Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for the apology.
Drug costs have doubled since 1985 and, after hospitals, are the second biggest category of health related costs in our country.
Almost four years ago, Roy Romanow in his commission recommended catastrophic drug coverage as a start. Not only does Bill C-13 not make preparations for pharmacare generally, the government cannot even act on a four year old recommendation for catastrophic drug coverage.
In the budget there is no funding for home care, something many seniors and their families rely upon. There is no funding for the training of health professionals so that people at the Henderson, St. Josephs' and General Hospitals in Hamilton do not have to wait as long to see a doctor.
The Conservative government could also have taken the opportunity to introduce measures to adjust seniors' pensions to help those seniors who have expressed concern to me about having to decide what to buy: hydro or food. However the government did not take that opportunity to invest.
For the many seniors living on fixed incomes and in poverty in my community and across Canada, a 1% GST tax cut or an income tax cut that only applies to a higher tax bracket means very little. It likely will not even cover the increase in home heating oil or hydro costs this year.
Not only will oil and gas companies get big tax cuts, they also continue to get the estimated $1.4 billion in subsidies; $1.4 billion for gas companies, but only $500 million in the budget to fight pollution. That is the same amount that the NDP put in its budget last year for low income housing energy retrofits, money for people with lower incomes to do renovations that would help green their homes, help them fight pollution and do their part.
The budget cancels that NDP investment. The budget not only does not fight pollution, it is taking away the help the NDP wanted to provide to low income families for retrofit.
By opting out of Kyoto, the Conservatives think they can do better than the years of consensus building in the international community. They will make their own plan but they do not have a plan yet. It is not in the bill we are debating today. The government tells us that it is under development. Canadians have heard that story before. The Liberals promised a Kyoto plan for years. When they finally did introduce something, it did not even try to meet targets set at Kyoto in all areas.
The budget means pollution will go up. Just like the Liberals, the government has no plan to invest in what we need to do to cut greenhouse gas emissions and reduce pollution.
We often hear governments, businesses and people talking about economic innovation, greening the economy or products. We do not have to be political scientists to know that the world is changing around us, and with those changes, particularly in the economic arena, come many new challenges. However it is worth stating that with those new challenges, challenges like those faced by steelworkers in my riding and people working in manufacturing industries across the country, come new opportunities.
Manufacturing as a sector was mentioned at least 10 times in the preamble of the budget when it was presented in the House, mentioned because of the huge losses expected in the sector. Yet, in the Conservative budget plan, the only mention of the manufacturing sector is that it will be getting some of the proposed corporate income tax cuts that we see presented here in the bill.
If we can get in on the ground floor, we can become world leaders in these technologies, manufacturing processes and knowledge.
The Conservative budget does nothing for the manufacturing sector, even though the dollar is now hovering around the 90¢ mark.
However, these changes do not just happen overnight. We need more training and retraining opportunities. Training is the clearest example of how we can invest in working families to improve real life opportunities and to boost our dropping productivity rate. While there are some positive changes for training here in the bill, they are very limited and specific to apprentices and a small tax credit for trades people who buy their own tools. There is nothing for training and immigrant settlement programs even while more and more people are facing underemployment and lower paying jobs.
Instead of a vision for an integrated training role in the 21st century and a strategy to get us there, the Conservative budget gave us a few ad hoc fragments but no strategy.
The budget also did not broaden the EI program. Even though all workers pay into EI, fewer than 40% of them qualify for support. The greatest percentage of those who do not qualify are women who are most often in the part time, lowest paying and least secure jobs.
In the 1990s, 75% of workers qualified for EI benefits. Now, only 38% of workers qualify for EI. This bill, this Conservative budget, does not change eligibility requirements or benefits, which is another lost opportunity.
I was pleased, however, to second a bill that was proposed to make some changes in the EI program. It was put forward by my colleague from Acadie—Bathurst a few weeks ago in the House and I commend him on his work in this area.
Bill C-265 would modify the employment insurance program so that benefits can be calculated on the basis of the best 12 out of 52 weeks. The private member's bill will also see the eligibility requirement at 360 hours for all benefit recipients in Canada. With a $49 billion surplus in this program, it is long past the time for these changes.
This bill is equally disappointing when we look at post-secondary education. Instead of keeping the tuition lowering oriented funding of the NDP budget at $1 billion, this bill proposes to convert that funding into one time education infrastructure funding. When four out of ten university students are unable to graduate on time because they dropped courses to work, we all lose. When 70% of high school graduates want to go to college but cannot, and list finances as the main reason for not getting a further education, we are all losing. We are losing out on the increased contributions that these graduates could be providing communities like my home town of Hamilton and others across the country.
This Conservative budget does nothing to address the most pressing financial issue related to students: the need to reduce debt loads. This budget does provide a few positive changes, such as removing the income tax on bursaries and scholarships and textbook credits. If the government will not invest when it has billions in surplus and corporations are not reinvesting the breaks they get through tax cuts and subsidies, who will invest?
That is why I stand with my NDP colleagues in opposition to this budget. It is a lost opportunity to invest and I do not believe it reflects what Canadians have asked us all to do in the House.
