Debates of Dec. 9th, 1997

Transfer Payments

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the government's responsibility was to ensure that Canada's fiscal house was in order.

We have cut transfer payments, but this year we have restored the cash component to $12.5 billion, as recommended by the national forum on health, because this is the level necessary for a good system in Canada.

When we made cuts, we did so in everyone's best interests. That is why provincial governments are now saving hundreds of millions of dollars in interest on their debt. It is because we have succeeded in lowering interest rates below U.S. rates.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, what the prime minister is telling us is that, instead of cutting $48.4 billion, he will cut $41.7 billion. That reminds me of something I read in the newspaper recently.

A thief was sentenced by a court for having stolen $48 out of the pocket of an honest citizen. Even though he gave him back $6 a little later, the judge still found him guilty.

I ask the prime minister whether he is not doing the same thing with the provinces right now.

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the total transferred by the federal government to provincial governments, in particular to the Government of Quebec, represents a large part of Quebec's budget. That is how our system works. There are certain provinces that do not receive transfer payments, but because Quebec's revenue is lower than that of other provinces, it benefits from the transfer payment system. It receives large payments, and these payments have continued to go up since 1993.

Poverty

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, since this government came to power in 1993, its main decisions have been to cut over $11 billion in education, in health and in social assistance, and over $3 billion a year in the unemployment insurance program. These are all policies that are having a cruel effect on the poorest in our society.

My question is for the prime minister. How can this government justify its continued attack against the poor and how long does it intend to maintain this policy?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we have cut much less than what the member is saying here and we have restored the government's financial stability. That is why we have succeeded, with these programs, in creating the proper environment that has allowed, since this government came to power, unemployment to drop from 11.4% in January 1994 to 9% today and to put our country's finances on the best footing in the western world.

This is good for everyone, and especially the poor because they will have greater opportunities, since Canada is in better shape than before.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, at a time when food banks cannot meet the demand during this Christmas season, the Minister of Human Resources Development, as the technocrat that he is, refuses to recognize the devastating effects of his employment insurance program.

What words will we have to use to make the government understand that there are people who will have nothing on the table at Christmas because they were excluded from employment insurance by the Minister of Human Resources Development and reduced to poverty by this government?

[Pierre Pettigrew, Liberal, Minister of Human Resources Development]

Mr. Speaker, the system that we have implemented is a system which, far from being condemned all over the world as being inefficient and damaging to the economy, is now a system which, on the contrary, helps people return to the labour market.

We have increased to $2.7 billion the funding for initiatives to help people return to the labour market. What the people are requesting are not only passive measures and initiatives to support income. What people want are jobs, and this is what the government wants to give them.

Social Programs

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the prime minister.

Reuse, reduce and recycle are not normally fundamentals of Liberal economics. Yesterday the finance minister reused one of his old decisions. He tried to reuse it to fool Canadians into believing he is investing new money in health and social programs.

Today we invite the prime minister to practice the remaining r principles. Will he reduce the $2.4 billion in social transfer cuts he has made this year and will he recycle his worn out red book promises into something Canadians can use?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, what the Minister of Finance did is restore the cash transfer payments to the provinces to the level recommended by the forum on health. It stated that if we restored the $12.5 billion in transfer payments it would be enough to operate these programs. This is exactly what we have done.

We cut when we needed to cut and now that we are doing better we have restored the $12.5 billion in cash transfers to the provinces. Now that the economy is performing well, the provinces are making more money because the tax points are producing more—

[The Speaker]

The hon. member for Halifax.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, there are no new dollars and no more cash and the prime minister knows it. Despite all his comforting words and his soothing reassurances, report after report shows that our children are at greater risk, slipping deeper and deeper into poverty.

Is the prime minister ready to stop the double talk? Is he ready to go to the first ministers conference with specific proposals to help our kids? Is he ready to show them the money, new money?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I am proposing to put $850 million into tax credits for children next year. We want to make sure that the money the provinces are spending now on child poverty is maintained in the same program because we do not want this money lost in the shuffle. There will be $850 million next year and another $850 million before the end of our term.

[Jean Charest, Progressive Conservative, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the least we can say is the prime minister has a lot of nerve telling the provincial governments he does not want the money to be lost in the shuffle after he guaranteed funding for health care and cut it by 35%.

Yesterday his ministers of finance and health played a practical joke on provincial governments with their smoke and mirrors show.

Could the prime minister confirm today the real fact that seven out of ten provinces over the next six years will see a net reduction in cash transfers?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, there is a formula that when tax points increase there is less need for cash transfers. At this time we did what was proposed in a document called “Let the Future Begin” at page 25 where it stated “A Jean Charest government will restore the level of the cash portion of the—”

[The Speaker]

The hon. member for Sherbrooke.

[Jean Charest, Progressive Conservative, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians will be happy to know that after pursuing many of our past ideas he has now decided to pursue our new ones.

Will the prime minister take up, on behalf of Canadians, the offer of the provinces to enter into a partnership on standards and delivery of health care services? He will find ideas for a Canadian covenant in “Let the Future Begin”. Will he put that idea on the table at the first ministers conference?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, this week, we are meeting with representatives of the provincial governments in order to hold discussions aimed at forging a partnership so as to guarantee mobility and provide Canadians with social programs which are as equivalent as possible, regardless of what part of the country they are in. That is what we are doing. That is why we are organizing a conference on Friday to address child poverty and other social programs, as announced in my letter to the premiers last week.

Kyoto

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the government is ignoring our questions. The government is proposing—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, government members may think it is a joke when tens of thousands of people will possibly lose their jobs because of the Kyoto accord. Obviously the government must have done some internal studies to determine the impact of the Kyoto accord on the Canadian economy.

My question is for the prime minister once again. Where are those internal studies? How many jobs will be lost? How high will gas prices rise?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, let us sign the treaty. We said that there would be a cost over a period of 20 years, but there will be a much bigger cost if we are irresponsible and do not face the challenges facing the world today.

The member should meet, as I have met, some leaders of island countries who are afraid that in the next 50 years their countries will disappear under water.

They do not want to look at facts. They just want to protect the interests that they have with people who gave them money to come here.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, thousands of Canadian jobs are at stake. The Liberals say that the economic cost of not implementing the Kyoto deal will be higher than not going ahead with it.

If they do not know how much the Kyoto deal will cost in the first place, how can they say it is less expensive than not implementing the Kyoto deal?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I should explain to the people across the floor that it will be an international agreement. If there is a cost, and I say there will be a cost, it will be exactly the same cost to every nation signing on the dotted line.

We are already in a better position than the Americans because we are relatively better than they are. If we accept to do exactly as they are doing, we will finish better than they will because we are already ahead of them. Our competitive position will not be impaired by the Kyoto deal.

Employment Insurance

[Christiane Gagnon, Bloc, Québec, QC]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister of Human Resources Development was boasting that women were the primary beneficiaries of his employment insurance reform.

One might say the minister is living on another planet. Women's groups have criticized this reform, which is leaving them poorer.

Will the minister recognize that while an additional 500,000 people, primarily women, are contributing to employment insurance, women, we learned from his department, are receiving $300 million less than last year in benefits?

[Pierre Pettigrew, Liberal, Minister of Human Resources Development]

Mr. Speaker, women have received a large proportion of these benefits. The system was changed specifically to help the very large number of women working part time, who in a system of weeks worked were not covered, whereas they are on the basis of hours worked.

Could the hon. member tell us that there is a family income supplement to help those with children and that 67% of the supplement goes to women on employment insurance? These measures in our employment insurance reform are very favourable to women.