Actually, yes, I am.
Since time allocation motions may be moved only at one or two stages of a bill, no bill may pass the House without opposition co-operation unless the government has applied time allocation two or three times to that one bill.
A quick calculation of these facts shows that government bills in the House of Commons have been considered at 429 separate stages at which time allocation could have been applied. On only 27 of these occasions has time allocation been applied, which is only 6.3 per cent of the time. On five of these occasions, however, at least one opposition party gave procedural assistance to the implementation of time allocation, leaving only 22 occasions on which the government unilaterally implemented time allocation. That is only 5.1 per cent of all possible occasions.
Another important issue about time allocation is that Canadian citizens expect us to get on with the business of governing. They request that we move forward. We hear all the time about how slow government is and how much it needs to move forward. I would suggest, as those of us who came from the world of business know, that the time the discussion is called to an end we can agree to disagree, vote and move forward. I have absolutely no problem with our record.
With regard to the blended sales tax I understand in this morning's debate there were some particularly outrageous comments on the concept of the blended sales tax.
It seems the Bloc Quebecois has spent its time for debate on this important issue telling Atlantic Canadians that their elected officials, the bureaucrats and the people of Atlantic Canada themselves do not know what they want and that the BQ knows what
Atlantic Canadians want. It is a pretty curious situation. They are trying to deny the Atlantic provinces the blended sales tax when they have had that system since the GST was implemented.
The second component of their time was used to talk about the adjustment assistance package when that is not even being considered today. In fact it has already been dealt with in a previous bill.
What do members of the House of Commons do? They are supposed to be debating the issue at hand. They are supposed to be getting on with the business of the day. They are supposed to be implementing legislation that Canadians want. Instead the opposition parties are getting into a silly game of trying to oppose the business we are trying to accomplish, to debate other issues that are not on the table and, in the case of the BQ, to use the time to tell people who actually elected them to make the decision for them that they are wrong and the BQ knows better.
I suggest they run federal candidates in all the provinces in the next election and we will see where the chips will fall.
I am particularly disturbed that my province does not have the opportunity to have a blended sales tax, even though we hear from Canadians and business people all the time about the complicated procedure of two sales taxes on two different bases, with two different collection times.
In the last provincial election our premier advanced to the Canadian Manufacturers' Association the reasons we in Ontario need a blended sales tax. I will quote the premier of the province:
I want something that works. And I'll tell you this: that if we had one VAT (value-added tax), one base, one bureaucracy to collect it, the manufacturers and the businesses in Ontario would save over a billion dollars by being able to deduct those costs that you cannot deduct today on the sales tax.
Mike Harris went on to say:
It has been one of the areas of major competitive disadvantage that Ontario manufacturers have had and Ontario businesses have had and I say, stop the rhetoric, stop the politics, stop the finger-pointing. Get on with harmonization and simplification of the GST-or whatever the new initials are-and the PST.
Mr. Harris underestimated the savings to provincial businesses and manufacturers by some $6 billion. The savings to the provinces and their businesses would be $7.8 billion with a blended tax system. So I say to Mr. Harris to stop the rhetoric, stop the finger pointing. Let us get on and make a better system for those provinces and businesses.
Why are we giving a competitive advantage to the provinces of New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and Quebec? Why do our business people have to struggle with complicated paperwork many times during the 12 months of the year on two different bases. Why can they not deduct what they should be able to deduct for their input costs?
Now is the time for action. Now is the time to end this debate and to move on to a vote on this issue. Let us go to the electorate with our platforms in place.