Debates of Feb. 21st, 1995

Presence In Gallery

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear.

The House resumed consideration of the motion.

Supply

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Human Resources Development]

Mr. Speaker, a major portion of Reform's so-called taxpayers' budget has to do with its radical proposals for a $15 billion cut in social security spending. This is an ill thought out proposal which we heard before from Reform during the social security reform process.

The reform of Canada's social programs is a necessary, valuable and timely exercise. Its impact will be better programs and services that deliver the best results. Its impact will be actions that meet our highest priorities. With those outcomes in the balance, it is a process that deserves thought, care and creativity.

To date, and I include today's debate in this comment, it is not a process to which the Reform Party has added much beyond shopworn clichés and one track slogans. That unfortunate reality was exemplified by the Reform members' contribution, if I can use that term, to the recent report of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development. Much of the thinking, or lack thereof, that went into the Reform position also characterizes their interventions today.

Reform Party members appear to have a problem with social programs: they cost money. In their vision of Canada, families take care of their own and charities take care of the rest. This is just like the 1930s.

There is only one big problem for them in that vision: Canadians do not buy it. Canadians understand the value of social programs. They understand many of the flaws in the status quo and they want changes. However, they do not accept a social vision based on a déjà vu as the answer to every problem.

Today's Reform Party budget has a principle of equality of contribution which states that the burden of reduction must fall least heavily on the most vulnerable members of our society. Yet Reform's proposals would have completely the opposite effect.

Instead of helping those most in need, Reform Party members would cut seniors pensions by $3 billion. How would this help the most vulnerable in our society? They would eliminate all regional differentiation and all non-UI components. How would this help the poorest regions of the country, workers who need training or women who want maternity leave? They would cut aboriginal programs by 24 per cent. How would this help one of the poorest groups and arguably the neediest group of Canadians? They would cut equalization payments by $3 billion, or 35 per cent. How would this help the poorest regions of the country or Canadians who really need help?

These proposals would burden the most vulnerable members of our society, not help them. In the same vein, Reform's minority report was a sad collection of opinions desperately masquerading as fact. It showed the utter lack of depth in Reform members' thinking. It displayed a complete lack of attention to many of the important issues shaping our economy today, issues clearly outlined in the green paper released last fall.

Canadians deserve better and this government is determined to provide that. In my remarks I want to talk about the vision behind the government's perspectives on social security reform. I want to look at questions that face Canada and its social programs, questions for which the government has offered real proposals. I will then compare that to the silence or simplistic if not outright contradictory opinions of the Reform opposition.

Was the Reform minority report weak? This House may not simply take my word for it. Take the word of the hon. member for Calgary North. She was quoted in the Ottawa Citizen on February 8 that aspects of her party's report ``were not thought through very well before they were rushed into print''.

Canadians expect much more from their members of Parliament. I could not agree more and I can see no evidence of improvement in the position taken in today's debate. On an issue of this significance do Canadians not have the right to expect thoughtful analysis and vision? The government has done its part. Why have my hon. friends on the opposite side not done theirs?

Indeed, this government is committed to doing even more. Social security reform remains an integral component of the government agenda, rebuilding the system so that it meets the priorities of today and of tomorrow.

These are important issues and will meet the objectives set down in the green paper. What were they? It was to help Canadians get jobs and keep them. It was to help the most vulnerable in our society with the focus on child poverty. It was to do that in an affordable manner.

The report of the committee is one important contribution to determining how those changes will take place but of course it is not the only one. That takes me to the first point I want to raise in analysing the Reform's minority report.

The first issue the Reform Party raised was that of consultation. Reading Reform's comments one might think that this report was the beginning and the end of the consultation process, that some ideologically high bound government had decided to set up a sham process that would freeze Canadians out.

I ask these questions: Would this be the same government that has already received more than 40,000 social security reform workbooks from Canadians? Would this be the same government that has helped more than 200 members of Parliament hold town hall meetings on social security reform, drawing more than 20,000 people? Would this be the same government that has communicated with 7,000 people via Internet, 35,000 via a 1-800 number, as well as receiving 3,000 letters addressed to the minister directly?

This government is consulting. Reform Party members may not have liked to have heard from legitimate groups with valid perspectives as it travelled across Canada. They may have wished to have heard from more individuals, but you simply cannot make the leap from that complaint to the implication that there has been no opportunity for Canadians to offer comments. Far from it. This government has undertaken the most wide ranging consultation on any issue ever.

More than 100,000 Canadians have had their say in one way or another during the past year on this issue. Most Canadians do not accept the extremist views displayed by the Reform Party. They do not buy what Reform is peddling on social programs.

Canadians have made it clear that they want to see change, not destruction, and they are right. They believe governments must invest in people, address child poverty and support those individuals with low incomes. They are right. They believe we can do a better and more efficient job, and they are right. They want governments to work together and Canadians are right again. That is what the consultation process told us. That is what we, as a Liberal government, are prepared to do for the people of Canada.

The second issue the minority report raises is a complaint about the alleged lack of scope in this exercise. From the point of view of the Reform Party, all social programs are alike; they are all drains on the public purse and should be treated as such. Of course, this is not surprising.

The Reform symphony still only knows one tune, well over a year after its arrival in this House: the deficit is the only thing that matters. Of course the deficit matters. The government has been extremely clear on this issue. Our programs must be affordable. But the deficit is one consideration in designing a new social safety net. It is not the sole rationale for action or the sole test of options.

Reform's commitment to take $15 billion from social programs leaves so many unanswered questions. Time does not permit me to even start listing just a few of them. I am content to let Canadians ask Reform members instead. That is the Reform idea of scope.

For the government, the scope of this exercise is those programs and spending that relate to working, learning and security. The emphasis is on those programs that help people who are, could be, or will be in the labour market.

Health care does not fit this and it is undergoing its own study. The needs of seniors do not fit this and they will be discussed elsewhere. Canadians understand this. They understand that we want social programs that help people prepare for real jobs.

The so-called logic of the Reform Party would have included our defence and foreign policy reviews in this exercise. After all, does the deficit not matter in each of those too? No, the scope of this exercise is logical, intelligent and consistent.

That brings me to Reform's third issue of division in the committee's report and the green paper. Most of the Reform's position in both the minority report and today's debate is based on allegations regarding the government's vision of social programs and a mish-mash of ideas that Reform members trumpet as their own vision.

We can look and look through their comments and find a lot about the "how" of Reform's approach to slashing programs. What we will not see is any "why". Oh, there are claims about principles such as self-reliance and decentralization. But nowhere do we read a consistent, logical analysis of the social and economic issues facing Canadian families.

Nowhere do we find a thought through perspective on what social programs can do to help people and our economy. All we see is a series of other people's ideas and notes about programs that countries such as Chile and Singapore are trying. However, where is the social and economic vision to link them? There is not one.

What vision there might be lies between the lines. For example, Reform members continue to critique our work to expand the number of good quality child care spaces in Canada. In fact, not long ago they found one. It was an unpublished study which they claim shows that the product of child care will be a generation of depressed, stressed criminals. We are dealing here with people who read one report which has very little relationship to reality.

Given the real world, parents who must work to meet their family needs, how can they say those things? How can they ignore the mass of evidence that good child care can actually help kids, especially those from backgrounds which are far less privileged than those of the average Reformer?

Forcing women out of the workforce by drying up good quality child care is not my idea of a sound social or economic policy. However, stands such as that make the Reform vision for Canada obvious.

Now Reform members may say that is not fair, so let me ask my hon. friends to spell out the issues that face Canadians. What would be the most important priorities for social programs to address? How do we balance the competing demands for action, all of which have at least some legitimacy?

I ask this because I realize that in the world inhabited by the Reform Party there is only one issue, the deficit. There are no other challenges. Government should set aside all other priorities and just hack and hack until the debt is eliminated. That is the beginning and the end of their vision on any subject.

Obviously the deficit is a priority of the government. The need to bring expenses and revenues into line is essential. We are taking action to reach that goal, as we promised Canadians. However, Canadians expect governments to achieve many goals with intelligence, co-ordination and a sense of priority. The deficit is an important one, indeed a critical one, but it is not the only one.

Families, workplaces and the entire society have changed dramatically in the decades since many of the social programs were first envisioned. Unemployment insurance, social assistance and training programs were designed in days which were very different from today. Today workplaces are full of people who juggle home and family responsibilities, often as single parents. They take part time courses to develop new skills. They face uncertain career paths. Above all, they are required to be more flexible in every facet of their lives than ever before. They recognize their responsibilities but they also need some help.

Social programs can be improved to help people. We can identify the priorities for the limited funds that are available. That is the art of governing. It is what citizens have a right to expect from their government.

The proposals that the government has discussed with the provinces, business, labour, social action groups and all Canadians reflect that vision. All are rooted in the jobs and growth agenda which the Prime Minister set out in his speech in Quebec City at the Chamber of Commerce last September. As he noted, our social and economic priorities are linked closely together. We cannot meet the needs of Canadians without a strong economy. No strong economy is based on a society polarized into haves and have nots. We know social programs that respond to the most important needs can build our economy, even if the Reform Party does not want to believe it.

Let me discuss one aspect of our changing economy, learning. We are in a world in which skilled needs are changing faster than we can identify. We have a world in which people are challenged by new technologies and opportunities. The government's vision of social programs will realize the potential of these changes and help Canadians to harness them.

Compare that to the vision of the Reform Party.

I would ask my hon. friends where is their perspective on the training issues facing older workers? Where is their perspective on helping young people get real job skills that employers need in high technology fields? Where is the analysis of how to make life long learning work in an economy where people will change jobs and employers more often than ever before?

Any talk of a new economy is utterly absent in the comments of the Reform Party. The government believes in working with employers and workers to address the needs of their industries. Our work with sectoral councils has identified needs and initiated action plans.

What would Reformers do in the real world of these needs? Would they let the growth sectors of our economy wither? Would they claim that some magic tax cut will let them solve all of their problems? The government has done better.

For example, we have begun to address both the needs of industries and the employment problems facing young people through innovative partnerships. The government has entered into agreements with employers, workers and educators in fields such as horticulture, tourism and automotive repair under our youth internship program. We are working with them to develop the training that young people need to fill the skilled jobs that are available. We are working with them to create a climate that will attract even more job opportunities to our country.

Compare that to the do-nothing attitude of the Reform Party. We are working with provinces and territories to explore new and better ways of meeting the needs of people through our strategic initiatives program.

This example of federal-provincial co-operation is alive and well with many provinces. We are working with them on a pilot project called Integrated Training Centres for Youth. This is to help our young people.

I would like to conclude by saying that social security reform is a chance to recognize the real needs out there. The status quo does not meet them. It is a chance to cut today's suit to fit today's cloth and no one wants the tattered rags being flogged by the Reform Party.

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, once again I am puzzled by some of the comments of yet another Liberal.

It seems as though Reformers do not have parents who are in need of OAS. It seems as though Reformers do not understand what it is to be responsible for 80-year old people, that Reform-

ers somehow do not have friends and acquaintances who are falling through the cracks of our economic cycle.

It seems as though we live in a vacuum and only those opposite have a way of understanding. I am sorry. We do have parents in their elderly years who depend on OAS. We do have people in our families who receive GIS. We do have people in our families and acquaintances who require child care. To characterize the Reform Party as not knowing or not understanding is just beyond my capability to understand.

Perhaps I could help this member understand why these people are in that position, why they are dependent on the social welfare and the social safety net in the country. It is because the spending of the government is destroying our ability to be able to provide for them. That is why we came forward with the plan today.

I find it really unfortunate that this member, along with many others, would choose to interpret the Reform document from some kind of weird perspective, as if we had landed from another planet. We represent the people in our constituencies. We represent people in this member's constituency. I had the privilege of conducting a couple of town hall meetings and getting input from people in his constituency. I reflect many of the values of many of his constituents.

With respect to the issue of learning, I would like to ask the member if he has had an opportunity of taking a look through our document to page 47 where we show our method of lowering cash transfers but giving the provinces cash points. In fact, the amount of funding available for health and for education under our scheme actually increases.

This is not cut and slash. This is a realistic budget which is more than I can say for the pipe dream that the government is continuing to give to us.

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, York North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, let us talk about the pipe dream of the Liberal government. When we were elected on October 25, 1993, may I add, and I will submit to you there are some Reformers-

[The Deputy Speaker]

I would say this to all members. For reasons such as this we ask that members put their remarks to the Chair. Any time the word "you" is referred to, it is supposed to refer to whomever is in this chair.

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, York North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, through you to the hon. member that attended a town hall meeting in my riding. There were people in my riding that voted for the Reform Party. Approximately 15,000 voted Reform and approximately 72,000 voted for me. I understand that some people may share their opinion, but we will see if we can rectify that in the upcoming election.

I would, first of all, like to address the concern raised by the hon. member, vis-à-vis the Liberal pipe dream. This is the same pipe dream that has put the economy back on its proper footing. We have created over 450,000 jobs since taking office, in co-operation and in partnership with the private stakeholders. We have increased the number of jobs for young people. We have the fastest growth of any of the G-7 countries.

These statistics illustrate to me, as an objective viewer of what is going on in Canada, that things are getting better with a Liberal government at the helm. May I also add that my thoughts are reflected far and wide throughout Canada. I was in Alberta last week and people are generally happy with the direction which the government has taken.

In reference to the deficit, we have used what I consider a more rational approach. We have targeted 3 per cent of GDP by 1996-97. It is reasonable. It is a dual track approach. It will not hurt people as much as the Reform agenda would.

[Ken Epp, Reform, Elk Island, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am glad that we can have this debate. The Liberal government has a point of view and the Reformers have a point of view on how the finances of the country ought to be run. I hope that the people of Canada are paying very close attention because literally their future depends on it.

I did a little mathematical extrapolation. When I first started this process it was 1992. The federal debt was about $420 billion and now it is around $550 billion, an average of around 9 per cent per year. At that rate, the debt would grow to over $600 billion by the year 2000.

Interest payments would increase from $33 billion in 1992 to over $50 billion in the year 2000. That $50 billion is not available for education, is not available for health, is not available for any of the social programs or anything else.

I want to ask the member who just made the speech a question. We recognize if we do not cut spending that the debt will continue to grow. In fact, the deficit needs to be cut to zero so that we can start attacking the debt which is growing every day by $110 million.

We have to do something. Does the government have any plans at all, and if so, where is it going to get the money? The $40 billion deficit is about equal to our $40 billion interest payment. Are we going to default on our interest payments? I am sure the member would say no.

Are we going to take money out of running the government? That costs around $40 billion per year. It would mean shutting government down completely. That would balance the budget. I am sure he would say no. Let us keep at least some of it going.

What is left then are transfers payments to the provinces. To say that the budget can be balanced and bring the financial situation under control without doing that, I submit, is not

facing the facts squarely. It is being very unrealistic. I think it is giving the people of Canada a false sense of security.

I would like the to member to respond on where he would actually cut.

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, York North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member. As he probably noticed, he was answering most of his own questions. Therefore this will probably give me an opportunity to address some real issues that are the minds of Canadians.

I would like to tell the hon. member that we will continue what we have been doing up to today. I think he has seen some cuts in expenditures. We are running a more efficient government than we have had. I remember my years in opposition watching the Conservatives squander money left, right and centre. We are not doing that. We are very fiscally responsible individuals.

At the same time we are investing in people because we feel that one key role of a government is to help people get and keep their jobs, to help the most vulnerable in our society with a focus on child poverty in a very sustainable fashion.

The results to date since our election would indicate that we are on the right track. We are creating jobs. We have great growth in our economy and Canadians are generally pleased with the way the government is governing.

At the end of the day the real measuring stick of our success will be whether Canadians are happy with the way we are bringing the country forward. I would say to the hon. member that they are very happy with the Liberal government.

[Ken Epp, Reform, Elk Island, AB]

Mr. Speaker, sure the people are feeling happy. Do they have the correct information? Do they know what deep trouble we are in? Perhaps the government of the day with its be happy, don't worry attitude is convincing them of it but hiding from them the bitter truth of what is going to happen.

The government has stated as its goal to bring the deficit down to $25 billion. That is a cut of $15 billion from the present deficit of $40 billion. Where are there cuts of $15 billion? I have not heard one of them. It is worry about one million here and one million there. That is important but it does not begin to touch the big question.

[Maurizio Bevilacqua, Liberal, York North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I did not really hear anything worth nothing in what the hon. member said. I think if we have to deal with reality we can look at the state of the nation. Canadians are not happy fools, as the hon. member would have us believe. They are happy because they see all the economic indicators are looking good for the Canadian people and that hope and jobs are part of the Canadian fabric once again.

I resent the fact that the hon. member would think that Canadians are fools. They are not fools. They look at the issues and examine the issues. They see the growth in the economy and they are feeling good about it.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to discuss this issue and talk about whether 3 per cent of GDP is a valid target for the government to be aiming at in two year's time and whether that is going to restore the confidence investors need before they will continue to leave their money in this country. There all kinds of implications that flow from that.

I want to talk a little about some of the wants and desires of Canadians. I think when we design a program, when we put together a government we have to give some consideration to what Canadians want and need. If we listen to them they say things that are really just common sense.

As taxpayers, Canadians want to keep their income. They want to have lots of disposable income and they work hard every day to try and grind out a living so they have some money for their family and so that they can retire some day, or if there is an emergency they can draw on some savings. That is what they want.

As investors they want to be able to get a good return and also protect their capital. They do not want to see their capital jeopardized. As people who some day may have to rely on a social safety net, they want to know that it will be there and that it will be adequate, that it will be something they can count on.

As parents Canadians want to be able to know that there will always be a university there so that they can send their children. They want to know that there will be some kind of safety net in place for them as they move into their senior years. They want to know that there will be a health care system there for their children. Those are some of the desires and wants that I think government has an obligation to try to meet.

It is not necessary for government to be in conflict with those wants and desires. A responsible government must align itself with those wants and desires and come up with ways of accommodating those wants and desires. To me it is obvious that there are ways we can do that.

Reform presented a perfect example of that this morning. I would argue that this government has not got itself in line with Canadians' wants and desires. I would argue that Canadians are moving completely against that.

A situation in which the government's best effort adds $100 billion to the debt and leaves us with a $25 billion deficit at the

very top of the business cycle in a couple of years, combined with the desires that I have just mentioned, creates in my judgment a very explosive situation. On the one hand we have the wants and desires of Canadians and on the other hand we have a government that in my judgment has created a business environment that is completely contrary to that.

Let me go back through the different hats people wear in their lives and talk about how their wants and desires are really in conflict with the disincentives that the government puts in their way to prevent them from achieving some of the things that they want to achieve and from getting the type of government that not only do they want but that they deserve.

As taxpayers they work hard every day to try to make a living and provide for their families. Look at what massive government debt does to them. It imposes a fantastic tax burden.

In 1963, if I remember correctly, taxes constituted about 20 per cent or a little over that of where people's income went to. People worked hard and all that hard work and effort was a tremendous positive force pushing up and providing jobs and prosperity for the country. Then we had that 20 per cent of taxes pushing down a little but not nearly enough to stop the desires and incentives that people had to create some prosperity for themselves and their families.

As the years have gone on we have seen more taxes piled on top of that positive force and now it is very difficult for that force to push up anymore. That is why a lot of people are giving up on Canada and giving up on staying in the working world. That is why we see people fleeing to the United States and other lower tax jurisdictions, particularly people who are highly skilled.

Other disincentives are the perverse incentives that are a big part of a lot of social programs today, social programs that actually pay people to remain idle. People who are responsible, work hard, want to provide for their families and work long hours every week see this. They ask themselves: "Why am I knocking myself out when the next guy over does not care and he is just laying on the system?". There is a real inequality in the system. We have a lot of disincentives now piling up on top of all those desires and wants of Canadians. It is beginning to push them down and they are getting tired.

As investors they expect to make a good return on their money but they also expect that their capital should be protected. We have been sent a message in the last seven days that investments in this country are in jeopardy to some degree because the government has not been able to get a handle on its overspending.

Now the international community is wondering whether Canada is a place where it should be putting its money. The same applies to domestic investors who have lots of options other than their own country.

I saw in the Globe and Mail the other day a very scary graph that showed how indebted Canada is to foreign investors compared with other countries around the world. It was frightening. We have a foreign debt load twice what the next country in the world has. I found it frightening to know that we are so tied to the whim of foreign investors because successive governments have not been able to get a handle on spending.

Now we have a situation in which this government is proposing to add another $100 billion to our overall debt load before we get down to $25 billion. That is its target and it is ridiculous.

International investors have to deal with that, as do domestic investors. Although they want to invest in this country there are a lot of disincentives and a lot of pressure pushing the other way to prevent them from doing that and to dissuade them.

As people who want to invest and want to have confidence in our social programs they are very concerned as well. In spite of the fact that we spend $150 billion a year on social programs we still have all kinds of unemployment. HRD's own studies show that social programs are contributing to unemployment, including the unemployment insurance program. In many cases we have people living at the bottom echelons of society with no hope, not because there is not a safety net there but because they are trapped in the safety net.

I think it is crazy that in a country this prosperous relative to the rest of the world where we spend $150 billion a year on social programs we have people trapped with no hope in our social programs. Something must be done to help them out of that situation.

This morning I believe that Reform came up with some alternatives that will get people out of that situation, give them some hope and give them some of the positive incentives they so desperately want to be in alignment with Canadians' wants and desires.

People in the bottom echelons of society are as desperate as anyone else to see their dreams and hopes realized. However, this government and successive governments have placed all kinds of disincentives in their way to prevent that.

The government has set no date for the elimination of the deficit. The best it can do is come up with a point two years down the road from now where it will reduce the deficit to $25 billion. It refers to its rolling two-year targets, whatever that means. Maybe it is like a moving target, one it does not want to hit and can keep moving it.

Very often the government says it does not know what the future holds so there is no point in setting a date when it will eliminate the deficit or when it will balance the budget. It is true that we do not know what the future holds but it is ludicrous for the Government of Canada to say that it does not know what the future holds and therefore is not going to set a date for when it can eliminate the deficit. That is crazy. It is almost criminally

negligent when one considers how many people's lives depend on what that government decides.

It is a little like telling people who are saving for their own retirement: "Yes, you should save some money but it does not matter how much because we do not know what the future holds. Perhaps somewhere down the road you will win the lottery or you will inherit a bunch of money so don't worry about it". It is the same mentality that the government is applying.

I fear very much for Canadians if we are going to take this situation so lightly that the government, in spite of what international investors have been telling us even this week, is going to say it does not matter, it does not know what the future holds and therefore it is not going to set any targets. I think it is absolutely crazy. The government must wake up for the benefit of all Canadians and acknowledge that it has to set a hard target and take some tough action right now so that it can move toward it.

What Canadians really want is a government that is absolutely in line with their wants and needs. They want programs that encourage their deep desire to be self-reliant, not programs that work against it. They want an economy that rewards their work, not punishes them. They want a government that gets out of their face, not like this one which seems to have to have a finger in every aspect of their lives. The government has been absolutely without a single success that I can think of, in terms of really helping people over the long haul. I will talk about that in more detail in a moment.

Canadians want a federal government that recognizes its severe limitations. A federal government in a country this size that is so far removed from ordinary Canadians has tremendous limitations. That needs to be understood. The federal government has to allow lower levels of government, families, charities, communities and obviously, individuals themselves to take more responsibility for their lives and to empower people to do things for themselves and give them some of the hope that they truly need.

I want to talk a bit about some of the areas where government has failed dramatically and compare them with areas where individuals have absolutely succeeded.

The first example I want to use is the Canada pension plan, and I will throw in old age security for good measure. I want to compare it with how RRSPs have done, a program that Canadians fund themselves and they are joining in ever greater numbers. In fact, I saw in the newspaper today that there has been a tremendous rise in the number of people who have gone to get bank loans so they can buy RRSPs.

When the Canada pension plan was established it was done so with the belief that it would sustain people in their old age. I do not think there is anyone in the country, and probably not even anyone in all parties in this House, who believes that is going to happen. Everyone knows the Canada pension plan is woefully underfunded. It is about $510 billion in the hole, if you compare it with other actuarially sound pension plans.

Old age security started out as being a funded program. However, that was abandoned and now it comes out of general revenues. People understand that as the debt gets bigger, the amount of money that can go into OAS and other social programs is rapidly diminishing. Most people realize now, even if they did not a year ago, that they cannot rely on government programs.

More and more people are starting to set aside money for themselves. That is why we see RRSPs growing tremendously. It is not a revelation to me that people believe they can save better for their own future than the government can. People all along have had more faith in themselves than in the government when it comes to these types of programs. However, it is only now, when the fiscal situation has become so acute, that people are taking this situation very seriously. They are scrutinizing how the government spends money and scrutinizing the form social programs take.

If we ask people to compare which is more successful today, the Canada pension plan or RRSPs, people are going to say absolutely that RRSPs are much more successful. They know their RRSPs will be there and that the Canada pension plan has eroded over the years.

I am going to get off the fiscal topic for a moment to talk about another area which is indirectly related to social programs and in which the same principle applies.

The other day the minister of multiculturalism said that Canada has no Canadian heritage. I thought that was curious, but then I thought about it and I think I understand what she was saying. For 20-some years or maybe a little longer than that, the government has tried to cobble together an official heritage, some kind of an official culture for this country. It has failed miserably and I think the minister of multiculturalism truly realized that.

Concurrent with that, there is a tremendous rise in Canada in the number of people who are going back to look at their own history. They are going through history books trying to figure out where their ancestors came from, where they lived in this country, and from which countries they originated.

People are very interested in the heritage of this country, but there is a big difference in how the government or the minister defines it and how people define it. People are very proud of their personal histories. All that taken together gives us a very proud heritage in this country.

We could even expand on that a little bit. In many cases, people are very proud of their communities. I come from a small community in Alberta. People there take a tremendous amount of pride in some of the local sites. What they really do not get very excited about are programs like official multiculturalism. They see that as something the government created a long time ago, not in response to their concerns but it was something the government felt it should do, that it knew better than Canadians did of what constituted real culture.

The comments of the minister of multiculturalism from a few days ago indicate that those types of top down programs have completely and utterly failed. The victims were the taxpayers who had to pay billions of dollars for those types of programs to keep them going.

Let us not continue to make the same mistakes over and over again. Let us not continue to have top down government in our social programs when we have shown over and over again that Canadians are more than capable of standing on their own feet. If they are given the tools, they are empowered to do so.

I want to talk about Reform's approach to empowering individual Canadians. We spoke this morning about a new approach to handling social programs. The member for Calgary North is sitting beside me. I applaud her and members of her committee for the tremendous amount of work they did in going out to really listen to Canadians and to come up with an alternative approach to Canada's social programs and safety nets, one that is really in alignment with Canadians' wants and desires.

Reform talked a little today about how we can empower the different groups of people who make up our country. We talked about empowering seniors, how we need to focus OAS and the guaranteed income supplement on people who are most in need.

This country is in tremendous financial difficulty. We have a debt that is over $550 billion. Just about everybody realizes we are going to have to target our social programs to people who actually need them. That is what we have proposed in our document this morning.

We are going to eliminate mandatory retirement so that those who choose to work beyond 65 can continue to do so. There was an article in the Ottawa Citizen today that talked about the high suicide rate among seniors once they are forced to quit at age 65.

We are not saying that you have to keep working. We are not saying that at all. We are saying that if people want to, they can continue to work. Many people have a tremendous amount of potential and ability to still give to society when they hit 65 years. Of course people are living longer now. We see elderly MPs who make a tremendous contribution to the House. We should not write people off because they have come to an arbitrary point set some years ago. Let us make sure that people, if they want to, can continue to fulfil their aspirations.

We want to give this country long term tax relief which will help seniors and all Canadians. Seniors are just as hard hit as anybody by high taxes. We have to move away from a government and a system that really does encourage growth in taxes. To do that, we need some accountability in the system. Maybe that could be a discussion for another day.

Of course, we have talked about our registered personal security plans. That is something we can talk about in more detail when we have some time.

We have talked about empowering families, strengthening the capacity of families to care for themselves and their dependants with tax relief and tax reform. We would like to see child care assistance come in a neutral form so that people themselves can decide what kind of child care they want.

I want to make a strong point. We are calling for a national registry so that people who have dodged their obligations to their families, those who are supposed to be making child support payments but have somehow dodged them will be eventually tracked down and forced to pay up.

I am proud to say that my office has helped track down a lot of deadbeat spouses. Eventually these people have had to pay up. They have to pay the money back to their children through their ex-spouses.

The government has really not moved quickly enough in this area, although it has been in power for about 16 months. We very strongly advocate having a meeting with the provinces to work with them to put that registry in place. It is absolutely critical. Hundreds of millions of dollars out there are not getting to the children who really need the money. We are going to push very hard for that.

As we have mentioned before, we do have our RPS plan which we are going to consult with Canadians on and hopefully, eventually put into place. It would be a way to give some power back to families and allow them to provide for themselves.

We want to empower the unemployed and the job creators. I want to talk a little bit about the five-R jobs plan Reform has come up with. It is radically different from what the government has proposed in its infrastructure program.

We are proposing to reduce and eliminate the federal debt and deficit. We are proposing to relieve Canadians of their oppressive tax burden. We are proposing to restore labour market

efficiency and reduce social program dependency. We wish to remove barriers to internal and external trade. We want to renew Canada's physical and intellectual infrastructure. Those are the five steps we would take to get Canadians back to work.

We could talk for a long time about these issues, but I know my time is up. I encourage the government to move quickly to establish a point at which it will reduce the deficit to zero and balance the budget.

[Mac Harb, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister for International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the speech by the hon. member. He was raving on about doom and gloom and negative things. I did not hear him speak at any time of the positive things this government has done since taking power.

I did not hear him talk about the fact that Canada for the first time in 10 years has led the industrialized world in terms of economic growth. I did not hear the hon. member talk about the fact that in a matter of one year and four months this government has created more jobs than the previous government did over a period of 10 years.

I did not hear the hon. member talk about all the progressive initiatives this government is taking in terms of embarking on major reforms, the foreign policy reforms, the social program reforms, the tax reforms. There are all of the major initiatives the government has taken on in order to look at the kinds of programs the federal government is suited to offer versus the provincial governments.

I did not hear the member talk about the infrastructure program this government has put in place. Municipalities from coast to coast have endorsed it and have spoken positively about it. People have seen positive things coming out of it.

I also did not hear the member congratulate the government on the fact that for the first time in a matter of 10 years this government will meet its deficit goals.

The business community is fed up with this negativism. The business community tells us day in and day out that it wants positive talk. It wants us to stop talking negatively. When will my colleagues in the Reform Party stop talking about the doom and gloom?

I will read a quote from a newspaper in Alberta where some of my colleagues were elected. The February 7 Edmonton Journal talks about the tax revolt which is being led by the Reform Party and states: "That is why the tax revolt incited by Manning and played out by the Canadian Taxpayers' Federation has the reek of raw manipulation about it. It is a classic case of setting up a straw man, knocking it over and savouring the victory. Instead of-

[The Deputy Speaker]

The hon. member for Medicine Hat.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry that the hon. member subscribes to these conspiracy theories that the Reform Party has created the tax revolt. He should give Canadians more credit.

There are a lot of people out there who are vitally concerned about the state of this country's economy. They are vitally concerned about the fact that they are being taxed to death. We did not have to invite people to talk about this issue. When the government was floating trial balloons about RRSPs there were many letters that came to the finance minister to tell him to get the government's hands off their wallets. We did not have to do that.

The parliamentary secretary has talked about the fact that the country is leading the world in economic growth. What he did not say is it is because of the people in this country. It is not because of the government. He said the government has done this. He said the government has created jobs. Government does not create jobs. It was small businesses that created jobs. It was not because of the government, it was in spite of the government.

The parliamentary secretary talked a bit about the new initiatives that the government is taking, social program reform. That is a laugh. Even the human resources development minister admitted on national TV that it was dead, as dead as the dodo. That was a few days before the social program committee had to report. For crying out loud, the fact that it has started on an initiative is no guarantee it is going anywhere and that has certainly been the case with social program reform.

The infrastructure program that he referred to has given Canada some boccie courts in Toronto, a canoe museum in the Prime Minister's riding, another $6 billion in debt. There is no doubt about that.

There have been many things that the government has done, but let us not believe for a moment that they have been positive. They have added to our debt. They have contributed to the concerns that taxpayers and investors have around the world. That is why this government has been assailed by investors and by taxpayers over the last couple of weeks. If the member doubts me, pick up the newspaper and take a look.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the member. I cannot get over the fact that the member would try to compare the RRSP system, which is essentially a government created system, not for a large number of Canadians, with the Canada pension plan which is something that every Canadian has access to. It is probably only about 40 per cent of Canadians who have even the ability to participate in an RRSP plan.

I want to challenge the member on one particular program of government that I personally am very proud of, multiculturalism. I happen to believe that multiculturalism is one the jewels

of this country and because of people being very frivolous with it we are about to lose it.

For over 20 years, since 1971, we invested, promoted and encouraged Canadians to preserve their language and culture of origin. Today because of that investment by Canadian taxpayers we are recognized as one of the greatest trading countries on the planet. One of the reasons we are and that we have that trading advantage is that we have people who have preserved their language and culture of origin and it has given us very special access to these lucrative markets all around the world. Multiculturalism has also made us a tourism asset which if we ever got our marketing act together could be another envy of the world.

I think the Reform Party should be very careful when it is criticizing these programs and just wants to sweep them away. Renew them, eliminate waste, fiscal discipline, I support all of that. We would be absolute crazies if we did anything to take away our multiculturalism policy which is the envy right now. The United States is now in the process of spending billions of dollars to try to promote a multicultural reality because it had its melting pot theory. We were so far ahead of it and the Reform Party has missed the whole point.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. parliamentary secretary must have been very discouraged when his own minister of multiculturalism acknowledged publicly that we have no Canadian heritage.

I want to talk a little about some of the things the parliamentary secretary said. He said that we should have multiculturalism so people will preserve their language and they can use that for trade. I have more faith in people than that. I think there are people who have always preserved their language so they could trade.

It is crazy to suggest that since 1971 there has been some huge jump in the amount of people who are preserving their languages so they can trade around the world. I do not have the statistics but I would love to see the statistics. I think I could convince the hon. member across the way that we did not need to spend $25 million a year for the past many years to encourage people to do that.

I think people are proud enough of their own heritage and that they will continue to preserve their own heritage at their own expense, without having some government program run by people who think they know better than individuals themselves what their lives should be like. That is crazy. It is time to give people some credit for being able to run their own lives.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to participate in this debate. This morning I had an opportunity to pick up a copy of the Reform Party's taxpayers' budget, a plan to balance the federal budget.

I thought it was very appropriate that today in question period the finance minister was able to rise in his place and with only a very short period of time to look at this advise the Reform Party this plan would not balance the federal budget. He went on to explain why.

I want to give a few comments about what this document really means. It is important that the Reform Party has now put on the table what it really had in mind, the details it left out when it presented its balanced budget program to the finance committee last fall. It laid out $10 billion of cuts on non-social program spending, which only added up to $9 billion, showing the accuracy of the information it was given.

It did not tell Canadians about the social program side of it. It is only fair to let Canadians know now. I appreciate the Reform Party is now letting Canadians know what its real agenda is. Canadians should know its real agenda.

If you are on a guaranteed income supplement, the Reform Party is out to get you. If you are on old age security, the Reform Party is out to get you. If you are receiving Canada pension plan, the Reform Party is out to get you. If you are receiving health care benefits, the Reform Party is out to get you. If you are on socially assisted housing, the cuts in the CMHC, the Reform Party is out to get you. If you are on unemployment insurance-read the document-the Reform Party is now out to get you.

I had an opportunity to review the document this morning. It is quite simply an incomplete document. There is no information on the economic impact of the proposed cuts. It is unclear which programs are going to be cut and the numbers it will cut from several government programs are not there.

The leader of the third party admitted it this morning in the press conference. He did not have the numbers and details to support the numbers. It was simply an arithmetic exercise the Reform Party went through to say it can come up with $25 billion.

It did not cost out the impact of those cuts. It did not even take into account many fundamental assumptions that are necessary in preparing a budget. It is not being honest with the Canadian public. It is not telling Canadians the true impact of the proposals on seniors. It is not telling Canadians the truth.

It does not take into account we have a growing number of seniors. It does not take into account which seniors will be affected by the proposed $3 billion in cuts. Rents for seniors will be impacted if CMHC is privatized. It did not say how much. It did not care about seniors when it did this.

During question period there was quite a debate going on about the word compassion. I can say in all sincerity that there is no compassion in this document. Slash and burn is the title of this document. The Reform budget is based on a philosophy that says families and charities should be the ones to take the burden for social programs. The Reform Party just wants to second the responsibility for these important programs to families and to charities that already are stretched to the limit.

How many families can afford personal insurance RRSPs? Reformers are proposing that Canadians set up some sort of quasi-RRSP to provide for their own unemployment benefits, their own education, their own retirement and for their own non-essential health care.

Today most Canadians cannot even afford to contribute to RRSPs and yet the Reform Party is saying it can eliminate old age security, the Canada pension plan, all of these things that the government does. All it has to do is let people contribute to RRSPs. This is not clear thinking at all. Reformers are out of touch with Canadians and out of touch with the basic communities.

The Reform budget includes a two tier health system, the slash and burn to our health care system. It is unbelievable. There is a 25 per cent cut in transfers to the provinces. There is a proposed reduction in international aid. There is no question that there may be some cuts there but the Reform Party fails to realize the importance of international aid as it is tied into the promotion of our international trade which is a major source of new economic growth.

The Reform Party has not addressed the accumulative impact on the regions of Canada, the cuts in equalization payments that it is proposing, the regional development and support programs to industry. There is not one detail as to the impact of those cuts. Simply we can cut the spending and they do not do anything anyway so the cuts will have no impact. That is fundamentally wrong.

What are the main features? Reform has said it is going to cut $10 billion out of government operations and non-social program spending. This is the same or similar to the report of the finance committee of the House of Commons. These are the things that were dealt with, the business subsidies, et cetera. I do not think there is much argument there. However, the key component that was missing was the component with regard to the social programs and that is where it is going to cut $15 billion out of social security spending, including $3 billion from the elderly, $3.4 billion from unemployment insurance and $6.6 billion from transfers to the provinces.

Let me deal very briefly with elderly benefits. Reformers are talking about a $3 billion cut. However, if one takes into account population growth and indexation, the real cut they would have to make is something like $5 billion. They have not taken into account the fact that we do have an aging population and that there will be more people demanding those benefits presently being offered. That has not been taken into account. That is a fundamental flaw in the entire document.

In addition, the programs include income thresholds and age requirements. I think the Minister of Finance today in question period basically laid out that if one were receiving old age security, under the savings that the Reformers are proposing in their plan the threshold for clawback would be something like $11,000. That means people who are receiving GIS would all of a sudden not be getting old age security.

This slash and burn and trash people is the kind of thing that Canadians should know about, the vision and the plans that the Reform Party has for Canadians. The Reform Party is out to get you is the message this document shows.

I wanted to talk very briefly about UI reform. Reformers said they would eliminate regionally extended benefits, lengthen work requirements and shorten the benefit entitlements to lower benefit payouts for repeat users with each additional claim. Reformers count the $3.4 billion benefit reduction to the deficit because they could not let premium rates go down but rather they would run up a huge-estimated at around a $12 billion-accumulative surplus on the UI account until the overall budget deficit is eliminated.

This kind of mathematics is simply numbers. There is no substance, no vision, no explanation and no detail to the impacts. There is no compassion in this document at all.

What about the transfers to the provinces? Reformers are going to lower cash transfers under the EPF and the CAP but they are also going to transfer additional tax points.

In question period today the finance minister pointed out very succinctly that you cannot have it both ways. Revenue is going to be impaired simply because of the transfer. Sure it is in there. It is in there to show the arithmetic works but if you do not take all the components into account, the budget will not balance. The Reform Party has not carefully managed the revenue stream that it is going to need.

The $3 billion reduction in equalization would be a massive attack on the poorest provinces. Regional differences do not matter. The Reform Party represents Alberta. It does not care about the maritimes. It does not care about Newfoundland. It does not care about Quebec. All it cares about is, we can do it ourselves and why can you not?

Members of the House of Commons have to speak on behalf of all Canadians. We have to have a national vision, a Canadian vision. We have to speak on behalf of all Canadians, not just on behalf of our own regional interests.

The conclusion I reached in going over this document is that it is terribly vague but it does show some very important points, the most important of which is the absolute attack on seniors, on the elderly, on those who are in most need in our society. That to me represents what is contained in this document that the Reform Party says is going to balance the budget. Let us look at some of the facts.

Canada's growth rate in the last year was 4.25 per cent, the highest in the G-7. The OECD predicts that Canada will continue to lead the industrial world for the next two years. Real exports are up. The Conference Board found a positive boost in investment, with 81 per cent of firms planning more investment.

Over 450,000 new jobs have been created since the government took over. The 1994 budget laid the foundation. Today the Minister of Finance announced that next Monday, February 27 he will present the next budget for the people of Canada.

There we will see how a government shows compassion and also meets its fiscal targets of 3 per cent of GDP by the end of the third year and lays the foundation for the next two-year cycle to bring Canada's budget into balance.

That is what the Liberal Party stands for, not slash and trash, particularly seniors and those most in need in our society.

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay East, BC]

Mr. Speaker, how scared the Liberals are of the Reform Party when they make absolutely outstanding comments. This speech is just absolutely, totally off the wall.

As I said to another member from the southern Toronto area, my family and the families of the people within our party have seniors who we are concerned about. We are concerned that this government is destroying the ability of government to fund the social programs on which they depend.

He says about us: "You are just doing to slash and burn, you are going to trash seniors". I cannot imagine the fear that there must be within the Liberal Party that finally there is a party that is prepared to stand up and expose government overspending, expose its inability to get spending under control. Social programs are under threat from the Liberal government.

I do not see anything positive about coming into the House and characterizing Reform members as being uncaring and not worried about social programs. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, that is the reason why we are here. That is the reason why we made such an effort today. We want Canadians to have an opportunity to see an alternative to the silliness that is presently going on.

I ask the hon. member a question. I know he has an accounting background and must be able to read a balance sheet. Surely he must know that while revenue is growing at a rate of 3.3 per cent, debt is growing at a rate of 10.3 per cent. The 7 per cent spread is growing. Every single solitary dollar of the $110 million that we borrow today is going to pay interest on the money we have already borrowed. We are going deeper and deeper into the hole.

Perhaps the hon. member can tell us, as a professional accountant, how in the world can you possibly run a balance sheet when you are going into debt twice as fast as you collect revenue?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member always talks as if the Reform Party would not increase the debt over the period that it is talking about. It never talks about how much it would increase the debt in implementing its plan.

Let me read from the Reform Party's document. This is what that party is going to do to seniors. To Canada Mortgage and Housing it proposes a 24 per cent cut. Does that party not believe that seniors require assisted housing? If we look at seniors' benefits, there is a 15 per cent cut in all of their benefits. Clearly those cuts would be at the lower end where people can least afford it. To unemployment insurance it proposes a 22 per cent cut, and a 34 per cent cut in welfare.

I do not have to go on. Simply look at the numbers. We can see that this document, which was prepared by the third party, represents an attack on Canadians who are the most in need.

[Randy White, Reform, Fraser Valley West, BC]

Mr. Speaker, in this life if you do not make a choice, someone will make it for you. That is what is happening to that motley crew over there.

The government sounds like an opposition party, not a leading party. My colleague has done nothing but critique the Reform's proposals. The difficulty that I am having here is, what is the Liberal Party doing?

I would like to ask the hon. member this. How much debt will the Liberals have incurred since taking office to the end of their mandate?

The second part of the question is: At the end of the mandate I believe the Liberal Party will be overspending by approximately $26 billion a year. We say zero. Which is better for Canadians in the long run?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the government election campaign was run in October 1993 on a platform which said that it would achieve 3 per cent of GDP by the end of the third year of the

mandate. The Minister of Finance has brought down a budget. We are on track.

If members noticed, the Minister of Finance said today that not only are we going to meet this year's deficit target, we will do substantially better. I think that is important.

The hon. member asked a very important question. What would be better, zero or 25? It is the same question, the answer to which is basically that the operation was a success but the patient died. That is what the Reform Party is proposing. It is proposing an operation that will get us to zero, but at the same time Canada's social programs will die.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin-

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay East, BC]

Now we will get some intelligent comments.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

You may not say that by the time I-