It could be 50¢ lower. It would create jobs. I would not mind if the government were to take credit for creating jobs if it were to drop the EI rate and that is what created the jobs.
We have to be competitive in the world. We understand how our productivity is declining versus that of our friends in the United States. What happens? The government continues to squeeze the employers and employees for more tax and more tax. The Auditor General has pointed out that is not appropriate. It may not be illegal but it is definitely inappropriate.
We could look at the other types of things the government has wasted money on. We voted on the Kyoto accord yesterday. That will also be another tax on industry. It is fine for the Minister of Finance to stand up and say that he will put a cap of $15 on every tonne of carbon dioxide that is produced but our friends in the United States do not have to pay a single penny because they are not going to participate in the Kyoto accord.
How are we going to maintain our competitiveness? The cost of Kyoto will be foisted upon business. The cost of this overtaxation on EI has been foisted on business. It goes on and on.
The Liberals seem to think they are acting more like socialists than entrepreneurs where they think they can tax those people and they will continue to produce. They will not continue to produce. They will pack their bags and move to the United States or somewhere else where there is a government that is friendly toward the concept of job creation, wealth creation and for that they do not mind paying a share of that in tax. But to be gouged by the government is not on.
We think also of the $7 billion that the government has parked in foundations. There is the $2.5 billion millennium scholarship fund. There is the medical research foundation. It goes on; there is a whole list of them.
The Auditor General pointed that out too. There is $7 billion of taxpayers' money parked in private bank accounts, paid for by the taxpayers of the country, paid for by the employers and employees of the country. The government has stashed it in private bank accounts so that it can at its wish, at its time and at its whim, decide that the money is going to be spent and presumably at the most appropriate time to buy votes for the next election. The Auditor General has been highly critical of that also.
The second report of the public accounts committee takes issue with the fact that the government takes the surplus, it continues to take an excess of EI premiums from employers and employees of the country. It puts the money into the general bank account of the Government of Canada and at the end of the year says, “What a wonderful thing. We have another surplus”.
The Liberals brag about that surplus as they take that overtaxation and stick it in private foundations. They waste it on gun registries where the costs are totally out of control. They waste it on the $1 billion boondoggle at HRDC. They waste it on advertising contracts. We heard evidence before the public accounts committee where it was said, “I knew what I was doing”, but the Auditor General said that they broke every rule in the book.
The litany goes on. The waste goes on. The overtaxation goes on. Canadian taxpayers are fed up. They want this to come to an end. Therefore, I would ask that we concur in the second report of the public accounts committee.