Mr. Speaker, I have just a few words to say in response to what the hon. member for Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre was saying.
He made some references to Reform and some of them were a little unkind. I want him to know that as a fellow hon. member I respect him anyway. I hope he learns to clean up his thinking. That will then clean up his speaking.
I would like to say a few words about this whole general concept. There is this anti anything outside Canada bias by some people. Yet we find, for example, the Liberal government at a snap of a finger will lend $1.5 billion to China to finance a nuclear reactor, a country which has not signed on to any nuclear non-proliferation agreement, a country which does not comply with environmental standards, a country which we presume will maybe some time pay back this $1.5 billion by goods it produces or whatever. We hope that is true. The government is thinking it can do that with taxpayer money.
If we are going to say we do not want to do that, that we are going to do everything inside Canada only, I think we will entirely loose our trade. Very frankly one of our strongest trading partners is also one of our strongest economic partners, the United States. If we are able to invest some of our retirement money in the United States, it has to be at least as secure as the money invested in Canada in most instances. It seems to me rather arbitrary to say that we should not do this.
There is another aspect to this that is very important. There is not a gift or a payment by other taxpayers when someone puts money into an RRSP. The same thing is true when we invest in the Canada pension plan fund. The fact is if some of that money is invested from outside the country, it comes back with a return. According to the rules on both Canada pension and RRSP that money is then taxable on receipt.
Why on earth would we say we do not want any American money in Canada? If we can take $100 and have it bring back another $100 because it has been invested there for a number of years at a good interest rate, it brings $100 into this country from an international market that was not here before. It is now going to be taxed at regular tax rates. So it not only adds to the wealth of the country but it also produces tax revenue for the government at the time of retirement, as all RRSPs do.
The member from the NDP has some really cute statements. I like that one about Reform getting at the grassroots. He had it wrong about the sand part and the head. We do want to listen to the people. We want to do what is best for them. He is cute in that regard, but I really think he should start thinking a little more globally, a little more laterally, think a little more beyond a very narrow focus that the NDP seems to be stuck in. That has kept it at the low level of public support it has enjoyed over the last 50 years.