Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to support the motion of my colleague from Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot to delete lines 13 to 43 in clause 4.
In essence, this would re-establish the calculation formula planned at the time when the Minister of Finance announced the Canada social transfer in 1996. I must point out what the Canada social transfer is, or what it was, since it has just been changed again.
The Canada social transfer is a set of transfers to the provinces made by the federal government in the past for health care, post-secondary education and social assistance. I remember that the 1995 reform of the social programs took two years. At that point, I was a member of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development, which travelled around the country consulting people. I recall the type of consultations we had. There were demonstrations everywhere, because people were concerned about what was going to happen with the cuts to employment insurance and the changes to the social programs.
By putting all that into a single fund, the government seized the opportunity to cut payments to the provinces. Quebec was hit particularly hard. There was nothing to be proud of, but it is a fact. There were more unemployed and poor people in Quebec than the Canadian average. I might point out as well that there is a link between cuts to employment insurance and the transfers to the provinces and today's debate.
The intent of the member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot in his motion is to bring things back to the way they were in the 1996 budget. It must have meant something. It was planned.
I will mention it in conclusion, but we had not just the word of the Minister of Finance but his written word that the government perhaps did not agree to it all, because there were cuts, but there was a formula. This is the commitment the Minister of Finance made to carry out this reform, to bring everything together in the Canada social transfer.
With its 1996 budget, the federal government established a mechanism to reduce current disparities in per capita entitlement between the provinces by half by 2002-03. The mechanism in question would have increased the per capita weighting from 10% in 1998-99 to 50% in 2002-03.
That was what the Minister of Finance promised. But, in the 1999 budget, without a word of warning to Quebec, the federal government is proposing to completely eliminate these disparities in three years. The new increases under the CHST, including the one for this year, will be distributed equally, per capita, in every province and territory.
The budget proposes a weighting of 70% in 1999-2000 and 100% in 2002-03. Because of this unilateral decision by the federal government, Quebec will lose out on more than $350 million annually. This explains why Quebec is getting only 8.3% of the $11.5 billion increase in the CHST over five years, while Ontario will get 47.2% or almost half.
In the circumstances, we should not be surprised to see Ontario MPs take turns applauding this measure, because it is to their advantage.
They have short memories. Now they have harsh words for the member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, when all he is saying is that this was not what was promised. These were not just idle words from the Minister of Finance. This was a promise made in the budget. That is all the member is saying.
Today, the member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot is being called all sorts of things I would rather not repeat, is accused of being nuts, wrong, unfair, and told that the concept of need took precedence over the concept of per capita distribution. That was the Minister of Finance's plan and philosophy in 1996.
The hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot merely raises this point. Great consternation is stirred up on the other side. They say “My goodness, what he is proposing is insignificant, wrong, and far-fetched”. Is the Liberal side saying that what the Minister of Finance proposed scarcely three years ago was far-fetched and wrong? All those adjectives can be applied, for that is what the commitment by the Minister of Finance was.
Recently, the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs claimed that the provinces had called for this change on June 15, 1998. There is a connection with the social union, which was accepted by the other provinces, but not Quebec. The others accepted that in future provided there is advance notice of three months, I believe, the federal government can change provincial social programs as it sees fit. Quebec did not accept this, because it is unacceptable to Quebecers, and the premiers of the other provinces accepted so that they would get some money.
I know that there are some words that cannot be said in this House, but when principles are cast aside in favour of money, there is a word that springs to mind: intellectual prostitution, at the very least. This is terrible, scandalous.
The Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs claims the provinces asked for this change. This is no excuse for the government's not giving any advance notice of its intention to modify the transfer formula in its 1999 budget. There was no advance notice. At any rate, had there been one, it would have been only seven months, whereas the social union framework agreement calls for a minimum of one year. The Liberals reneged on their own signature on social union.
That is not all. The Prime Minister said that the premiers' letter of January 23, 1999, concerning the reinvestment of the new transfers in health satisfied him and that he considered it a sort of agreement on health.
The Prime Minister broke his word in the weeks before the budget, since the letter on health care asked the government to totally reverse, within a reasonable timeframe and through existing arrangements under the Canada social transfer for health and social programs, the cuts it had made in its transfers in recent years.
One aspect concerns me increasingly and that is respect for and the promotion of democratic process. One of the conditions of democracy is that information be provided. There is, however, another condition. People who give their word or who agree on a commitment must honour it afterward. Otherwise, it means nothing.
Again yesterday—I would just refer to this matter of particular concern to me, shipbuilding—we debated for an entire day a motion of the Progressive Conservative Party, which, in the end, had used word for word the resolution passed by Liberal Party faithful at their latest convention. Most Liberal members were probably in the hallway, sipping coffee or something, but I asked whether they remembered being at that convention. They did not say yes, of course. They nodded their heads, but did not recall having voted on this resolution. However, they did vote in favour of it.
But in the House, that means nothing. It is like the election promises in the red book. They are meaningless. The Prime Minister said he would scrap the GST. He did not do it. At one point, he also said he would tear up the free trade agreement and change it. He did nothing of the sort.
We could make a long list of such commitments and broken promises. We could talk about promises made during election campaigns and at conventions, but the issue today is a commitment made by the Minister of Finance in his 1996 budget to reform the Canada social transfer.
To put all this together and to make his cuts more palatable, he said “I will tell you in advance how the amounts will be calculated and how much the provinces will be getting”. He said that for two or three years and then, suddenly and unilaterally, in another budget speech, the minister said “This is it. It no longer works that way”.
We must condemn this kind of about-face. People are losing confidence in the Canadian political system because they are increasingly aware that it is plain rubbish.