Madam Speaker, it is my privilege to stand before the House today as the regional critic for Alberta, to speak on behalf of Alberta and to explain how I arrived at the questions I will be posing to the House today.
I got those questions by canvassing 26 ridings in Alberta. I have enough to fill the rest of the afternoon with what they feel has alienated them from the federal government.
First, they are insulted that a task force has to be sent to a province where there are 24 MPs who would be glad to tell the government and the Prime Minister of exactly the sorts of things that alienate the people of the province I live in and represent.
I got involved in politics because I believed the message had to come from the constituents to Ottawa and that all MPs should have the opportunity to express themselves and to be listened to.
Just last night we were here talking about Kosovo. As the foreign affairs critic, I have many points of view that I believe Canadians would like to have expressed here. Of course no one was here to listen. It was a take note debate. The motion had no substance and of course there was no vote at the end of it. That is the sort of blatant abuse that just disgusts people from the province of Alberta.
I have the list that will save the Prime Minister and the member for Charleswood St. James—Assiniboia from having to visit our province. Here are some of the things on the list that have alienated our province.
First, we feel the federal government has become too intrusive in provincial affairs. That is a claim that could come from most provinces, specifically Quebec where a whole party was formed that said it knew it could not make any changes so it was going to separate. What a terrible option. Many people in my province are saying that if the government keeps intruding the way it is, they will not put up with it forever.
The millennium scholarship is an example. The provincial education minister was not even consulted. There have been health care cuts of 40%. The federal government continually wants to blame the provinces for those cuts. On the environment, the endangered species act keeps floating around this place, again without consultation with the people who will make it happen. Farmers, grassroots people, will save endangered species. It will not be those on high in government. People are responsible and do want to have input into legislation.
We could go on. The flag money was mentioned many times in many ridings, the waste of money by Ottawa and of course the Kosovo situation and the vote which I have already alluded to.
The second item that was most often mentioned by the 26 ridings in Alberta was the whole tax situation. The federal government just does not get the message that taxes cost jobs. Taxes cost this country in lost productivity. The incentive to work is destroyed by high taxes. The government just does not get it.
Of course Alberta has led the way. We have the lowest taxes. We are going to an 11% flat tax in 2002. That is leadership. The federal government could learn a lot about that.
Taxes on petroleum and not on hydro has been brought forward by many petroleum producers. There are taxes on private utility companies like TransAlta while government run utility companies are tax free. That is a penalty against the free enterprise system which Alberta practises.
Then there is Kyoto and what that will mean for our province, as well as the GST promises on which the government reneged. We do not have a sales tax in our province and we do not want to have the GST either.
There is unfair taxation on families. The EI surplus is being taken as a tax. When only 38% of people can actually receive EI, the rest is just tax money. Small business after small business talked about the EI and the CPP. They said “Just be honest about what you are doing”, but the federal government is not doing that at this point. It is taxing us to death.
Third, there were many mentions of patronage. The CF-18 bill is not dead yet in Alberta. We still remember that. I often have said that in Alberta there are two things to be mentioned if one wants to get elected. One is to mention the name of Mr. Trudeau and the national energy program. Immediately individuals say “I won't vote Liberal”. Then one has to mention the name Mr. Mulroney and GST. That means “I can't vote PC”. We have eliminated two parties right away just by saying those words. It becomes pretty easy.
There is blatant patronage everywhere. Candidates who are defeated end up on parole boards and all kinds of other boards simply because they decided that they would be a Liberal candidate. We have example after example. It makes people furious that the Liberals are using taxpayers' money to reward their friends.
The fourth is the judicial system. Albertans are concerned about victims' rights. They are concerned about the soft Liberal approach to justice. They are concerned that when a judge in B.C. said it was okay to have child pornography the government did not slam into that judicial system and say “That's wrong”. That is wrong in anyone's books. They cannot understand how any government can agree with child pornography. They just do not understand how anyone who cares about anything could go along with that sort of thing. It infuriates them.
Albertans are fed up with the very fact that the Young Offenders Act is tampered with a bit, but that the real recommendations by the committee are not looked at. The judges are making the laws. The Prime Minister says that it is okay for judges to make laws, that parliament should not have any say in that area.
Albertans find fighting for criminals' rights, whether they be in Brazil or in Texas, distasteful.
The fifth is gun control. I received 13,000 letters in my riding from people who wanted to talk to me about Bill C-68. They are disgusted by it. I asked the justice minister to come to my riding. I said that I would book the Centrium, which holds approximately 10,000 people. I would pay the bill if she would come to explain to me the justification for Bill C-68. She has not said no. She has said she is very busy. But she should come. She is our Alberta justice minister. If she is so certain that the law is good, why will she not appear in front of 10,000 Albertans to justify it? Why will she not do that? What is she afraid of if the law is so good? Again I challenge her to accept the invitation, which she has now had for two months, to come to Red Deer. I will make sure the crowd is there for her.
I also noticed someone in an Edmonton paper reporting that they bought an $800 dinner. It was donated by the minister. She now has decided not to give the dinner because it was someone opposed to gun control who bought it.
As far as the wheat board is concerned, let farmers have their say.
There should be Senate elections. It is a slap in the face of Albertans because we elected two senators and we want them to be appointed, not some political hacks.
Then we had the Prime Minister's comments about the UN and not being Canadian.
The message is “Wake up”. Albertans are entrepreneurial. We are gaining population. We are gaining influence and we will roll over the government if it does not start listening to us.