Mr. Speaker, I would like to say it is a real pleasure to discuss the bill in the House but I cannot. However, I can tell you how disgusted I am with the government for moving closure on what is probably the most important bill it will bring before parliament in this mandate.
We have had eight hours of debate and already the government has moved closure. Hon. members in the Reform Party, and no doubt in other parties as well, will tell the House that when people come to their town hall meetings the issue that is highest on their agenda is the issue of pensions.
I guess the government does not think it is important enough to allow parliamentarians to debate this issue. After merely eight hours it has said “Enough, we are going to close off debate”. That is absolutely disgusting, anti-democratic and typical Liberal.
Last time around the Liberals jumped all over the Tories who set a record for introducing closure. This time around the Liberals have already gone well beyond what the Tories did. It proves the old adage of my friend, the member formerly for Beaver River, now from Edmonton North, Liberal-Tory, same old story.
I want to speak now to the essence of the bill. First, the Canada pension plan is in serious trouble. Everybody knows that. It has a $560 billion liability. We know that in order to deal with the problems of the plan, the government is raising the premiums by an astounding 73%, the largest tax hike in Canadian history, a $10 billion tax hike by the final year that the new premiums go into effect. Despite that $10 billion when people retire they will still only get a pension of $8,800.