Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to the amendments to Bill C-43 and to the bill in its broader context.
For the first time in many years the NDP had an active role in the development of the budget. We take great pride in the fact that we used our minority status in this Parliament to the advantage of the greater Canadian population by trying to steer this budget process toward a spending pattern that would use our tax dollars to benefit Canadians. That is the best way to sum it up.
We cannot really speak to the amendments to Bill C-43, the main Liberal budget, in isolation without speaking in extension to the changes that the NDP negotiated.
We saw Bill C-43 as not meeting the needs of Canadians. We saw it as another typical Liberal budget with great shortcomings. The Conservatives voted for the original Liberal budget as it stands, but are now moving amendments that seek to break out the environmental provisions that would seek to improve the environment.
I do not understand their thought process. I am not sure they understand fully the logic behind their approach to Bill C-43. They voted for it at one stage and then when the NDP managed to seek amendments in a completely separate bill, they cannot see fit to support either.
I find the position of the Conservative Party on environmental issues not unusual, but difficult to understand, especially the spending to help us come in line with the Kyoto accord. I have watched an agonizing process as the Conservatives, and previously the Alliance and before that the Reform Party, tried to get their minds around the issue of global warming. I should note that they started out in complete denial.
When I first came to this place in 1997, the Reform Party members were in complete denial that global warming was a problem. They would bring up all the old yarns that cow farts were more devastating to the environment than the impact of human activity. We watched that thought process evolve. The member for Red Deer had the unenviable task of trying to represent the Reform Party's views on global warming which seemed to be evolving as fast as global warming itself.
I do not envy the public watching who are trying to get their minds around where the budget is going and where their tax dollars are going to be spent because it is in a state of flux and contradiction. The Conservative Party voted for the original Liberal budget, which contained elements for spending on meeting our Kyoto targets and fighting greenhouse gas emissions. We voted against it because that budget had no spending for social issues, and the biggest deficit that Canada has today is the social deficit left in the wake of years of budgetary cutbacks.
A flip-flop took place. As soon as the NDP successfully used its minority status in this opposition Parliament to lever its agenda onto the public domain, as a good political party would do, the Conservatives reversed their position. They are now against the Liberal budget even though it has been broken into two separate bills. The original budget that they first voted for is Bill C-43 and they seem to be opposed to that now, and by extension they are opposed to any social spending.
This contradiction is not lost on Canadians. This contradiction has been partly responsible for the absolute plummet in the public opinion polls for the Conservative Party. If Canadians ever did see that party as a grassroots party here to represent the little guy, they certainly do not see that anymore.
What Canadians see is a party that is using its significant opposition status in this minority Parliament as the Queen's official opposition to no constructive purpose at all. In fact, opposition members are holding back some very good news spending for ordinary Canadians, municipalities, post-secondary education, and social housing in the very communities that they were sent here to represent.
The contradiction is glaring in our mind, for those of us who deal with it every day. However, it is glaring in the minds of ordinary Canadians too who are tuning in and trying to figure out just what the Conservatives are doing. We almost feel like saying that if they cannot do something constructive, why do they not just stay home because they are just getting in the way of us trying to do something constructive on behalf of ordinary Canadians.
It must be terribly frustrating for the voters who sent them to Ottawa to act on their behalf. The ultimate task and duty of any member of Parliament is to bring home the bacon. Well here they have an opportunity to bring home the bacon and they are obstructing. They are stalling and opposing spending for their home communities.
In other words, they think that it is squandering taxpayer dollars to invest in things such as social housing, post-secondary education, and cleaning up the environment, the very air we breathe. As Canadians are choking on smog days to an unprecedented degree, we have a budget that actually plans on spending money to address smog days, but the Conservative Party is opposing it. It boggles the mind. The plummet in the public opinion polls can be attributed in part to this confusing message that the Conservative Party is sending to Canadians.
The NDP finds itself frustrated to one degree because it would like to send Canadians a positive message before this minority Parliament adjourns for the summer break. Our party would like to say that we have used our time well, that we have used our time constructively, and that we have used what little influence we have in these 19 seats way over in this corner of the House of Commons. Our party has managed to use its political capital to lever some good news spending for Canadians and our members are very proud of that track record. Look at what we have done with 19 seats. If we only had 99 seats like the Conservative Party of Canada has, imagine the constructive good news spending that could take place.
There is one message that I would leave people with as my time expires. It is plain to see that when voters send more New Democrats to Ottawa as members of Parliament, good things start to happen. That is self-evident and abundantly clear, and Canadians apparently have taken note.
They also know that when they send 99 Conservative members of Parliament to Ottawa, it stalls progress. They are the antithesis of progressive. Maybe that is why they took the word “progressive” out of their name because progress is stalled when 99 Conservatives are standing in the way. It is like 99 bottles of beer on the wall. We have to knock them off, so we can move forward with the agenda that we have.