept the idea that it should be able to throw everything in the kitchen sink into a budget implementation bill, including things like the post office remailers, which have nothing to do with it.

I want to draw attention again to the air travellers security charge. While the government is reducing corporation taxes to the big banks and other profitable corporations to 15%, as it says, to be competitive to with the Americans, it is increasing the air travellers security charge by 50%, making ours the highest in the world. This will continue to drive Canadian passengers to American carriers.

What does the member think the government is trying to do in supporting American carriers over Canadian carriers?

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservatives are trying to hide everything in this omnibus bill, which is very thick and has over 2,200 clauses. We think there must be something in this bill. So they are afraid. In my opinion, a government that does this must be afraid to confront us and tell us exactly what is in this bill. It is afraid to tell it like it is.

Basically, they are a bunch of cowards. They do not want to tell us what is in the bill. So they try to sneak in some things and hope that no one in the opposition will see them. Well, it is our job to flush those things out and make sure that the NDP, the Bloc and the Liberal Party stand up and vote together in favour of the amendments.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to speak on behalf of a whole bunch of my constituents, since the AECL offices in the Sheridan research centre are a couple hundred yards behind my home. I know a lot of these people. I am sure the member will appreciate that when we talk about the changes to AECL and the possible privatization of certain aspects of it, it will mean jobs.

I hear about the shovel-ready infrastructure projects, et cetera and all the jobs we will have. Yet for the government to throw into the budget implementation bill something that was not in the throne speech or in the budget document is really an affront to Parliament. If we had a stand-alone bill to deal with AECL in terms of partitioning it and privatizing aspects of it, there would have been very substantial public hearings and expertise on this matter because it is so important to Canada.

Why does the government feel that it is appropriate? Why would it think it could simply throw this summarily into the pool and not provide the due diligence and scrutiny that members of Parliament are supposed to give important decisions, when we say our prayer to make good laws and wise decisions?

[Daniel Paillé, Bloc, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Speaker, regarding what our colleague just said, my impression is that the government's behaviour is not so different from that of the members on this side of the House that do not show up to vote. It is exactly the same thing.

I am very happy to see that people are standing up and saying that they do not agree and that they will not hide. The member is quite right to say that the Conservatives are hiding behind an omnibus bill. And they deserve to be called the same thing we could and will call those who do not show up to vote when they said they will vote against something. It is no different.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of my party to denounce the government's actions on Bill C-9 and what it tries to do.

Let me provide a bit of historical background. I know you are fairly new member of Parliament, Mr. Speaker, but there are some members of Parliament on the Conservative side that have memories of this place.

I remember in 1997 when Preston Manning and the Reform Party said that under no circumstances would they invoke closure on government legislation if they were in government. The Liberals, from 1997 until 2006, brought in closure on important debate 58 times.

Every time, the Conservatives, led by members like Monte Solberg, stood in their places and went absolutely bananas on the Liberal Party. Mr. Solberg was right. Mr. Solberg and the Reform Party of Canada were absolutely correct in their objection to closure on such important legislation. What do we get today? We get closure from the same party that said it would never do that.

We heard the President of the Treasury Board say that we had 17 days of debate on this legislation. It is over 800 pages. I guarantee the President of the Treasury Board has not read all 800 pages because not one member of Parliament in the House can honestly say he or she has read the entire legislation.

However, I can assure everyone of this much. I have tried for five years to get a one-page bill on national tartan day through the House with no success. Yet the government wants to rush through 800 pages of complicated legislation in 17 days.

My hon. colleague from the Liberal Party who just spoke is absolutely correct. The subject of AECL is of such grave importance to the Canadian people that this should be a stand-alone debate so there can be proper debate in the House and in committee with proper witnesses, as well as a complete and fair analysis of what this would mean.

It is so typical of the Conservatives, who have learned very well from the Liberal Party, to throw all the junk into one pile. I am surprised they did not include their dry cleaning in the bill because literally everything else is in it. I am sure when the Auditor General gets her chance, she will review their dry cleaning expenditures.

We fear that AECL will be sold for a song to some private enterprise. Years from now, heaven forbid, if something happens at AECL, who will be left holding the bag? It is certainly not the company. It is going to run away and hide. It will people of Canada who will have to clean up this mess. This is the type of debate we should have on a stand-alone basis.

Then there is Canada Post. My father was a proud letter carrier in Division L in Marpole in Vancouver for many years. He was proud to be a letter carrier. I know many people across the country who work for Canada Post and treat their careers very well. Canada Post is one of the last vestiges we have of Canada from coast to coast to coast.

I have had the opportunity of living in British Columbia, Yukon and now in Nova Scotia and one thing is clear. Canada Post is in most communities across the country. The issue of remailings will take millions of dollars from Canada Post revenue. By the way, it has been mandated that any profits have to be returned to general revenues. We have known this for many years.

This will put a death knell in the Canada Post operations and eventually lead to the privatization of Canada Post, which I never thought in my life I would ever see. Eventually, so typical of their philosophy, Conservatives will privatize anything that has “Canada” on it.

Where did the Conservatives learn to do this? The Liberal Party of Canada. If flight services can be privatized into NAV Canada, then literally anything else can be privatized. What is next? Will Parks Canada will be privatized? Will Correctional Service Canada be privatized? Will the supply chain to the military be privatized? What is left?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

CBC.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Is CBC gone next? What do we have left of Canadiana in our country that the people over there want to get rid of?

I guarantee that if the Conservatives ever have a majority government, we can kiss Canada goodbye, the way they are going. They make it more expensive to live in Canada. They talk about tax reductions, but the reality is that not one Conservative will stand in his or her place and say very clearly that on January 1, employees and employers in this country will have to pay more in income tax in terms of payroll deductions for EI and CPP. That is a fact. They refuse to admit that.

My hon. colleague from Elmwood—Transcona has said very clearly that the airport travellers security charge is now the highest in the world. The Conservatives do not like to say that, because they are the so-called tax-reduction party, but the reality is that they are the tax-increase party.

I will let the House know a little bit of history. Can any member name me the one party in Canada that brought us the two taxes most hated by Canadians? Robert Borden of the Conservative Party during World War I brought us income tax so that we could pay for World War I. The last hero of World War I recently passed away. I think it is fair to say that we have paid for World War I already, but we still have the tax.

What other tax do we all hate? Oh yes, it is the goods and services tax, which is now being brought in as a combination in Ontario and British Columbia. The Conservatives like to say that this is a provincial decision. It was an easy to decision to make when they were bribed with billions of Canadian tax dollars. It is amazing. Again, who brought in that tax? It was the Conservative government of Brian Mulroney. God love these guys. They refuse to revisit their history.

What did the NDP bring us? Let me give the House a few things. It was the only party to stand up against Japanese repatriation to the interior of British Columbia and Alberta. It was the only party to stand up and say that it was wrong to intern Japanese-Canadian citizens and take all their possessions away, steal from them, and give them nothing when they returned. It was only the CCF, under Angus MacInnis, J.S. Woodsworth, and Tommy Douglas that had the courage and the fortitude to make the political decision to stand up and say that it was wrong. Forty something years later, this House had to apologize for that.

The NDP also brought us health care. It brought us medicare. It also brought us pensions for veterans and the Canadian people. That is what the New Democratic Party has brought to this House. That is what we have brought to Canadians. We do not bring the huge tax increases in income tax, the GST, and all kinds of levies on services that these Conservatives continue to bring us time in and time out.

The fact is that they throw all this junk legislation into one bill and say that we have had 17 days to read an 800-page legal, technical, difficult document to understand. Then they say that we have had enough debate and that Canadians already understand it. They tell us that they are okay and to trust them, because they are Conservatives. The most dangerous thing Canadians can ever do is trust the Conservatives.

However, I will say this. There are many Conservatives who on an individual basis I happen to like. In fact, there is not one of them I would not want as my neighbour, but I have to watch out for my wallet, my pocketbook, and my job if I continue to look at these Conservatives in any kind of way.

I would encourage all Canadians to take the ten-tonne challenge. What is the ten-tonne challenge? It is the combined weight of all the Conservatives together, and it equals ten tonnes.

I recommend that all Canadians in the next election, which I hope is tomorrow, take the ten-tonne challenge and vote for anyone but Conservatives. We will be able to sleep better at night knowing that Canadians and many corporations we have in this country, especially the Crown corporations, will have positive long-term jobs.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

Mr. Speaker, there is a little competition in this House about who can speak loudest and most eloquently, and I think the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore is in the running.

I know that he actually read, unlike everybody else on the government side, the 880 pages of the bill. I would like him to use some of his experience, some of his expertise, to help the government members opposite answer one very simple question, lest they fall prey to the accusation that he suggested already, which is that the government side is a group of tax-and-squander members.

Will he tell us, to help the Conservatives out, because they are in need of assistance, what page in the government's action plan and budget includes the $3.2 billion tax on air travellers in this country?

Second, will he also refer them to the page in that action plan/budget plan, Bill C-9, that shows where the $550 million bribe to the State of Michigan Legislature is located so that we can know how the bridge is going to be built?

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I happen to have Bill C-9 right here. It is over 800 pages long.

[An. hon. member]

It is 880.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

It is 880 pages long, to be exact, Mr. Speaker.

I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, that not one member of Parliament has read every single page in this book, because it is literally impossible to follow a document this thick. One would need a team of Toronto Bay Street lawyers, along with a bunch from Halifax, by the way, who are very good, to fully comprehend this complete book.

My hon. colleague, a long-time member of Parliament, is absolutely correct. The Conservatives are the tax-and-squander party. I just mentioned $1 billion on a couple of gazebos in the Minister of Industry's riding and for Toronto. It is $1 billion, while London did it for $30 million. The member should check it out.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with our colleague. It is a rather thick document.

I would like to ask him a question. This is the second time, since I arrived here in 2004, that the budget implementation bill is an omnibus bill.

In 2005, the Liberals had included a number of measures in their budget in an attempt to hide the bitter pill. The Conservatives are now doing the same thing in 2010. With Bill C-9, the Liberals and the Conservatives are attacking Canada Post. They want to privatize Canada Post, which turns a profit. They are privatizing it and leaving the deficits to the public sector.

I would like to hear what my colleague has to say about that.

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague is absolutely correct. The reason a government would throw a bunch of junk into an omnibus bill like this is that there are always a couple of good things within a budget. Obviously, if we vote against the budget, months later the government can say that we voted against this or we voted against that. At the end of the day, this is a confidence vote.

We are telling the Conservatives very clearly that we in this corner of this side of the House have absolutely no confidence in the governance of this country by the Conservative Party of Canada.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-9.

I have before me this bill, which is called a bill to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures. I have it in hand and I know that everyone is familiar with it.

It is a very large bill with 880 pages and more than 2,200 clauses. Those who are watching us might think that such a large bill is meant to improve things for Canadians in terms of taxes. It is called a budget implementation bill, but on the contrary, it is a Conservative scheme for pushing through a significant portion of their policies—their right-wing philosophy of which I will provide some examples—knowing full well that the official opposition, the Liberal Party, will back down. Thus, we already know that some members will be absent. They say they are against the bill when they take part in the debate, but when the time comes to vote, they will back down. The Conservatives know this very well. That is why they decided, after four years as a minority government, to seek passage of unpopular measures in bulk that they could not get passed in separate bills.

It is important that Quebeckers and Canadians watching us understand this: the Conservative Party has included unpopular measures in this bill, measures that would otherwise not get passed.

I will take as an example part 15 of the bill, on the Canada Post Corporation Act, on page 568. Clause 1885 has one paragraph:

1885. Section 15 of the Canada Post Corporation Act is amended by adding the following after subsection (2):

(3) The exclusive privilege referred to in subsection 14(1) does not apply to letters intended for delivery to an addressee outside Canada.

This change was part of Bill C-44, introduced by the Conservative government on June 17, 2009. That bill went to the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, of which I am a member. The debates were so serious that, after prorogation, the Conservatives decided not to bring back this bill, which would have made changes to the Canada Post Corporation. The Conservatives decided not to bring it back, because changes in the exclusive privilege of Canada Post will reduce its revenues.

As a Quebec sovereignist, I believe that one day, we will have our own country. We will control our postal service, but until that happens, there is one agency, the Canada Post Corporation, that delivers mail in all regions of Canada. Not a single member in this House would dare say that postal services are not important. It is the only service that the Government of Canada provides to the public through a crown corporation, Canada Post. It affects every single citizen, and these services are provided every day. It is the only service left for the public, simply because the remaining public services are provided by other levels of government. Municipalities provide a significant number, as do the provinces. The only service that the Government of Canada provides to the public is the postal service.

When the revenues of Canada Post are cut, its services are also cut. That is what we heard in committee, even before the first version of the bill, when remailers came up with an idea, and lost their case in the courts. These remailers were, and still are, operating.

When they lost in court, they brought their request to us. The president of Canada Post came to tell us why the corporation was suing the remailing companies it had tolerated for 20 years. It was because Canada Post lost approximately $80 million in 2007, and the losses were not stopping.

It is important that Quebeckers and Canadians, and even members of the House, fully understand what remailing is. Companies offer to collect a large business's mail and send it to clients overseas, outside of Canada. Canada Post has tolerated remailing for a long time. Obviously, these companies have grown and are continuing to grow. They have found all sorts of ways to collect mail here and send it from elsewhere. They ship mail in containers and then mail it from overseas, in countries where the costs are significantly lower than in Canada, which leads to financial losses for Canada Post.

Remailing companies came to realize that as long as they were collecting international mail from businesses, they could suggest to these businesses that they collect and send all of their mail. When Canada Post realized that remailing companies were signing mail collection contracts with all of the large organizations—universities and all of the major health networks—it realized that it was losing significant revenue.

In order to stay afloat, Canada Post has to cut services. There is a reason why, in the past three or four years, Canada Post has been closing post offices, trying to reduce the number of rural routes and installing group mailboxes instead of offering home delivery.

I do not think that a single member of this House would dare debate this issue. The Conservatives have decided to hide this measure in their omnibus bill, Bill C-9. We must never forget that Canada Post was the first major Canadian corporation. The famous Royal Mail has always been delivered ever since there was mail. The largest union in Canada is the Canadian Union of Postal Workers. It makes sense because the corporation delivers mail to every home.

The Conservative Party is destroying this service. This bill will take away its exclusive privilege. Canada Post won in court because the onus was on the companies to prove that they were obeying the law. Bill C-9 will take away that exclusive privilege and remailers will be able to collect mail.

What the government and the minister are telling us is that remailers will only be able to collect mail destined for foreign countries. If they collect mail distributed in Canada, it will be up to Canada Post to prove it. We can imagine the money Canada Post will have to spend to prove that private businesses are not collecting only international mail.

The companies knew what they were doing when they asked for the end of the exclusive privilege. Their problem was that they had to prove in court that they were not collecting mail. Now, Canada Post will have to prove it. What does that mean? I can say right now that Canada Post plans on cutting its spending by $250 million over the next two years. That means that services will be cut in rural areas in Quebec and the rest of Canada.

With the Bloc Québécois, I will be voting against Bill C-9 because I do not want to be responsible for ending the provision of service to the entire population. Every citizen pays taxes, whether they live in a rural or urban area. Everyone has the right to postal service in all parts of Quebec and Canada. I do not want to be the one to vote to eliminate postal service in rural areas.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for a very good dissertation on the whole issue of remailers. He has described it very accurately and has raised the spectre of serious consequences, certainly to Canada Post as a corporation but also in another area that concerns me. We had the same kinds of issues with regard to airlines when they were talking about whether they would get rid of Air Canada and things like this.

If we wanted to run a business as a private, for profit business, we would eliminate, in terms of airlines, the unprofitable routes and just deal with the most lucrative ones and maximize our profits. However, when we think of CBC and Canada Post, these are the anchors that communicate and connect this country together.

I am a little concerned, I do not know if the member is, that withdrawing the kind of essential services to rural Canadians is really contemptuous of the vision of the country, the importance of keeping people connected and that we are all created equally in terms having access to essential services.

I would be interested if the member is aware of any other potential--

[The Acting Speaker, Barry Devolin]

Order, please. The hon. member for Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this gives me the opportunity to tell my hon. colleague that it goes much further, since it affects all urban environments. My colleague does not understand what Canada Post is doing at this time. There is a moratorium on post office closures in rural areas, but not in urban areas.

So in urban environments, they are trying to give contracts to private enterprise. Of course, when the time comes to renegotiate the contracts, since Canada Post has lower revenues, fees are not increased, nor what is paid to dealers for providing the service. More and more dealers in urban areas are not interested in the service.

Now Canada Post is forced to centralize in post offices that are further away because there are no more dealers, all because Canada Post is broke, and all urban areas are going to be affected.

The members of this House believe that the measure they are taking is a minor, short-term measure and that Canada Post will recover, but Canada Post will not recover. In order to provide the service, Canada Post will have to rely more and more on dealers in urban areas, for instance, and yet will have a much harder time paying the dealers. So dealers—obliged to provide a certain amount of space, but not paid for the space they are providing even though dealers have rent to pay to the owners of locations—will no longer be able to sign contracts with Canada Post. Worse still, in Montreal, at this very moment, fewer contracts are being signed.

Dealers even say they no longer want to provide the service because it is not worth it. Once again, this does affect rural areas, but hold on to your hats, because it is also going to affect urban areas pretty soon.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, clearly, the Canada Post remailer issue is a smoking gun in Bill C-9 because it, like the sale of AECL, especially does not belong in Bill C-9. The evidence of that is the fact that the government itself introduced the remailer issue in Bill C-14 and Bill C-44 in the last couple of years.

I applaud the member for his analysis of the bill. I want to ask him why he thinks the Liberals should be able to claim that they are sympathetic to this issue, when in fact they will not be supporting it.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I was quite surprised to see the NDP member from Outremont try to add a new measure on oil or oil drilling to the bill in an attempt to entice the Liberals to vote in favour of the bill. This quite simply means that with such a measure, the NDP would also be prepared to support Bill C-9, knowing full well that some of the measures are unacceptable.

I did not understand what the deputy leader of the New Democratic Party, the hon. member for Outremont, was trying to do. He wanted to add a measure, apparently to try to mollify the Liberals to get Bill C-9 passed. I am trying to understand, but I still do not get it.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to Bill C-9 and to the Group No. 2 deletions that the NDP alone has been attempting to have deleted from the bill.

To answer the Bloc member's question, we in the NDP recognize that we cannot effect changes to legislation in Parliament without the co-operation of the other two opposition parties. Therefore, it makes sense that if it takes a proposal or an amendment to get the Liberals to support it, we would be prepared to do that.

However, having said that, we have no intention of voting for the bill even if we were to get the deletions that we were looking for because, once again, the bill is not an honest attempt at a budget implementation bill. It is well-known that if we want to implement the provisions of the budget, as the member for Mississauga South has indicated, we should at least talk about the budget or at least mention it in the throne speech.

What the Conservatives have done here, recognizing that the Liberals are the weak link in the chain here, is decided in a minority situation to ram all this stuff into a bill that is basically like vegetable soup and throw in the issue of the remailers, the issue of selling AECL and the environmental issues and serve it up in an 880-page omnibus bill and hope for the best. They are basically challenging the Liberals to vote against them and have an election over it. That is not the way we should be running Parliament.

The Conservatives presented the post office remailers as a government bill on two occasions and they ran into a wall. Even the Liberals said no when they brought in the remailer issue on Bill C-14 and Bill C-44 over the last couple of years. The brain trust of the Conservative government saw a way to get the budget implementation bill through so it threw in a bunch of things that did not apply.

Now we have the government's very weak defence today of saying that we have had so many days to discuss the bill and that it brought in an omnibus bill because the Liberals did it before. In other words, two wrongs make a right. Just because the Conservatives can point to and attack the member for Mississauga South on the basis that he was in the House when the Liberal Party was in power and it did the same thing that--

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

It being 5:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

The House resumed from June 3 consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 2.

Jobs and Economic Growth Act

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

When the matter was last before the House, the hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona had the floor. He has seven minutes remaining in the time allotted for his remarks.

I therefore call upon the hon. member for Elmwood--Transcona.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise for perhaps the last time on Bill C-9. The bill, as we have pointed out numerous times, is 880 pages long, which is quite excessive even for the government.

Governments in the past have resorted to omnibus bills to bring in measures that are largely unpopular. Measures they cannot get through any other way, they have stuck them in omnibus bills in the past, but this one will probably never be beaten because I have never seen one of this size, 880 pages. The government has thrown in all sorts of measures that it cannot get through.

The best example of that would be the issue of the post office remailers. The government has tried to get the bill through as Bill C-14. It failed. It tried Bill C-44. It failed again.

Now that it sees a weakness in the Liberal official opposition, it has decided to go for broke and throw everything into this vegetable soup essentially and bury the remailer issue in there, which is going to be the beginning of a deregulation process of Canada Post.

To combat this attempt by the government, we have tried to delete a number of the objectionable parts of the bill. As such, the amendments have been grouped into two different groupings.

We have so far dealt with Group No. 1, which is the air travellers security charges, environmental assessment, and EI funding. Now we are now dealing with the Canada Post issue, which I just spoke about, and the fire sale of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited in Group No. 2.

In terms of the Atomic Energy of Canada Limited, AECL, it is the largest crown corporation. This in itself, as I think everyone would agree, would merit a separate bill because this particular crown corporation has had over $22 billion put into building the company. There is a critical mass of expertise.

The government is bent, we believe, on selling and privatizing AECL probably to an American firm, and just at a time when the nuclear industry is starting to become popular again. In some parts of the world there are over 100 reactors being initiated on a global basis. This industry in Canada is well known as a world leader in this area.

As much as I do not condone the expansion of nuclear development because of all the associated problems with it and the timeline to get it up and running, we have Ontario interested in nuclear as well as Saskatchewan and I believe Alberta. Is the timing not perfect for a free enterprise Conservative government to take a company that we have put $22 billion into and basically sell it off at fire sale prices to the private sector? That is just typical of the way the Conservative government operates.

We have spoken at length about the remailers at Canada Post and where the government is headed with Canada Post.

The government announced last year that it was going to do an inventory of government assets. It was going to look at selling some of the assets, particularly looking at the deficit of $56 billion.

This is a perfect opportunity for the Conservatives to start assessing the asset base of the government and selling off buildings, the CBC, and other assets that the government owns.

We are really looking at neo-Reaganites and Thatcherites in reality. The Minister of Immigration claps at that. This is what a minority Conservative government is doing. Imagine what would happen if these guys had a majority government. They would not even have fire sales, they would just give the assets away, maybe even pay their friends to take the assets.

However, we find it very disturbing that in an environment where we had a worldwide recession on our hands, the banks of this country still managed to post a $15.9 billion profit. What does the government do? It rewards them with a reduction in corporate taxes trying to race to the bottom, trying to get down to 15%, so they will be at least 10 points below the United States.

The bank presidents are still at the trough. The president of the Royal Bank is earning $10.4 million a year and what do the Conservatives give to Canadians? They raise the air travellers tax by 50%, making it the highest in the world. This at a time when the Americans are charging a $5 tax. So we are going to be sending our travellers over to American airlines. Is that smart economics? But that is the Conservative government.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I have to refer to a wonderful quote that our hon. transport minister has been using and that speech I will suggest was pretty much fact free. All sorts of insinuations, accusations, fearmongering about things that have not even been talked about--

[Dick Harris, Conservative, Cariboo—Prince George, BC]

And a lot of dreaming in Technicolor.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

And even as the hon. member for Cariboo—Prince George says, dreaming in Technicolor. The member should be in the theatre rather than in the House of Commons delivering those sort of comments.

He spent a fair bit of time talking about AECL. We all know that has been a very difficult and challenging file for all governments to deal with. There is a future for nuclear. As much as I am surprised that the NDP members even comment on it because they usually run as fast as they can from any way of using nuclear energy to produce power in this country. Now they are suggesting that we should not do anything rational with it.

However, let me read one quick quote and I would like a comment. This is from Neil Alexander of the Organization of CANDU Industries, who should be a very knowledgeable individual. He says:

OCI has been a long-time and consistent supporter of the restructuring of AECL to achieve the objectives that are very clearly defined in Rothschild's investment summary. We agree that CANDU technology has to be properly capitalized to be successful, that the management team of AECL does need a significant injection of commercial capability, and that the sales team at AECL does need a much greater international outreach.

That is what we are trying to provide. Why will the member not support that?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, we want a public discussion and we want to debate that issue here in Parliament. We do not want it stuck and buried in an 880-page omnibus bill, which is what the Conservatives are doing. Not only that, but they bring in a closure motion. When they were Reform Party members a number of years ago, they were outraged at the Liberals bringing in closure in the House. They said they would never do it. So we see their principles are absolutely gone. They are bringing in closure when they said they would not.

They are sneaking this privatization of AECL through Bill C-9. They do not even have the courage to introduce it as a separate bill. They are not sharing this information with Parliament. They are not willing to have debate here in Parliament on that issue. This is just typical and another example of how the government operates in an environment of secrecy.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, under the Canada Post Act there is a provision which refers to the exclusive privilege of Canada Post.

Bill C-9 introduces an amendment which says that the exclusive privilege would not apply to letters intended for delivery to an address outside of Canada. This is commonly referred to as the remailer issue that the member talked about.

Although there is a moratorium on rural post office closures, moratoriums are at the discretion of the government, and I believe that rural post offices would be at risk because of this change. I also believe that because of the contracting, the contracting of even urban postal outlets would further impair Canada Post.

I wonder if the member believes that this change would in fact impair, not help, Canada Post.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Mississauga South is very wise on this issue. He is absolutely correct. This is basically the thin edge of the wedge.

We are looking, as I said before, at a government here that is operating or thinking that it is a majority government when it is not. If the Conservatives end up with a majority government after the next election, watch out. In short order, we are going to see all of the things happen that we are suggesting are going to happen if a majority government ever does materialize over there.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I am thankful for the opportunity to stand in strong support of the jobs and economic growth act, as well as in support of Canada's continued economic recovery.

Like my Conservative colleagues, I completely oppose the NDP's attempt to delay and threaten the jobs and economic growth act, which is a key component of Canada's economic action plan.

As demonstrated again this morning, Canada's economic action plan is working. Canada's economy is getting stronger. Each month, more and more Canadians, who only a year ago spent restless nights worrying about finding jobs, are now findings jobs and waking up to brighter mornings and, indeed, brighter futures after hearing the great words, “You got the job”.

I know the NDP likes to talk down the Canadian economy, businesses and workers as it preaches its doom and gloom economic defeatism, but the NDP needs to open its collective eyes. We have seen over a quarter of a million net new jobs created in this last year. We have seen job gains every month this year. Canada had record job growth in April. We saw Canada's economy, in the first quarter of 2010, roar ahead with 6.1% growth, the strongest quarterly rate of economic growth in a decade, as well as in the G7.

Both the OECD and the IMF are predicting our economic growth will lead all G7 countries both this year and next. Hope has replaced fear, the fear that we saw a year ago. Optimism has replaced pessimism. Canada is on the right track. If members of the NDP do not want to believe me, they should listen to what the OECD had to say about our country's economy. It stated, “I think Canada looks good - it shines, actually, Canada could even be considered a safe haven”.

Nevertheless, the global recovery is fragile and that is why Parliament's overriding priority must be fully implementing Canada's economic action plan, a blueprint to help create jobs, lower taxes and foster growth for an even brighter tomorrow. We cannot stop moving forward. We cannot delay Canada's economic action plan any longer, but the NDP's procedural delaying tactics would do just that.

We have debated the jobs and economic growth act in Parliament for nearly three months. We have heard over 50 speeches to date. We heard from over 50 witnesses in the finance committee. In that time, we heard some wild allegations. We heard some members criticize the act as far as being too ambitious as an 880-page document.

What is clear is that those members complaining about the size of the act have actually not even looked at it. If they had, they would soon realize that the action to make Canada a tariff-free zone for manufacturing makes up over one-half of the entire document, or 52% of the pages in this act, due to technical and legal requirements.

I know the protectionist NDP members voted against making Canada a tariff-free zone for our manufacturers and it irritates them that we are eliminating so many job-killing tariffs, but I am proud our Conservative government is making Canada a tariff-free zone for manufacturers in the G20. This will cut costs and paperwork for our manufacturers. This will make Canadian-made products more competitive here and abroad. This will create jobs for Canadians for years to come.

While the NDP may not like it, I am proud to stand behind the over 450 pages in this act that delete the tariffs exclusively dedicated to supporting manufacturers and the Canadians that they employ.

We have also heard some members, spurred by biased special interest groups, complain about a provision in the act that would literally save small businesses and the thousands of people they employ. These are the ones involved in the remailing industry across Canada.

I want to now take a moment to set the record straight so there are no misunderstandings. It is nonsense to suggest that this is about privatizing Canada Post. That is not this government's intention. If the NDP members do not believe me, they should listen to Canada Post CEO, Moya Greene, herself. She recently told a parliamentary committee:

However, I want to make it clear that the bill does not take away the exclusive privilege. It applies only to a tiny segment of the mail.

Private sector remailers, mainly small businesses, have been operating and competing with Canada Post for decades. Due to legal wrangling and recent court decisions, these small businesses are now threatened without quick passage of this act.

This is about saving small businesses and saving thousands of jobs, and nothing more.

We had the honour at the finance committee of hearing from Barry Sikora. Mr. Sikora is one of those small businessmen who have been involved in the international mail industry for decades. He has been employing people for decades and his business has been contributing to local communities for decades. He had a simple plea:

...my company employed 31 people. We're not a huge corporation; we're an average business in the printing industry. Now, because of this situation, we're down to 17 employees. Many of our customers have left us, and they have not gone to Canada Post for their foreign mail delivery needs; they have taken their business to another country. They have forced our industry to lay off long-time employees, and that's not a pleasant thing to do.

If this doesn't pass [the jobs and economic growth act], I'm out of business.

The NDP can wail, heckle and yell all they want over there but those are the Canadians for whom we are trying to protect their jobs. I do not care if the NDP members are not in touch with Canadians or with small businesses in this country but the least they can do is keep their mouths shut while we try to support them.

For those members who talk about delaying and defeating this act, I want them to go to classicimpressions.ca and click on the “about us” tab. They should look at the faces of those people who Mr. Sikora employs and whose jobs are at risk. Their futures demand that the NDP comes to its senses.

What is more, I will put in perspective what else is at risk in this act if it is not passed or if it is delayed: $500 million in transfer protection payments to the provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, Manitoba and Saskatchewan; $75 million to Genome Canada; $20 million for Pathways to Education to support disadvantaged youth; $13.5 million for the Rick Hansen Foundation; legislation to enforce debit and credit card industry code of conduct, vital for retailers and small businesses, again, in Canada; key income tax changes to attract foreign investment into Canada's venture capital and private equity industry; key reforms to federally regulated pension plans in Canada, such as requiring an employer to fully fund pension benefits if a pension plan is terminated; and many more.

The NDP delaying tactic would put at risk all of those measures, measures urgently needed to ensure that Canada's economic recovery continues. Canadians do not want that to happen. The risks are too high.

We need to work together as parliamentarians to ensure this act is adopted and adopted quickly for the benefit of our economy and the jobs of Canadians.

I therefore urge all members to support Bill C-9 and oppose the NDP's tactics to delay this passage.

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

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the parliamentary secretary's speech and I heard two elements in it that were so ridiculous that I must come back to them. He talked about tariff reductions. I certainly hope he has read the bill, because the Conservatives have a tendency not to read the bills that are before the House and it is the NDP that catches them on it.

The Conservatives have imposed a softwood lumber tariff, a self-imposed tax, on softwood communities across the country. Tens of thousands of jobs have been lost as a result of their irresponsible and incompetent softwood lumber sell-out. I just want to ask him how much of an increase that will be. We know the answer in this corner of the House, which is about a 10% increase, but I would like to hear it from his own mouth.

My second question concerns the HST, to which British Columbia has said no. We have had a massive petition campaign. Eighty-five provincial ridings have all said no to it. A referendum was held which the Conservatives have refused to recognize. They refuse to say on the record that it will withdraw the hated HST imposed on British Columbia.

Since Bill C-9 also has an increase and spreads the HST, could the parliamentary secretary reply to this question for once and for all: Will Conservatives respect the will of the people of British Columbia and say no to the HST?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure the gentleman is in the right House to be asking half of those questions. He should be in the B.C. legislature asking his premier.

I listened to that hon. gentleman filibuster for hours at the trade committee almost two years ago. When we finally came up with legislation that would settle the softwood lumber challenge that would give $5 billion back to the Canadian softwood lumber industry, an industry that was suffering, that hon. member fought tooth and nail, including reading from the dictionary, to stop us from putting the agreement in place, an agreement that would finally settle years of lawyers getting richer and loggers getting poorer.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for my colleague along the HST line.

My riding is located on Vancouver Island in British Columbia. The HST that is going to go through will result in winners and losers. Oftentimes, the situation in B.C. is conflated with the Maritimes where an HST did go through but under an entirely different circumstance.

The government has a $1.6 billion incentive on the table but the provincial government can only have 5% flexibility in providing tax breaks. Would the member ask his government to allow the $1.6 billion to stay on the table for another year and allow the provincial government to expand that flexibility to provide tax breaks for those of modest means and for the four major sectors in my province, tourism, the service sector, home building and restaurant service associations? These sectors will be hit very hard, particularly at this time when the economy is under dire straits. People will lose their jobs because of entirely preventable situation.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I might remind all hon. members that we are actually here to debate Bill C-9. The HST for any province is not referred to in this bill.

We treat all provinces equally. The previous government offered some provinces several years back the opportunity to harmonize their sales tax. They knew it was good for business, so they accepted that offer. The offer has remained open because this government respects provincial jurisdiction and it respects treating every province the same. Those questions are for the Premier of British Columbia and I would encourage that hon. member to address those questions to him.

We have heard many comments in this House about pensions. It is critical and time sensitive that we get this legislation passed because we have made improvements to the federally regulated private pension plans in the bill. We need this done by valuation day at the end of June. We need to have this bill passed to protect people's pensions.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is with considerable interest, but also considerable concern that I rise once again today to speak to Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures. This enormous 880-page bill, with its more than 2,200 clauses, contains many different measures. I wonder if anyone has actually read this entire document, which has a lot to hide from the people. That is what I intend to speak out against during my remarks today.

Some might think that this bill contains only budget-related measures, but that is not the case. The Conservatives introduced a bill that is a catch-all for various measures and legislative actions that will make major changes to other laws, many of which have nothing to do with the budget. This will affect all Quebeckers.

It is important for Quebeckers to be aware that the Conservatives have the support of the Liberals despite the fact that I urged them to vote against this budget so we could rescue things like the Canada Post Corporation and recover the $57 billion in workers' and unemployed workers' money that has been misappropriated. That money will simply disappear if this bill is passed. I do not believe that the Liberals really intend to stand up and vote against this bill. Once again, true to form, they will act against the interests of working men and women, of Quebeckers and of society's poorest by supporting the Conservatives.

I believe that some Liberal members will vote against the bill, but there will not be enough of them to really register their dissatisfaction with Bill C-9. They tell the House that they are against this bill. They take part in the debates and ask questions, but when voting time comes, they do not show up. That is unfortunate because they know that this omnibus budget, Bill C-9, includes measures that will really affect the quality of life of Quebeckers and all Canadians.

The Conservatives know this. When I first came to the House, I noticed that, after a speech by an NDP member, they were laughing. This bill will privatize certain areas of Canada Post's activities and they are not taking seriously the harm that this will cause. We often say that the government is giving the profits to the private sector and the losses to the public sector. With this bill, that is what will happen to Canada Post, as well as to the unemployed, to our workers and to people who pay into employment insurance. Both workers and employers—who have been swindled, or robbed, of over $57 billion over the past few years—could see this practice continue if the bill passes.

Bill C-9 will permit letter exporters to collect letters in Canada and transport and deliver them abroad.

I listened to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance tell us about Moya Greene, who, he says, supported the initiative proposed in Bill C-9.

However, when that Canada Post representative testified before the Standing Committee on Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, she said that Canada Post has already lost $80 million so far because of that particular kind of privatization. If this bill passes, it is estimated that another $50 million in revenues will be lost if international remailing is allowed. That is a lot of money for Canada Post to lose.

What happens when Canada Post loses revenue? Inevitably, if Canada Post starts losing revenue, it will have to cut services.

So how will it cut services? My riding of Berthier—Maskinongé is mainly rural and when revenues decrease, Canada Post services are cut. It is usually rural areas where services are cut first.

And how are they cut? When the Liberals were in power, several post offices in my riding were closed. There is now a moratorium on post office closures, but several were closed then, including the offices in Saint-Édouard and Saint-Sévère. Those are some of the municipalities in my riding where post offices were closed.

At the time, people organized and demanded that their post offices be kept open, but the Liberals just said they could not afford to meet those needs and had to cut services. So Canada Post services were cut in these rural communities.

If Canada Post's revenue is reduced by $50 million, then postal service in rural communities will be cut again, unfortunately. Major urban centres receive far more mail and, according to a Canada Post study, urban postal service is often more profitable. This means that it often does not pay for Canada Post to deliver mail door to door in rural areas.

Yet rural residents pay tax and contribute to society, and they need services just like urban dwellers. The people of Quebec are very worried that this bill will mean the loss of rural mail delivery.

Maureen Green clearly stated that the corporation had already lost $80 million in revenue in recent years and would lose a further $50 million with this bill. That will mean the gradual privatization of Canada Post. It will be increasingly difficult for people to get their mail. They will have to make a considerable effort or go to another town, sometimes 15 or 20 kilometres away, to pick up a parcel. The government is going to do this to people who are 80, 85 and 90 years old.

I would like to come back to the issue of this bill and the employment insurance fund. The government took money from the unemployed and, with this bill, it is wiping out the $57 billion debt it owes them.

At the same time, even though it has a $57 billion surplus and is forecasting surpluses of $15 billion to $20 billion in the near future, this government has the nerve to vote against measures to improve employment insurance in general and eliminate the waiting period. It is continuing to build up a surplus in the employment insurance fund while reducing access to EI benefits.

It is shameful.

In closing, I would like to say a word about environmental assessment. How will the government be able to provide nuclear oversight if it further privatizes Atomic Energy of Canada Limited? The stakes are very high. If the companies the government creates become political party backers, how can they really provide more oversight and control over nuclear operations?

Those are my concerns. I would add that it is shameful, and to sit here and watch as this bill—

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Questions and comments.

The hon. member for Peterborough.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I want to correct the record. I am sure the member would not want to mislead folks in his riding and others.

He indicated that the government consistently voted against measures to improve the EI fund. As I recall, significant measures were brought forth last fall, $1 billion in new supports for employment insurance that built on other significant investments the government made to its economic action plan.

The NDP saw fit to support those significant improvements, but the Bloc Québécois members voted against the specific EI improvements. They voted against the economic action plan as well, which is investing billions of dollars in infrastructure in the province of Quebec.

The member should be open and clear about the voting record of the Bloc Québécois and how this government has improved EI and also made significant investments in the province of Quebec and, in fact, in every province and territory through the economic action plan. We see the results of that and they are significant: 6.1% expansion in GDP growth in the first quarter and another 24,000 jobs created this month.

I am sure the member would like to be accurate with his constituents and all of those who heard his speech.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative member is telling us that the Conservatives are helping unemployed workers. They have added five weeks with a bill that targeted specific individuals. But we have been calling for an older worker assistance program for how long? It would cost about $100 million for all of Canada, but the government does not have the money to support older workers or to improve the employment insurance system, when 50% of workers do not even have access to it.

Yet the Conservatives will spend $1 billion on security for three days. We are not asking for nearly as much to improve the employment insurance system. They are spending billions of dollars on military ships. They have the money to build up a great military force abroad, but when the time comes to help seniors and workers, they sit here and laugh in our faces. It is shameful.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the Bloc member on his speech. I have a question for him about Canada Post, since he spoke extensively about the corporation. The Conservative government has already tried to make changes several times, with Bill C-14 and Bill C-44. This time, it included the changes in and Bill C-9, in this massive volume.

I would like the Bloc member to tell us what he thinks will happen to Canada Post if Bill C-9 is passed by the House of Commons.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague for his question. I spoke about the fact that Canada Post is losing revenue because profits are going to the private sector and the losses are going to the public sector. That is how the Conservatives think and the Liberals are supporting them.

With this bill, Canada Post would lose its exclusive privilege, which will jeopardize its revenues and undoubtedly have other negative repercussions, such as the reorganization of rural mail delivery. Rural areas such as my riding of Berthier—Maskinongé are the most affected.

This partial deregulation is not necessary. Canada Post is currently making money and is providing a service to the entire community. We are not going to create private mini-corporations that will eventually fund the Conservative Party. It is possible that both the Conservatives and the Liberals are hoping for funding.

The most important thing is to ensure that all citizens are receiving services, especially the aging population in rural areas. People aged 80 or 85 have reduced mobility and no longer have nearby access to their mail because numerous post offices have already been closed. The government wants to keep taking profits away from Canada Post, and that would effectively reduce services.

In light of all this, we are against this bill. Once again, I am asking the Liberals to vote against this bill.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I am here today to speak about measures supporting the jobs and economic growth act and budget 2010 and against the NDP delay motions that are currently before the House.

The jobs and economic growth act focuses on the economy. My remarks will centre on two sections of part 22 of this important bill.

Part 22 outlines key investments to help bolster our economy for today and for tomorrow, specifically, support for the Rick Hansen Foundation and pathways to education Canada.

First, the jobs and economic growth act invests in the Rick Hansen Foundation.

The success of the Vancouver Olympic and Paralympic Games is a source of pride for Canadians from coast to coast to coast and, most certainly, in the electric city region, Peterborough, Ontario. The games provided us all with an opportunity to reflect on what makes this country so special and the stories and events that have united us as a country. The games left us with many lasting images.

Many Canadians will never forget seeing Rick Hansen, a national hero, as he brought the Olympic Flame into BC Place during the opening ceremony. Mr. Hansen, who trucked across 26 countries to raise awareness and funds for spinal cord injury, truly inspires us all and represents the very best this country has to offer. It was only fitting that he be the one to escort the flame into the stadium as the entire world watched.

This year the Rick Hansen Foundation is celebrating its 25th anniversary.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order with regard to the issue of relevance.

We are speaking about Bill C-9. The member is reflecting on the Olympics and the people in the Olympics. As much as I agree with his sentiments about the great games we had, we should really be speaking to Bill C-9.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I am sure the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage is going to tie his remarks to the bill very shortly.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, having sat on several committees where that member is the chair, I encourage you to consider that the member is not quite aware all the time what actually constitutes a point of order. In this case he is clearly wrong about calling a point of order. The Rick Hansen Foundation is specifically a part of our budget implementation bill and I will get to that. The member apparently has not read the budget, but I am going to tie this in for him.

This year the Rick Hansen Foundation is celebrating its 25th anniversary of the Man in Motion World Tour. To date, the Rick Hansen Foundation has raised over $200 million to address spinal cord injury in Canada.

Mr. Hansen continues to push toward finding a cure for spinal cord injury believing we are closer than ever. This government shares Mr. Hansen's vision. This is the tie-in for the member for Mississauga South, who will want to pay attention.

In year two of Canada's economic action plan, through the jobs and economic growth act, there is an investment of $13.5 million over three years in the Rick Hansen Foundation to strengthen spinal cord injury research and care in Canada. This funding will support leadership, operations and programs at the foundation as well as formalize and launch the Rick Hansen Institute, which is part of the budget.

The launch of the new Rick Hansen Institute is the centrepiece of the 25th anniversary campaign. This world-class institute will build on previous successes and federal support to strengthen Canada's international leadership in the field.

Planned activities include: expanding the existing spinal cord injury registry to include critical data from other countries and networks; supporting groundbreaking research including a study examining whether the spinal cord can be repaired by implanting cells from elsewhere in the body; establishing a global clinical trials network to accelerate the validation and implementation of emerging care and treatment strategies; and hosting a conference that will bring the world's foremost experts together to share best practices.

In short the institute will represent the next step in Rick Hansen's unrelenting quest to find new ways to improve lives and help find a cure for spinal cord injuries.

This investment, which is in the current budget bill, Bill C-9, also furthers the government's science and technology strategy by helping to build and sustain Canada's international research leadership in health and related life sciences and technologies.

This new funding provided in Bill C-9 will also support the foundation's efforts to raise awareness during the 25th anniversary campaign. This partnership will allow Rick Hansen to tell his story to a new generation of Canadians, inspiring them to make a difference.

Our government is proud to support the Rick Hansen Foundation, the celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Man in Motion World Tour and the new Rick Hansen Institute. Investments such as this will not only cement our position as a world leader in health research but also have a real impact on the health and quality of life of Canadians across the country.

I have an uncle who has a severe spinal cord injury that he received in the workplace. This type of research is very meaningful to families. I can speak on his behalf in saying that this is something he supports emphatically.

Second and finally, the jobs and economic growth act invests in pathways to education. Our government has been committed to ensuring that Canadians reach their full potential, creating highly qualified people and the ideas that our economy needs to thrive.

Canada has one of the highest post-secondary participation rates in the world. However, a gap continues to exist between the post-secondary participation rates of youth from lower income backgrounds and those from higher income backgrounds. We do not accept that. Research shows that many of the barriers to participation are not financial and that some youth need other supports to reach their goals.

Our government is committed to ensuring that all Canadians have the opportunity to undertake post-secondary studies regardless of their background. With this aim the jobs and economic growth act provides $20 million for pathways to education Canada.

Pathways to education Canada is a unique program of early intervention and support for high school students that aims to help students overcome the barriers they may face in pursuing post-secondary education. This community-based volunteer supported program provides tutoring, mentoring, counselling and financial support to disadvantaged youth and to their families. It has an established record of reducing high school drop-out rates and increasing post-secondary enrolment of students from inner city high schools.

The new funding announced in budget 2010 will allow pathways to education Canada to partner with the private sector, other governments, and non-governmental organizations, and work with the communities to provide support to more disadvantaged youth in more communities. Every Canadian deserves the chance to reach his or her full potential and budget 2010, the jobs and economic growth act, is a big step in making this possible.

The Canadian Alliance of Student Associations praised budget 2010, the same budget which the NDP is delaying and stalling. The Canadian Alliance of Student Associations said the budget is “making intelligent investments to help students find their way into post-secondary education”. They also had special praise for our government's investment into the pathways to education program. They said:

$20 million for the Pathways to Education program is a valuable investment in "early intervention" that many researchers believe can help Canadians that have not historically attended post-secondary education in high numbers to attend college or university - low-income Canadians, recent immigrants, aboriginal Canadians, and youth whose parents attained low levels of education.

Through all of these measures and others, our government has created a budget that responds to the needs of our times while setting out the goals that our long-term prosperity demands. The global economy appeared to have stabilized in mid-2009 after undergoing a deep and synchronized recession. I think all members would acknowledge that it was the worst financial crisis seen since the 1930s.

However, with support from the extraordinary measures in Canada's economic action plan, the Canadian economy has started to recover. I mentioned earlier in a question that just this week Statistics Canada reported that there was growth of 6.1% in our GDP during the first quarter. That is outstanding. Just this morning Statistics Canada reported that 24,700 jobs were created in the month of May. These are encouraging signs. We have seen job creation in eight of the past 10 months.

This is what Bill C-9, the jobs and economic growth act, our budget 2010 implementation bill, is all about. I cannot for the life of me understand what is happening with the NDP. We must continue to provide the steady guidance that has allowed Canada to continue on the right track to recovery. I urge all members to continue to support the government in this work that is so vital to the people of Canada and their continued prosperity.

I ask that all members oppose the delay tactics that we see before the House today, get behind Canada, get behind their constituents and get behind the recovery. Let us all work together for a brighter future for this country.

[Keith Martin, Liberal, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot believe that the member so blithely disregarded the construct of this bill. It is partially a budget bill, but there are major parts of it that will significantly change the country, including the environmental checks.

If nothing else, the member has to see what is happening in the southern United States. He has to ask himself why on earth the government is simply abrogating its responsibilities on the environment and giving the checks and balances to the private sector when this model has been proven to have devastating results in other countries. This will be an abysmal failure. The government will wear it if anything happens.

Will the member at least take to his Prime Minister the notion to remove those sections of the bill that have nothing to do with the budget, but are substantive issues that will dramatically change our country? They should be debated in the House and committee, where we can bring the best ideas to craft a better bill.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in fact, these are specifically economic measures. When I talk to leaders in my community and people in the provincial government, they say that in the current system there are overlapping regulations and it requires environmental studies to be completed when studies have already been completed, often by the exact same firms. This is stifling Canada's economy.

We will not abrogate any responsibilities with respect to the environment at all. I am proud of the regulations that protect Canada's environment. We have the most stringent rules in the world when it comes to offshore drilling and the hon. member should know that. Perhaps he should speak to his own provincial government and municipalities about why they so strongly support the government in this regard and what we are trying to do.

This is about creating a stronger economy, more jobs, more growth and more hope. That is why this budget bill has been constructed in the way it has been.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

As hon. members will know, it is now 11:00, so we will have to proceed with statements by members. However, there are three minutes remaining in the time allotted for questions and comment by the hon. parliamentary secretary, which we can take up when the debate on the matter is resumed.

The House resumed consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Group No. 2.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The parliamentary secretary had been speaking. Questions and comments. The hon. member for Mississauga South.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, Bill C-9 includes provisions that would change the laws of the land with regard to the environment.

Bill C-9 would pre-empt the five-year review that we were going to do of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. It also would allow the minister to dictate the scope of environmental assessments rather than allowing for the normal assessment process. It also would weaken the participation of the public in efforts to protect our environment.

Would the hon. member advise the House why he believes this weakening of our environmental laws in Canada is in the public interest?

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Madam Speaker, obviously this government has worked very effectively on strengthening Canada's environmental protection.

I was part of the environment committee that completed a review of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act. The member may not be aware of this, but that bill, under the previous Liberal government, was completely ineffective because of all the red tape and it was refined.

I am told now that President Obama is looking at the effective regulation in this country as a way to build environmental protection in the United States. That is our record.

[Greg Rickford, Conservative, Kenora, ON]

Madam Speaker, going around northern Ontario the past week or two, it is very clear that the mining sector is pleased with what this government is doing. They are concerned that they are not getting the support from MPs in other parts of northern Ontario.

I just want to ask the parliamentary secretary, who I co-chair the mining caucus with, if he can tell us what some of the specific things in this great bill would do for that mining sector and how we can help that important sector out in northern Ontario despite the lack of support from the members of Parliament across northern Ontario outside the great Kenora riding.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

That is a great question. Obviously, Madam Speaker, we have done an awful lot for the mining sector, more than any government in recent history.

Of course, we have stimulated the mining industry by extending the mining exploration tax credit. We brought in a CCA writedown so they can depreciate their equipment faster. We have reduced the corporate tax rates, which are a tax on jobs. We have extended the super flow through for prospecting and developing across this country. We have eliminated tariffs on the importation of equipment needed for the mining sector.

The government is standing four-square behind the mining sector, and the NDP members, especially the ones from northern Ontario, which has some of the premier mining constituencies in the world, are holding up the bill, a bill that helps the mining sector. I cannot square it. It does not make a lot of sense.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to participate in the debate at third reading on Bill C-9.

This is the budget implementation bill. Canadians would think that the budget implementation bill deals with items that were in the budget and in the throne speech. That is not exactly true. In fact, it is the basis of concern of a lot of parliamentarians and Canadians that buried in the budget implementation bill are a substantial number of significant items that have just been added to it. What the government has done, in fact, is to avoid its obligation to be accountable, to be open, to be transparent.

I remember giving a speech to a parliamentary forum in which I tried to define accountability. I try to apply this in most of the work that I see in the House, to see whether accountability has been achieved. I define accountability to say that one is accountable when one has explained or justified one's decisions or actions in a manner that is true, full and plain.

I do not believe the government has been accountable in Bill C-9. The budget implementation bill is really an omnibus bill, because it includes in it changes to an awful lot of pieces of legislation and acts in Canada that were never included in the throne speech, the budget speech, or in fact, in the budget document itself.

Why would the government do that? In my view, it is to seek to be unaccountable, to be less than transparent, to be less than open--

[An hon. member]

Do you remember how to do it?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member knows I am the runner-up this year, so I am going to get a chance to get my speech.

But I congratulate him on the honour that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance received this week. He has a good speaking voice, too.

In any event, in this bill we know there are some items that were not pre-disclosed. It is an 880-page bill.

That bill went to committee, but if that bill includes a number of items that are not included or not part of the mandate or the discipline of the members who are at that committee, how could they possibly give it the due diligence? How could they possibly give it the attention? It is like having a dozen serious, detailed pieces of legislation all put into one bill and treating it as if it were one. That means the whole process of second reading, referral to committee and hearing of witnesses, report stage, third reading, all of these things, are done once. Yet in the budget implementation bill, there are items that in themselves could have been a separate bill and would have required substantial debate within the House at second reading, substantial review and due diligence activity at committee to ask the tough questions of the government, as well as the making of amendments at report stage, and then, of course, the rest of the legislative process.

The government has preempted that. It has preempted that process by including these pieces of legislation.

One of the big changes we have, as I referred to in a question earlier, is significant changes to the rules, the laws of Canada, as they relate to environmental assessments. Our environment committee would have liked to have had an opportunity to call experts and Canadians and to promote public participation in terms of significant environmental issues. Buried in Bill C-9 are provisions that would preempt the five-year review of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.

That is a legislative review. It is something that we do very often.

As a matter fact, I have one coming to my ethics committee, hopefully early in the fall. It is a legislated, mandated review of the Lobbying Act.

These are important pieces of legislation and they are to be reviewed to ensure that they continue to provide the representation of the public interest.

Bill C-9 also allows the minister to dictate the scope of environmental assessments. It leaves it up to the minister, delegated authority, effectively, that the minister can truncate the scope of work that would be done. Environmental assessments are done because Canadians have said we need to know what will be the consequences of a variety of initiatives or projects that may take place.

This now gives the authority to the minister to limit the scope and the number of environmental assessments that will take place. Does it paint a picture? It is going to weaken the public participation.

We always talk about the importance of representing our constituents. Yet the government, through this ploy of an omnibus bill and throwing this in and not allowing the full amount of debate, has destroyed the opportunities that Canadians have to deal with important issues such as the environment.

The government does not have the environment as a priority. It thought that Kyoto was a socialist plot trying to transfer money from the rich to the poor. It embarrassed us at Copenhagen. It has no priorities and no plan on the environment, yet it is going further to weaken the legislative tools and the rights of Canadians with regard the provisions of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.

That is not accountable. By burying it in this bill, it is not transparent. It is not plain, it is not open, it is not clear, it is not concise, it is not correct. It is wrong. The government boasts about accountability but does it with its fingers crossed behind its back. It does not want to be accountable.

As a matter of fact, the government is even ordering witnesses not to appear before committees, who have been summoned under the law to appear before those committees. It is telling them not to appear, because it does not want the committee and Canadians to hear what witnesses have to say about the obstruction of the Government of Canada in terms of the release of public information under the Access to Information Act.

Is that accountability? No. It is not accountable. In fact, it is promoting secrecy. It is promoting, “I'm doing it our way and we are not going to tell anybody anything”. This is the kind of attitude that the government has shown.

There are many other examples. We have Canada Post Corporation. One of the changes that is going to happen as a consequence of Bill C-9 is that buried in it is a little clause that is going to change the Canada Post Corporation Act to say that the exclusive privilege referred to in subsection 14(1), which is the privilege of Canada Post to collect and deliver the mail, does not apply to letters intended for delivery to an addressee outside of Canada.

Can we imagine the impact of that? Can we fathom the reason that the government would bury this amendment in a budget implementation bill?

Is there more? Of course there is.

How about Atomic Energy of Canada Limited? Its offices are located in the Sheridan Park research centre, a couple of hundred yards behind my home. It employs a very large number of engineers, technicians and experts. They work on projects, whether they be related to Candu or other reactors where we are dealing with the production of medical isotopes or whatever. Somehow the government believes it can take pieces out of AECL; it can privatize it; it can sell it off.

We do not have the confidence. The government is saying by this bill and how it has handled AECL that it does not care about AECL anymore. It does not care about how we are going to provide for medical isotopes. It does not care about the reputation of the extraordinary technological knowledge, experience and expertise we have in Candu reactors and AECL's future.

All the government cares about is that it can sell off an asset and get some capital injected by someone else, not by the government. Why? It is because it has destroyed the fiscal position of the country.

The Conservative government inherited a $13 billion surplus from the prior government in 2006, and now it has driven it down to a $50 billion deficit. It is going to go higher and unemployment is still going to go higher, notwithstanding the recent reports.

This is a government that is scrambling with the lamest of approaches to try to capitalize on asset sales or on disposing of other rights or authorities of the government, passing on future profits for cash today so that it can say it is getting the deficit down.

The bill should be defeated because the government has not been accountable.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Madam Speaker, I thank the House for allowing me the opportunity to show my shock at some of the comments, as I stated in the House earlier today, that are completely fact-free.

I know the hon. member is very active on committees, and I congratulate him on being elected by his colleagues in this House as the second hardest working member of Parliament, but he does not have the privilege of sitting on the finance committee where we heard from over 50 witnesses who talked about the benefits that are in this legislation.

However, I do know that he has had the privilege of sitting in many Parliaments before, so I would assume that he supported many budgets because his government put them forward. One example is Bill C-43 in 2005. It actually impacted more federal acts than this legislation, such as the Auditor General Act, the Asia-Pacific act, the Broadcasting Act, additional payments to the maritime provinces and Canadian environmental protection. I am sorry but there are just too many to mention them all.

I have a list of budget bills that the member sat through that were far deeper and far more omnibus, if he wants to use that word, so how does he justify complaining about this bill?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member says that it was okay to do something wrong because somebody else may have done something he did not like.

One of the points that the member made was that the finance committee had 50 witnesses. The committee looking at the changes to the Environmental Assessment Act would have had 50 witnesses itself. The committee dealing with the changes on the Canada Post remailers would have had 50 witnesses itself. The committee dealing with the changes proposed with regard to Atomic Energy of Canada would have had 1,000 witnesses because it would have deserved it. That is the difference. The member just thinks that one committee can do it all.

The Conservatives may have talked about the subjects, at least by title, but they never had a real debate where there was due diligence in holding the government to account because they handled this bill as an omnibus bill rather than being accountable to Canadians.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to bring the member's attention to a situation that is occurring in my riding with respect to the environment. Brascan, a Brazilian company, is draining the Mississagi River, affecting the water levels and destroying access to Rocky Island Lake, and it is in the process of doing the same to Tunnel Lake. This is threatening the survival of the tourist industry and is affecting the main stem of the river.

Through this bill, the Conservative government is abandoning some of the triggers needed to perform a federal environmental assessment. The government calls it streamlining but we call that coded language taking away public rights of property, reducing responsibilities of corporate entities and endangering the good of the public.

I would like to hear my colleague's comments with regard to the government trying to take away environmental assessment in this bill.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member is quite right. She gave a very good example of how the government has absolutely abrogated its responsibilities with regard to important environmental assessment elements. That leads straight to the issue of accountability.

On the environment, the government is pre-empting the scheduled five-year review of the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. The bill would allow the minister the discretion to dictate the scope of environmental assessments. Even if we had any work done there, it would not necessarily be done in a fulsome way that would permit public participation, which is the third element and one that is so important.

Canadians care about the environment. The Conservative government does not care about the environment, which is why we need strong laws that promote public participation and input into the controls, the regulations and the processes that happen in terms of matters that affect Canada's environment and our children's future.

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to rise and support a stronger Canadian economy through the jobs and economic growth act, Bill C-9. Indeed, that is why I am opposing the delay motions introduced by the NDP.

The jobs and economic growth act and budget 2010 are an integral part of Canada's economic action plan that has been successfully strengthening our economy and helping to create jobs. Recent job gains illustrate that Canada's economic action plan is working. The month of May represents eight straight months of job gains in the past 10 months. Since July 2009, Canada has created over 300,000 new jobs. Both the OECD and the IMF have predicted that Canada's economic growth will lead the G7 by a wide margin this year.

The jobs and economic growth act helps continue that focus on the economy. My remarks today will centre on two sections of part 22 of this important bill. Part 22 outlines key investments to help bolster our economy for today and tomorrow; specifically, support for the Canadian Youth Business Foundation and Genome Canada.

First, the jobs and economic growth act invests in the Canadian Youth Business Foundation. Since taking office in 2006, this government has been committed to supporting Canadian businesses and entrepreneurship. Let us be clear. When businesses succeed, Canadians succeed. Businesses create jobs, generate prosperity and serve as the lifeblood of the Canadian economy.

However, it is not enough to support the business leaders of today. In order to maintain the quality of life that Canadians enjoy, we need to invest in the business leaders of tomorrow. This is even more important given the uncertain global economic times. Canada's economic action plan recognizes the importance of encouraging the entrepreneurial spirit of Canada's youth, taking targeted measures to encourage youth and create jobs while securing our long-term economic growth.

Year one of Canada's economic action plan invested $10 million in the Canadian Youth Business Foundation, a not-for-profit organization that provides financial support and mentorship to young Canadians who want to start their own businesses. The Canadian Youth Business Foundation has taken a unique and innovative approach to support young entrepreneurs. The foundation assists in matching young motivated Canadians with experienced volunteer business mentors and provides them with access to the capital they need to get their ideas off the ground.

This unique approach has helped more than 3,500 young entrepreneurs create more than 16,900 jobs since the Canadian Youth Business Foundation was founded in 1996. Given this impact, it is not surprising that the foundation was awarded top honour at the Global Entrepreneurship Congress this year. As well, the Canadian Youth Business Foundation is helping engage young Canadians in the G20 meetings that our government is hosting this June in Toronto.

The Canadian Youth Business Foundation is organizing a G20 youth entrepreneur summit, which will allow young Canadians the opportunity to meet with successful entrepreneurs, prominent business leaders and government officials and participate in identifying key actions that governments can take to unleash the potential of our youth. Entrepreneurship in all G20 countries is of great importance.

Hosting the G20 this June allows Canada the opportunity to show leadership on the world stage as member nations define the path forward after the largest global recession since the second world war. I am encouraged to hear that our leaders of tomorrow will make their voices heard as we host the world in Toronto.

Given the foundation's success to date, I am happy to note that the jobs and economic growth act builds on our investment in year one of Canada's economic action plan by providing an additional $10 million to the Canadian Youth Business Foundation. This support will enable an estimated 500 new Canadian businesses to launch over the next year, generating approximately 2,500 new jobs and $63 million in revenues within three years.

New funding for the Canadian Youth Business Foundation announced in budget 2010 will help young entrepreneurs like Jessica Williamson, who, with the help of foundation support and mentor Al Norman, opened the doors of Hoopla Clothing, a retail activewear store in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, with resounding success.

The Canadian Youth Business Foundation is supporting young entrepreneurs like Jessica, who have great potential to generate innovative ideas in Canada's communities from coast to coast, in addition to serving as role models for young people and inspiring them to consider entrepreneurship as a career option. Clearly, this investment in the Canadian Youth Business Foundation is one that will pay dividends now and in the future.

The jobs and economic growth act also invests in Genome Canada. Science and technology have been and continue to be fundamental priorities of this government. As we move toward an ever more global economy, it is clear that research, innovation and highly qualified people will be the key to Canada's future economic prosperity. This government's long-term economic plan, “Advantage Canada”, recognizes the need to create the best educated, most skilled and most flexible workforce in the world right here in Canada.

Our long-term science and technology strategy, “Mobilizing Science and Technology to Canada's Advantage”, further outlined our plan to make Canada a world leader in science and technology through significant investments in people, knowledge and entrepreneurship. To date, this government has backed its words with action. Through budgets 2006, 2007 and 2008, our government has provided an additional $2.2 billion in new funding for science and technology initiatives between 2005-06 and 2009-10.

Canada's economic action plan built on these investments by providing an unprecedented $4.9 billion in additional funding for research infrastructure, research, highly skilled people and commercialization. This unprecedented investment in science and technology explains why Canada ranks first among the G7 countries in terms of expenditures on research and development in the higher education sector as a share of our economy. This is an achievement that all Canadians can be proud of.

However, this government is not content to rest on its laurels. Budget 2010 continues the momentum of previous budgets, providing over $1.4 billion in new investments to support science and technology in Canada.

Genome Canada is one beneficiary of this significant new investment. Genome Canada is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to developing and implementing a national strategy in genomics and proteomics research for the benefit of all Canadians. In other words, Genome Canada is decoding the language of our genes, giving researchers a better understanding about the foundation of life.

The research performed by Genome Canada, such as genomics research, has outcomes in the areas of human health, the environment and natural resources. Genome Canada has received significant support from our government. This funding has supported over 130 large-scale collaborative projects among academic, private sector, government and international partners.

Recognizing the work performed by Genome Canada, year two of Canada's economic action plan through the jobs and economic growth act is investing $75 million—

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Order. Perhaps the hon. member can complete his comments in questions and answers.

The hon. member for Mississauga--Streetsville.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Madam Speaker, the government has taken a cowardly and immoral approach to enacting such profound policy shifts as deregulation of Canada Post and privatization of AECL. It is cowardly because it buried these profound policy shifts into this omnibus bill without giving it fulsome debate in the House, and thoughtful and mindful consideration at committee.

AECL will be sold off for barnburner prices. It is proprietary technology that has made all Canadians proud. Instead, it is going to become the Avro Arrow of our generation with lost technology, lost jobs and lost opportunities.

With Canada Post, deregulation is going to lead to compromised service, lost jobs and increased costs.

Why will the government not agree to give these items, deregulation and privatization, the fulsome debate that they deserve, that Canadians deserve to hear?

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Madam Speaker, concerning the budget allocations and Canada Post, the fact is that there were talks with the chair of Canada Post and a full agreement with Canada Post to implement these necessary changes to allow the remailers to continue business and provide jobs for all those people who work in the remailing sector.

As far as AECL, it is kind of interesting that for a number of years, this was neglected by the previous government. There needed to be a plan for the future. This budget reflects that we are going forward to ensure that AECL has a future, that we are able to put it into this century and make it as it was in the past, a leader in providing nuclear energy not only to Canada but the world.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am sure the government would agree that important questions such as what Canada's policy should be with respect to developing nuclear power, with all the attendant jobs, high technology jobs and investment that Canadians should or should not make in this project, is something that is worthy of a full parliamentary debate.

We note that AECL is one of the largest crown corporations. Canadian taxpayers have invested some $22 billion over the course of its life. We are talking right now about potentially a sale of this crown corporation for approximately $300 million if we sell it now.

With respect to Canada Post, it is of course Canada's largest employer of the government with 70,000 employees, and important services to many communities, including rural communities, are at stake when we talk about reducing the services of Canada Post in any regard.

Would the government not agree that these are important, critical subjects that ought to be debated fully by parliamentarians in this House, so that we can make a considered, intelligent and thorough move going forward in these important areas, and not just put them in a budget bill that gets passed, yes or no, along with many other pedestrian economic issues?

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Madam Speaker, regarding the member's question about Canada Post, the fact is that remailers have been in operation for a number of years. There needs to be some clarification to legitimize their operations. They employ people. They create jobs with their business and there is no reason why they should not be allowed to operate. That is incorporated in our budget, as clarification, and it is supported by Canada Post, so I do not think there is any argument that there needs to be a review.

The fact is that those people who are involved in the industry and also Canada Post have been negotiated with and feel that this is the best solution, so we just implemented that in our jobs and economic growth bill.

As far as the government's investments in research, we have proven that we have invested many dollars in research. For a fellow British Columbian, it is really interesting that our B.C. caucus talked to the chancellors of the University of Victoria and of UBC, and they were very complimentary on the way our government has invested in research in those faculties and those universities. The member should get behind what we are doing as far as research is concerned.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

No, please, Madam Speaker, I would implore my colleagues to hold their applause until the end. I want to talk about my Conservative colleagues.

I am honoured to stand here today to talk about this particular piece of legislation, but I want to put this into context as to where we have been over the last little while. It is called the jobs and economic growth act, but by another name, we call it the budget implementation act.

Just a couple of years ago, regarding the budget implementation bill, there were certain details regarding fiscal payments equalization regarding my province of Newfoundland and Labrador. I remember the common expression at the time was that the devil is in the details. There lies the devil, and in the budget implementation act at the time, there was something in there that was not transmitted prior to that. Now the theme has carried on over and over again.

I will begin with one example that is relevant from this morning. On the front page of today's Globe and Mail the headline states:

Tories to launch plans for telecom shakeup

The article talks about some of the details of the impending announcement next week and states:

The government is expected to launch consultations on scaling back foreign-inv2estment limits--changes that could shake up the future of Canada’s $41 billion telecom industry. Telecom sector sources anticipate the process could be kicked off as early as Monday.

Therein lies a piece of legislation that will be debated, that will be talked about for quite some time, witnesses called, maybe in excess of 50 witnesses at that time. Here we are at the budget implementation process or, as it is being called, jobs and economic growth act, and it is included here. Within the over 800 pages, we find that there is a section about amending the Telecommunications Act to allow foreign satellite carriers to be considered a common carrier.

It is the process that already has begun without telegraphing as such, and again we go back to the devil in the details, except now the Conservatives have become more brazen about doing this by allowing certain subjects and certain headings, and talking about initiatives that they propose over the next little while. They say that there have been over 50 witnesses, but as my hon. colleagues from Mississauga—Streetsville and Mississauga South also pointed out, we could have called in at least 50 or more witnesses on each and every subject that we see here.

My hon. colleague from Mississauga—Streetsville talked about AECL and did it rather passionately. She talked about a fire sale of assets. If we think about it, that is exactly what will happen. We have this wonderful entity that is truly a Canadian entity that is about to be sold off. The only thing the Conservatives forgot to mention is that if we call within 10 minutes, they will give us a peeling knife as well.

There are so many things in here that could be described as slipping under the cover of night and stealth by operation. Let me just bring up a few of these issues in the House. The first one and the biggest one, and I will get to that later just to give members a heads up: Employment Insurance Act changes, that is really something; GST and financial services; as I mentioned, AECL; medical expense tax credits; softwood lumber; and pensions.

Here is what is being proposed in this particular implementation about pensions, and this is what it says, “Increases the maximum insolvency ratio for a pension plan from 110% to 125%, allowing for more overfunding”.

How generous is that? To a certain degree, it is a measure by which we will make an improvement, but here is another measure.

Just a few days ago we voted on a private member's bill in the House that talked about bankruptcy and insolvency. That is the issue where the Conservatives are going to throw in pensions. That is what we have to talk about, topics such as bankruptcy and insolvency for the sake of pension security.

Right now, given the downturn that we have just had, when the stocks went down, a lot of the securities, for example, the pension that is very popular in my riding regarding AbitibiBowater retirees, lost 30% of their value, and yet not a word about this as to how this situation could be dealt with.

Nortel was in the same situation. We had all these private pensions that were losing value and the government never brought in the vision by which how we were going to address this in the near future. The only passing comment was at the very beginning when our beloved Prime Minister said, “It's a good time to buy”.

Again, I go back to, if we call within the next 10 minutes we might even get a better deal on another piece of stock. But here we have what I thought was going to be a little bit of vision if we go beyond what has already been telegraphed when it comes to pensions, and we did not see it.

Remailers is another big situation, as my colleague from Mississauga South pointed out. We could have had 100 witnesses come and speak about that issue alone, which is a fundamental change in how we do business here in this country.

Regarding environmental assessments, my colleagues from the NDP have talked about that quite a bit and I wholeheartedly agree with them in this particular case. There have been some changes that were asked for. Here is the one little tidbit I am going to put out to the Conservatives that I agree with. I have received a lot of feedback about these environmental assessments from municipalities and from the province. However, do not take this sort of thing and slip it under the radar as the government has been trying to do.

I think a fulsome debate about this would have been warranted because there is a balancing act here. We do not want to be bogged down in red tape when it comes to infrastructure, and I agree, but at the same time we certainly do not want to look past our own responsibilities for ensuring that we have a clean environment.

Interest rates for over-contributions to the Canada Revenue Agency are also in this bill, certainly something that could trigger a fulsome debate in the House.

Finally, if we are talking about the intent of the bill and all that is in this omnibus piece of legislation, I want to point out to the Conservatives how they may want to at times practice what they used to preach.

There was a situation in 2005, and I remind my hon. colleague from northern Alberta because he was not here at the time. We had a budget debate in the House and I remember we had signed a huge agreement regarding the Atlantic accord, but there were changes in legislation that needed to be made to put it forward and ensure it came into force. To do that it was part of the budget implementation act at the time.

Trust me, because I was there, and I remember my two Conservative colleagues from Newfoundland and Labrador as they vehemently, and I mean vehemently, argued against including this change within the budget. The words that they used were “under cover of night, under the radar, slipping it in at the last moment”. These are all the words that I just brought out, so really I am being repetitious for the Conservatives. I am using their own argument. My goodness, I could probably qualify to be their spokesperson, although I would have to get a minister to represent me, but that is beside the point.

In this situation, if we start practising this way of dealing with legislation, where everything is put into one omnibus bill, what happens to the debate in the House? I enjoy debating in the House. I enjoy coming here because that is what we are paid to do, but yet, if we try to undermine it each and every time by undermining the process by which we debate, then we will find ourselves in a great deal of trouble.

We are in a minority Parliament and in this case we must behave responsibly for our constituents and for Canadians in general. To do that, this runs counter to what we are here for in this minority Parliament. It is almost like we want to just keep wedging each other to the extreme.

By coming out with these issues and clashing over them without any way of providing debate among the parties, it has undermined Parliament in a minority situation. In 2006, when I was elected to a minority Parliament, I thought we may even find ourselves in a level of maturity that would have increased in Parliament. Would that not be a novel idea?

However, in some instances, there were some flashes of brilliances, not only from us but everybody in the House, where we actually came to an agreement. We decided in a responsible manner to govern the country expediently given the times. We had just come out of a recession.

However, expedience is not at the price of debate. We have so many things jammed into Bill C-9 that it is untenable.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, the current government is lowering corporate taxes to 15% for the big banks, which happened to make $15 billion in profits in 2009, and that is during a recession. CEOs of the big banks are earning up to $10.4 million. Meanwhile, Canadian air travellers are facing a 50% increase in the air travellers security charge, making Canada the highest taxed in the world, surpassing even Holland.

The government is clearly now the new best friend of the U.S. air carriers because the security charge will be five times higher in Canada than in the United States. The government is forcing Canadians to fly with U.S. carriers rather than our own carriers.

Does the member think that makes any sense?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad he brought this up. Within the bill is the air travellers security charge and the onerous expense placed on individual travellers.

One of my favourite moments of how we get caught up in a bind and we go back on our own word was when debated the proposed levy from CDs onto MP3s. The Conservatives called it the iPod tax, but that is not true. The member for Peterborough said, eloquently, that it did not matter what we called it. He said that we could call it a fee, or a levy, but it was a tax, and a tax was a tax was a tax.

However, what is in Bill C-9? An air travellers security charge. Is it a levy by another name? Is it a fee by another name? No. According to the member for Peterborough, a tax is a tax is a tax, and this one is really big, as my hon. colleague pointed out.

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Madam Speaker, I listened to my colleague's speech on Bill C-9. As he said, the Liberals and the Conservatives have co-operated to some extent to deal with the crisis that has been going on for the past year.

Does my colleague believe that the Conservatives are going a bit too far with Bill C-9? With this omnibus bill, they are trying to privatize Canada Post and blatantly steal money from the unemployed.

The Conservatives are saying that there is a surplus and that the economy is healthy. If there is an economic surplus, the government could provide more support for seniors, the poor and workers. It does not have to privatize Canada Post. It could improve postal services and restore the services that have been cut in recent years.

Why do the Liberals not stand up and vote against this bill and send the Conservatives packing, instead of supporting them as they are now doing?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Madam Speaker, I am glad he raised the issue of employment insurance. He says that Bill C-9 would close the old employment insurance account and would clarify some provisions. It is possible that the government could raise employment insurance premiums over the next while by 35%.

I would like to know what happened to the people who were unable to qualify for EI and the measures by which they could benefit from in an economic downturn. The Conservatives decided to extend the weeks entitlement at the end of the benefit period. The problem with the people who could not qualify. It was as if the government was trying to create EI benefits for the least amount of people possible to qualify. It like starting at ground zero and trying to make our way up, but not too far, as long as there is a cap on it. I do not see how that is becoming generous within the EI system.

We were in a situation where those people could not qualify at that time because the government did not create benefits for them. The problem with that is during the next downturn, that will not happen.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Madam Speaker, I rise to speak in support of splitting Bill C-9, the government's latest Trojan horse bill.

Once again, the two core issues at hand are transparency and accountability. It seems that every time we turn around, we find this secretive Conservative government trying to sneak things past Canadians. It is almost as if it is allergic to transparency and accountability. Shine the light and the government will run for cover.

This allergy is quite severe. The Conservatives have sneaked into their budget implementation bill clauses that would permit them to sell Atomic Energy of Canada Limited for a mere pittance and weaken Canada Post's ability to provide universal affordable service to Canadians.

On the first issue, the sale of AECL, it is important to note that while the government is busy bragging about its supposed fiscal prowess, it wants to sell a publicly owned corporation, which has benefited from $22 billion of public investment, for possibly a few hundred million dollars. It is the Mulroney era all over again, ballooning deficits, mismanagement and poor public policy. Once again, secrecy surrounds this issue. We need public consultation and we certainly need more substantive debate on the merits or risks of selling these crown corporations.

I call on my Liberal and Bloc colleagues to support the NDP in an attempt to remove these heinous elements from Bill C-9. A budget bill should be about the budget, point final, as we say in French. Why is the government so opposed to acting in the best interests of Canadians? We have seen this behaviour when it comes to foreign investment in Canada as well.

That is why the NDP proposed three key ways of strengthening the Investment Canada Act: one, lowering the threshold for public review; two, holding public hearings in affected communities when a Canadian company is being sold; and three, publishing the reasons for the government's decision to approve a takeover, as well as the conditions that a foreign company must meet in order to get federal approval.

The decision to sell AECL cannot be taken lightly. We are talking about nuclear technology. As signatories to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, we have committed to do our part in preventing the spread of nuclear weapons and nuclear fuel. We have also committed to ensuring nuclear technology does not get into the wrong hands. We know that India is a nuclear superpower today, in part, because it bought several nuclear reactors from us and used that technology to develop nuclear weapons.

Surely, keeping AECL as a crown corporation would give Canada greater control over how and what we do with civil nuclear technology. Should we not have a more substantive public debate on this issue? We believe that the risk of selling this corporation warrants much more debate and separate legislation.

The second element noteworthy of discussion is the removal of Canada Post's exclusive privilege to collect, transmit and deliver international letters. Denis Lemelin, president, Canadian Union of Postal Workers, stated the issue perfectly when he presented to the Standing Committee on Finance on May 11. He said:

In Canada, letter mail is regulated for a reason. Canada Post has an exclusive privilege to handle letters so that it is able to generate enough money to provide affordable postal service to everyone, no matter where they live in our huge country. This privilege includes both domestic and international letters.

We know that Canada Post is already forgoing revenues to illegally operating international remailers. If we erode Canada Post's exclusive privilege with respect to international mail, there is no doubt the remailing business will grow in Canada and Canada Post will lose more of its international letter business.

A significant portion of my riding of Nickel Belt is made up of dispersed rural communities. Each community is rich in its cultural makeup and traditions. Each community is a gem. I am so honoured to represent these communities. My riding is a perfect representation of Canada as a whole. We have so few people relative to the size of our geography and, as a result, there is a cost to ensure that all Canadians have relatively equal access to mail service.

Canada Post serves a purpose that we deem important to us and to our communities. The government's move to undermine Canada Post's exclusivity in the area of international letters is the beginning of the deregulation of Canada Post. It is betraying the wishes of Canadians and it is jeopardizing that corporation's fiscal capacity to deliver mail remotely at a reasonable cost.

In addition, the government's own strategic review of Canada Post found that there was virtually no support for deregulation. The December 2008 “Strategic Review of the Canada Post Corporation: Report of the Advisory Panel to the Minister” noted:

There appears to be little public support for the privatization or deregulation of Canada Post, and considerable if not unanimous support for maintaining a quality, affordable universal service for all Canadians and communities.

In fact, municipalities were especially adamant in their opposition to deregulation. Five hundred and forty-three of the 653 municipalities that made submissions during the strategic review of Canada Post said that they opposed deregulation. Another 26 municipalities said that they were concerned. Only one municipality supported deregulation.

Municipalities oppose deregulation because they understand the nature of our country. Rural and remote parts of our country account for over 90% of our land mass but only one-fifth of our population. We have a unique characteristic in that we need to equip our public postal corporation with the fiscal capacity to serve these regions at a fair cost to the citizens.

Here we have an instance where the company does not want it, the workers do not want it, Canadians do not want it and even municipalities do not want it. What does the government do? It sides with the remailers and their lobbyists. It does not have the gumption to bring it in a stand-alone bill. It sneaks it into the budget bill. What a disgrace. It can still do the right thing and split this bill. It is not too late.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member for Okanagan—Shuswap said that the government was attempting to legitimize remailers. Obviously, they were existing illegally and by imposing them into the budget bill does not really legalize them, but it does not make it right either. We know that Bill C-9 supercedes an upper court decision that confirmed Canada Post Corporation's exclusive privilege.

We know as well that deregulation will lead to compromised service in rural areas and in some urban areas as they close outlets. It will lead to lost jobs and increased costs. The government tell us that there is a service charter in place, a moratorium on closings in rural areas, so we should not worry about it. However, we know that if it had really meant it, it would have legislated the moratorium. Therefore, it is as worthless as the paper it is written on.

I do not even want to go toward AECL, which the member also referenced. This is proprietary technology that all Canadians should be proud of and a barnburner sale is going to take place. It will be the Avro Arrow of our generation.

As the member said, why is the government not willing to sever out these portions of the bill? Why is the government not willing to open up debate on deregulation and privatization to full disclosure and fulsome and mindful debate? Why will it not sever out remailers and AECL for a full debate?

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Madam Speaker, the government does not want to split the bill to take out Canada Post and the AECL because it knows it will lose that debate. It has already lost it twice.

As far as remailers are concerned, as the critic for the Liberal Party for the post office, she knows full well that there are remailers existing in Canada that are doing it illegally.

Will the member support the NDP motion when it comes time to vote on this bill and defeat Bill C-9 so we can bring back a real budget that excludes all of the heinous issues that the Conservatives have put in this bill?

[Guy André, Bloc, Berthier—Maskinongé, QC]

Mr. Speaker, this morning, the parliamentary secretary told the House that everything was going well and that according to the OECD, Canada has had a major economic recovery, which means more revenue for the government. When the government has more revenue, it should be able to provide more support to those who need it most. The government is responsible for redistributing our collective wealth. It needs to provide more support to the unemployed and improve postal services instead of introducing Bill C-9, an omnibus bill that attempts to slip in reduced access to services. The government could be providing more services to the public, but it is doing the opposite.

I would like my colleague to say a few words about the Conservatives' philosophy. They are spending $1 billion on three days of security in Toronto, but they are not giving a dime to support the unemployed, seniors and the less fortunate in our society. What is more, they are not investing anything in the environment, which is supposed to be a top priority for the G8 and the G20.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my Bloc colleague for his good question.

He is absolutely right. The government is going to spend $1 billion to ensure the safety of the heads of state who are coming to Canada for three days and we do not know exactly why.

He raised another good point: employment insurance. The deregulation of Canada Post and the sale of Atomic Energy of Canada Limited are going to result in more layoffs. The private companies that are going to buy these corporations for just a few million dollars will want to make more and more profits and it is the workers who will be the first to pay the price.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

It being 1:15 p.m., pursuant to order made Thursday, June 3, 2010, all questions necessary to dispose of the report stage of Bill C-9 shall be put forthwith, without further debate or amendment.

The question is on Motion No. 3. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

In my opinion, the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

The recorded division on the motion stands deferred.

The question is on Motion No. 4. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

In my opinion, the nays have it.

And five or more members having risen:

The recorded division on the motion stands deferred and the recorded division will also apply to Motions Nos. 5 to 15.

Ordinarily at this time, the House would proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded divisions at the report stage of the bill. However, pursuant to Standing Order 45, the recorded divisions stand deferred until Monday, June 7, 2010 at the ordinary hour of daily adjournment.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Madam Speaker, I believe that if you were to seek it, you would find support for seeing the clock as 1:30 p.m.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Does the hon. member have the unanimous consent of the House?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

The House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business, as listed on today's order paper.

The House resumed from June 4 consideration of Bill C-9, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 4, 2010 and other measures, as reported (without amendment) from the committee, and of the motions in Groups Nos. 1 and 2.

[The Deputy Speaker, Andrew Scheer]

It being 6:44 p.m., the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motions at report stage of Bill C-9.

Call in the members.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

The question is on Motion No. 1. A vote on this motion also applies to Motion No. 2.

(The House divided on Motion No. 1, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #56

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare Motion No. 1 lost. I therefore declare Motion No. 2 lost.

The next question is on Motion No. 16. A vote on this motion also applies to Motions Nos. 17 and 18.

(The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #57

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare Motion No. 16 lost. I therefore declare Motions Nos. 17 to 18 lost.

The next question is on Motion No. 19. A vote on this motion also applies to Motions Nos. 20 to 38.

(The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #58

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare motion No. 19 lost. Consequently, I declare Motions Nos. 20 to 38 lost.

The next question is on Motion No. 39. A vote on this motion also applies to Motions Nos. 40 to 62.

(The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #59

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare Motion No. 39 lost. Consequently, Motions Nos. 40 to 62 are lost.

The next question is on Motion No. 3.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if you seek it I believe you would find agreement to apply the vote from the previous motion to the current motion.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Is there unanimous consent to proceed in this fashion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

(The House divided on Motion No. 3, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #60

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare Motion No. 3 defeated. The next question is on Motion No. 4.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if you seek it I believe you would find agreement to apply the vote from the previous motion to the current motion.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Is it agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

(The House divided on Motion No. 4, which was negatived on the following division:)

Vote #61

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare Motion No. 4 defeated. I therefore declare Motions Nos. 5 to 15 defeated.

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

moved that the bill be concurred in.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if you seek it I believe you would find agreement to apply the vote on this motion with the Conservatives voting yes.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Is there agreement to proceed in this fashion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal Party will be voting against.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the members of the Bloc Québécois will be voting against this motion.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, the members of the NDP will be voting against this motion.

[André Arthur, Independent, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be voting in favour of this motion.

(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)

Vote #62

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

I declare the motion carried.