Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak in support of this very thoughtful and very important legislation. As my colleague, the member for St. Albert, stated in his remarks, the objective of Bill C-289 is to hold statutory spending to the same standards of accountability that Parliament currently applies to discretionary expenditures. That is a very noble and worthwhile cause to put forward in this assembly.
While time is limited, there are two points I want to make in these remarks. First, as statutory programs come to represent an ever-increasing amount or share of total government expenditures, the inability of Parliament to evaluate these programs effectively and objectively is making it more and more difficult for members of Parliament to hold governments accountable. For this reason there is a need to have a bill such as Bill C-289.
The second point is that the intense fiscal pressures brought about by decades of government over-spending not only make enhanced review and evaluation of statutory expenditures desirable, but certainly very essential at this point.
On the first point, I would like to remind the members of the House how our system of government is supposed to work. Under the Constitution as members of Parliament we have been granted three very important powers. First, we must decide how much government will be permitted to spend. Second, we must decide how the government will spend it. Third, we have an obligation to hold the government accountable for those expenditures.
The objective of the legislation is to bolster and to enhance the third of these three parliamentary powers that are given to us as members of Parliament. Specifically, it asks that statutory programs be subject to the same periodic program evaluations that are presently applied to non-statutory programs.
These program evaluations seek to answer four very fundamental questions. First, is the program relevant? Second, is the program effective in meeting its objectives? Third, is the program being delivered effectively and efficiently? Fourth, can the purpose of the program be fulfilled through a variety of different means?
At present no such reviews are conducted for statutory items. When weighing the merits of extending program evaluations to cover this area, we must consider the following: This year, fiscal year 1995-96, the Government of Canada will spend some $164 billion dollars. Of this only $48 billion will be subject to parliamentary review. That means that some 71 per cent, or the remaining $116 billion of our tax dollars will be spent automatically without any attempt to evaluate those programs success. That is just not accountability. That has to change. That is the main purpose of Bill C-289.
Given the size of these annual expenditures, it seem rather ludicrous that members of the House would not be provided with the information to determine whether such programs are effective in meeting their objectives. It is hard to believe that members would have no way of determining whether there is a better way to do things. Yet that is the current state of affairs. Members do not have the information they need to evaluate the effectiveness of statutory programs.
This brings me to my second point. The federal government is presently facing what amounts to a fiscal crisis. It finds itself under immense pressure to reduce government expenditures. Even after making significant cuts to discretionary expenditures in its last budget, it will still have a deficit of $25 billion in the year 1997.
Simple arithmetic tells us that if the government has any hope of achieving a balanced budget then the lion's share of the cuts will have to be made in the area of statutory expenditures. Discretionary programs have already been cut or pared to the bone. The only sizeable pool of money left is in the area of statutory programs and programs such as old age assistance.
That is why Bill C-289, which would subject the statutory programs to periodic review and evaluation, is so critical. In the coming years, members of Parliament will be called on to make more difficult and tough decisions than previous Parliaments have had to make. We will have no choice but to reduce or even
eliminate benefits which millions of Canadians consider to be virtual birthrights.
If we as parliamentarians are to fulfil that task in a responsible manner then we will need the information to make intelligent decisions. At present this information does not exist. Bill C-289 seeks to fill this information gap.
In conclusion, Bill C-289 is valuable legislation which would address two fundamental concerns. First, by improving the scrutiny of statutory expenditures, it would begin to put control of the government purse back in the hands of Parliament.
Second, the information obtained from these evaluations and reviews would provide members with the information they need to make intelligent spending decisions. At a time when every government program is being evaluated, when the most sacred of government cows is being reconsidered and when every dollar is now subject to careful scrutiny by the budget cutters, legislation like Bill C-289 is not merely desirable but is most essential.