Debates of Dec. 11th, 1997

Committees Of The House

[Mac Harb, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I do not know what planet my colleague is living on. In fact, he has forgotten that in a matter of three years this government has been able to win the war on the deficit and to balance its books. We came out of a devastating recession. We came out of a situation that was beyond control.

Before we decide to take every single penny of surplus and dump it in across the board tax relief for what he calls Canadians, I wonder whether he is advocating this tax cut relief be given, for example, to someone who makes $500,000 or whether it should be given to somebody who makes $30,000. Is he really advocating across the board tax relief without having a balanced approach to say if John Smith or ABC Canada Inc. or whoever is making enough money, they do not need the tax relief? These are the people who can make it on their own.

I do not understand how he can stand up without blushing and call for tax cuts across the board when what this government is doing is providing incentives, proper programs, proper dividends and proper assistance for people who need the assistance.

He cannot just say that the government has not done anything to help people like Mrs. Lee. As a result of this government policy Mrs. Lee and many others like her across the country have been able to save. For example, on a house with a $100,000 mortgage they could save over $3,000 a year. That dividend is a result of what the government has done. That came as a result of what this government has done in terms of proper fiscal management of the nation as a whole.

Sometimes I wonder about that kind of poison coated statement that comes from some of my colleagues on the other side of the House when they talk about special interest programs. I believe it is their objective to eradicate every single grant that is given to special interest groups. Mrs. Lee, her husband and her children fall under those special interest groups. These are the kinds of groups, organizations and individuals who benefit from what they define as special grants or special interest groups.

They want to eradicate every single grant for every single special interest group because they probably call women a special interest group. They call organizations for the disabled special interest groups. They call groups that are multicultural organizations special interest groups and they paint everybody with the same brush and they want to cut grants all across the board.

My colleague should stand up within the next 30 seconds or so and congratulate the government on the excellent job it has done in trying to strike a balance between controlling the deficit, reducing the debt and ensuring that Canadians get the net dividend out of its proper fiscal responsibility. Would he stand up and congratulate the government right now?

[Jason Kenney, Reform, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Madam Speaker, I will not congratulate the government for perpetuating 15 years of shrinking disposable after tax income for the average family. This member talks about lower interest rates. That has not been felt by people even when the member includes the reduction in interest rates. People are coming home with less today than they did 15 years ago, in real terms after tax, because of the tax burden.

Talk about tax fairness, this member is from a shameless party. I remember the prime minister held a confederation dinner with 2,300 people at $500 a plate. He talked about the Reform Party fat cats to people who paid $500 a plate. The same government that talks about fat cats also taxes 7.7 million Canadians who earn under $30,000. It collects over $11 billion from them and takes on average $1,500 per taxpayer just within the income tax system.

People like Mrs. Lee are not feeling anything but the economic pain of 30 years of bigger government. I guess that member just counted himself on the side of those who think they know how to spend that money better than she does.

[Alex Shepherd, Liberal, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to enter into the prebudget debate in the House. I was very happy to have a town hall meeting in my riding of Durham which many of my constituents attended.

Reform members talked about their desire to consult their constituents. It is interesting to look at the back of this report. It talks about the members who actually submitted reports from their constituents to the finance committee. The list includes many of my own colleagues, many of the opposition party colleagues but not a single name of a Reform Party member. That is unfortunate because this was a great opportunity for Reform Party members to do what they are always saying in the House that they do, that they represent their constituents, that they want the views of their constituents heard in Ottawa.

I am happy to say that the people of Durham had a direct voice here. We had a very good and open discussion. Almost 70 people attended. They gave me their ideas on what should be done if there is a fiscal dividend. I was very happy to participate.

I have one slight criticism of the finance committee report. One of the recommendations is to allow for an increase in the deductibility in the foreign component of registered retirement savings plans. Within their RRSPs people can put up to 20% in so-called foreign investments, foreign assets. The finance committee has recommended that the limit be increased.

This is very important. This limit is used not only in RRSPs but in all aspects of the pension system. As I understand it, the newly formed Canada pension plan board would have a similar threshold. I object to this.

I believe we have to focus on what we are talking about when we are talking about RRSP deductions. RRSPs are used as a tax deduction. Essentially, the result of this would be to subsidize, and I underline the word subsidize, higher income earners to invest in foreign countries.

There are no laws in Canada against foreign investments. People are free to do that if that is their choice. However, they may have to do it with their tax paid money, in other words from their normal savings as opposed to actually getting a tax deduction, an incentive if you will, to invest in another country.

That is one small point on which I differ. I believe it would be improper and unwise to proceed in that direction.

A lot of the debate on budgetary items concerns expenditures. The Reform Party and others talk about government spending, spending, spending. What is missing when we talk about the expenditure of money is that sometimes, in fact a lot of the time, the expenditure is an investment.

We should all know the difference between investing and spending. When we invest in something, we expect a return. That is why it is important to recognize in the upcoming budget that we are not wasting money to spend money in areas of some things that will actually come back to us. In other words, that money did not disappear. It will come back to us in the form of a return on our investment.

One of those very important areas is science and technology. There is a general recognition that we must move forward and embrace the challenges which science and technology present to us.

Durham College is in my riding. It has a science and technology faculty. There is something like three jobs for every one of its graduates. We talk about youth unemployment on the one hand, but we also have on the other hand a disproportionate demand for people who are trained in certain areas.

Today I attended the industry committee and we heard from the granting councils. Representatives of the National Research Council, NSERC and MRC appeared before us. They pointed out that Canada's expenditures in research and development lag behind just about every other country in the western world. I think the only country that gives less money to research and development based on its gross domestic product is Italy. We need to invest more in the science field.

Recently the Conference Board of Canada published a very excellent report about the Canadian economy. It found some very remarkable things. It found that Canada is one of the highest spenders in education.

I should interject, Madam Speaker, that I am sharing my time with the hon. member for Oxford.

The Conference Board of Canada made a number of observations. Some of the very important ones were that in post-secondary education, Canada is one of the highest spenders in the world. At the same time, some of the performance in the area of science and technology is in fact some of the most mediocre. We need to revamp some of our educational institutions to ensure that we are training our people properly.

Having said that, it is interesting that one of the initiatives which our government is involved in is called technology partnerships. It is a program I am very proud of. In fact the member across the say said to give away money to Bombardier. Bombardier was a recipient of the technology partnerships program. But that just shows the lack of knowledge that exists on the other side of the House.

Technology partnerships matches the expenditures by companies in the area of research and development. It provides a degree of risk capital but it is an investment that is based on a royalty system. For instance as Bombardier sells more Dash-7 aeroplanes, money comes back into the government.

This program has only been around for about three years and just recently we received our first cheque, a royalty payment coming back to the government. It is very clear that the object of the exercise is to allow this funding to assist. It is sort of risk capital. We are matching money. We have a partnership going with small and medium size businesses to do this.

There is a company close to my riding called Camateoid which is another recipient of a technology partnerships venture capital loan. This is a very interesting company. It makes the paint for the Challenger aircraft. It is very much related to aerospace.

These are some of the ways we can use the resources we have in government to lever other forms of capital, pools of capital that possibly would not have been spent in the area of research and development. That generates all kinds of multipliers in our economy.

It allows our graduating students from high tech institutions to have a place to work in this country. We often talk about the brain drain and how people are being forced to leave this country because the opportunities are not there. This is a very specific way in which the government can invest in some of these sectors, not give the money away but invest it in such a way that the money is coming back to the people of Canada.

I hope that when we are putting our budget together we can find some room to move in these areas. As the granting councils and the Conference Board of Canada have said, Canada is lagging behind.

A lot of the growth in our economy has been based on the export sector, almost 40% now. If our Canadian dollar goes upward vis-à-vis the U.S. dollar which it probably should—and some people suggest the Canadian dollar is worth 85¢—if that happens, we are going to see a lot of unemployment because we have not kept up with the productivity challenges that are going to make this country great.

I reiterate it is important that this government puts more money into research councils and also the technological programs that will make this country strong.

[René Laurin, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, I have a question for my hon. colleague. He seems to be looking for funding for research and development. But the government has a great source of income that has not been tapped into, and intentionally so I think.

Members of the Bloc Quebecois have often spoken in the House about family trusts and trusts in general. The fact is that trusts are exempt from provisional tax, while every other company as well as self-employed workers have to pay tax instalments four times a year.

By making advance payments on their income tax these people are actually making funds available to the government, and the government earns interest on these very large amounts. Why does the government persist in exempting trusts, in which hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars are invested, without requiring that tax instalments be paid on these amounts, thereby benefiting the government much earlier than if it had to wait till the end of the year to receive the tax owed on these trusts?

At present, the government is paid a lump sum at the end of the year, when these trusts file their tax returns. Yet we are looking for funds, we need money that could be used, based on our priorities, to relieve child poverty and to invest more in education, health and research and development, as my hon. colleague just said.

I would like my colleague, who is a member of the party in power, to tell us what he thinks of this approach and why the government would not require trusts to pay tax instalments four times a year, as all self-employed workers are required to do.

[Alex Shepherd, Liberal, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, I cannot specifically answer but I suspect that part of the problem is the predictability of income. For people to pay on a quarterly basis there has to be a degree of predictability of what the income of the trust is going to be. I suspect there is some argument that some trusts are active in some years and not active in others. It is very difficult to predict what their quarterly payments would be. I suggest to the member that it is probably not that significant a loss of revenue in any case.

There are more interesting areas of the administration. I think the member was talking to some extent about the auditor general's report. It was interesting how the banks are actually holding back cheques in the GST system and excise system before they deliver them to the government. Something our government is very keen on looking into is how we can make the whole collection process a lot more efficient and effective and increase some of the revenues to the government.

Most of us think that tax reductions will come and tax relief should come to some of the people the hon. member is talking about.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate the member for Durham on his comments. He has been a very tireless advocate for job creation initiatives and R and D.

I would like to ask him, with regard to the technology partnerships such as the Pasteur Merrieux one which was announced within the past year, whether he could comment on the potential impact on jobs and the economy of those kinds of initiatives.

[Alex Shepherd, Liberal, Durham, ON]

Madam Speaker, I am very happy to respond to the hon. member for Mississauga South who has also been very active in these areas. We share a lot of similarities in our vocation and also in our desire to create jobs in this country.

The whole concept of the expenditures in the technology partnerships program is about creating jobs. Sometimes we forget about taking it to the nth degree. It is about creating jobs. It is about creating opportunities for small and medium size businesses. It is also about helping our environment. Companies like Ballard Power are at the forefront of research and development in Canada and are creating exciting and good jobs for Canadians.

[John Finlay, Liberal, Oxford, ON]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Durham for splitting his time with me.

It is with courage and a commitment to do what is right that the government has been successful on the economic front. The Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance realized we could not continue to burden our children with constant deficits and an ever increasing mountain of debt.

The national debt of more than $600 billion hangs like a millstone around our necks. It takes 35¢ of every tax dollar collected just to pay the interest.

When the Liberal government was first elected in October 1993 we inherited a deficit of $42 billion. This past fiscal year the deficit came in at $8.9 billion, almost $20 billion lower than the deficit in 1995-96. It also represented the largest year over year reduction in the deficit in Canadian history. At 1.1% of GDP as compared to 6% per cent of GDP when the government took office it is the smallest federal government deficit in over two decades.

This represents economic success that we are well on the road to surpassing. There are indications that the federal government will be at or very near a balanced budget this year. With a balanced budget Canadian taxpayers can begin to look forward to annual surpluses rather than annual deficits.

This fiscal dividend will force the government and by extension the Canadian people to make choices about the kind of Canada we want to build for our children and grandchildren.

The Liberal Party pledged during the last federal election that any surplus would be invested in social spending, for example health care, youth employment initiatives and education, as well as debt reduction and tax relief. It was a platform that I endeavoured to ensure my constituents understood so that they knew what to expect from a Liberal government.

It is clear that we need to make certain strategic investments. Some quick examples of this type of investment are the increases in the Canadian health and social transfer allocation to $12.5 billion a year and the prime minister's millennium scholarship fund which will help Canadian students compete in the global economy. These investments strengthen Canadian society for today and tomorrow.

We must remember, though, that the battle against the deficit is not finished. As we enter the era of surplus we must remember that we continue to have an immense debt hanging over our heads. We ignore it at our peril. I am convinced, and I believe the people of Oxford agree with me, that we should invest as much of the surplus as possible in debt reduction.

While it is tempting to prescribe a short term tax reduction fix, it will have been for naught if economic circumstances change and we have not reduced the national debt. The fiscal dividend cannot be used to benefit this generation alone. We must look forward and realize that Canadians decades from now will judge us for what we do about the debt now.

I do not want to tell my grandchildren that when I had the chance to influence government policy, as I do now, I did nothing to relieve them of the tremendous burden of paying interest year after year after year on a $600 billion national debt.

We hear a lot in the House and in the provincial capitals of the country about tax cuts. For the past few years the leader of the Reform Party has stood and asked the Minister of Finance when Canadians could expect an across the board tax cut. As a member of Parliament from Ontario I have been able to see firsthand the effects of the Mike Harris inspired tax cut.

Since Mike Harris is some type of super hero to Reformers, we can assume a Reform administration would operate much like the Ontario Tories. Mike Harris and the Ontario Tories have made a crucial mistake in making a tax cut. By reducing taxes before the budget is balanced, Mike Harris has been forced to make draconian cuts to some essential services in Ontario.

Members of the official opposition may have a problem with my use of the word draconian. To me an additional $700 million cut in education spending, following the $700 million loss in provincial revenues due to the latest round of the tax cut, is draconian. Speaking personally, the small amount of money I save from the Harris tax cut is not worth the effect it is having on the education system in Ontario.

If the Reform Party were governing the country it would follow the lead of Mike Harris. Could the Reform Party tell us how much will have to be cut from education, health care and the environment to pay for the tax cuts? Furthermore, it would add $600 million to our debt through its super RRSP to replace the CPP. How could we possibly trust a party that refuses to even acknowledge that the CPP has an unfunded liability of $600 million that must be paid out whether or not people are paying into the plan?

We all want tax cuts, but those of us on this side of the House feel they should not come before they are sustainable. We cannot afford to cut taxes one year, only to raise them the next, or, worse, cut an essential program because we provided an across the board tax cut before it could be sustained.

In the short term tax cuts should be targeted at those who need it the most. These are students, persons with disabilities and children of working parents with low incomes. To be honest these tax cuts have already been made by the government in the last federal budget.

Now we need to broaden the group to include, possibly, environmental initiatives, agricultural and agri-food development, technological and biological research, and an end to the luxury tax on jewellery. These selective tax cuts could provide a needed shot of adrenalin to the economy while assisting certain sectors to remain competitive.

In the aftermath of Kyoto it would be appropriate for a firm specializing in environmental technologies to receive some tax assistance for undertaking research and development in this area. This can assist Canada and the global community in reaching their goals. Canada is already a leader in environmental technologies. Let us take it one step further to underscore Canada's commitment to the environment and sustainable development.

As well, we need to reward research and development in new agricultural products. Tax measures taken by the Minister of Finance have already assisted in helping a growing domestic ethanol industry. Programs like the tobacco diversification program are successful in assisting farmers in developing new crops. Southwestern Ontario is playing a large role in the development of an industrial hemp crop for export as fibre to the United States. This industry will create jobs in rural Canada and government assistance will allow it to get off to a fast and successful start.

I would also like to discuss briefly the excise tax on jewellery. The finance committee report which we are debating now suggested that the Minister of Finance consider removing this luxury tax. This is a 10% excise tax which is unfair when other items of luxury, such as fur coats, speed boats and sports cars, are not similarly taxed. While there is some debate concerning the correlation between the luxury tax on jewellery and the underground economy, I ask the Minister of Finance to do what is just and remove this unfair tax.

Before I conclude I would like to refer to cost recovery in the agricultural sector. This is an issue that I dealt with extensively with corn producers in my riding in the debate over the creation of the Pest Management Review Agency, the PMRA.

While farmers are prepared to bear a portion of the costs for these programs and for the most part do not have a problem with cost recovery, we have to ensure the system is fair. We cannot ask farmers to pay for a system that is top heavy in bureaucracy and benefits other groups. For farmers to pay the entire cost of this program when consumers and industry also benefit from it is unfair.

I sincerely hope the government has learned a lesson from the PMRA debate which took place last winter and spring. I congratulate the committee for studying the issue during its deliberations.

Five years ago we would never have seen a debate like the one taking place in the House today. The standing committee and members of the House could not have offered their feelings about the budget in a debate like this one today. Consultations took place in bank board rooms with the country's elite in attendance. The average citizen on the street did not have a choice.

I thank the Minister of Finance for giving Canadians a voice in this process. His previous budgets have shown that he listens to the debate in the House, to committees and to average Canadians.

I thank you, Mr. Speaker, and the Minister of Finance for giving me the opportunity to share my perspectives in this important debate.

[Reed Elley, Reform, Nanaimo—Cowichan, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think Canadian people should be fooled on this point. Successive Liberal and Conservative governments over the past 25 years or so have got the country into the terrible debt situation it faces today. The Liberals ought to listen to constituents in their own ridings like we in the Reform Party listen to the ones in ours.

When I go back to my riding of Nanaimo—Cowichan people ask me why Canadian taxpayers should have to continue to pay increased taxes because of the gross mismanagement and mistakes of our governments.

It is all well and good for the hon. member to say that they removed taxes on jewellery. I have a son who could never afford to buy the kind of jewellery he is talking about.

What does the government have in real tax relief to offer Canadians so that they have money put back into their pockets and can simply live?

That same son of mine has a family. He is 23 years old. He has a wife, a small child and another one on the way. The average youth unemployment in that age group in Nanaimo is 16.5%, one of the highest in the nation. He recently had to leave British Columbia and move to Alberta where the economy is booming under the strong fiscal management of the Klein government. He now has a full time job and can finally feed his family.

What kind of hope does the government offer my son and his young family in the final analysis of giving them tax relief not only now but in the future? Could my hon. colleague give them some hope?

[John Finlay, Liberal, Oxford, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his comments and his question.

Successive governments, Liberal and Progressive Conservative, built up the debt. That is quite true. However we elected those governments. There is only one taxpayer and we will have to pay the debt sooner or later.

It is better to pay it under a balanced system which tries to take into account all the needs, beginning with those most serious like health care, seniors benefits and the disabled, than to have a government that would hand it all out in some form of tax cut to everybody whether or not they need it.

I am very glad my colleague's son is working successfully in Alberta. Perhaps there is a lesson there. No one else will pay the debt and no one else will balance the budget. The people of Canada will do that, as we have been doing it.

We are still considered the best country in the world in which to live. People are still clamouring to come here. We must be doing something right. The government got it right this time and will keep on doing it until things are in balance.

[Pauline Picard, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today to the prebudget consultations. These consultations are an opportunity for the public to provide input to the government as it gets ready to draw up next year's budget.

This year, the country-wide approach to the consultations gave the temporary impression that the government was open and ready to listen to what people had to say. But that was the extent of the surprise. The reality of the matter can be found in the committee report we are discussing today.

The much-heralded exercise was very simple: take the Liberals' red book II, remove the cover page and tack on a new one that reads Report of the Standing Committee on Finance.

That is exactly what it contains: the same reasoning, the same promises, the same spending and the same plans for interfering in provincial areas of jurisdiction. In short, the entire consultation exercise was a sham, because the report is nothing more than a rehash of the Liberals' last election platform

To set the record straight, I would like to remind the government what the people of Quebec and of Canada want to see in the Minister of Finance's next budget. We in the Bloc Quebecois have appended a dissenting report to the finance committee's report. I would like to give an idea of what we are calling for in the next budget.

We want the Minister of Finance to pass seven specific measures. These measures represent the consensus of Quebec's stakeholders during the prebudget consultations.

First, the government must quit interfering in provincial spheres of jurisdiction, such as health, education and social security. It must drop the idea of creating new programs in areas of jurisdiction that would only multiply bureaucratic structures, not to mention driving up costs for taxpayers.

The Minister of Finance must instead use some of the spare funds that he frees up over the coming years to pay back part of what he took from the provinces for postsecondary education, health and social assistance.

Second, the federal government must reform the present employment insurance system to put an end to the injustices created by this program and to provide better protection for the workers of Quebec and Canada, especially seasonal workers.

The Bloc also calls on the Minister of Finance to greatly reduce employment insurance premiums, based on a company's performance in job creation. This reduction in rates could represent 40 cents for every $100 of the total insurable payroll.

The Minister of Finance must also create an employment insurance fund which is separate from the federal government consolidated fund, as proposed by the Auditor General of Canada, so that money from the workers and the employers is not used to artificially reduce the deficit.

Third, the federal government must stimulate job creation and commit to seriously fight against poverty. The Bloc Quebecois, along with many stakeholders in Quebec, is calling for a major reform of personal and corporate income tax through which these objectives could be achieved, while implementing targeted tax reductions for individuals and small and medium size companies.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to mention now, as I forgot to do so at the beginning of my speech, that I will be sharing my speaking time with the member for Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup—Témiscouata—Les Basques.

Fourth, the federal government must restore indexing in the tax tables. No indexing is essentially a hidden increase in personal income tax.

Fifth, the Minister of Finance must pass a law to prohibit deficits, like the one passed by the Quebec National Assembly.

As far as the GST is concerned, the Minister of Finance must first accept the arbitration proposal made by the Bloc Quebecois to settle this issue, and, depending on the outcome, he must pay to the government of Quebec the $2 billion in compensation being demanded for harmonizing with the GST.

Seventh, the Minister of Finance must re-establish funding for international assistance. Since 1993, that is since the Liberals came to power, funding for international assistance has been drastically reduced, contrary to Canada's humanist tradition.

Recent consultations clearly indicate that there are now more than ever two completely opposite visions on the role that the federal government should play, with Quebec calling for more powers for the provinces and greater autonomy. The nine other Canadian provinces are calling for stronger action in Ottawa in their areas of jurisdiction. This is what we see in health, education and policies to fight poverty. In Quebec, the federal government's intrusion in these jurisdictions belonging to the government of Quebec is strongly condemned.

Yet, these respective areas of jurisdiction are clearly specified in the Constitution. We said it throughout the last Parliament, and we are repeating it again. The government is once again putting its foot in the door to get into other areas of jurisdiction. We are asking the government to comply with the Constitution of 1867.

We are also asking it to repay the money taken by the Minister of Finance in this respect, while the rest of Canada is asking for Canada-wide programs and national standards from coast to coast. These two competing visions are irreconcilable and a sign of future jurisdictional battles and useless and costly frictions between Quebec and the rest of Canada.

As we know, the first ministers are gathering here in Ottawa this week. Let me tell you what Mr. Bouchard said yesterday at a press conference, when he condemned the federal government's activities in areas of provincial jurisdiction. Mr. Bouchard said that “instead of sprinkling money through new programs in areas of provincial jurisdiction, the Chrétien government would be better off reducing personal income taxes and easing off on the cuts it has been making for years in transfers to the provinces. The finance minister's surplus, said to be somewhere between $4 billion and $6 billion for 1998-99, should be used first and foremost to reduce taxes. Quebeckers and Canadians are being taxed to death. Nothing would have a more positive impact on families and on the economy than quick federal tax relief”.

According to him, the Canadian tax burden is a millstone around the neck of Canadian productivity. Seventy-five percent of the surplus should go to reduce taxes by approximately $100 per taxpayer. One-quarter of the remaining surplus should go to social expenditures, as Ottawa wants to do but through transfer payments to the provinces, transferring tax points instead of creating a series of new programs whose common denominator is interference in areas of provincial jurisdiction.

In Ottawa the premiers want to sell the idea of creating a framework for federal spending powers, a mechanism through which new initiatives by Ottawa would have to be approved by a committee of provincial governments.

So they created a transition fund for science and health, a national pharmacare program, millennium scholarships, a Canadian foundation for innovation, sprinkling a little money here and there to create new programs, just after they cut health care and slashed transfers to the provinces.

They wanted to cut up to $48 billion, and now they are handing us back a piddling $6 billion. Instead of transferring that to the taxpayers who need it, they are trying to create new programs. And who do you think will end up holding the bag with these programs a few years down the road? The federal government's tactic is to pull out of these programs and leave it up to the provinces to administer them, although it created both the programs and the needs. Then it withdraws funding. That is unacceptable.

I wish this government would understand common sense and take away this tax burden it is imposing everywhere. What is of the most concern to me, as I tell people regularly, is that the government is not giving us anything. They are just returning our taxes to us. They should stop distributing their goodies to make us close our eyes to reality; they should stop sprinkling crumbs. The people are hungry, the people want to see a lessening of their tax burden.

[Yvon Charbonneau, Liberal, Anjou—Rivière-Des-Prairies, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to our Bloc Quebecois colleague's speech. At one point in it she mentioned that her party had included a dissenting opinion in the report she was commenting on.

[The Deputy Speaker]

The hon. member knows he should not be using props in the House. I hope he will follow Standing Orders in this regard.

[Yvon Charbonneau, Liberal, Anjou—Rivière-Des-Prairies, QC]

Mr. Speaker, do you mean that it is indecent to show a government document, that it is not permitted?

[Francine Lalonde, Bloc, Mercier, QC]

That is right.

[René Laurin, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

It is not indecent, but it is not permitted.

[Yvon Charbonneau, Liberal, Anjou—Rivière-Des-Prairies, QC]

Mr. Speaker, would you include that as part of my parliamentary apprenticeship. I had no idea that it was not appropriate to show a government document in quoting it. I could not have guessed.

In her remarks, the member mentioned that her party had presented a dissenting opinion. She quoted a number of sections of the dissenting report.

However, she neglected to quote an important passage of the opinion, which provides that, for the Bloc, the only solution for Quebec is either to let itself be steamrollered by the federal government or to get out of Canada following a referendum on sovereignty.

If this is the definitive analysis of the Bloc Quebecois on this debate on public finances, the upcoming budget and the choices to be made, I would like to know how they can point to dissent based on the idea of having to separate from Canada while listening to the eminent spokespersons of the Quebec government, the minister of finance and even the Quebec premier say that the federal government cannot be allowed to destroy Canada's Constitution.

Which face is the real one? Which is the real intent? Do these people want to help rebuild Canada on a healthier basis or do they want to separate from Canada as they indicate in their dissenting report?

[Pauline Picard, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I use a professional approach in my work, otherwise it would more difficult for the member for Anjou—Rivière-des-Prairies to comment on my remarks.

We want to withdraw from the federal system precisely because we have been witnessing intrusions in our areas of jurisdiction for 40 years. For 40 years we have been asking this government to abide by the Constitution, which makes Quebec a people distinct from the rest of Canada.

To say that we want out of Canada because we are fed up with these intrusions is nothing new. The hon. member should know that a number of premiers have complained about the federal government's intrusions. Remember Mr. Duplessis, who used to tell the federal government “give us back our loot”. As for Jean Lesage, he coined the expression “Maîtres chez nous”, masters in our own home.

So, we are not the first ones to condemn the centralizing attitude of the federal government, which wants to create a Canadian people, while we say we are a different people, a distinct people. We want to separate, we want to achieve sovereignty, but we want to do it in harmony with the rest of Canada.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Resuming debate. The hon. member for Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup—Témiscouata—Les Basques.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Kamouraska—Rivière-Du-Loup—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I congratulate you for the way you said the name of my riding, which truly represents the four regional county municipalities that it covers.

We are discussing the prebudget consultations whereby the government is asking the House its opinion on the report submitted by the parliamentary committee. I would like first of all to mention the consultations that I carried out in my riding, which were submitted to the committee and which are included in the report.

Among other things, I will quote some of the people who participated in the debate. These are people who are experiencing these things in their daily lives and who are in contact with the population.

For example, Mrs. Bilocq, of the KRTB economic development corporation, said “The danger, after a period of economic restraint, is that the government will start spending again to please the electorate”. I think the federal government has clearly demonstrated that it cannot shed its old habits and that, as soon as it has money available, it cannot refrain from dishing it out in its programs in the hope of gaining votes.

True, the Canadian federal system is rather pitiful. The federal government might have less visibility than it wants if it limited itself to its responsibilities as defined in the Constitution, but that is what it should be doing. It should ensure that it does not invest in areas where the provinces already have jurisdiction and where they have developed programs. What the provinces really want is that the money be returned to them so that they can invest more in their own programs and in the strategies that they are currently developing.

They can say that it is the nasty separatists who are saying this, but this week, unanimously, the provincial finance ministers gave a warning to Mr. Martin, the minister. “Ottawa must resist the temptation to get involved piecemeal in programs with isolated initiatives in areas under provincial jurisdiction like home care services and pharmacare, for example”.

So this message is not coming from sovereignists, it is coming from Canada's finance ministers, who remember. If they were not there themselves, they remember what happened during the seventies in the Trudeau era. The federal government started to spend left and right to give its members more visibility, to give itself more visibility as a government, and the result was the financial situation we had in 1993.

That situation has now been remedied, to a large extent on the backs of the people who are paying employment insurance, both employers and employees, and also on the backs of the provinces through cuts in transfer payments, but the government should not revert to its old habits. If, in 2000, 2001 or 2002, we have to say once again that the federal government should not have invested in this program, that we are in the red once again, we will have failed to learn the lessons from the past.

I will quote another person who spoke during the consultations, Benoît Aubut, who represents the unemployed. He said: “We ask that the EI benefit period and amount not longer depend on the financial needs of the government but rather on those of the workers, who pay to be covered if they lose their jobs”.

This week, the Bloc Quebecois made a very constructive proposal. We have introduced six private members' bills from six different members clearly showing what needs to be changed in the employment insurance legislation. We were even so lucky as to have the support of the NDP. Again, this is an issue on which the big, bad separatists could have made suggestions that might not have been good for Canada, but as it turns out, members of another party sitting next to us—and I am referring to the NDP—also found the idea interesting because they have been elected to teach the government a lesson and tell the government: “The changes you made to the employment insurance plan one or two years ago are unacceptable. We in high unemployment areas cannot live with that because workers are not assured of a sufficient income between two jobs.”

That is another very concrete quote on a very concrete problem that the government should address as soon as possible.

By lowering EI premiums by an amount equivalent to the increase in CPP contributions, the government acted on part of a recommendation made by the Bloc. I think this must be applauded. We made this recommendation in committee before any other party, and the government took our lead. There is, however, still room for improvement in the employment insurance plan.

About the EI reform, even though the chief actuary said that the system could be self-sufficient with premiums of $2 per $100 of insurable income, premiums will be set at $2.70 as of January 1, 1998. So there is a 70-cent margin of manoeuvre. The Conservatives would like to see all of that used to decrease contributions.

We, on the other hand, would rather cut contributions by about 35 cents, or half of that margin of manoeuvre, and earmark the other half for improving the system so that unemployment insurance can resume its function of stabilizing the economies of high unemployment regions and become a true tool in the battle against poverty. That is all we hear about these days, the battle against poverty, against child poverty. The federal government absolutely wants to have a cheque with a nice Canada flag in the corner, whereas there is a proper way of doing things, with tools over which it has complete control, and over which it would have full jurisdiction. We could talk about that this afternoon and tomorrow morning if that is the hon. members' wish.

The employment insurance program could be modified and its human face restored, making it into something which could, for instance, eliminate the so-called spring gap. With the new reform, few seasonal workers can get employment insurance to tide them over for the entire period they are without work until they start up again the following year. We want to see that corrected.

We also want to see the intensity rule done away with, which reduces rates by 1% each time 20 weeks of employment insurance is used. That was part of the principle of the former Minister of Human Resources Development, but he got the message—very emphatically—on June 2, 1997, when the people of his riding told him that, no, they could not live with such a thing, that it offended their dignity, that they no longer wanted a minister who was capable of doing such a thing.

Should the government, which will be producing its legislative progress report within a few days, not have addressed the real problem? The first message it got in the June 2 federal election was that the high-unemployment regions are seriously dissatisfied with the employment insurance program imposed upon them. Budget choices will have to be made. We are debating pre-budget consultations and I trust the government will be capable of heeding what has been said.

The people we heard from in committee on November 12, 1997, also told us that it was important that those who have contributed the most to bringing down the deficit should be the ones to benefit from the fiscal dividend. Here again, the reference is to EI premiums, but also to provinces that have had to manage with cuts in transfer payments. It was not their idea to make these cuts, but they are the ones who have to live with them, who have to contend with the impact on hospitals, CLSCs, home-care services. Many of the decisions taken were the result of these cuts.

So, many social stakeholders did not make extravagant demands. They want the money to go towards existing programs. They told us, for instance, to use it to consolidate existing organizations and to resist the temptation to woo voters by creating new programs.

Yesterday again, this was brought home to us in caucus. We heard from Canadian women's groups, who told us that what they want is not money to duplicate provincial programs, but satisfactory funding for women's groups in Canada. The present government should listen carefully to this request because it is another way to fight poverty. If children are poor, then you can be sure that many women in Canada are poor as well. They must have the means to escape this poverty, and be represented and be able to conduct their lives with dignity.

People in my riding also tell me they do not want to see more federal interference in provincial areas of jurisdiction, because this leaves the public confused and always trying to get the best deal. People are not stupid. They have seen what has been going on for the last 25 or 30 years. I will conclude on this. People have been perfectly aware of the competition between the two levels of government over the years, and they want no more of it. They want each level of government to stick to its own area of jurisdiction until such time as there can be just one level of government. In addition, when they elect representatives, they want to be able to know exactly who is responsible and that they can re-elect the government they have chosen, or not re-elect it, in the knowledge that they are fully responsible for their choice.

This is one of the fundamental reasons we want to leave this madhouse. The Canadian federal system has resulted in such confusion in Canada that voters are unable to make logical choices.

In conclusion, we should listen to what the public is saying. Each of us should take his or her responsibilities and the federal government should mind its own business.

[The Deputy Speaker]

The hon. member for Etobicoke-Lakeshore on a point of order.

[Jean Augustine, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am asking for unanimous consent for a motion. I move:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should consider the request of the Famous Five Foundation to honour the memory of Emily Murphy, Nellie McClung, Irene Parlby, Louise McKinney and Henrietta Muir Edwards, the Famous Five, by allowing a statue commemorating them to be placed on Parliament Hill.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Does the member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore have the unanimous consent of the House to propose this motion?

[Some hon. members]

Yes.

[Some hon. members]

No.