Madam Speaker, it is indeed with pleasure that I participate in this debate which effectively launches our review and reform of Canada's social security system. Constituents in my riding of Brant have been anxiously awaiting the tabling of this discussion paper. They want to see what the options look like. They want to have input and they want to suggest alternatives. I look forward to working with them over the course of the next couple of months and in bringing their advice and counsel back to this House and debate it at a later time.
For the purposes of this intervention, I would like to take aim at some of the criticisms that we have been taking and will continue to have to deal with over the course of this review.
There are those who say that by undertaking this reform our government is abandoning its Liberal roots. To my mind nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, it was Liberal governments in the sixties that wove together Canada's first effective social safety net. They were responding to the needs of Canadians at that time.
This system worked very well for us through the sixties and the seventies, but now it is becoming dysfunctional. Is it wrong for us to listen to single parents who tell us that they are caught in the welfare cycle because they cannot find appropriate day care for their children or because they cannot find a job that pays them enough to meet and support the basic needs of their families?
Is it wrong for us to listen to employers who say that our training systems are ineffective? They prove this by saying that they have to go to England and Europe to find technically trained staff to help them do the work of their businesses.
Is it wrong for us to want to stop businesses from using the unemployment insurance program as a wage supplement for their employees? I think not. In fact, when I think about it, if we had been the government over the last 10 years I believe we would have continuously changed and modified our social safety net so that this major intervention would not be necessary today. Unfortunately, that is not the way things worked. To meet the needs of Canadians we now have to make significant change. This government will not shy away from that. I am proud to say that I agree with its strategy.
Second, there are those who say to go ahead, embark on this reform, but only do so if the purpose is to reduce the fiscal deficit. I believe that indeed we have to take stock of our economic times and that that has to be a major consideration in the work that we do. However, the economic times that led to this fiscal deficit have also created a huge social deficit in Canada.
We are sending our children to school without appropriate clothing and without enough food in their stomachs. We have university graduates who cannot find that all important first job and as such are threatening bankruptcy and, worse still, suicide because they cannot repay their student loans.
We have men and women across this country whose skills and abilities are not being utilized. They are undervalued, underused and as such they are not able to contribute to their fullest potential to help us reduce our fiscal deficit and to reduce our social deficit.
If we do not deal with our social deficit there is no question that it will add exponentially to our fiscal deficit. We cannot support that. It is not sustainable and it is not right.
Third, I would like to comment on the criticisms that we are receiving from some provinces, particularly my home province of Ontario. The Government of Ontario is constantly saying it feels that Ontarians are not getting their fair share from the federal government. They point out, and rightly so, that the federal government contributes about 50 per cent to the cost of social programs in the province of Quebec and by and large in the maritime provinces.
It points out that in Ontario that contribution is about 20 or 25 per cent. Let us look at the background here. Under the 50:50 cost sharing split that is part of the Canada assistance plan, it has been provinces which have been able to afford to spend money on social programs that received larger transfer payments.
In the 1980s and certainly in 1990 with the partial implementation of the SARC report, Ontario expanded and enriched its social programs significantly. The federal government decided to cap its transfers, deciding that its responsibility was not so much to fund at all costs the unilaterally created social programs of provinces but rather to support the mandate we have under the Constitution, section 36, that says we are responsible to provide for Canadians no matter where they live in this country reasonably the same level of services for reasonable the same level of taxation.
Do not get me wrong. I do not accept and I do not agree that the Canada assistance plan is the appropriate or the right way to manage our transfers to the provinces. I would encourage all our provincial partners to come to this table, sit down and discuss the options that are tabled, suggest alternates, and help us make sure that Canadians no matter where they live have equal access to social security programs.
Finally, I would like to say that as a government our prime role and purpose as we have stated time and again is to create jobs and opportunities for Canadians. The initiative of the Minister of Human Resources Development adds a dimension to that commitment.
Coupled with the work of the Minister of Finance, who will be tabling a statement in the next few weeks, and the work of the Minister of Industry who will be tabling some information on our micro economic status, possibilities and strategies for economic growth, we will have a blueprint that will help us to renew Canada.
I look forward to implementing that blueprint and being part of a government that will in fact bring Canada back to the level that it should be. In closing, I would like to quote from an editorial that was written this week in my local newspaper The Brantford Expositor . In reference to the initiative of the Minister of Human Resources Development the editor writes:
Rightwingers will complain that the plan does not go far enough, that there are too many people living off the government gravy train. Leftwingers will object that the government is caving in to corporate interests and balancing its budget on the backs of the poor. What sensible Canadians should do is try to avoid being buried in all of this muck and take a long and serious look at what Axworthy proposes because the time has come for real reform. Canadians who are fed up with the high taxes and program recipients who are not getting the help they really need stand to be hurt a lot more if things are not fixed.
I do not always agree with the editor of my local newspaper, but this time we are at one. I want to thank the Minister of Human Resources Development for the hard work that he has put into this discussion paper and tell him that as a member of Parliament I will be working hard with my constituents to make sure they have input and that they are consulted in this process so we can work effectively to restore Canada's social security system.