Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Wild Rose for letting me share his time with him. I also congratulate the member for Longueuil for her fine intervention today.
This is a very important motion. As an Olympicophile and one who had a long time dream of participating in some form but had no chance whatsoever of doing so, it is a great pleasure to speak to the motion.
From Donavoan Bailey to Norris Bowden, Greg Joy, Sue Holloway, Debbie Van Kiekebelt, Kathleen Heddle and so many more, the Canadian Olympic amateur athletes and indeed professional and other athletes who have worn the Canadian flag so proudly on their shoulders have done us proud for many decades. They have embodied the finest elements of being Canadian and in many instances have shown us what it is like to be the best of being human.
The motion goes to the heart of something that is very important and very dear to Canadians: sport, particularly amateur sport. We have seen much excellence and heroism among our Olympic athletes. We have also seen them as superb role models for not only the young but also the old. I would argue that the cherished dream of Baron Pierre de Coubertin lives on in the hearts of many athletes in the country today.
Many Canadian athletes, particularly those who have competed in the Olympics, have succeeded not as a direct result of what we have managed to do for them in an organizational capacity but what they have managed to do for themselves. Many amateur athletes have lived lives of poverty, indeed below the welfare level, in order to compete in a sport that they love and do Canada proud.
The root of this debate is how we can improve the situation for our amateur athletes. I would argue there are things we can do. We can make sure that money gets directly to the athletes. The money should not be invested in a bloated bureaucracy.
We invest a sizeable amount of money. It is understandably limited because there are so many priorities. More of the money rather than going into bureaucracy must be focused directly on the athletes who need it most, on the hard edge of sport in Canada; not on the organizational capacity but into the pockets of the athletes to enable them to eat, travel and survive.
Therefore I would argue that we need to downsize the bureaucracy in many amateur athletic sports and focus the funding on successful sports. We currently fund over 70 sports in the country, which I would argue is too many. We have to make choices. We need to decide which sports are more important for Canada's identity and fund those selectively.
This is not to say that we should ignore the other ones, but there are ways of getting funding for them. For example, when a particular sport becomes very successful, then a percentage of those funds can be poured into general revenues for sports that do not make much money. Successful sports, such as track and field, rowing and sports that generate funds, can be used to pour into sports that are less attractive from a funding perspective.
We can also try to develop some innovative private-public partnerships. We have talked about tax incentives for investment from the private sector. We should consider using an adopt an athlete or adopt a sport for the private sector. The quid pro quo is that the particular advertising group can get money from advertising at the specific sports venues and generate something for them in that way. Those are the things that can be done.
I also want to draw to the attention of the House something the Canadian Olympic Association has been doing to address a very important problem and one that is largely going undiagnosed and unrecognized in our society; that is the inactivity among our youth.
If we are going to have an important and profound impact on the health of Canadians, in particular among the youth, we need to make sure that the youth get into healthy practices. One of the healthiest things they can do is engage in a sport. Sports are good for our health. The earlier we begin engaging in regular physical activity, the easier it will be to keep up with that physical activity when we are older.
In other words, starting early will give youths good habits that will enable them to carry on with healthy sports habits later in life. This will give us a health dividend. We know that regular activity and exercise is healthy for us. It lowers the risk of cardiovascular problems, other health problems and increases longevity.
The Canadian Olympic Association has tried to push forward an innovative program of using Canadian Olympic athletes as ambassadors for sport, using them as role models to push sport among youth, not necessarily at a high level but at the grassroots.
If the federal government chooses to take a leadership role with the provinces and is willing to approach the ministries of education to work with the Canadian Olympic Association, I think that would be a fantastic partnership. We would be able to use these Canadian heroes, who have competed nationally and internationally for us, as ambassadors for sport and to really have an aggressive campaign to convince our youth that competing in sports early on is very important.
We not only must convince the youth, but we must convince their parents. I have had many parents come into offices that I have worked in as a physician asking that their child be excused from physical education. It is very unfortunate that in many of those cases the request was not for good medical grounds, but because the child did not want to participate for various reasons. Sport can be made an integral part of people's lives and it is important that it be started early.
I also want to address the aspect of professional sports. Much has been said recently about whether we should or should not fund professional sports to keep them in the country. In a word, the answer, in my view, is absolutely not. How can we justify giving money to professional sports where people are making millions of dollars a year, when we have people on the street who might be making $17,000 or $20,000 a year? How can we justify taking their hard earned tax dollars to pay for professional sporting groups to stay in the country? We cannot and we should not.
The problem of professional sports in the country and why they are leaving is an indicator of a much larger problem that is affecting Canadians from coast to coast. It is taxes. Taxes are driving Canadians, Canadian companies and the best of what we have south of the border because the tax structure is so skewed. A family of two makes at least 44% more in the United States than they do here.
Similarly, the professional teams in the country are unable to compete with those teams south of the border because their taxes are high. The province of Ontario has an 10% entertainment tax on tickets for these sports. In the case of the Corel Centre in Ottawa, its property taxes have gone from $1.1 million to a proposed $7 million in less than seven years. That is ridiculous. We also have the only publicly funded and publicly owned highway.
What we need to do is lower taxes not just for professional sports but for Canadians from coast to coast. I am glad the problem was brought up by the professional sporting groups. It shows that not only are they labouring under high tax rates but so is the rest of Canada. They are also having a problem because the Canadian dollar is so low.
The reason the Canadian dollar is so low is because the government has put its tail between its legs and lowered the Canadian dollar to increase productivity rather than trying to deal with the elements of productivity such as taxes, education and rules and regulations, amongst others. It does not address that. It just lowers the value of the Canadian dollar to make our exports more competitive. In the process, however, it damages and hurts many Canadian companies that have to deal in U.S. dollars.
When it comes to sports, Canadian athletes show some of the finest examples of what it is to be Canadian. In the words of Lord Alfred Tennyson, in his poem Ulysses , he said:
To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield.
This is the motto of many Canadian athletes. I think sports are something that Canadians are all proud to participate in, to honour and to uphold.