Mr. Speaker, I oppose Bill C-48, the NDP-Liberal budget, because it is fiscally irresponsible and creates a danger to the federation. It creates fiscal arrangements that are a tangled web and lays some very dangerous markers down for future years.
For example, Bill C-48 is full of one off deals. There are one-off deals for affordable housing, foreign aid, the environment and post-secondary education. This is not the way to approach financing the federation. This is not a way to provide long term, stable funding for program spending. This is completely irresponsible. This was a deal that was cooked up as an act of desperation and something that is going to do some serious long term damage to this country.
The other problem with this bill is that it represents one of the largest increases in government spending in the last three decades. In the last five years alone, government spending has increased 20% on a per capita basis. This too is fiscally irresponsible because it provides a risk that in future years, when the economy slows down or enters a period of either zero or even negative growth, we will face increasing difficulties in balancing our budgets.
All these problems, with the large increases in spending and the tangled web of fiscal arrangements that the government has managed to find itself in, point to the fact that the government has no focus. It has no plan for the fiscal arrangements of Confederation. Another area this budget fails to address is the needs of small town and rural Ontario. These municipalities face huge infrastructure costs.
I will give two examples in my riding of Wellington--Halton Hills. The township of Centre Wellington has a population of about 22,000. It has over 100 bridges. In that township alone, we are facing a bridge repair cost of about $15 million over the next several years. That is a huge number for a rural township with a population of only about 22,000 and an annual operating budget of about $15 million. In Halton Hills, I have been told that there is a backlog of about $57 million in roadwork and other infrastructure. That is an equally big number for a community with only about 50,000 people and with an annual operating budget of about $20 million.
While these numbers may seem small to those in this House, if one were to extrapolate them to a large city such as the city of Toronto with a population of about 2.5 million, one would get an infrastructure backlog of about $1.7 billion to $2.9 billion.
Rural communities, with their scattered populations and their huge infrastructure, face the same kinds of challenges that are faced by more densely populated areas. We in this House should not forget these rural communities that are the lifeblood of this country. However, that side of the House has forgotten rural and small town Ontario as well as rural and small town Canada.
The government's gas tax plan forgets rural communities in small towns. Under the government's plan, smaller communities will get less of the gas tax than more densely populated areas. Witness its approach to the gas tax for towns and cities. The city of Toronto, with only 20% of the population in Ontario, is getting 50% of the gas tax money. Toronto is getting $1.1 billion of the $2.2 billion in gas tax money, even though it only has one-fifth the population. Rural areas with small towns desperately need this money.
The lack of detail and action means more closed bridges, more deteriorating roads and, ultimately, higher property taxes because the money for rural townships, cities and towns must come from somewhere. It means that seniors in my riding, like Maria Kurath and Margaret Alexander in Rockwood, may have to sell their homes because they cannot afford to pay their property taxes. These are the real life stories of what happens when a government only addresses the needs of half the country.
People in Wellington—Halton Hills and across rural and southern Ontario pay just as many taxes as those in more densely populated areas. In fact, they pay more in gas taxes because of the longer distances involved in travelling these rural ridings. Yet the government is siphoning money away from these areas to more densely populated areas, despite the fact that these rural areas face the same kind of infrastructure challenges that are faced by the more densely populated areas.
The areas of Wellington County, Simcoe County, Halton region, Peel region, Dufferin County, York region, Oxford County, Brant County, Niagara region, Waterloo region and Hamilton-Wentworth, just to name a few, are being shortchanged by the government's budget .
The problem with this budget is its ad hoc asymmetrical approach to the fiscal arrangements of the federation. It has created a Canada of haves and have nots. Witness the government's approach to equalization which is an ad hoc approach with side deals for some provinces, pitting one province against another and one region against another.
Witness its approach to child care which is a two tier system, one for families who can afford to access locally licensed day care and nothing for those for whom there are simply no locally licensed day cares or who choose to stay at home. A child care system that creates only 120,000 fully subsidized spots for six million Canadian children aged 12 and under is not a universal system and is not fair.
Witness its approach to the gas tax for towns and municipalities in this budget. The city of Toronto, with only 20% of the population in Ontario, is getting 50% of the money. Toronto is getting $1.1 billion of the $2.2 billion in gas tax money even though it only has one-fifth the population. This is simply not fair. We need a fair formula for the distribution of the gas tax money based on a per capita basis. If we were to give additional moneys to public transit, and I support public transit, we should do so, but through a separate formula from general government revenues, so that small towns and rural areas in Ontario and across the country are not shortchanged.
I support more money for cities, but I do not support creating an unfair formula that leaves half the country behind. I support a fair formula so that both rural areas and cities in this country can move forward together in the 21st century.
I have ridden the TTC. I have lived and worked in the city of Toronto for many years and I appreciate the challenges the TTC faces. The government has neglected the TTC for over 10 years. Ridership is down, the number of buses on the road are down, and the number of subway trains running are down despite the fact that the city has exploded in population. The government finally reacts with an ad hoc formula that leaves half the country behind and only addresses the needs of the other half.
I reiterate the point that we need a fair formula for both cities and rural areas in this budget. We have problems addressing infrastructure in both cities and rural areas, but the government leaves half the country behind in this budget. For these reasons, I am opposed to the NDP-Liberal side deal as evidenced by Bill C-48.