My friend is saying shame with a smile on his face.
It is important to note that there are a number of noble activities that parents support for their children as they are growing up. There are many ways to enrich their lives, keep them off the streets, and give them something that they can accomplish and be proud of.
If one has children who like to dance and wants to put them in ballet, that costs money. If one has children engaged in various kinds of crafts, obviously that can cost money. If one has them in music, that can cost a lot of money. There are all kinds of things that cost money that the children could go into that obviously this bill would not cover.
One of the obvious things is that we do not want to suggest that one activity should be of a higher ranking than another. Sports are a great thing. I participated in sports when I was growing up, my kids have and we support that. However other people make different choices because their children have different interests. We should not have legislation that favours one kind of activity. In doing that we discriminate against other kinds of activities. Frankly, that is what this bill does. For that reason I just cannot support it.
It is important to send the message to the public and to parents that we want to support them in having the money to put their children into all these kinds of activities. That is why the Canadian Alliance does not favour specific tax relief for certain activities that guide people, that says that if they follow our rules they will get a tax break.
We support, and I hope my friend who has moved this motion supports, general tax relief for all Canadians, so if they want to put their children into sports, or if they want to go into music or whatever it is, then by all means they should do that, but a lot of people today do not have the means to do that.
One thing we proposed in the 2000 election was a $3,000 per child tax deduction for single income families, single parents, and dual parents. That would put not a few hundred but thousands of dollars into the pockets of families with children under the age of 16. We received tremendous support for that idea in the 2000 election and people were very interested in that. It would demonstrate that the government recognizes the value of raising children and that it is a difficult job.
There is no question that one of the toughest jobs in the world is to raise kids. I am a member of Parliament and many people in this place have had other jobs where they have achieved tremendous things and high status in their professions. But I bet there is not one member who is a parent who has not found, in the middle of all the achievements, that when there is a problem at home with a child, they forget about everything they are doing and all that matters is what is going on with their child. I think we have all had that experience.
What I found, as our children grow up, is that it gets to the point where I would much rather see my children achieve than have some kind of personal glory for something that I have achieved. I think we have all been in that position.
I remember when my oldest scored a goal at a hockey game one time in the playoffs. He dived into the crease and knocked the puck into the net. I think I was happier than he was. I almost jumped on to the ice. I was so excited for him. The game went into overtime and his team lost if I remember correctly, but it was just a wonderful thing.
It is a wonderful thing if parents have the means to support their children to accomplish those kind of things. In this case it was sports. But in other cases it might be a piano recital, or whatever the case may be.
To the member who has proposed this private member's bill, I think it is a noble effort, but it is too narrow and it is shallow. It is too narrow in the sense that it does not cover all the activities. We must remember that the activities children want to engage in are endless. They may have no interest in the arts or sports. It may be computers that interests them. That may be where their talent lies, that is where they get their joy, and that is what they want to do.
In that case, that is where mom and dad, or mom, or dad, or whatever the case may be in that family, may want to devote the money but they do not have the money.
Let us support a tax deduction like the one we proposed in the 2000 election that opens up the ambit of choice for people so we are not limited by whatever the government happens to think of on that day.
One of the great things that I discovered being a member of Parliament is that I have come to appreciate how wonderful families are in the sense that they do so many things that governments could never do and they do them so well, by and large. I am speaking generally here. But by and large, nobody cares more for children than the parents of those children. Let us find ways to give them the means to look after their children.
If we were resourceful and sat down to look at the books of the government, where it spends $170 billion a year on all kinds of things, we would find all the stuff in there that was wasteful. We would find outcomes that did not achieve what they were supposed to achieve and in some cases were counterproductive or actually harmed the economy. There are things like that. If we were resourceful, I could guarantee that we would find a bunch of savings and we could use those savings to give to parents so that they could provide opportunities for their children.
In some cases it would not even be any of the activities that we talked about. In some cases it would be to send them to university because maybe they are in a situation where they do not have the capacity to do that otherwise. I also want to point out to my friend who proposed this, what if a parent has a disabled child who cannot participate in sports? This bill would discriminate against disabled children. We need to think in much broader terms about how we could help families
I have come to realize, after being here 10 years, that governments cannot decide what is right for families. That is crazy. Do not let the government do it. Let families decide what is right for families, who all have different heritages, traditions, and views about what is right for their children. Sure, there are times when individual families make mistakes, and that is a tragedy. But a much worse tragedy is when the government makes a decision that causes a tragedy for all families.
Let us not try to cure a problem for a small group of people by introducing a solution that would turn out to be a tragedy for a whole bunch of people. Let us find a way, instead, to take this motion, broaden it to include everything, and deepen it so that it would provide a lot more money to families so they can provide for their children in whatever way they see fit.