Mr. Speaker, putting together a budget is mainly a science, although not 100%. It is also partly an art with a little bit of a hope, on a wing and a prayer, because one is never sure in the upcoming year what kind of economic factors one will face as a country that may be out of one's actual control.
It takes a lot of work from a lot of people giving it a lot of thought to come up with a budget that they think will carry the nation through for a year, and with these Liberal budgets even further than that, and properly provide for the essential services based on the amount of revenue that will come in from a variety of sources.
However we need to take into account the interest rates, the commodity rates and what the price of oil and gas will be. It is definitely a science that has to be followed carefully and rules have to be applied and followed, otherwise the budget goes off track.
It is not a lot different than preparing a household budget. Every family that is prudent knows that they have to take a look at what is coming in for the month, look at what the expenses are going to be and base their spending accordingly. Anybody who has ever put their household on a budget also knows that if one suddenly lurches from one's budget plan, one can be headed for trouble. There might be things that the family might look at and like to buy but we would consider those things in light of how much income there is or what is predicted to be coming in. Departing from that path could lead to a financial disaster in the household budget.
Canadians need to understand that this is precisely what has happened with the federal Liberal government. It came out with a main budget and when we looked at it as an opposition party there were some things that we did not like but there were some things in the budget that we did like. As a matter of fact, a number of the key factors in the federal budget, which was originally presented, were there because of our input. Our leader and various critics had gone over certain areas and came up with some suggestions. It was our suggestion that a portion of the federal gas tax go back to municipalities, so of course we support that in the budget.
We supported a lot of elements in the main budget but then an extraordinary thing happened. On the way to tabling the budget, which the Liberals did table and to which we gave tacit support because of our own input, all of a sudden there was a lurch and the budget went off the rails because the government made a deal with the socialists, the NDP, and came out with an unprecedented and unplanned amount of spending in the neighbourhood of $4.6 billion. This was out of the blue.
Earlier, when we had been proposing other measures, the government said that it could not be done because it had carefully budgeted, that it was a science and a bit of an art. It said that it had considered everything very carefully and that it had a budget. However, out of the blue, it put $4.6 billion on the table to buy 19 socialist votes. I ask members to do the math. It roughly works out to about a quarter billion dollars per vote. In a frantic effort to survive, the minority government went to the NDP and asked what it would cost and said that it would pay whatever the price. The price was $4.6 billion.
Some people have criticized the NDP members for striking this deal with the Liberals but I do not. I say, good for them. They said that each one of their votes was worth a quarter billion dollars. If we accept the amount that the Auditor General said the government blew in the province of Quebec on the sponsorship scandal, which was about $350 million, and we accept that Quebec has four million or so voters, that means that each voter in Quebec was worth about $80 to $85 to the government. However members of the NDP were worth a quarter billion dollars each. We are talking about egalitarianism gone wild.
The government just tossed out this $4.6 billion of taxpayer money. If we were to depart from our household finances as radically as the Liberals have departed from the finance of the nation we would get the attention of our bankers, our creditors and our suppliers who would be saying that we are out of control.
The exact same thing will happen here and is already happening. Outside sources monitor what Canada is doing. Governments have to contend with credit agencies and rating agencies because their bonds are based on the kind of stability and confidence these external agencies have in their projections. When we take a $4.6 billion lurch, that introduces a notion of instability in people who are banking literally on our bonds and on our credibility.
The $4.6 billion caught the attention of the Economist magazine, one of many, which is a non-partisan magazine, but pointed to the government being out of control.
I have heard Liberal MPs try to blame previous governments. We all know that it was in the 1970s moving into the 1980s when the Liberal government, under Pierre Trudeau, departed from all sense of economic reality. That is simply a fact. Deficit financing was introduced at a gigantic, unparalleled, unprecedented rate and the country was plunged into record deficits like it had never seen before. That is when it started.
Pierre Trudeau had bought into the philosophy of John Maynard Keynes who said that when we run into trouble we just keep borrowing. That is basically what it comes down to. When John Maynard Keynes was asked what would happen in the long run when deficits kept piling up and we started hitting compound interest, he said that in the long run we would all be dead.
That was an irresponsible approach and this was an irresponsible approach to throw $4.6 billion out the door just so the Liberals would not wind up dead in the next election. That is irresponsible to future generations.
The mayors and councils of municipalities in my constituency could not get away with tabling a budget one day and then, in a matter of days later, radically depart from that budget. The ratepayers would not allow them.
The mayor of Okanagan Falls; the mayor of Naramata; Mayor Perry in Penticton; Mayor Tom Johnston in Summerland; Mayor Bob Harriman in Peachland; the regional district in Westbank; Mayor Laird in Merritt; and Mayor Brown in Logan Lake; those people could not get away with departing from the budget and just telling the taxpayers to trust them and that the money will be there.
The former finance minister, who is now the Prime Minister, had built up a bit of a false legend about himself being a great deficit cutter. What he did to dig into the deficit was that he slashed the health care transfer to the provinces overnight by 34%. It was no act of genius.
Regardless, he had built for himself a bit of a reputation as someone who was concerned about a deficit, but suddenly, like a drug addict who had finished the rehab program, he went crazy when he had a budget and he thought he was going to be curtailed; $4.6 billion one day and in the next 21 days the Prime Minister went coast to coast after his sad appeal to Canadians on national television and announced spending of $23 billion, even outstripping the amount that he paid to buy off that NDP vote.
The other concern is with whom he has struck the allegiance. He has struck the allegiance with NDP members of Parliament, people who operate on a failed socialist philosophy, an NDP philosophy that plunged the province of Ontario into unprecedented debt and deficit and racked and ruined the economy. They did the same thing when they had the opportunity in British Columbia.
NDP policies are not built on reality. It will take whatever jurisdiction and plunge it into debt and deficit and therefore the inability to pay for essential services.
On this side of the House we are concerned about Canadians. We want to see essential services maintained, strengthened and, where necessary, expanded. We have already support Bill C-43, the main budget, but the only thing that will expand under Bill C-48 is the sense of recklessness that will lead to increased deficit and possibly even debt. We want to stop that. It is not wrong for opposition MPs to stand in the House and try to put a stop to the recklessness that the government is now putting on the shoulders of Canadians.