House of Commons Hansard #49 of the 35th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was budget.
Bernard Patry Liberal Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
In light of the recent spate of terrorist attacks in Israel and the occupied territories, could the minister report to the House on any Canadian intervention to help keep the peace process on track as well as any communication Canada has had with the stakeholders in the region?
André Ouellet LiberalMinister of Foreign Affairs
Mr. Speaker, I accept the hon. member's question by recalling that today is the 46th anniversary of Israel's independence. I can tell the hon. member that we are particularly troubled by this act of violence which killed some six people and injured thirty. We expressed our condolences to the Embassy of Israel and offered our heartfelt sympathies to the victims' families.
As for the broader question of the peace process in the Middle East, I am pleased to point out that the chairman of the task force on refugees is a Canadian and that Canada will continue to support the peace process, and we earnestly hope that these acts of violence will not derail the peace process which is well under way.
Osvaldo Nunez Bloc Bourassa, QC
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.
The minister wonders whether the teaching material used by the COFIs, centres for the integration of immigrants into the French community, refers enough to Canada. He is reported to be about to intervene, despite the fact that this material has been approved by the Quebec Department of Education.
Should I interpret that as an indication that the minister disputes not only the know-how of Quebec when it comes to the integration of immigrants, but also its exclusive jurisdiction over education?
Sergio Marchi LiberalMinister of Citizenship and Immigration
Not at all, Mr. Speaker. We discussed that yesterday with the standing committee. I made three statements. First, I said that, during the 25 years of the agreement, the government and the province of Quebec had done a good job of integrating immigrants.
Second, I said to the member of the media who made the allegation that it would be a good idea for the committee to review this allegation, not investigate, but talk with officials from Quebec and Canada.
Third, I said that you could be proud of being a Canadian and at the same time be proud of being a Quebecker or the resident of a given region.
Osvaldo Nunez Bloc Bourassa, QC
Mr. Speaker, according to the media the minister said that the COFIs were hiding the Canadian reality. Does he not realize that by saying that he challenges all that had been accepted under the federal-provincial agreement, the Cullen-Couture agreement, signed in 1978, which recognizes the distinctiveness of Quebec and allows it to integrate its immigrants into the French community?
Sergio Marchi LiberalMinister of Citizenship and Immigration
Mr. Speaker, that is an absolutely false and inaccurate allegation which the member just made on the floor of this House of Commons. What I said yesterday in the committee was in reaction to what two media reports suggested about somehow low bridging or hiding Canada.
As the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, on behalf of a national government we ought not to hide whether it is our country called Canada or the loyalty that one feels for one's province or region. Part of my responsibility simply is to promote Canada, east, west and north.
When an immigrant comes to our country, he or she comes to a country and lives in a province and ought to feel loyalty and patriotism to both.
Bob Mills Reform Red Deer, AB
Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
The Prime Minister has indicated he wants us to tell of ways of saving money in our committees. I would like to know from the minister how a cost conscious MP can make a decision on taking an international junket organized by his department unless he has the answers to the following questions. What does it cost? What is the itinerary? How will it benefit the taxpayers of the country?
Members Of ParliamentOral Questions
The Speaker
Just by way of explanation, usually when a committee acts, it acts on its own and the minister per se is not responsible for that committee.
Perhaps if the member could rephrase his question it might be acceptable. I would give him a single question.
Bob Mills Reform Red Deer, AB
Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the minister if he would undertake to provide answers to those questions for upcoming trips.
André Ouellet LiberalMinister of Foreign Affairs
Mr. Speaker, I believe there is some difficulty on the part of members of the Reform Party to participate in international visits. I tried to convince their leader to participate in these activities on the grounds that they serve a useful purpose.
I take in good standing the request to submit in advance the cost, the reason for going and the advantage of such a trip. I will do so in the future because there are regular requests for parliamentarians to go abroad to sustain the objectives of the Canadian government or to promote the interests and points of view of Canadians.
For instance, there was a request recently to send a delegation to Washington to impress upon Americans the importance of respecting the steelworkers of Canada. Unfortunately so far we have not been able to convince the Reform Party to join forces with other representatives of Parliament.
I believe there are a number of useful visits abroad. We would like to have the support of that party in joining the two other parties in Parliament to promote Canadian interests abroad.
Michel Gauthier Bloc Roberval, QC
Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Government House Leader what is the planned order of business for the next few days?
Herb Gray LiberalLeader of the Government in the House of Commons and Solicitor General of Canada
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to provide the weekly business statement.
Today the House will continue with Bill C-17, the budget implementation bill. When we have completed it we will be debating Bill C-9, implementing some of the provisions of an earlier economic statement.
This will be followed by Motion No. 10, authorizing the procedure committee to provide the basis for legislation to reform the system of adjusting electoral boundaries. If this business is not completed today it will be followed in the same order tomorrow.
Monday shall be an opposition day. I believe it will be the turn of the Reform Party to present the subject for that opposition day.
Next Tuesday the House will resume the business not completed Friday.
This will be followed by consideration of Bill C-7 respecting the control of certain substances, Bill C-11 concerning tobacco, Bill C-4 dealing with the NAFTA side deals, Bill C-2 to reorganize Revenue Canada, Bill C-8 regarding the use of deadly force by police and prison officers, Bill C-13 respecting GST technical amendments, Bill C-15 revising the statutes respecting income tax, and Bill S-2 ratifying certain tax treaties.
Doug Peters LiberalSecretary of State (International Financial Institutions)
Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 83(1), I wish to table explanatory notes and a notice of a ways and means motion respecting the Excise Tax Act, and I ask that an order of the day be designated to debate the motion.
The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-17, an act to amend certain statutes to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 22,
1994, be read the second time and referred to a committee; and of the motion.
Yves Rocheleau Bloc Trois-Rivières, QC
Madam Speaker, I would like to resume where I left out before Question Period. I said that so far the main characteristic of this government has been its lack of vision. I was talking about the conversion of military industries to civilian production, something we have not heard much about ever since the government wrote about it in its red book, so much so that recently, no later than last week, the Quebec Minister for Industry, Trade and Technology was getting impatient and-no matter how federalist and Liberal he is, just as this government-asked the Canadian government what was implied in the statements made in the red book. And since then, in spite of his influence, this minister has not heard a word regarding three specific matters of some urgency, namely Oerlikon, Paramax and MIL Davie.
There is another issue that brings to mind the notion of vision, if we can use that word, but in this case it is a machiavelic vision; I am referring to the Youth Service Corps. We know that one of the three objectives of this planned corps, which should involve 10,000 participants a year, is to promote a better understanding of Canada, and this, strangely enough, just before the Quebec referendum. We recognize there the consistency and the persistence of these same Liberals who were already very actively involved in the 1980 referendum and who used all means, from Pro Canada to the Council for Canadian Unity, to try to unduly influence the people in Quebec. Next time, they will outdo themselves, for sure!
We find the same lack of vision and political courage when it comes to the information highway. We know that in the United States the whole project is being spearheaded by the Vice-President, whereas here, all we have is a committee in name only which, completely in the dark, is supposed to be advising the government. This exemplifies the kind of political courage and vision this government has.
This is what was written in the red book, but things seem even worse when we look at what was not written down in its pages. The situation is even worse when you consider the actions of this government since the opening of the session, through the budget. I am referring to measures which were not mentioned in the red book. Indeed, when the government uses nice metaphors about modernizing, revitalizing or undertaking major initiatives, such as is currently the case with social programs, we cannot help but wonder about how sincere it is, about its real goals, and about the real motives of the Liberals even before they were elected, considering the measures they are now proposing to correct the situation.
The government targets the unemployed instead of unemployment; it targets the poor instead of poverty. Indeed, the government targets the poor when it decides to lower UI benefits from 57 per cent to 55 per cent, a measure which will affect 85 per cent of claimants.
The government is targeting the unemployed, when it decides they will need 12 weeks instead of 10 to be eligible for unemployment insurance. Does this mean that from now on employers, in a show of social solidarity, will hire five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-four, fifty, eighty, or a hundred employees for an extra two weeks so they can get their unemployment insurance benefits? That is not how it works. An employer needs an employee for a certain period, especially in disadvantaged regions, and unemployment insurance criteria are not a consideration when hiring people.
We should also realize that because of the latest amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act, people will receive less money for shorter periods of time. So the government is deliberately targeting people who work and often live in unenviable circumstances. The government has decided that from now on, they will receive less and receive it for shorter periods, although they will have to work longer to be eligible. If this is not hitting the unemployed instead of unemployment I would like to know what is.
If we consider the amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act and if we recall the government's stated intention to modernize and revitalize social programs, is it any wonder we are extremely concerned about the government's underlying motives for making such sweeping changes in the administration of social programs and the whole concept of government intervention in this area, especially when we consider the following. Let me explain. In spite of consultations that were held and others that will be held by the minister on this subject in the months to come, we know, and this was made clear in the Budget speech, that this modernizing and revitalizing will save the public purse $7.5 billion at the expense of the most vulnerable members of our society, with more than $5 billion resulting from amendments to the Unemployment Insurance Act.
When discussing these issues, we must not forget we are talking about fellow citizens and the conditions in which they live. We must realize that across this country, hundreds of thousands of Canadian men and women are living in a state of anxiety and poverty. We know how such conditions can lead to criminal activity, family violence, undue reliance on medication, malnutrition in children, and so forth.
I must say that I deplore the apparent lack of concern shown by many members opposite, including the Prime Minister, about a situation that is so disturbing and I would ask them to make cabinet members realize that something must be done to find intelligent and effective ways to improve the lives of these people. I think we can all say the unemployment rates in our ridings are intolerable, for instance in the Maritimes and Que-
bec, where levels are totally unacceptable, in Ontario, which is experiencing problems, and even in western Canada.
However, we should talk about the causes as well as the effects. In this kind of debate, which is a debate about the kind of society we want, one issue is particular important, and that is that in a few years, our society may start to resemble what we see in other so-called underdeveloped countries, where there are a wealthy few in a sea of poverty and a fast-disappearing middle class. I think that is something we should consider, namely, the kind of social structure we have and the kind of society we can expect in the future.
In concluding, I would like to quote briefly what was said by an economist at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières. André Joyal, a resident of my riding whose work I admire, wrote the following in the Catholic magazine RND: "What we have experienced for the past 20 years is probably not, as is often said, just another economic cycle, but a thorough transformation of our society. A transformation as drastic as that caused by the steam engine in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries or by the agrarian revolution 10,000 years ago when our ancestors realized they could sow and harvest crops, which meant they could have permanent settlements. The society of tomorrow may be totally different from the one we know today".
In the same vein Louis O'Neil, a distinguished professor at Laval University, wrote the following: "There is no reason why we should accept, without further analysis, the disappearance of thousands of jobs, today's exclusion after yesterday's exploitation, job uncertainty, the dismantling of health care services, a return to inequality of access to knowledge, the pauperization of rural areas, and regional population loss. We have the right and the duty to oppose a return to unbridled capitalism, to a system which currently puts 35 million people out of work in industrialized countries and which triggers disintegration and impoverishment.
Dale Johnston Reform Wetaskiwin, AB
Madam Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to speak on Bill C-17 today. I am going to speak for a moment or two on debt.
In 1993-94 we all know that the provincial, federal and municipal debt amounts to some $660 billion. This is an increase of about 11 per cent over last year and it is quite a startling number.
Put another way, this amounts to some $23,000 for every man, woman and child in the country. The net federal public debt amounts to some $500 billion and that is an increase over last year of some $45 billion or again around 10 per cent.
Federal debt divided equally among Canadians comes to some $17,600 per person. The federal debt is increasing at the rate of $123 million a day. This amounts to some $6,200 per year for a family of four. To put this another way, the debt amounts to 93 per cent of our GDP at the present time. Ten years ago it amounted to around 50 per cent. It nearly doubled as a percentage of the GDP in 10 years' time.
As a matter of fact, the Vancouver Board of Trade, which has done a considerable amount to draw the Canadian public's attention to the debt situation, has placed its debt clock to work out that if the debt, rounded off to $.5 billion, were converted to hundred dollar bills there would, believe it or not, be enough to cover the Trans-Canada highway from Vancouver to Ottawa.
If this deficit were reduced to zero, the average employed person in Canada would see their taxes reduced by about $3,000 a year. Bill C-17 deals with budgetary measures and certainly unemployment insurance. To me this reduction in the taxation is one of the best things that we can do to reduce unemployment in Canada.
A recent Canadian Chamber of Commerce survey showed that if the debt and deficit were reduced, payroll taxes and corporate tax rates lowered, government regulatory burdens eased and training and education of the labour force improved, small Canadian businesses, any business under 100 employees, would be able to create jobs at the rate of 14 jobs per firm for the next three years. This is certainly another recipe for the reduction of unemployment in Canada.
The budget has simply nibbled at the edges of the unemployment insurance program. By reducing the generosity of this program, certainly I have to give the government credit for making a step in the right direction. After all, we are aware that over generous unemployment insurance programs do have the effect of increasing the number of people on UI, not decreasing, not putting a lot of people to work. The number of people on UI has increased as the debt ratio has increased.
We all know that the cumulative deficit in the unemployment insurance account is in the neighbourhood of $6 billion. We also know that it is a fallacy to believe that this is an employer-employee funded program and that $6 billion has to be picked up by the taxpayer of Canada. We pay the shortfall.
I have said in the House before that the Canadian unemployment insurance plan has become an inefficient income supplement plan rather than social insurance. We need to take the "un" out of unemployment insurance. We should come up with a scheme of employment insurance with extra emphasis on insurance.
The Reform Party's policy is to make employment insurance a sensible, sustainable program of social insurance which provides compensation for temporary loss of employment. We believe the program should be funded by employers and the employee and the level of premiums and benefits determined by the employer and the employee. This, I am sure, would also go a
long way to reducing the burgeoning underground economy and ultimately relieving the tax burden of Canadians.
Stephen Van Houten, president of the Canadian Manufacturers Association, has extrapolated today's figures to come up with a prediction that if the federal debt continues to grow at the present rate, by the year 2001 and we will hit the $1 trillion mark. He has also predicted that when we hit the $1 trillion mark our deficit will be in the range of $60 billion to $70 billion. Should it remain the same, the interest on that amount of money would amount to some $76 billion, and that is roughly double what we have today. In my opinion that would be extremely crippling to the Canadian economy.
I am convinced that percentage of after tax income has decreased, and yet at the same time the same government that allowed the debt to escalate to half a billion dollars continues along the same path. Really when questioned or pressed on it the Prime Minister even makes remarks about that line of questioning being irrelevant. It is extremely relevant and we look forward to the day when we can reduce taxation and have a stimulative effect on our economy.
Economic growth is hampered by high social spending. As we all know, high social spending is also accompanied by high levels of taxation.
If Canadians were relieved of this burden of high government debt and taxation and government intervention through excessive regulation, I believe Canadians would be motivated to work harder and to save more and invest more and ultimately hire more workers.
Investors would be clamouring to invest in Canada and to set up business here. It is high time that Canada was open for business and took on that posture.
We noticed the other day that when the Prime Minister did announce that he was willing to make further budget cuts there was a dramatic change in the markets. The dollar went up and the interest rate went down. I really felt quite heartened by all this.
Just the other day I noticed in the Financial Post the headline: ``Deficit rattles investors''. To say the least it would rattle them.
In conclusion, it is time to change this budgetary process and admit that we do have a spending problem in Canada. This is not a problem that can be solved strictly by revenue.
Budget Implementation Act, 1994Government Orders
The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Maheu)
The hon. member for Beauport-Montmorency-Orléans.
François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC
Madam Speaker, I believe that the hon. member for Beauport-Montmorency-Orléans spoke just before Question Period. So, unless an hon. member from the Liberal Party wishes to speak at this time, I would ask that you give me the floor.
Budget Implementation Act, 1994Government Orders
The Acting Speaker (Mrs. Maheu)
Well then, the Chair recognizes the hon. member for Bellechasse.
François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC
Madam Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Wetaskiwin for his remarks on Bill C-17. He made several worthwhile points, some of which I will raise myself in a moment.
Let me just say that today is an historic day because this morning, for the very first time, the Chair was occupied by a sovereignist member of Parliament, namely my hon. colleague from the Bloc Quebecois and member for Chicoutimi. Having said this and extended my congratulations to him, I would like to speak to Bill C-17.
As history has it, Nero played the fiddle while Rome burned. This government is doing the same thing. While the country is crumbling down, while the poor get poorer and the unemployed despair of finding work, while middle-income individuals and families see their tax burden grow heavier and heavier, the government does nothing. Just like the previous government. You would almost think that they fit in the same shoes. This government certainly took no time to adopt the same pattern as its predecessor. My friend the member for Frontenac was mentioning that these shoes are probably Kodiak boots because we are not out of the woods yet with the current policies of this federal Liberal government which acts the same way as the Mulroney-Campbell administration did from 1984. That is to say doing so very little. Words, words, words. They are all words, but no action. None at all! The only movement we see in this House is when the hon. member for Kingston and the Islands walks from the table to his seat once in a while. Very little is actually accomplished.
I agree with the hon. member who spoke before me, the hon. member for Wetaskiwin, when he says that the key to economic recovery in Canada and in Quebec as well is small business. We have relied on big business, like Hyundai in Bromont, for too long. Great hopes had been placed on businesses like this one which is now in a very precarious situation to say the least, on the verge of shutting down and laying off its workers. So, the small and medium-sized businesses responsible for creating 80 to 85 per cent of jobs are really undervalued, underestimated and undersupported in the projects they can initiate.
We see it at our constituency offices when a small businessman or businesswoman comes to us with a proposal to create two, three or four jobs. It is hard to get the government
interested in setting up or improving a small business. It still likes to think big, an approach that harkens back to Mr. Trudeau's era. And look where that Trudeau-style vision got us.
Our economy is in ruins. Our debt currently tops the $500 billion mark. Of course, the Mulroney-Campbell administration has been blamed for the situation, but previous Liberal administrations were responsible for fuelling the debt crisis in the first place. It should be noted that when the Conservatives took office in 1984, the national debt already totalled $189 billion. The red ink was already flowing freely. In fact, several bottles had already been used up.
The budget measures now on the table offer no help to small business, no help to middle income families, no help to individuals as far as housing is concerned. There are no real measures to provide social housing assistance to low income families forced to spend more and more on housing. As Bernard Derome said, if the trend continues, low income families will no longer be able to afford proper housing. What the government needs to do is reintroduce a real social housing policy.
François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC
At least I am being applauded by my colleague from Laurentides, as well as my colleagues from Berthier-Montcalm, Lévis, Brome-Missisquoi, Frontenac and Chambly and all those whom I could not see or hear, since we sometimes recognize each other by the way we applaud, Madam Speaker.
What do we see in this budget for housing? The Residential Rehabilitation Assistance Program, RRAP, is back. It is very nice to have such a program, but first you have to have a home to renovate, and there is no measure for home ownership, especially for a first home. There is nothing for single people and young couples, but they are told to improve what they do not have. What a fine philosophy, putting the cart before the horse! That is the finest example we could give. Our grandparents used that expression. It is still current for describing the government's economic policies or lack thereof.
As my colleague from Trois-Rivières just said, the government is attacking the unemployed as if they were responsible for their condition. The unemployed are responsible for the poor state of the Canadian economy; the government is responsible, because of its ineptness and inaction in this area. There is no political will to fight unemployment in Canada.
All they are doing is to go after UI recipients, blaming them for unemployment. They are being penalized. Their benefits are being cut. The length of time they must work to obtain UI benefits is increased. But hitting the unemployed does not affect unemployment. Just as when a mortician does his work, he does not attack death, he deals with someone who is already dead. The government is the big funeral director of this country and it seems it is about to celebrate a funeral mass for the economy. In the next election, voters in Canada, the remaining nine provinces, will decide this government's fate.
Probably our friends in the Reform Party will have alternatives to propose or other parties will come along, because we see some parties appear and grow like mushrooms in this country.
I am glad to see-again you are signaling me that I have one minute left-with just a minute to conclude, I have to choose between the Royal Military College in Saint-Jean, of which we have spoken a lot, and the Prime Minister's statements in this House that there would be more cuts, although no minister wants to cut in his department. We asked questions yesterday; no minister wanted to cut, but the sum of the parts is greater than the whole because the Prime Minister said that he was going to reduce the deficit.
So in closing, I will say a few words about an issue that I care about, MIL Davie in Lauzon, where 400 of my constituents work. It is high time, and in the 30 seconds remaining to me, I will say that it is high time for the government to stop thinking about reviving the MIL Davie shipyard in Lauzon and to immediately give it the contract for the Magdalen Islands ferry to replace the Lucy Maud Montgomery .
Randy White Reform Fraser Valley West, BC
Madam Speaker, once again it is a pleasure to speak on a bill in the House of Commons but it is not such a pleasure to talk about Bill C-17.
In question period today I mentioned the simile of bailing out a ship with a thimble. That is what we have here, the government trying to deal with the large problem of $40 billion and we are playing around the edges with some of the cuts. Most people in Canada know that just will not work.
I spent some time in Halifax during the spring recess with a number of business groups and a model parliament. It was with enthusiasm that I watched the prime minister of that model parliament and his elected members from the school expressing their views and frustrations about things that are happening in the country; the criminal justice system, parliamentary reform and so on, but expressing long term views of the problems that exist in our economy. I do not think we should take this so lightly. These young people have reason to be concerned.
A lot of people talk about our younger generation today and refer to them as generation x , a generation some say that does not have its own identity as far as music and other things. My impression of generation x is one of young concerned Canadians, a group that probably will have, very rightly so, very little tolerance with us baby boomers who have managed to spend ourselves into oblivion.
When it comes time for us to have a pension in the next 15, 20, 25 years I somehow think that generation x will be very dissatisfied with us and our spending and will have no sympathy
whatsoever. Perhaps it is well deserved by us. The frustration is across the country. I see it in my riding every day in Langley, Aldergrove, and Max Lake.
The budget has created some serious concerns for Canadians and as I travel and talk to people in this fair city of Ottawa you can hear it every day. It is on their minds. The government has not addressed the concerns of the economy.
I sense there are some members on the government side who want to deal with it. I do not know what the problem is. Maybe the cabinet ministers wish to hold them back but I sincerely hope those members will convince their leaders that something more serious has to take place.
I have talked to bankers in the maritimes. They expressed the same concerns as bankers in Fraser Valley West. It is no different. It is not regional. How can any rational person support Bill C-17 which will provide for $3 billion more in expenditures next year than the previous year?
The Liberal government has provided what I referred to some time ago as a flaccid approach to managing Canada. The dictionary definition of flaccid is limp-wristed, lacking vigour and feeble. At the time when I talked about that I put my own definition of the word flaccid. I made it an acronym. Flaccid to me really means the federal Liberals are crafty Conservatives in disguise. I do not see a lot of difference. Now I am getting a rise from the members on the other side of the House so I am starting to hit a few buttons here. I expect that will happen over the next few years.
However, they should not take it so badly because I am going to do my very best in the next 10 minutes to explain why Canadians coast to coast feel this way and are disappointed in the selection of the government in the last election.
Let us compare the short record of this Liberal Party with that of the Conservatives who were annihilated in the last election. It is necessary to make this comparison throughout this speech to understand why we cannot support the Liberal budget and why I predict that party will fail dismally in the next election. That is a pity really but that is the way it is going to go.
I can remember back in 1984 when the Liberals were thrown out and we brought in the Conservatives. Canada had so much hope. What happened? They spent their way into oblivion. Now we are just continuing on with the next generation of traditional politics.
The budget is going to see Liberal spending increase by $3 billion at a time when our national debt is $40 billion.
The financial markets are reacting to it and businessmen have reacted to it for the last 10 years. They are concerned. The only group that is not reacting to it is the government itself. It is ironic.
The government does not have the intestinal fortitude to deal with reality. It indicates also that the government cannot take a tough stand on the big issues and will not. This Liberal government really is a Liberal government. It is not Conservative in nature and it is definitely not Reform in nature. Some of the members are suggesting that is a good idea but we will see in the next election.
Let me take you into some detail that will astound you, Madam Speaker. I want to talk a little bit about just why we get frustrated here and why the people out in all of the communities in Canada get frustrated. I want to talk about a little organization called the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
This council has existed for some years now. I do not know how far back, but it existed in the Conservative reign and it exists here today. I will just run by a couple of bottom line budgets of this organization. In 1991-92 its budget was $90 million. In the next year, 1992-93, its budget was $101 million. The budget has gone up and at one point it was $97.7 million.
One might say: "Well what is wrong with that? It must be a good organization and it must do a lot of good things". I do not doubt that. However, in this budget when we were looking for some cuts there were no cuts to the organization. In fact its budget increased.
Let me give you an idea of some of the expenditures coming from that organization that have not been questioned at all. In fact its budget has been increased. After I read these I think the people watching and listening this afternoon and my colleagues next will ask themselves the question: Why did we not look a little harder at this in the budget? Why did we not take some money out of this budget?
Payments: $15,435 to study eunuchs in Imperial China. Now I ask: Do we have a better way to spend $15,000? The amount of $147,827 was spent to examine lullabies, form and function in infant directed music.
While that may be interesting to some, I doubt very much whether there are many people in this country who have a lot of interest in their tax dollars going this way.