Mr. Chair, I guess what can we expect out of the NDP is a typical bank bashing speech. Here we have, “Let's have fun and games with the banks”. It is a terrible thing that they made somewhere in the order of about $13 billion profit.
Members might be interested in knowing that banks paid about $9 billion worth of taxes last year. That $9 billion basically covers the Canada child tax benefit, which is a program that alleviates poverty for young people. It is close to what we paid for the military. It is a fairly significant contribution to the revenues of the Government of Canada. Yet the NDP has decided that we should take 5% of our GDP, which is what the financial services are, and take some free bashing at them because that is easy to do and it is cheap politics.
I come from a community in the greater Toronto area. Financial services represent 21% of the gross domestic product of that area. The members can take their free shots. They are welcome to do so. However, if it is not the most, it is one of the most significant industries in the GTA.
The hon. member seems to be locked in some sort of mindset about bank closures and things of that nature. He has not noticed that over the last five to ten years Canadians have gone electronic.
I do not know about other members, but I cannot think of the last time I actually went into a bank and used the services of a bank. I do all my banking electronically, as I am sure most people do. Who needs lineups? If they enjoy standing in lines, they are welcome to them. However, the banks recognized that a long time ago.
As to the point on the living standards, the poor old NDP cannot take yes for an answer. It does not seem to recognize that for children, there has been a general improvement in the family income situation. The number of families in poverty situations has declined from 15.8% in 1996 down to 11.4%. In 1996 14% of all people lived below the LICO line, the low income cutoff line. In 2001 it was 10.4%. That is a decline somewhere in the order of 25%. Similarly with children, 31% of children now have achieved a level above the poverty line where they were below it prior to 1996.
A lot of it has to do with the fact that the Canadian government has a sensible balance approach to the management of the nation's financial affairs. There have been tax cuts in which my hon. members are not interested. There has been debt reduction in which my hon. colleagues are not interested. There has been a significant increase in program spending in which apparently they are interested. On a three-legged stool, they want one leg and they want to cut the other two off. If we cut off two of the three legs of a the stool, it would be on the floor by now. That is exactly what the NDP program is. It wants to cut two of the three legs off so we can fall flat on our faces.
I put it to the hon. member that in the area of seniors, we have the lowest rate of senior poverty in the OECD. In the area of children, significant progress has been made in taking children out poverty. In the area of the general welfare of Canadians, his entire speech is misapplied to this subject matter.