Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his comments. There were two major points made. I will address the first one. There are two kinds of families, the wealthy and, increasingly, the poor as indeed the middle class seems to be buffeted on all sides.
What is it that is destroying our middle class? The very thing that is taking the power and the resources from that middle class is the increase in the government programs that are ever increasing its taxes.
The poor become trapped in a cycle of not breaking out of poverty because, for instance, single parents families get jobs but earn hardly more than they receive on welfare. They choose not to because it works against themselves to do so.
I believe the best way is a fair taxation system and government only doing what it has to do so that the resources are left in the hands of Canadians. A fair taxation system, for instance the flat tax system I suggested, would fairly treat wealthy and middle class, and allow and accommodate for poorer people so that Canadians would be able to use the money to address the needs they have. That way I believe the middle class can survive and the families of the middle class can survive. The more government we have the worse it is.
I am not sure I quite understood the second half of the member's question. Again it may go back to the same philosophy. I agree we should not be asking for more government assistance for programs. The government money should go to people who need that money. Our social assistance programs should be designed to be targeted only to those who need them and if it is a social program, whether it be day care, UI, or any of the other many programs that are there. We could take it right to the equalization to provinces. Social spending should go only to the people who need it. Perhaps then employees and employers and indeed the families represented in those relationships would have more money to do what they need to do.
I am not sure I answered the question but again it goes to less government involvement, therefore less government spending, better targeting for government spending long term. That is a solution to most of these problems.