Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today in the debate on the Address in Reply to the Speech from the Throne. As you know, the Bloc Québécois proposed an amendment to the amendment and the Conservative Party of Canada proposed an amendment and both were unanimously adopted by the House. Therefore, the Speech from the Throne has the unanimous approval of this House.
I am very proud of the amendment by the Bloc Québécois. I am going to read it now, because it will clarify the rest of my statement.
and we ask Your Excellency's advisors to ensure that all measures brought forward to implement the Speech from the Throne, including those referred to above, fully respect the provinces' areas of jurisdiction and that the financial pressures some call the fiscal imbalance be alleviated.
This amendment to the amendment is very important. Like my colleague from Beauport—Limoilou, I was listening to the hon. Liberal member making his speech and other Liberal colleagues in this House boasting about the new deal for municipalities and saying they must be helped.
I have been a witness to all that has happened with Quebec's municipalities, because I was active for years in the municipal arena. I was president of the Union des municipalités du Québec from 1997 to 2000 and I had been active in that organization for 10 years before that. I have seen what the stress and fiscal imbalance caused by the federal government did to Quebec's municipalities.
Beginning when the current Prime Minister became Minister of Finance, the Government of Quebec had to impose two major reforms on municipalities because of cuts in the transfer payments to provinces. For those working in the municipal domain, the first was the Ryan reform, which cost the cities and towns of Quebec $250 million, and then there was the Trudel reform.
I will say this and I will name the ministers—one was Liberal and the other from the PQ—but the premiers and ministers of municipal affairs were not exactly happy when they went to ask the cities for more money.
With the Ryan reform, the vast majority of roads that had been maintained by the province became the responsibility of municipalities in Quebec. This means that cities had to maintain additional infrastructures. All the municipalities had to help pay the bill for the Quebec provincial police. Over time, costs increased for each community. In fact, so much pressure was exerted to have the QPP and other police forces provide increasingly more services to cities, that some of them did away with their police force, turned to the QPP and paid the bill.
With the Trudel reform, something unprecedented in North America occurred. Cities wrote cheques to the Quebec government to help it pay off its debts. Such is the reality. Later on, a tax deal, negotiated by Lucien Bouchard, gave a bit of money back to the cities. But the fact remains that, ever since the current Prime Minister took over the Department of Finance, Quebec cities have only received bills.
Why? Because cities come under the jurisdiction of the provinces, as provided under the Canadian Constitution. Of course, when the federal government cuts in health transfers and in transfers to the provinces, the latter have no choice but to tell cities, “Look, we also have to cut”.
So, Quebec reduced services to cities and school boards. This led to a school tax increase and, for many, to a municipal tax increase. Everyone had to assume their share of the burden.
I find it appalling that Liberal members, including the Prime Minister, would come and tell us today that they will help the cities. It is the Prime Minister who put them in dire straits. He has to use the technique that he employed at the time. If he made cuts in transfers to the provinces, which in turn had to make cuts to their transfers to cities, then he must give money back to the provinces. This is what we are saying. The Liberals want to help cities? Then let them give money to the provinces, and the provinces will help the cities.
Take my word. There is not a single provincial minister or premier who does not like to have his picture taken with the mayor of a municipality, whether small, medium or large, while he is handing out a cheque and offering his help to buy equipment and maintain infrastructures.
Unfortunately, when the current Prime Minister was the finance minister, many years ago, he cut transfers to the provinces, and the cities have not been investing in infrastructure. They have not had the money. Any money they had went to helping the province soften the impact of the cuts to health, transfers to the provinces, social services and so on. That is what we have had to deal with.
Almost 12 years later, we have impoverished cities that have not invested in infrastructure because they have had to help the provinces deal with the federal cuts. And now the federal government wants to tour Canada and give money directly to the cities.
I lay some of the blame on my former mayor colleagues and the city councillors who buy into this, saying, “The federal government is going to give us money.” In any event, it is not the federal government that adopts policies for the cities, it is the provinces that adopt policies for water, sewers, waterworks, and transportation. Everything is under provincial jurisdiction. Anything municipal is under provincial jurisdiction. Such is the reality.
Consequently, the provinces need help. They need more money in order to help the cities. That was the meaning of the Bloc Québécois amendment to the amendment—to respect the jurisdictions entrusted to each government by the Canadian Constitution. Municipal governments come under the authority of the provinces, which have their own jurisdictions. Often cities are a good example. Once the federal government has made a mess, it wants to help directly. We see this with many organizations. It is prepared to go to the universities and hospitals and help them directly with money it took away from the provinces. That is what it has done. In an attempt to give itself some capital, it cut provincial transfers. Such is the reality.
When the Prime Minister was the Minister of Finance, the feds. were footing 25% of the health bill, and then the figure was cut to 12.5%. Now they are in the process of raising it, and everyone is calling for a return to 25%. But doing that is bringing it back to the level the federal government was paying when the Prime Minister was in finance. That is the reality. In the meantime, people in the provinces absorbed all these sums. Cuts could not be made at all levels, so everyone in Quebec society had to make an effort, the cities and the school boards too. Today, of course they are getting some help.
We feel that a new deal with the municipalities is indeed necessary. Each community, whether small, medium or large, will have to receive federal assistance, which will be transferred to the provinces under a nice agreement, respectful of the various jurisdictions, to provide funding to the municipalities. Yes, it is high time, because since the PM has been finance minister, the municipal level has been under some very considerable pressure. The municipalities have had to pay a pretty heavy price to help out the provinces.
Once again, that is one of the things that brought me here. I wanted, in a way, to follow the problem to its source. I did not go to the provincial level; that is not where it originated. The source of the problem is here, in this House. The Liberal members do not get it. It is as simple as that. They have never got it. That is, in fact, why there are fewer of them than last time I was here. The next time, there will likely be still fewer, because they just do not get it. Some will, of course, say that this is a kind of sickness. I would say that being Liberal is a sickness in itself. Of course the way out can still be seen. What the municipalities are experiencing is far from funny. All my colleagues in the Bloc Québécois can see that the municipalities in all regions of Quebec are most definitely in need of help.
I was pleased to accept my party leader's request to take the lead in the infrastructure and community file. Yes, it is time that the governments negotiated a deal with municipalities, but with the greatest respect for provincial jurisdiction. Therefore, it must truly be the province that obtains an agreement with the federal government in order to be able to help the cities, simply because the ones who pay the taxes, in the end, are the citizens. Whether it is for school boards, municipal, provincial or federal governments, the same taxpayer always pays. Therefore we must be able to agree.
Just now, I heard the hon. member for Saint-Maurice—Champlain say that we must make certain that this happens without quarrelling. That is true. My colleague was correct in saying that to his opponent. Yes, we are ready to do this, as long as each respects the other's jurisdiction. And that is not so difficult. The worst thing is that this country has a document that tells it what to do. Once again, the Liberal members cannot even read it. Therein lies the tragedy. That will always be the tragedy in this House: they cannot read the document they created for their country. Naturally, that causes problems for Quebec.
We, the men and women of Quebec who sit in the House of Commons, are here to defend the interests of Quebeckers, to prevent the others from doing whatever they want and from again pillaging the money from provincial coffers to build up a big treasure chest here at the federal level. What we want is just the opposite: take the big federal treasure chest and pay out where the needs are, that is, in the provinces and in the cities, for the well-being of all Quebeckers.