Madam Speaker, it might not be a bad idea for members opposite and those Canadians viewing the debate at home if we were to go over the motion again so they know what we are talking about.
Today is a supply day which means the opposition, and in this case the Bloc, supplies the motion for debate in the House. The motion the Bloc Quebecois put forth for debate today reads:
That this House condemn the federal government's ineffective regional development interventions, which create overlappings and inconsistencies, resulting in an administrative chaos that hampers regional economic growth.
Although I probably would not have put it in those terms at all, the whole notion of Canada's regional development is one of the basic differences between Canada and the United States, Canada and many countries in the world. There are not many countries in the world that take resources from one part of the country and transfer them holus-bolus to another part of the country in order to create some sort of evenness across the country.
What usually happens in terms of world affairs is that they make sacrifices for the future. Perhaps none of us would be here in Canada today, or very few of us except the indigenous people, if our forefathers had not left where they were so that they, their children and their grandchildren could have a better life in a new country.
What has happened in Canada over the years is that rather than making the sacrifices for the future, we made the future sacrifice for us today. Today when we are making transfers of money from one part of the country to another, by and large the transfers of money are transfers of borrowed money. We are really transferring money and wealth from future generations to this generation and then once again transferring it to another part of the country, in the hopes that it will make one part of the country work a bit better and that we will have a more even playing field.
I guess the debate is not really out. Does it work? Is it effective? If it worked probably there would not be much debate about it because we would recognize it as a good thing.
Given that we have been doing this transfer of resources from one part of the country to another over these years and given that it really has not changed the nature of dependence in various parts of the country, it is reasonable to question whether it works at all.
The basic premise of the Bloc motion is to suggest that perhaps this money transfer could be done in a more efficient and more effective way. From the Bloc's perspective it would like to see all the money transferred to the province of Quebec and the province of Quebec making the determination, controlling all the strings, even though it is federal money. The real question, though, is whether or not we should be doing it at all.
I would draw the attention of hon. members to the situation that exists in the United States. The southern United States, as many members would know, for many years languished relatively poorly compared with the northern and western United States. Yet today the south is vibrant and flourishing in part because it was not force-fed resources from the more prosperous parts of the nation and in part because they have a triple-E senate. Things were able to find their natural level. The cost of land and the cost of being in business today in the southern United States are less than in the north. Therefore people establish their businesses in the south.
We do not have the same playing field in Canada because we have a federal system of government that favours central Canada at the expense of the regions, particularly the maritimes. If we had a system of government that did not favour one part of the country over another because the vast majority of the population of Canada is centred in Ontario and Quebec, we might not have the need for regional economic expansion.
I suggest we should give some thought to why we got into this situation in the first place. The Bank of Nova Scotia headquartered in Toronto is not called the Bank of Nova Scotia because it started in Toronto. It is called the Bank of Nova Scotia because it was established and started in Halifax. Why did it move to Toronto? It is because that is where the economic base of the country is. Chapter and verse the concentration of wealth is in Ontario and Quebec because that is where all the votes are in the country.
We need to change things in a much more fundamental way. As a Parliament we should consider a triple-E senate because in my opinion it would help dramatically in regional economic expansion.
Does it work? Is it worthwhile? We have read with considerable interest that the new entrepreneurial class in Quebec in the last 20 years or so has created a revolution in thinking and in spirit. My colleagues from Quebec could speak in much more detail about it, but that is the perception many other Canadians have of the entrepreneurial class in Quebec.
Quebec and Alberta in harmony embraced the whole notion of NAFTA or free trade with the United States. As a matter of fact Canada has free trade with the United States in very large measure because Quebec wanted it and Alberta wanted it.
Let me just read a few statistics about what has happened to the west after five years of free trade with the United States. I submit that in these statistics lies the avenue for expanded economic activity for Quebec, for the maritimes and for all other parts of Canada. I am quoting from a report by the Centre for International Business Studies, the Faculty of Business, University of Alberta, Edmonton, dated April 1994:
Over the five year period, 1988 to 1993, the value of exports from western Canada grew by 23 per cent, while exports to the U.S. market rose by 58 per cent. The growth of total exports amounted to 51.3 per cent for Alberta, 18.4 per cent for Manitoba, 9 per cent for British Columbia, and 3.7 per cent for Saskatchewan. The growth in exports to U.S. markets was 77.1 per cent for Alberta, 70.4 per cent for Saskatchewan, 46.4 per cent for Manitoba, and 34.2 per cent for British Columbia.
I recognize that in quoting all these numbers it ends up being a major jumble. However, the fact remains we are not going to get rich in our nation by transferring wealth from one part of the country to another and then quibbling over who got more and who got less or where it came from. We are going to be wealthy as a nation because we produce wealth all over Canada. As an exporting nation we export primarily to the biggest and wealthiest market in the world which is right next door to us no matter where we live in Canada, the United States.
If we would put half of our energies into developing our manufacturing base, our competitiveness and our export markets and break down the internal trade barriers so that we are competitive within the country and put those energies into exporting and developing our markets in the United States and elsewhere in the world, we would gain dramatically. This incessant bickering about who gets more and who gets less within our Confederation is destructive and leads nowhere.