Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in one of the first adjournment debates of this 39th Parliament. My remarks deal with the very first question I asked of the Minister of Canadian Heritage, concerning the funding for the Canada Council for the Arts.
We will recall that, last fall—more specifically on November 23—the previous government announced a commitment of $342 million over three years not only for the Canada Council for the Arts, but also for other institutions in the same field.
This investment would have seen the annual budget of the Canada Council for the Arts grow from $150 million to $300 million over three years. This represents an increase of $50 million for the fiscal year that started on April 1. Another $50 million would have been added each subsequent year. This was responding in a tangible way to the pressing and repeated demand of cultural and artistic communities across the country to increase from $5 to $10 the per capita amount allocated to the Canada Council for the Arts in support of our country's cultural and artistic communities. In those days, the heritage minister was the critic for the Conservative official opposition. During her election campaign, she said:
“We will honour the commitment that they have made, that the artistic community has received”.
The word We was used.
In saying, “We will honour the commitment,” the minister, who was then the official opposition critic, was speaking for her party. However, we heard her say on the radio on the weekend that she was speaking for herself. That has caused a great deal of concern in the community as to whether or not the government indeed will honour the commitment that was made by the previous government of doubling in three years the funding for the Canada Council for the Arts.
It was a commitment that was made after long discussions and consultations with the community. It was a commitment made in good faith. Money had been accounted for it in the fiscal framework, which would have seen the budget go from $150 million to $300 million over three years.
Unfortunately, in the estimates that were tabled earlier this week, we see that there is no increase. Some of us are still hopeful that the government will come to its senses, respect the commitment of the previous government, respect its own commitment that it gave to the community during the campaign through the voice of the Conservative Party's own critic that they would respect that commitment, and indeed increase the budget of the Canada Council for the Arts.
We are hopeful that come May 2 the government will honour that commitment. It is one that is the appropriate response to the repeated demands and representations from the artistic and cultural community of Canada.