Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise and speak today on Bill C-85, an attempt to reform the MP pension plan. Before I do I would like to address a couple of comments of the member for St. Boniface who attempted to make such an eloquent defence of the indefensible.
This really has not been much of a debate. Very few have come to defend this so-called reform of the MP pension plan, although he did make a feeble effort. He talks about being fair. I wonder who we are attempting to be fair to here. I suggest it is about time we were fair to the taxpayers who have been paying the bill for all of these years for this gold plated pension plan.
He also talks about what the provincial governments are doing in their pension plans. He forgot to mention the promise of Liberal Party in Ontario to scrap its pension plan and put in
something that is more in line with the private sector, as has already happened in Alberta and will happen in P.E.I. Those provincial governments have got the message that these gold plated pension plans have to go. The federal government has not got the message yet.
It is obvious from this bill that the members of the government still do not understand that what we are talking about here is integrity, credibility, and getting a handle on the deficit and debt by showing leadership by example.
The President of the Treasury Board said during his opening remarks that the pension debate has been discussed here for 10 years. For the same 10 years it has been cussed in the rest of Canada. The voters have been upset with it and have been growing more upset. I can assure all members of the government that Bill C-85 will not end the discussion or the cussing. It will continue because the bill does not address the problems. I can assure the House this will be an issue in the next federal election because we will be there to make sure it is.
When we had some limited debate, Liberal comments were that the amount of money is small when it is taken in the context of the total debt.