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.