Mr. Speaker, the budget the government presented last December 10 was a great disappointment to many of us. We were expecting the government to do something about the fundamentals. However we saw no provision for scheduled debt reduction, no measures to stimulate the economy, no tax relief and no substantive or significant increases to medicare and the things people in Canada value so much.
The Canadian dollar was at 78 cents U.S. or thereabouts when the government came in. It is now sitting somewhere around 62 cents. People are not calling it a dollar. They are calling it a dollarette. We used to make comparisons on a North American context and compare ourselves in the worst case with the Mexican peso. Now we cannot even do that because Mexico has become a much friendlier place than Canada for investment. The Mexican peso has increased in terms of double digits in relation to the U.S. dollar while we have gone in the other direction. It would be flattering to be able to compare ourselves with the Mexican peso but we cannot make that claim.
The largest symptom of what is going on is that Canadians have chosen not to invest in Canada. The world has become a much more flexible place. Canadians will no longer be held hostage in their own country in terms of how they choose to make investments, and money is very fluid as we all know.
We had a longstanding restraint which was counterproductive. We were only allowed to put 10% of our RSP investment into non-Canadian investments. That has recently been increased although it is still not a free for all. There is still some constraint. However even with the constraint Canadians are choosing more and more to invest outside their country. We are investing more outside our country than inside and there is a reason. The expectation is that the Canadian dollar will continue to do poorly against its international comparison which is primarily the U.S. dollar. Until we turn that around it will become a self fulfilling prophecy.
The only way to turn this around is to change the fundamentals. However the government has chosen not to address the fundamentals in the budget at a time when we need to bolster the credibility of the government in the public eye. We all know that after September 11 a lot of anxiety was directed toward how the government would address a lot of things. Without trade Canada's prosperity is jeopardized. Some 87% of our trade is with our U.S. partner. What we did in the budget to address our security and other concerns had obvious implications for our trade.
I will pose a rhetorical question. What has happened to Canada's pride? Because of the unique circumstances and timing of the budget the government did not address the things on which people were placing the most personal emphasis. We ended up with the Department of National Defence getting an increase to pay for Operation Apollo, our commitment in Afghanistan, and nothing to address the rust out and other major considerations we all know are so necessary to upgrade the armed forces and give our personnel what they deserve.
Last year I went with seven or eight members of parliament to Fort Lewis, Washington to watch Canadian army reserves from British Columbia participate in a training exercise. Since the army base in Chilliwack, B.C. is closed it is a way for them to train cost effectively. It was an eye opener. First, there are more U.S. military personnel stationed at Fort Lewis than there are Canadian personnel in the entire Canadian armed forces.
Second, while we were there we were given presentations on the Canadian Clothe the Soldier Project. I saw state of the art, technically developed and internationally acclaimed clothing, body armour, boots and other instruments that would be the envy of many of our NATO partners and other countries around the world.
It was with great concern that I discovered yes, we had seen all the prototypes and yes, we had spent $300 million on the program, but when it came to deploying our troops we did not have what was required. That was the impression I was left with.
I have made this statement but I will repeat it. The budget did nothing to address the fact that in its early response to September 11 Canada, the major trading partner of the U.S., was displaced as a friend of the United States by the U.K. We have not got that status back because we have not put our money where our mouth is.
We need to do more, spend more and have a firmer policy on border security. We need an immigration and refugee determination process that places Canadian security concerns first. We need to address our lack of military spending. We have been criticized across the board by Lord Robertson of NATO.
The Bush budget of last week added $46 billion to the U.S. military. If we were to do that on an equivalent basis it would be $4.6 billion. It shows how silly our commitment looks. We need an enhanced set of personnel resources on all fronts. This includes our park wardens, customs officers and every other front line service.