Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to say a few words on this extremely important bill. This bill is of particular importance to my region of the country.
I listened attentively to what the member for Dartmouth said. She laid it out quite clearly as to how federal funding generally affects not only the country but specifically the Atlantic region. The points she raised when she referred to her home province of Nova Scotia, I could just switch the province to Newfoundland and they would also fit. I congratulate the member on how well she understands the financial situation in which the Atlantic provinces find themselves.
I want to say from the start that we support the legislation. That is not to say that we support the present equalization funding mechanisms because we certainly do not. We are supporting what the legislation does which is to extend the present agreements for a year so that presumably the new government will put in place a type of funding program for the provinces that will really be equal. Certainly, the equalization program that we have today is not equal in any respect and I will explain that as I go on.
The proposed legislation extends the present agreement for one year, I presume in the event that the government does not have its act together. We might ask why the government would not have its act together because it has known for some time that this agreement was going to run out. The answer is it has not been paying any attention to this agreement or any other agreement because it has been too caught up in playing its own games; one Prime Minister is trying to develop a legacy and the other prime minister is trying to make an impression.
What will be interesting when the incoming prime minister in comes is the effect it will have on the incomes of the people across the country. If he delivers on half of the promises, not on all of the promises, then we will not have to worry about surpluses any more because he will have overspent tremendously. People are looking at that very carefully.
The question raised at the end of the speech by the hon. member for Dartmouth concerned the overpayment to provinces and the negative effect it is having on the Atlantic provinces in particular, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, New Brunswick, and P.E.I. perhaps in this case to a lesser extent. They have been told, “The census figures are out of whack. You owe us a lot of money and we want it”. It is funny when the provinces come to Ottawa looking for money that they are owed or which they deserve, they do not get that same quick response that the federal government is expecting from them.
Perhaps the federal government should look more closely at the census generally. We are now seeing the manipulation of a process that has existed for a number of years, that is, the process of changing the electoral boundaries every 10 years. The change is based on a close accounting of the electors and the boundaries are adjusted to make sure that there is relative equality. We could argue equality here also because trying to represent 80,000 or 90,000 people in an urban riding compared to representing that same number in rural Canada is certainly two different kettles of fish entirely.
Because of the wishes of the incoming prime minister, there is a need to have an early election. He wants to get rid of those who surround the present Prime Minister and reward some of those who have patiently sat in the backbenches, all 150 of them who think they are going to be in cabinet, so that they will live happily ever after.
In order to do that he is faced with the conflict of having two groups around him. Because he does not want to bring a lot of the backbenchers up front and he certainly does not want to keep the frontbenchers around him, the easiest thing to do is to clean house. That is exactly what he intends to do.
There is a complication in that under the existing legislation he cannot call an election under the new boundaries until August 25, 2004. In order to have the best of both worlds, the incoming prime minister was instrumental in getting the government to bring forward legislation to move the implementation date up to April 1 so he could call an election any time after that date based on the new boundaries.
However because of the lesser amount of time that the Office of the Chief Electoral Officer has, despite what they say they cannot do justice to the census to determine the number of electors in certain areas by following such a circumvented process. Therefore we question the reliability of the figures upon which the government bases its payments or overpayments to provinces.
The member from Winnipeg asked whether the government, in light of an upcoming election, would put pressure on the provinces to pay back that money because it is not going to be a very popular political thing to do. There is another reason the government may not put pressure on the provinces to pay it back. There is an election coming, but when the government originally made that decision, it probably said, “It does not matter because the people are going to vote for us anyway as they have for the last 10 years”. That is not necessarily true anymore.
There is a major political change taking place in this country. For the first time in many years, we are seeing a party that will be front and centre, that will be taking on the Liberals head to head in the next election. Unfortunately for my friend from Winnipeg, it is not the NDP, but as I have always said, I hope members of the NDP will still hold a small presence in the House because they do present that social conscience which a place like this needs. The new Conservative Party now gives Canadians an alternative and the Liberals will not be doing anything rash between now and election time. Hopefully that will be to the benefit of provinces such as my own.
On equalization, the word itself is certainly a misnomer. There is no way that equalization describes what is happening in relation to the payments that are distributed across the country. The cap, which the government has now agreed to relax for a while, prevented that equal flow of funds from the rich to the poor, sort of a Robin Hood scenario. The whole concept based around equalization is have provinces and have not provinces, but what is the definition of a have not province? Ordinarily one would think of these poor provinces that have no resources and consequently, out of the kindness of their hearts, those of us who have will help them.
History has shown that over the years provinces across the country, or even before provinces were established, regions across the country have helped one another during the bad times. When the west was having a lot of trouble, it was helped by the east. Now perhaps the east is being helped by the west. As oil and gas dry up in the west and it becomes much more lucratively developed in the east, then undoubtedly the reverse will be true again.
Newfoundland and Labrador is referred to as a have not province and yet we have major offshore oil developments. We have the best, the cleanest and the most prolific hydro developments anywhere in the country, and they compare with any in the world, although many are undeveloped. We have great mineral resources and new ones are always being discovered. We have a rich forest industry. We had and still do have to some degree a tremendous fishery. Unfortunately, because of the federal government's complete and utter mismanagement, we have seen the stocks diminish.
A recent assessment was done by some very knowledgeable people of some 1973 landings, which was before we let the foreigners take over the resources, before we let the seal herds grow to the point where they destroyed the fish and before we completely abandoned surveillance and protection of our resource. The value of the 1973 resource in today's dollars would have been $3.38 billion on groundfish alone. One can just imagine what that could do to the economy of Newfoundland.
For the past couple of years the landed value of our total fishing resource has been roughly in the area of $1 billion, mainly because of crab and shrimp, the shellfish, which 10 or 15 years ago was only a very small part of the revenues produced. Shellfish has now become the saviour of the fishery in our province and has become a lucrative resource for those who still participate in the industry.
However, with the amount of fish that we had in 1973, if we had been able to protect and preserve the resource, as we should have been able to do with any leadership at all from the federal government, instead of trading it off for other benefits, it would have amounted to $3.38 billion. Newfoundland is not the only province that has been affected. Most of Atlantic Canada and a lot of Quebec also benefited from that resource. We have seen that resource disappear. As I said, it would have been $3.38 billion alone in what was landed in 1973 if we had been able to maintain that level.
In relation to our hydro developments, because of poor dealings in the past, when we had a government, unfortunately, a Liberal government--maybe I should say, from my perspective, fortunately a Liberal government--we negotiated a deal with Quebec with no help from Canada and somebody on our side forgot to insert an escalator clause. Quebec has benefited greatly from the deal and our revenues each year are approximately $10 million. From the sale or resale of that power I think the revenues for Quebec are somewhere in the area of $1 billion at this stage. That is another resource that has completely disappeared.
We have had no assistance whatsoever in the development of lower Churchill. Newfoundland and Quebec have talked in the past and under the new progressive government in Newfoundland, with tremendous leadership and cabinet, which will be put in place this coming week, and tremendous individuals involved, we undoubtedly will see Newfoundland dealing with Quebec again, hopefully for the development of our power, but in a way where we all benefit, not just one party, from the agreement.
With our mineral developments, again without any federal assistance or federal input, we see the resources being developed and brought out of the province to create jobs somewhere else. We are contributing to the national scene.
Some say Newfoundland is a have-not province and that it constantly takes from the centre. When we are providing Quebec with hydro and the spinoff from that is over $1 billion, when we are providing Manitoba and Ontario with our minerals for processing, when we are providing everybody around the world with our fish, how can we be a have province?
People might say that it is our own fault, and a lot of it is. A lot of the decisions were made with the lack of input from provincial governments of the past. That day is over. The resource giveaway from Newfoundland and Labrador has ended. I would issue this challenge to the rest of the provinces. The resources within our provinces should be primarily developed for the good of our provinces.
In a federation we undoubtedly will share and help wherever we can but we must look after ourselves first. However coordination and leadership is supposed to come from Ottawa but we have not seen it. Is it any wonder that provinces are upset? Is it any wonder Quebec is upset by its treatment from Ottawa? Is it any wonder Newfoundland and Labrador is upset? Not at all.
We have not seen fairness. We have not seen solid, central control. What we have seen is a whittling away of our controls and a lack of input from the government in the areas where it should be helping. The government interferes in areas where it should not and does not help in areas where it should.
When we talk about equalization let us first look at what we are trying to do. The government says that the theory behind equalization is to ensure that everyone in the country is treated fairly. What a joke. If it wants to treat us fairly, then it should let us help ourselves. We do not need handouts. We do not want to take federal money and still hold on to our own. We have never asked for that.
As we develop our finite natural resources we want to be treated the same way as Alberta was treated in the beginning. We want to hold on to enough of our revenue to reinvest so we can become a have province. If we could hold on to a larger percentage of the revenues garnered from the development of our resources we could invest in our own province and it would not take too long to create the jobs that are necessary.
We need to get legislation through that does not put provinces in the position of having to give away their resources. We need the freedom to develop and the right to reinvest until we can become a contributing partner.
Newfoundland and Labrador has only 500,000 people. With our resources we should all be millionaires. Why are we a have not province? The answer is quite simple. It is like the old days of serfdom when the lords were sitting in Ottawa and the peons were scattered throughout the country taking only what the lord giveth forth. That is not the way a Confederation is supposed to work.
Maybe we should look at the word equalization again. Maybe we should look at the fact that all areas of the country are not equal.
We should listen to the member for Dartmouth who talked about health care funding. Some time ago the federal government funded 50% of health care costs. Today in some areas the funding is down to as little as 14% of the total cost. The burden has landed in the laps of the provinces.
The member talked about what was happening in Nova Scotia. The situation is even worse in Newfoundland because we are the only province that is losing a high percentage of its residents. Over the last 10 years around 50,000 people, or 10% of our population, have gone to British Columbia, Alberta, Ontario and some have gone south of the border. What is left is an ageing population requiring, as the member said, more funding. Not only do we receive fewer dollars but we have greater needs. With the geography that we have, it is almost impossible to deliver that funding.
If we are going to look at the equalization situation and if we are asking for a year's extension to develop a proper program, then let us do it properly. Let us look at the entities across the country. Let us create a country where everybody is treated equally. Let us create a country where we help ourselves and the federal government lets us help ourselves by staying out of our hair.