Debates of Nov. 6th, 2006

National Defence

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Mr. Speaker, the member asks how long we are going to be in Afghanistan. There is all kinds of speculation as to what it is going to take. I can assure him that when the appropriate time has arrived, we will make the appropriate decision.

However, in the meantime, with Remembrance Day being this week, I trust he and all members of this chamber would stand with me to support our men and women in uniform, past and present, for the sacrifices they have made on behalf of our nation.

Citizenship and Immigration

[Johanne Deschamps, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Mr. Speaker, last week we learned that Immigration Canada was aware of the practice by immigrants who do not hesitate to resort to marriage between brothers and sisters in order to get around the sponsorship rules. Immigration Canada is aware of this practice but does nothing.

Does the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration not find it unusual that this type of deceit is tolerated and, in particular, that his department has not taken steps to put a stop to it?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for her question on this serious matter. We are aware that the issue of sham marriages is a very big problem and many people of course will try all kinds of things to get into Canada. However, we are vigilant.

Last year we turned down about 13% of all the applications from people who were coming here under the guise of sponsoring a spouse. That is because we felt that there were no grounds to believe that these people were truly married.

[Johanne Deschamps, Bloc, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in 50% of cases, families of individuals who obtain permanent residency must wait 13 months or longer before receiving permission to join their relatives in Canada. These delays are much too long.

Has the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration thought of ways to accelerate the family reunification process or does he intend to take no action to improve the situation of these families?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, one of the issues that we have to deal with is taking the time to ensure that we do not allow people into Canada under fraudulent means. It does take some time and that seems to be contrary to what she was just arguing a moment ago.

It is also true that when we took office, we inherited a backlog of 800,000 people trying to get into this country. We are working on reducing that backlog, but we cannot turn it around overnight. Once we have a chance to sit down and address this with my colleagues, we are going to make some serious progress on this and reverse the trend that we inherited from the previous government.

Income Trusts

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative election platform stated that “A Conservative government will...preserve income trusts by not imposing any new taxes on them”. Will the Prime Minister admit that his decision to tax trusts is a direct violation of his explicit campaign promise?

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the intention was always to provide income security for seniors which we are doing through the splitting of pension income. For pensioners with $40,000 worth of income, instead of paying at the current $40,000 marginal rate, they will now pay at a $20,000 marginal rate each which would be a saving for them of $2,500. At the $60,000 level the savings would be about $2,700. These are direct savings for pensioners in Canada commencing January 1, 2007. I am surprised the Liberals are not going to vote in favour of the bill.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, with that response I guess he agrees that the Conservatives did break their campaign promise.

Does the Prime Minister understand that his promise directly led Canadians to put their money into income trusts, that he is personally responsible for the increase in activity in the income trust sector, and that Canadians are paying a heavy financial burden for believing in him?

When will the Prime Minister apologize for blatantly breaking his promises?

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, let me try to understand the position of the Liberal Party on this matter.

Two weeks ago, on October 18, the critic for finance, the member from Markham said that we had no definite position on this issue. Then the other day, with the leader I gather, they decided in some kind of knee-jerk reaction that they would vote against seniors and vote against pensioners on this bill. The reason seemed to be that it was absolutely the right thing. It went something like “We had started on this track to protect the tax base, to ensure tax fairness, and to work for the productivity of the--

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

Order. The time has expired for the minister. The hon. member for Mississauga South.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the normally talkative Minister of Citizenship and Immigration has been noticeably muzzled when it comes to the multi-billion dollar betrayal of trusts of Canadians.

Last year as finance critic he regularly told the House that a Conservative government would never tax income trusts, but last week Senator LeBreton, the leader of the government in the Senate, suggested that he was not given the finance portfolio because he just was not up to the job.

Is that the reason or was it because he refused to go along with the devastating double-cross of hard-working Canadians?

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I know that the Liberal Party thinks that large corporations should not pay taxes in Canada. I know that the Liberals apparently plan to vote in favour of the position that this economy should increasingly put the burden for health care, education and infrastructure that we need on individuals and families in Canada.

We do not share that view. We do not share the view that is apparently the view of the party opposite. We think all Canadians, including corporations, should pay their fair share of taxes.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the finance minister has got it wrong. I do not believe in seniors getting screwed, that is what I do not believe in.

The government had options which would not have fleeced Canadians of billions of dollars of their hard-earned savings. The Conservatives recently assured Canadians that they would not tax income trusts, ever, and Canadians invested on the strength of that promise.

Was theMinister of Citizenship and Immigration passed over for the finance portfolio because he was opposed to taxing income trusts, or was it because he was just no match for the current Minister of Finance in the art of breaking promises?

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, if it is the position of the Liberal Party, then I say to the member for Mississauga South that I gather it is the official position of his party, which is as follows:

It was absolutely the right thing, and we had started on this track to protect the tax base, to ensure tax fairness and to work for the productivity of the nation.

The member for Mississauga South is wrong. He should turn around and say it to the author of that statement, the official critic who is sitting behind him, the member for Markham—Unionville.

Veterans Affairs

[Bev Shipley, Conservative, Lambton—Kent—Middlesex, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as we celebrate Veterans Week, it is time to reflect on the sacrifices that our brave men and women have made in the name of freedom. Can the Minister of Veterans Affairs tell the House what the government is doing to assist veterans and to improve services for veterans and their families?

[Betty Hinton, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for Lambton—Kent—Middlesex for all his hard work on the veterans affairs committee.

In the past eight months we have implemented the new veterans charter and we have a health care review under way as we speak. The new government continues to be committed to veterans by examining the implementation of an ombudsman, the veterans independence program, and the veterans bill of rights. The new government takes the time for our veterans, and we hold each and every one of them dear.

Afghanistan

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Speaker, military officials are scrambling to find enough troops to maintain the Liberal-Conservative mission in Afghanistan. Again, today, the chief of defence staff has contradicted the Minister of National Defence.

The CDS says he will “use every single man and woman that is necessary in the Canadian Forces to do the job, and that's exactly what we're going to do”. Not so, said the minister, “There is no intention of employing sailors, airmen or airwomen--”.

Which is it? Who is really in charge over there? Who is calling the shots?

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Mr. Speaker, we have the well-being of our men and women in uniform at heart. We want to limit their deployment to Afghanistan as much as possible, hopefully to one term. We have considered using sailors and airmen in administrative responsibilities like cooks or truck drivers, that sort of thing.

I want to remind all members in the chamber that we would not even be looking at these options if it were not for the fact that the Liberals put us in this situation after 13 years of neglecting the military.

[Dawn Black, NDP, New Westminster—Coquitlam, BC]

Mr. Speaker, a CIA report on the situation on the ground in Afghanistan is not encouraging and the UN reports that its food program is only operating at 30% of capacity.

One U.S. official said that there is no transmission belt that goes between Kabul and the local government. He said that we lost a whole generation of bureaucrats and people that can take a government plan and make it real.

Only 10% of our contribution in Afghanistan is spent on aid and reconstruction. In light of both of these reports, does the minister not think it is time that we rebalance this mission in Afghanistan--

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Mr. Speaker, the member talks about our spending money in Afghanistan. I want to be the first to announce to the House that the commander's contingency fund, which in the past was used for small projects, one-offs, to provide ambulances or wells for schools and that sort of thing, has been increased by 50% to $3.4 million this past week. I hope all members will support the efforts that we are making to win over the hearts and minds of the men and women of Afghanistan.

Income Trusts

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the letters from betrayed Canadians on income trusts are pouring in. Ed and Judy Bohnet write: “After the Prime Minister's campaign assurance of 'no change in tax structure for income trusts', we felt confident in our decision to put our savings into this investment vehicle. We were thoroughly taken in by the rhetoric of honour and openness put out by the Conservative Party, what a disappointment. We feel completely blindsided”.

Will the Minister of Finance apologize to the Bohnets and the thousands of other Canadians whose votes they stole based on a deception and whose savings they annihilated by allowing value to build falsely on a betrayal?

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, if we look back one year and see how this issue was not addressed and then was attempted to be addressed, we would see that it was bungled by the party opposite. I do not expect the party opposite to understand that a government, albeit a minority government, is obliged to look after the best interests of the country.

As commentators from coast to coast have said, what is in the best interests of Canadians? What is in the long term interest of Canada and the next generation? What is in the interests of our Canadian economy? Do we want to become a sleepy economy? The answer has--

[The Speaker, Liberal, Peter Milliken]

The hon. member for Ajax—Pickering.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if that is true, then why did the Conservatives campaign against the best interests of Canadians? Why did that party make a promise that it broke? It is a pure deception.

Robert Horner writes: “It is inconceivable to me that your party during the last election gave comfort to this most vulnerable class of our society to continue to enjoy the returns from their investments and then within a year break that trust with the people. Shame on you. Your Machiavellian approach to this situation has left me feeling betrayed, and that my government is deceitful, careful and as such, dangerous”.

When can Mr. Horner and thousands of other Canadians who feel cheated and betrayed expect a direct and unequivocal apology?