Mr. Speaker, I appreciate speaking to the federal budget on behalf of the constituents of my riding of Sault Ste. Marie. I am also happy to be sharing my time with my colleague for Windsor West.
Budgets first and last should be about people. The test of any budget is what it does for every Canadian in every walk of life. Budgets are not only a statement on the economy. They also are intended as a statement of vision, where we want to go as Canadians.
Frankly, this budget vision becomes a nightmare for too many Canadians. The people in my riding of Sault Ste. Marie heard the Prime Minister warn them during the election about the Leader of the Opposition and his party's politics and how they needed to vote Liberal for a progressive agenda and stop the Conservatives, but the budget delivered Conservative priorities.
Promises made; promises kept. The refrain of the Liberals last week is more like promises made; promises delayed. So much of the spending on urgent issues such as cities, child care and the environment are back loaded to the end of the five year funding cycle. Farmers and students get nothing in the budget.
Anything progressive that the government has promised and is delivering on, after not doing so for three consecutive majority governments, is due to this minority Parliament and especially the work of our party.
For two decades federal budgets have forced working Canadians to make sacrifices to eliminate the country's deficit through stagnant wages, cuts to health care and other social programs, and through insecure pensions. We have to move away from rewarding wealth and back to rewarding work in the country. It is time to reward hard-working Canadians for the years of sacrifice they have made.
Instead the government delivered a budget of which the Conservatives are proud. The Liberals delivered $4.9 billion in corporate tax cuts. The Liberals have put $28 billion away in the consolidated revenue fund, and the Liberals have built up a $46 billion surplus in employment insurance.
People in my riding have shared their disappointment. Progressive voters wanted relief from tuition fees. The Liberal-Conservative budget delivered nothing.
On housing, progressive voters wanted to restart a 20 year national housing program to build 200,000 affordable and co-op housing units, a commitment to renovate 100,000 existing units and to provide rent supplements to 40,000 low income tenants. The Liberal-Conservative budget delivered nothing.
As the social policy critic for my party, I cannot begin to tell the House how disappointed I am and how disappointed many advocates are in the lack of a comprehensive vision and social policy.
As important surpluses are predicted by the government for at least the next five years, the budget could have been the one which really began to chart a brave new course to making poverty history. Some of that $28 billion rainy day fund could have been allocated more productively to increase social investments.
No new money is added to the child tax benefit, which is far below the $4,900 per year per child which is needed to help many poor families escape poverty. The scandalous clawback of the child tax benefit supplement continues.
No new improvements are made to employment insurance, in spite of major recent recommendations by a parliamentary committee to do that.
On child care, over the next year $700 million of the funding will go to the provinces without any need for accountability as to how they spend this money. What kind of deal can the federal government sign with the provinces in the next month which can ensure the real application of the QUAD principles to the building of a quality national system?
On FedNor, I am disappointed with the place of northern Ontario within FedNor and FedNor's place within government. FedNor is the regional development agency that was created, initially, exclusively for northern Ontario. I have nothing but praise for FedNor, its staff and the projects in northern Ontario that do a lot of good. However over the years its budget has been reduced. What was truly FedNor, an economic development agency for northern Ontario, has now become in fact “FedOntario”.
The minister from northern Ontario has been upset with our party's criticism questioning the government's claim that the FedNor budget has increased 250%. We have yet to see that claim backed up.
The northern Ontario development fund gets reduced from $36 million according to the supplements in 2004-05 to $9 million for the next fiscal year. The community futures partnership program that funds rural development corporations in southern and northern Ontario has its spending estimates reduced from $20 million to $10 million in 2005-06
New Democrats in northern Ontario are fighting for the north and I am fighting for Sault Ste. Marie. My party is not here just to be in opposition. Our platform in the recent election laid out a different social democratic vision for all Canadians. Our commitment to a balanced budget is the record of the NDP governments in Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
This minority Parliament budget beats the past majority budgets of the government but Canadians deserve much better. We will never tire of fighting for working Canadians to get their fair share. All Canadians should matter. The Soo has to matter to the government.