Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join in the debate on the budget.
It would have been nice right before an election to have a budget with which we could go into the election saying that we cannot trust the Liberals to keep their promises, that they will never follow through on what is in the budget. That is just the way the government is before the election.
However, I have to admit that I was greatly shocked, simply because I am used to the usual Liberal way of doing things. They will talk from a social perspective, much like the Prime Minister did in the throne speech, that everything is wonderful and they are going to do all these things and they make all these promises. The Prime Minister could not do it in the budget. Something must have caught his conscience and he said, “I do not know if my corporate friends will support me in the next election if I do not follow true to them.”
Quite frankly, going into an election, I am pleased with the budget. I am darn pleased. After the election if he came forward with the usual kind of budget which gave everything, of course we would cheer. This was quite an interesting twist to things. I hope Canadians realize that if the Prime Minister, a month after the throne speech, could not follow through on a promise, then they had better not plan on the Prime Minister following through on any of the promises he was making on the side to people all throughout his leadership campaign.
I am sure he is even doing it now saying, “I could not put it in the budget right now because it would have looked bad. I am still going to make sure people get this and this”. I think we all expect that is what the Prime Minister is doing out there.
This is a budget that reflects the government's lack of priorities. It reflects the government's lack of vision. The budget reflects a government that is so out of touch with the people of Canada that it is incredible.
The Prime Minister probably travelled throughout Canada on his leadership campaign and spoke to a good number of Canadians. It is quite apparent which Canadians he spoke with, but he should have got a fair idea of what Canadians wanted and it is not there.
Let us follow up on the issue of health which the member for Burnaby—Douglas mentioned, which is the number one priority of Canadians. If there is anyone in the House who is willing to stand up and say Canadians do not consider health care to be their number one priority, then they should stand up and be counted because they are out of touch with Canadians as well. Health is the number one priority.
Canadians understand that the dollars have to be there to pay for the services. They understand that. Quite frankly, to my colleague from across the way, the secretary of state for privatization, we fully understand that. We did in Saskatchewan in the early years of medicare and we have continued to do that. In the province of Manitoba we want to make sure that the funding is there so that we can follow through.
Canadians want the dollars put into the budget for health care. They want to have a stable economy. They want us to have the money to support additional programs, but with a government that would finagle with putting over $200 million into Liberal patronage funds, it does not care about Canadians. The government does not care about Canadians and about ensuring that the dollars are there. The Liberals are just looking out for, not even 40 acres, probably it is about two acres as it is just that little group of whoever is around the minister of the day.
Canadians want to see the dollars go into health care, as do we. They want to see an overview of the system. Where changes to the management can be made to improve the system, let us do it. Canadians want the money to go into health care. Canadians want a not for profit health care system. Canadians absolutely do not want someone profiting from the ill health of someone else. The government's shameful example is not acceptable.
I want to also mention the situation with aboriginal health. The aboriginals are the most vulnerable group within our country because of the conditions they have been forced to live in, as a result of government policy over the years. It put them on reserves with inadequate housing, inadequate water and sewers and a lack of amenities that would be necessities in any white community.
I am going to say it because it is darn well true, the amenities in any white community were not put into the aboriginal communities for which the federal government is responsible, and it was a number of federal governments. The result within those communities has been poverty, poor living conditions and ill health within the communities.
There is something I recently found out. First nations should get their health care provided just like the rest of us. They have what they call non-insured health benefits. Any one of us can pick up an insurance policy to get some extra benefits. Everything that is covered by medicare gets paid by medicare. It is the insurer of last resort for those things that one is covered for. I want to talk about what Health Canada is doing to aboriginal people.
Assume that an aboriginal person would get an insurance policy to cover him or her for those additional things. Individual first nations members would pay for it themselves. In case anyone thinks it is coming out of the taxpayers' pockets, it is not. Individual first nations members pay for it. What does Health Canada tell them? They are told that the insurer has to pay for all of the individual's health care, and they operate differently. The most vulnerable people in our society are being treated like that by the government. It is not acceptable.
The government spouts off about all the dollars it is putting into education and research. Let us hear a really important part of this which maybe the government passed over, or maybe Canadians did not hear. It is additional funding to improve the capacity for the commercialization at universities, hospitals and other research facilities. We wonder why we get nervous when there is a secretary of state for privatization, when one of the government's major goals is the commercialization of universities and research.
Tell me, how much commercial profit is there if someone has an illness that only deals with maybe a small percentage of the population and drug companies are not going to make a profit by treating them? Do we think any effort is going to be made to find improvements for that condition, to find aids to assist with it and to do the research? If there is no commercial profit, do we think that is going to happen?
That is why a focus on the commercialization of universities and research is not acceptable. It is a disgusting vision for any nation, that all we would be looking at is the commercialization and that it would be espoused as something great.
This has been mentioned already, the broken promise, and it is happening to communities and cities with the gas tax. I hope people do not lose sight of that because if it was not in this budget, we are not going to see it, and anyone who believes the Prime Minister is really off in another realm.
The GST rebate is very commendable but it would make more sense to not have municipalities have to pay it in the first place. Is there not a way of putting in place a system where municipalities are registered as GST exempt for certain products so they do not have to pay it?
Why would we put in place a whole rebate system where we say that something is not covered anymore or that they will have to pay it on something else further down the road? It would make a lot more sense for municipalities and for that matter school boards and other educational institutions, not to have to pay it.
The government was very proud of its commitment to education, proud of ensuring that it is forcing students to have an even greater debt load in order to get their education.
A simple thing would have been to provide funding to keep tuition fees down. We can forget all the fancy little tricks that were put in where people get a certain amount of money if they have a child under a certain age, as long as they are not getting the national child tax credit in that family, then they will get a certain amount, all these little loopholes.
The Prime Minister as finance minister found all the loopholes he possibly could in the tax system, but we had hoped that there could have been a whole lot more vision and commitment for Canadians.
My colleague from Burnaby—Douglas also mentioned the failure to aboriginal people and there is no question about that. That was a real disappointment. The Prime Minister had gone around saying that he was going to be there for us. He did not last a month before he turned his back on the aboriginal people of Canada, once again. I hope they will not let the Prime Minister get away with it.