Mr. Speaker, I do not think I have ever fought this hard before to speak in the House of Commons but it is a pleasure to rise to speak today during the debate on the prebudget report issued recently by the finance committee.
While the finance committee was very successful in hearing from groups like the Business Council on National Issues and in hearing from many social activists across the country, I really believe that where the finance committee failed was in hearing from the 70% or 80% of Canadians who are in the middle of those two groups.
I will make my point by reading from a letter. I do not think we will find the views expressed in that letter reflected anywhere in the finance committee report. This letter was originally sent to the hon. member for Cariboo—Chilcotin who recognized its importance immediately:
I am writing in regard to the increase in CPP. I am a housewife with two small children.
My husband works 12 hour days, six or seven days a week. Even with all the hours my husband works we are only making ends meet. We cannot afford an increase in CPP. This increase only means my husband has to work even harder. Which means we will see even less of him. How is this good for my two children? How is this good for our marriage?
The government borrows or should I say steals from the CPP fund and then increases it because they can't pay it back. Why do we have to pay for a dishonest government?
They preach about how they want to save our children. They preach about broken marriages. Then they turn around and screw us again. Couples stress about money and it does affect the children. It does affect the marriage. How can afford to put my children in swimming lessons or baseball when any extra money we have the government takes? My oldest son is five and has said to me “Why can't I Mommy? We can't afford it, right?” This is from a 5 year old. All his friends at school get hot lunches on Fridays but he doesn't. How are we supposed to dish out another $100 a month? I can't work because of all the hours my husband works. Why should I have to? I want to raise my children not a daycare.
My husband is 34 and I convinced him to finally vote this year. We had many an argument about it. He said why should he bother voting when nothing ever changes. A lot of people feel this way. I am beginning to think he is right.
I have rent, house insurance, truck insurance, life insurance, hydro, gas, phone, food, truck payments. These are basic bills. As for fun, what's that? Will CPP even be there when my husband retires? I doubt it.
I have a friend who at 28 is having to declare bankruptcy. She has three children. I know that it could be us. Kids are in trouble today more than ever because parents aren't there. They have to work harder and longer so the kids are on their own. The future looks bleaker.
Something has to be done about this CPP. Canada is on its way to ruin the way I see it.
It is signed Margaret Snell of Quesnel, British Columbia.
I want to argue that people like Margaret Snell simply were not represented before the finance committee. People like Margaret Snell did not have their views represented in the government's report on the prebudget hearings. It is not only Margaret Snell. I believe that there are hundreds of thousands, in fact millions, of Canadians who feel exactly the same way as Margaret Snell feels.
What should the government do when it hears letters like the one I just read from Margaret Snell or the one which my leader read yesterday from Kim Hicks of Sackville, New Brunswick? If the government had the sense that God gave the goose, the first thing it would do is secure the future of people like Margaret Snell, Kim Hicks and other people who are suffering by first taking the debt situation seriously.
The other day the chairman of the finance committee rose in his place to speak about what the finance committee heard. I know that my hon. friend will acknowledge that we heard representative after representative come before the committee to say that the debt is a real problem and that we should do something about it. In fact, the government report even says that it is a problem.
What was the recommendation? The recommendation was to continue with the promise made during the election campaign, which is to allocate 50% of the surplus for more spending. It is absolutely incredible.
We know that when major polls are conducted across the country Canadians say that debt is an incredible problem. We have to deal with the debt. As my leader pointed out yesterday, when people have a little tax relief, what do they do with it? They pay down their personal debt. Of course they do. It is common sense.
What does the government do? It has a huge agenda to start spending again, but does it have any plan on what to do with the debt?
The government suggests that maybe it will reduce the debt to 50% or 60% of GDP by some point in the future. What exactly does that mean? It did not commit to putting a single dollar toward the debt in absolute terms. The government suggests that maybe if the economy grows fast enough the debt will look smaller as a percentage of our economy.
The very first thing the government should do is borne out by polls, letters and telephone calls which we received. The very first thing the government should do is secure the future of people like Margaret Snell, Kim Hicks and hundreds of thousands of other people by starting to pay down the debt. The government should have a serious plan to pay down the debt.
The second point I want to make is that the government should find a way to secure the future prosperity of Canadians. The way to do that is very obvious. After having read Margaret Snell's letter and after having heard Kim Hicks' letter, it should be obvious to the government as well. It needs to start reducing taxes.
We have a tax burden in this country which is absolutely staggering. In the last four years, since the government came to power, Canadians have seen their disposable incomes drop like a stone. We know that since the government came to power disposable income for the average family in this country has fallen by over $3,000.
Why it that? It is because taxes continue to mount.
My friends across the way stand every day and say they have cut taxes. If people across the country really believe that the government has cut taxes, I have a bridge that I would like to sell them.
People do not believe that. I do not believe that. We know that government revenues have gone up $25 billion in the last few years. We also know that the government has introduced 37 tax increases. We know that because income tax is not indexed for inflation, effectively there is an inflation tax in place which brings in just under a billion dollars in new revenues every year because people are pushed up into a higher tax bracket. We know all of those things. So how in the world can the government find the courage to say that somehow it has reduced taxes? Frankly, I do not think anybody believes it.
We know that in Canada today we have personal income taxes that compared to our G-7 trading partners are 54% higher. I do not believe for a moment that the government members across the way in their heart of hearts feel and can even persuasively argue that the government really has reduced taxes. I do not think Canadians are buying that at all.
I want to go over a couple of things which were said by my leader yesterday when he said we provided some tax relief for a family in New Brunswick. When that family in New Brunswick had a chance to spend that money, what did they spend it on? They paid off some personal debt. They set aside about a third of the money. Then they spent some on essentials like medical needs and groceries.
Canadians know better than this government what their priorities are. They should have the chance to direct where that money goes, to keep it in their pockets in the first place. That is why the Reform Party has been at the forefront of advocating lower taxes for all Canadians so that we can start to give Canadians the real hope that they need, the real hope that they have been deprived of over the last 10 years under successive Liberal and Conservative governments.