Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the debate today as well. I noticed that my colleague talked about the fact that we have been trying very hard for 20 or 25 years, I think was the number she used, to advance some of the problems we have seen today. I would like to put on record that a full 35 years ago in the mid-sixties, my mother Joyce was a single parent. It was fairly rare back then, certainly in Vancouver in the sixties. I can remember being I think the only family in our school that had divorced parents. It is not that many years down the road and it seems almost strange if a student has two parents at home.
Government money is going into looking at these problems. They are endemic in society, but is just throwing money at them the ultimate solution?
The minister just took a shot across, saying that my party and I are only concerned about taxes and debt, that we do not understand the lives of real women out there. I have news for her. I know all too well on a personal basis the pain involved in growing up in a single parent family in Vancouver, very close to where she lives right now. I have been very blessed by that. I would have given anything if my mom had been able to be a doctor or a professional person to raise her kids. She had no trade. She went out, got a job in a lamp store and raised five children single-handedly. I take my hat off to her.
There are thousands and probably millions of people out there in the very same position, but surely these things have been going on not just for 25 years but for 35 years. For the money the minister says she is putting in to rectify these problems, surely something else is missing in this equation. It is not just money for this group or money for that group, but something is wrong if the basic building block of the family is not a concern.
We put forward a tax friendly policy toward families because we truly think that families are discriminated against if, for instance, one parent chooses to stay home and raise the kids. That does not mean I advocate that one parent out of every family should stay home, but surely they should be given that choice.
The minister knows that under tax policy one needs a receipt for third party day care. What is the problem? If someone chooses to have one parent stay at home, why can that not be treated as some sort of tax break? We have been around the block on that. I know that the junior minister of finance got backed right into a corner some months ago about this very issue because it is indefensible.
If she says that all I do is rant about taxes, that is one way they could solve a whole lot of problems in a big hurry. Many of these things we are looking at and talking about today, and which the March of Women, address the whole idea of violence against women. However, there is violence against everyone in our society. Everyone of us here should abhor that. Surely we could make changes in the justice system.
I look at the youth justice bill for instance. The justice minister was sworn in I believe on August 3, 1997, but I am not sure of the exact date. She said the youth justice bill was going to be her number one concern. It is now October 2000 and I am terrified to think what concerns seven, eight and nine are.
The youth justice bill deals with women but it also deals with all kinds of problems. It deals with young men and women being perpetrators of crime and young men and women, older people and children being the victims of those crimes. What happened? She blamed the separatists and said they were holding it up in the House of Commons. This is a majority government. If something is as important as making sure that our justice system works well, surely to heaven we do not have to blame it on the Bloc just because it is doing a bit of filibustering in the House. If a government really believes that then let it work through the House and through committee. For goodness sake in two parliamentary terms, one of which is coming evidently to a rapid end for no reason, why can we not get these things through and let justice be justice in the justice system and not under the guise of the Minister of State for Multiculturalism.
Justice and equality do not necessarily require further government intrusion. As I said earlier, we put more and more money into these programs and yet the minister claims that the incidence of violence and the incidence of women's shelters is going up at an alarming rate. It would seem to me that when she talks about the roots of violence or family domestic problems, we have to dig a little deeper to the root.
She talked about the gun control bill and that this really was going to help things because she said guns commit these crimes, and granted they do in violence against women. However, it is almost as if there is a myth across the way that nothing is going to happen or some of these dreadful things will not happen again. Even if a gun is registered, do government members think that a gun will not be used commit a crime?
Let us look at the roots of violence and why domestic violence happens. I know plenty about violence even though the minister would laugh and say that am just a Alliance member and know very little about it. I understand what family violence is about. I do not understand it totally but I understand that even if there is a gun in the house or a knife or a frying pan, if a male or female has it in his or her heart to commit violence, we know darn well it is going to happen. It does not matter if a gun is registered or if a longbow or a crossbow or a Henckels carving knife is used. If violence is in someone's heart, the person is going to commit violence. I really do not think gun control is going to answer the question.
Let us look at economic equality and women and work. Women are more often greatly affected as part of the sandwich generation. They have kids at home to look after. Many of us who are baby boomers are not only getting older but our parents are aging. Many of us look after our parents at home and that obviously takes up, in terms of unpaid work, huge amounts of responsibility for women.
I already mentioned family tax fairness and child care. Why would we discriminate against two parent families where one chooses to stay home? Who in the House would be able to defend such a policy where the government discriminates in the tax system against someone who chooses to stay at home.
Setting up the promised national child care fund is something that the group is looking for, starting with an immediate contribution of $2 billion. When I talk about family and celebrating family as a priority, lots of people send their kids to day care and many times they have to. I do not think it should be a natural way of life to assume that we are going to send our kids to day care as a matter of course. This motion certainly leads in that direction.
Let me talk about personal and business taxes. The minister talked about taxes. I wish she were here to hear this because it is a really good one. She needs to know that women are starting businesses at twice the rate of men. That to me is a pretty significant and exciting development. Yet, I did not hear anything about it from the other side.