Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in the debate on the throne speech. Right off the bat, I want to say that I have heard all the throne speeches since 1993 when I first arrived here. What I heard in 2002 was a repeat of much of what I heard in 1993 and what was missed in this throne speech from 1993 the government picked up from the 1997 throne speech and before. It is nothing new.
We continually listen to these things over and over again. They are unfulfilled promises, a pile of rhetoric with no real means of achieving what the government is attempting to achieve. I will give a few examples.
First I would like to call to the attention of all Canadians, and particularly those people who are involved in agriculture, that in this particular throne speech there was one little sentence about agriculture in Canada. Agriculture is one of the most important industries, if not the most important industry. It is certainly one of the largest employers of the Canadian people. It deserves a lot more than one little sentence.
There are difficulties for the agricultural producers, the food supply and other things are happening, but Africa was talked about quite extensively in the throne speech. We have drastic needs throughout the country. In particular, western Canada has such a severe drought. No drought has ever been recorded as being this severe, yet it was not even mentioned in the throne speech, not one little sentence.
Nobody likes to see the suffering that is going on in Africa. It just sickens me when I watch the advertisements by World Vision, Samaritan's Purse and other groups. They are doing their best and they are doing an excellent job. However what we have done is to continually look at refunding, putting in more money and doubling our efforts in terms of money.
If that was the solution the problem should have been solved a long time ago. That has been our answer to their needs for the last 100 years. We have created in those other countries very rich people and extremely poor people. The more money we put into those countries, the larger certain Swiss accounts get for certain individuals, the bigger their palaces are, the better their robes are and the more jewels they have. The rich continue to get richer and the poor continue to get poorer. It is not the answer.
It is not a deficit of the rich and the poor as the Prime Minister has stated. When are we going to recognize that the real deficit in many of those countries is there is no democracy? Democracy does not exist. We are dealing with tyrants and dictators who have no value for the human being whatsoever and our answer is to feed more money to the tyrants and dictators while the poor continually suffer.
If we would wake up and recognize the real deficit that exists in these lands is that there is no freedom, that there is no democracy, maybe we could put a little different spin on our efforts to help those who are suffering so severely. However the throne speech talked about them for all that length of time and had one little sentence about people in our own country who are losing their farms. People are committing suicide. They are going completely bankrupt and are no longer able to fulfill their mission as good farmers because of all the things they have to contend with and we do not even address it even so much as to say small things.
For example, at the end of this month if a fine is not paid by 14 farmers in Alberta they will go to jail. Why will they go to jail? They chose through the Internet to find a niche market and sell their own grain across the border in the U.S. where they received a much better price. They were trying to survive and make a living and that is against the law.
Those farmers broke the law. Thousands of other farmers in Canada are allowed to do that but in western Canada the farmers are not allowed to do that. Let me give a very sad comparison. There are three countries that do not allow farmers to sell their own produce which they work hard to produce. Communist China is one, communist North Korea is another, and dare I say, communist western Canada? I will just say western Canada because it is not that bad yet.
Western Canadian farmers are in the same category. They cannot sell their barley and wheat without the government's approval through the Canadian Wheat Board, yet it does not apply to thousands of others. Talk about an unfair situation in a free country like Canada. For Pete's sake, when are the Liberals going to wake up over there and realize they cannot treat people like that? If it is good for one farmer in one region, then it has to be good for another farmer in another region.
It seems lately the only people who recognize this are the farmers themselves. A great number of farmers from Ontario and other places worked hard to produce some hay. People did their utmost to get it to the farmers out west to help them with their problem. The government sat idly by watching them do this and then dared to step forward and take credit for what the farmers themselves were trying to do. It is disgraceful.
Regarding child poverty, in 1993 the throne speech said that by 2000, child poverty in Canada would be eliminated. That was the government's promise in the 1993 throne speech. It is now 2002 and it is as bad as it ever was, if not worse. It is empty rhetoric but the government keeps saying it because it sounds so good. Poor old John Q. Public out there who never heard the 1993 throne speech does not realize that this is going on and on and on.
Then we ask why it is not happening. We are a rich country. The revenue that is taken in by the government is huge and it is sufficient to do the job. Is it because fountains need to be put in the Prime Minister's riding rather than take care of some poverty problems in our own country? Is it because contracts are given out to hundreds of people who do not even produce a product for the job they were hired to do, and which the RCMP has to investigate because it sounds so strange? Is it because the $75 million gun registry, which is now at $1 billion, is a complete waste of money? It does not fight crime. There is another $925 million that could have gone to fight poverty.
We could make a list that would go on and on, but the Auditor General did it for us. In the last report she said to the government that she could identify $16 billion of waste that could have been used for very good purposes like eliminating child poverty, like equipping our military that has the finest men and women we could ever ask for. I have talked to lots of them in the last year, particularly at the G-8 summit where they were so involved in security. They are great people. They deserve better. Canadians deserve better.
The taxpayers of Canada deserve better than what the government has been giving them for nine years. One day the Liberals are going to wake up and realize that we are tired of the same old throne speeches promising the same old things that they never fulfill because they are filling their own egos and so obnoxious that they have to find a legacy for the Prime Minister.
Why does the Prime Minister not work for a legacy that says he was the Prime Minister that addressed the very serious problems that so many Canadians faced? He has not done it today. He has not done it in nine years. He has looked after himself and his colleagues well, and that has to come to an end. The taxpayers of Canada have to wake up. It is time for a change.