Mr. Speaker, it is with great interest that I rise in this House today to speak on Bill C-36 introduced by the Minister of Finance.
I have followed the whole debate on this extremely controversial bill with great interest. After reading the remarks made by a number of members, I was shocked to see those few colleagues from Quebec that sit across the way speak out in support of certain parts of this bill.
While representing the people of their ridings in Quebec, they support the Canada millennium scholarship foundation proposed by a Prime Minister seeking visibility. This is happening despite the obvious consensus of the Quebec coalition, which was reiterated by the Premier of Quebec in a press conference. I just cannot get over it. This seems to indicate a serious lack of consistency between what Liberal members from Quebec say in Ottawa and what the Liberal wing is saying in Quebec.
In its last budget, the federal government announced that $2.5 billion had been earmarked for education and that he wanted to invest it in a new program, the millennium scholarships program, which, I remind the House, will not provide any relief to the existing education system, after cuts totalling $3 billion in education.
It claims to be putting the fiscal dividend, that is, the budget surplus, to work by investing in education, skills development, assistance for low income families with children and health care, through the Canadian opportunities strategy. A better name for this strategy would be Canadian government visibility strategy.
The Minister of Finance cut federal transfers to the provinces for social assistance, post-secondary education and health as part of the joint effort to put its fiscal house in order. But I would point out that 52% of the results were due to the sacrifices the provinces have had to make. Now that this goal has been reached, the Liberal government wants to act alone and spend budget surpluses instead of making up for the harm done by cutting transfers to the provinces.
During yesterday's meeting between the Premier of Quebec, his education minister, the Prime Minister of Canada and his Minister of Human Resources Development, the two governments agreed to establish a negotiating framework for the infamous millennium scholarships.
Quebec already has its own scholarship program and post-secondary education priorities. The two levels of government agree that there should be no duplication of programs and that Quebec's jurisdiction and priorities in the education sector should be respected.
It is clear, however, that the government opposite wants to celebrate the millennium by making a significant contribution to knowledge through millennium scholarships awarded to students over a ten-year period.
The Quebec coalition representing several organizations does not, however, have the same vision of what is needed to provide real assistance to students. At a press conference yesterday, coalition president Bernard Shapiro, vice-chancellor of McGill University, said, and I quote “We feel that the bill in its present form contains no appropriate provision whereby Quebec could use the important resources allocated to the foundation in a broader manner, consistent with its priorities. Members of the coalition, including Quebec students, believe that the resources set aside for the foundation would be better used within the existing structures and budgets of Quebec's education system”.
We in the Bloc Quebecois support this view. It is obvious that the student population, the faculty and many other individuals are in agreement with the Government of Quebec's position. This is blatant interference in a provincial area of jurisdiction that all governments, since Jean Lesage's day, have ardently defended.
Education is the soul of a people, its very backbone. It allows it to develop as a society, to understand its origins and its past, and to plan its future. It is the cornerstone of any society.
We in Quebec have chosen to invest in the future of our community and of our society with a system of education which responds to the true needs of its students. We have made a choice as a society.
The federal government, on the other hand, with all the cuts it has made since coming to power in 1993, has decided otherwise. Now, having seen its popularity with students dwindling away, it is implementing a new program which will get the flag of Canada onto its cheques.
But students are no fools. They know who cut $3 billion from education, and that provincial governments have had to make some difficult choices and will have to continue to do so, because cuts in federal transfers to the provinces for health and social programs will be in the order of $30 billion from now until the year 2003. We have a social deficit and it is time that deficit was remedied before it is too late.
We are asking the federal government, given that Quebec has exclusive jurisdiction over education, to exclude Quebec from the millennium scholarship program, but with fair and full compensation.
The Liberals are using this battle against the deficit as a pretext to continue privatizating the Canadian economy and are now setting their sights on education. This private foundation, to be established under Bill C-36, will allow the companies funding it to decide, in a certain way, which students deserve financial assistance. Will they make their choice according to the field of study that responds to their needs or the general needs of Quebec?
What about the real budget for research and development of $310 million and not $400 million over three years? That will enable the granting councils to keep their heads above water, but not to expand.
We must not forget that we are at the bottom of the list of G-7 countries in terms of research and development, and nothing indicates things will improve in the future. How can we compete with rival countries? How will we keep our brains? How will we interest our young people in post-secondary education? This budget provides no reassurance.
Another failing of the budget is the fact that the Minister of Finance said not a single word about agriculture. However, there are a lot of problems, which we will be coming back to in the House. Barely 16 lines in 275 pages are devoted to Canada's rural regions. The only reference is to the minister's having given the Farm Credit Corporation more money last year. The only major expenditure in this regard is $20 million over five years and among a number of departments.
Since 1991, the Liberal government has cut the agriculture and agri-food budget by $4 billion, and this year's budget contained other cuts. There is a lot to be said in this regard, and we will come back to it in the coming months.
I will point out there are several failings in Bill C-36, but my colleagues will surely return to other very important aspects of the latest budget of the Minister of Finance.