Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Saint-Léonard—Saint-Michel.
I come from a background of being on city council. I referenced that earlier today in my remarks. When councillors are confronted with bills or motions that do multiple things, they are usually ruled out of order. One has to introduce items that are specific to a line of thought and amendments and motions have to line up in a logical order. One cannot solve a problem in the fire department, while talking about transit, with a focus on a bill named after a daycare program. It confuses the public, but it also puts legislators in a position where, with a single vote, they have to contradict positions, or policies or promises made to constituents and residents. Members find themselves in exactly that situation today.
There is a procedural process on many city councils and in legislatures across the country where a motion can be split so one can accurately record one's position item by item. It is a shame the government has chosen to proceed the way it has and stack 100-plus different intents all together under one umbrella, pretending it is a budget bill when in fact it is sort of a cross-section of promises and announcements that have been made across the country. Sometimes in Parliament, they land on our desks and we have to make a decision yes or no on all of them all at once, and I do not think that is a fair process. It does not allows us to accurately register or represent our positions, and that is a concern.
I will try to address some of the issues that are specific and important to the folks who I represent.
First is the child fitness tax credit. We all understand that the goal is to get kids physically active, but a lot of kids cannot be physically active due to disabilities and, as a result, this is not a tax break that would be applied equally to all children. As well, many other children choose to exercise their minds and many families put their kids into cultural programs. There is no corresponding tax cut for that. This seems to be an oversight and is something that should be addressed. It is a concern because in cities it is not as singular an approach to child rearing. Parents do not stick their kids on a hockey rink if the kids want to do something else, such as dance, which is also a physical activity, but does not get covered under this program because it is an art and not a sport. It is a big problem.
There has been reference by some New Democrats that there is no initiative around housing. There are actually two initiatives around housing. The government is doing something spectacular in the middle of a national housing crisis, which is to look for ways to increase the cost of housing. If a condominium is renovated and the renovation is significant, people end up paying more for housing. How is making housing more expensive a strategy that anybody in our country has embraced? In fact, making housing more expensive, particularly in the condominium market, is the housing bubble about the government is so concerned. It once again shows, and this was the comment at the end of my member's statement earlier today, that the government does not seem to understand that the “C” in front of CMHC stands for Canada.
Canada has always had a national housing program in one way or another. The difference is that in the last 10 years the Conservative government is walking away from that responsibility. In this set of motions, beyond clearing up a past legislative error, the only real initiative under way by the government is to actually make housing more expensive, particularly in urban areas. That is so short-sighted, so ill-conceived and such a wrong move, I do not know how to describe it. What it really shows is that when given half a chance, Tories do raise taxes; they just do it on the vulnerable.
The other issues of concern are items that have been slipped in. The one that concerns me the most, coming from a city with a very small port that somehow keeps having privileges granted to it, is the changes under the federal ports act and the Canada Marine Act with regard to how federal ports can acquire new property.
For municipalities, the federal port system and the Canada Marine Act grant powers to land use zoning patterns that are not regulated by local city halls. Therefore, when the power is given to a port to acquire new land, it actually acquires land in very important, very sensitive parts of cities, sometimes environmentally, sometimes economically, and the government has stripped the local authority away from that land and has given it to federal agencies that are appointed largely through order in council. This is not good local planning, this is not good economic development, and this is not reasonable insofar as there has not been consultation with a single city, let alone a province, on this fundamental power that the government would extend to federal ports. That is a problem.
Finally, there is the issue of trying to pretend that a private member's bill is now something that was announced in the budget. This refers to the move to suspend the requirement that all provinces support refugees with social assistance.
Not a single province beyond Ontario was consulted. When we talked to Ontario, it was not consulted and it wrote the Conservatives to say not to do it. Therefore, the only province who speaks to the government on this issue is saying not to do it.
I do not know how to describe it. An anti-democratic move is one way to look at it, because there is nobody asking for this. Nobody is asking for this change, yet the change shows up mysteriously in a bill that is sold to Canadians as a budget bill. It is actually simply a mask or diversion tactic to slip in a private member's bill that the Conservatives are too embarrassed to have voted on individually because they know how bad the legislation is.
This is not good government. It is not good process. It is really a basket of flawed policies. When we total up the flaws, the correction of 10 mistakes that the Conservatives made in drafting legislation too swiftly before, and some initiatives which are worthwhile but they do not stand up in contrast to the damages, problems and inadequacies of the other legislation, parties like ours are left with no choice but to cast one vote, because that is the only opportunity we have been given, and the only vote we could cast in good conscience is a “no”.
If we have to pass this legislation based on its weakest piece of legislation, we have to vote no. It does not mean that we would pass it because we like a couple initiatives and let the other bad stuff slide by. That is not responsible government. It is not responsible legislative law drafting.
We have in front of us a collection of initiatives, some of which are not serious in terms of having to worry our time debating. They are housekeeping bills that simply clarify legislation. However, the bulk of them is an attempt to slip in poor legislation and trumpet the stuff that the government likes. That is not a fair way to present legislation. It is not an appropriate way for this body to deal with the complex issues in front of it. I would urge all members on this side of the House to certainly vote against it.
The backbenchers on the opposite side ought to think about what they are being told to do, and what they are being led into. If this process becomes common practice in this place, it will have them voting against their core principles one day and they will be just as upset as we are.
