Mr. Speaker, it is always a delight to be invited to speak while Your Honour is in the chair, someone who truly understands the procedures of this place.
I would like to begin by expressing my opposition to the bill before us today, Bill C-10, an act to amend the Municipal Grants Act.
As we have heard, this bill purports to amend the federal government's relationship with municipalities. As we know by the original act of confederation, the Constitution Act, 1867, the federal government and its legal creatures were excluded from having to make tax payments to subsidiary levels of government, namely those of the provinces and the municipalities.
It has been common practice since 1950 for the federal government to assist municipalities in covering the cost of services provided to the federal government and its creatures operating in those places through grants in lieu of taxes or payments in lieu of taxes.
The bill seeks to regularize and modernize the payment of those grants. However, we believe it is filled with loopholes because it provides far too much ministerial discretion, as do so many other bills we see in this place. There is far too much discretion given to the minister and the executive branch of the federal government to choose whether it will make adequate payments and grants in lieu of taxes to municipalities.
Let me begin by saying in principle that we in the official opposition, the Reform Party, believe strongly that municipalities are the first order of government. We believe strongly in the principle of subsidiarity, a principle deeply rooted in political theory, which suggests that the order of government which is closest to the people ought generally to provide the most services; that is to say, proximity to the people who are being served is the best criteria for determining whether a level of government should provide a service. We would tend to place a preferential option on municipalities. We think they are the most important level of government and that generally the role of the federal government should be reduced and minimized while the role of municipalities should be strengthened and upheld.
It is amazing how long it takes for this place and the federal government to work. I understand that this bill originally resulted from a panel of the public works department in 1992, which was an effort to review payments in lieu of taxes. Then it took until 1995 for the joint technical committee on payments in lieu of taxes to do its work. Here we are in 1999, virtually into the next century, before the legislation is actually introduced and acted upon. It has been eight years, with different governments and three parliaments, before action was taken. So often important legislation and important changes are just left to stew in the back rooms and these reports left to gather dust on shelves while we deal with less important priorities.
What really concerns me and my colleagues about the bill is the extraordinary discretion it gives to the minister of public works with respect to payments in lieu of taxes. The bill does not require the federal government to provide payments to municipalities in lieu of taxes. It leaves that up to the minister and his discretion. I refer specifically to the proposed subsection 3(1) of the bill, which states that the minister may, not must or shall:
—on receipt of an application in a form provided or approved by the Minister, make a payment out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund to a taxing authority applying for it—
That is to say, a municipality:
(a) in lieu of a real property tax for a taxation year, and
(b) in lieu of a frontage or area tax
in respect of federal property situated within the area—
If I look at the current act, which this bill seeks to amend, the wording in Bill C-10 is essentially the same. It is almost the same. We will not change the nature of the relationship between the federal government and the municipalities in this respect.
The Reform Party includes in its statement of policies and principles, its blue book, the statement that we will insist that all laws pertaining to individuals and the private sector apply equally to the Government of Canada, its personnel, its agencies and parliament. We believe that this should not be a discretionary matter left up to the whim and will of the minister, but rather we should recognize by act of parliament a positive legal obligation of the Government of Canada to pay for municipal services which it consumes, that it pay its fair share.
Not only does the bill give enormous ministerial discretion, but the bill also fails to include certain agencies and crown corporations of the federal government in Schedule IV of the act. We will propose at report stage or at committee that the schedule be amended so that the Canada Post Corporation, the Royal Canadian Mint, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation all be added to Schedule IV so that they, as creatures of the federal government, be included in the system of payment in lieu of taxes.
It really disturbs me that it is not just in the bill that we see the government's tendency to treat itself to a different legal standard from the standard we impose and expect from other Canadians and other levels of government. For instance, I have a private member's bill on the order paper, which is now No. 29, which is an act to amend the Income Tax Act regarding allowances paid to elected officials. It will be of interest to Canadians to know that the same parliament which is not going to require the federal government to pay its fair share of municipal taxes similarly does not require members of parliament to pay their full share of federal income taxes. Believe it or not, by act of this place we exempt elected officials, alone among all Canadians, from school board trustees to MLAs, MPPs and MNAs, and members of parliament are allowed to exclude one-third of their real income, the equivalent of one-third of their taxable income, from taxes through the so-called non-receiptable expense allowances, which is just an effort to legally avoid the same tax obligation we impose on the rest of Canadians.
If members of this place take out their pay stubs they will see that they are not required to pay the employment insurance premiums which we impose on the rest of Canadians, the same employment insurance premiums which are operating now at a $20 billion surplus, which is allowing the finance minister to pad his budget and cook the books.
We believe, as I said before, that all laws pertaining to individuals and the private sector should apply equally to the Government of Canada, its personnel, its agencies and parliament. That means that we must pay our fair share of municipal property taxes, and Bill C-10 should be amended accordingly.
It also means that members of parliament should pay their full share of income taxes and that all of our regular income from the federal government should be taxable, for full transparency, so we do not treat ourselves to a separate legal standard. It means that we should pay the employment insurance premiums that we impose by power of the coercive law of this place on the rest of Canadians. In fact, if we look at the members of parliament pension plan, there too we have treated ourselves to a different legal standard than is generally available to Canadians through pension plans registered under the Income Tax Act.
In all of these respects parliament should come back to the first principle that we should abide as individuals and as a government by the same laws that we impose upon everyone else.
Mr. Speaker, if you are a municipal property taxpayer, a corporation, a small business or a resident and you fail to pay your full share of property taxes to a municipality, there are legal sanctions. You could have that property taken away from you. If the federal government refuses to do so, if the minister fails to use his discretion, there is no sanction which those municipalities can impose upon us.
I call upon parliament to abide by the same law we impose on the rest of Canadian society.