Debates of May 8th, 2006

Financial Statement of Minister of Finance

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the negotiations as carried out set no example for us.

I do not know whether my colleague was here earlier, but I will recall the situation last year. The NDP supported a budget that cut $2.5 billion from employment insurance. It is recorded on pages 278, 279 and 280 of last year's budget.

What remains of the NDP's negotiations last year? Nothing. Quite the opposite. The unemployed have taken a loss. What is the Bloc negotiating? The defence, as we are today, of the public's positions, file by file. Yesterday, I listed six or seven files on which progress has been made.

Let us take the fiscal imbalance, for example. No major national party recognized the fiscal imbalance three years ago. Today it is in the budget. Who got it?

The same is true with social housing. They say they got things, but nothing was got. Today it is in the budget.

The same can be said for post-secondary education. A contribution was clearly made to municipal infrastructure, clearly. It could be ignored. However, the people in Quebec recognize it when they vote for us.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Laval—Les Îles.

The budget, in my view, is one that is full of losses. Some of them are really quite tragic losses. It is a budget that retreats rather than moves forward. It is hard to know what are the greater losses. Is it the loss of fiscal sanity? Is that the greater loss, or is it for the students in post-secondary education? Is it Kelowna, Kyoto or the child care agreements? It is pretty hard to fathom just what is in fact the greater loss.

I would describe myself candidly as a fiscal conservative. We spent 13 years trying to build up the nation's finances and four years after the Mulroney and Campbell messes, we were finally able to turn the corner and run eight surplus budgets in a row. We turned it from a point of fiscal insanity to a point of fiscal sanity. Yet in 13 short weeks the government is well on its way to trashing 13 years of very hard work. Everything starts with fiscal sanity, so let me compare the situation that the Conservative government finds itself in now, a very flush and robust situation, with what the Liberal government inherited after the Mulroney and Campbell years.

When we inherited the situation there were 12.8 million jobs. Now there are 16.4 million jobs, a full 25% increase in the workforce. Unemployment at that point was 11.5%. Now it is down to 6.3% and is on its way down even further if our numbers continue to hold. Our debt to GDP was approaching at some point 70%. Now it is under 40%. My friends talk about unemployment insurance premiums all the time. At that point it was $3.07 per $100. Now it is $1.86 per $100. Every cent is roughly $100 million in tax relief to employers and employees.

Canada's foreign debt has been reduced from 45% to now just 17%. That means when we owe money we owe it to ourselves rather than to people outside the country. That means we control our financial and fiscal situation rather than banks outside the country controlling our financial and fiscal situation.

I could go through all of the basic credits and the basic income tax thresholds. The basic thresholds are up from $6,800 to $8,600. I see that even the Conservative government did not dare repeal the increase of $500 in the basic personal exemption contained in the November update.

The lowest rate went from 17% down to 15%. In this budget, in a bizarre sort of way to pay for the GST cut, the Conservatives have to raise that 15% back up to 15.5%. The second bracket is down from 26% to 22%. The third bracket is down from 29% to 26% and the surtax has been removed completely.

As a percentage of government revenues, the federal government at one point was collecting somewhere in the order of 17% of GDP. It is now just a touch over 15% of GDP.

We have in fact cleaned up the previous Conservative mess but now the government is well on the way to creating a further fiscal mess that will play itself out over time.

It may be good politics to reduce the GST by one percentage point. I am quite prepared to concede that point, that in fact it is good politics, but frankly it is just plain stupid economics. It is pretty well the dumbest thing one would want to do.

I would suggest that members go to the Department of Finance website and look at its category of tax relief and look through the various areas in which we could give Canadians tax relief. What is the best for the economy? What is the best for the prosperity agenda?

[And hon. member]

Income taxes.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, exactly. That is what is best, income tax relief. What is the worst? We will see on the Department of Finance website that consumption taxes are the absolute last place we should cut taxes.

It will be interesting listening to Department of Finance officials as they come before the finance committee trying to explain to the finance committee and therefore to Canadians, why the finance minister has totally and completely rejected the advice of his own officials. That is just dumb, but it gets dumber.

The next area in which the Conservatives put our fiscal house in jeopardy is in the reduction of the prudence moneys. Canadians probably understand this as sort of a rainy day fund, and that is probably a good way of describing it. But a one point move on interest rates, a one point move on inflation, a meltdown in the American economy, or a SARS incident or something of that nature could literally shake the fiscal framework of the nation and the government. Because of that, we build into our budget substantial amounts of prudence.

The government, for whatever reason best known to itself, has chosen to reduce that to $600 million, a very small amount of money on a budget that is over $200 billion.

We do not try to run a budget for the sake of running a budget and keeping a balance and things of that nature. We want to do great things in a budget.

The previous government invested heavily in post-secondary education. It created all kinds of research chairs. It put the universities of this nation back in the research game so that Canada is now one of the foremost nations for publicly funded research.

What did the Conservative government do? It gave an $80 tax credit to some students so they could buy some books. I think that is wonderful. I have a daughter who will be going to university next year and frankly, I would have taken the Liberal choice. The Liberal choice was a one-half cut in tuition for the first year and on the graduating year, another cut of one-half of the tuition costs for that year. Frankly, that is way better than a lousy 80 buck tax credit for picking up a few books.

As I said, our universities are now back in the game, but this budget says absolutely nothing about post-secondary education in terms of funding those foundations and research chairs.

Members will recollect that in 1993 when the Liberal government first came in there was a great deal of conversation about brain drain. Brain drain was a really serious issue. We all know that the only way Canada is going to be among the most prosperous nations on this earth is if our nation functions on its brains. If in fact we have well-funded public research, if in fact we have excellent universities, we will have a chance of succeeding. Does this budget say a word about that? Nothing.

The decline will be slow and the decline will be painful, because those foundations will not be funded. As a consequence, those researchers who have come here to pursue their particular individual disciplines will find other places in which to locate. Canada will suffer as a consequence.

As I said, this is a budget of losses. It is a loss for the aboriginal peoples on the Kelowna agreement. It is a loss for child care advocates and those who wish to set up a child care system in this country. It is a loss of fiscal sanity. It is a loss for Kyoto. It is so full of losses so as to be a tragedy.

The budget has no tax policy except political expediency. It is a loss of fiscal sanity. Its margin for error is severely diminished. It has no debt reduction strategy. It gives money to pretty well anybody who, alas, has his or her hand up.

I hope members will join me in voting against the budget. It is not a budget to recommend to our nation.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, I enjoyed my colleague's address on the fiscal issues within the budget. My concern lies with something that probably the Liberals may find attractive in the budget, and that is the corporate tax cuts. We fought very hard in the previous Parliament to change that, and we did. I note with some degree of pleasure that the corporate tax revenues of $29 billion in 2004 went up to $34 billion last year. In effect, we have done pretty well under last year's NDP amendment on corporate tax cuts.

However, in this budget the personal income tax revenues will rise by 12% over two years and the corporate income tax revenues will only rise by about 6%. The budget represents another extraordinary change in the relationship between those two revenue sources. Does my hon. colleague consider this budget is being properly represented as a cut to personal income tax, or is it about cutting corporate income tax?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as I indicated in my speech, on the Department of Finance website is a variety of tax relief that could been done, such as corporate relief, capital cost allowance, consumption taxes, personal income tax. The absolute worst one from a productivity and a prosperity standpoint is relief from a consumption tax. Therefore, I would rank a corporate tax cut of any kind, whether it is capital cost allowance or whatever, ahead of the GST as proposed in the budget.

The hon. member will be interested to know that the government's revenues from corporate income taxes in the last year went from about 10% of gross revenues up to about 14% of gross revenues. Part of that had to do with the fact that the previous government had reduced corporate income taxes from 28% to 21% and the November update had proposed a further reduction from 21% to 19%. In that respect, the current budget picks up on the November update. We also proposed a relief of capital tax.

I believe we need to have a competitive tax environment. I realize that does not accord with NDP philosophy, but then the NDP never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity.

[Colin Carrie, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member talks about our budget as a budget of loss. I could pick apart some of the statements that he made, but I want to particularly address what he said about Kyoto. We all know the Kyoto accord was a huge mess. It was not working for Canadians. In other words, it was going to send up to $600 per Canadian overseas to countries like Russia and China with no accountability as far as reduction of pollution.

Does the member not realize that when a budget cuts programs that are wasteful and are not working, it is an win for the Canadian taxpayer?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough—Guildwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the previous Liberal budget had set aside something in the order of about $5 billion to fund the difficulties that Canadians, both corporate and personal, would experience through Kyoto. Included in that was a credit system. If the hon. member had studied it more carefully, he would realize that commoditizing Kyoto tax credits is way to incent for industry to deal with its Kyoto pollution problems. Sometimes technology simply cannot take us there, so we need a credit system.

The credit system within our country is the preferential credit system. It enables other businesses that are more efficient to get benefits for their efficiency. In effect, we have the less efficient, more polluting companies, the companies that create and contribute to greenhouse gases, contributing to companies that are efficient and that have created reductions in greenhouse gas, which they can then commoditize and which can then go to their bottom line. Therefore, they win.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy today to take part in the debate, which will, I certainly hope, contribute to improving the work of Parliament. I am however very embarrassed, I have to admit, to be in this House today and have to tell Canadians that this budget will not prepare our children for primary and secondary school and even less for university. I will give a few examples.

Canadian students will be unable to access the paltry pittance of $80 for university textbooks the government is dangling as a tax credit. It is obvious that he architects of the budget have not recently visited a university book store anywhere in Canada or even tried to purchase a book. One textbook can cost now as much as $115 and some courses definitely demand more than one textbook.

I am dismayed to stand here today to discuss a budget that confirms what the Reform-Alliance-Conservatives have been saying all along.

The Conservatives intend to attack the very heart of our country. They are going to build megaprisons instead of developing support systems that would enable us to work on the causes of crime and isolation among our youth.

Canada's labour market is booming, particularly in the construction industry, and employers need illegal immigrant workers. Yet the Conservatives have begun expelling them.

This government has also abandoned federal-provincial-territorial agreements, even though the negotiations demanded an investment of time and patience by all the signatories. By abandoning these agreements, the Conservatives have intentionally destroyed access to early learning opportunities for minority official language communities, especially francophones in the western provinces and the Maritimes.

The Conservative budget's $50 million for arts and culture includes nothing for linguistic communities. What does the government intend to do, considering that its primary responsibility under the law is to establish and enhance the vitality of our linguistic communities and promote positive measures?

Should we in the opposition thank the government for the settlement and integration program budget increase in immigration? Three hundred and seven million dollars over two years cannot support settlement and integration of new immigrants. Liberal immigration spending in 2005 exceeded the Conservatives planned spending by $1.879 billion.

As one example, Canada has a doctor shortage of which $75 million was pledged by the Liberals to integrate internationally trained doctors. This was presented in the Liberal budget of 2005. In that Liberal budget, $920 million alone would have been focused in Ontario for settlement and integration based on the Canada-Ontario immigration agreement. Instead, the government has announced recently the off-campus work experience for international students based on the Liberal plan, but CIDA funded students and other Commonwealth awards programs students have been excluded. This makes absolutely no sense.

Many of these students are ambassadors for Canada when they return to their own country. Even though many of them do business with Canada once they have completed their studies, we are refusing them the opportunity to gain Canadian experience, especially those who are willing to work outside major urban centres. Many students choose to start their education with our neighbours to the south, where they receive financial assistance and work experience for another three years after graduation with their visa. It appears that this Conservative government has cut the $700 million we had promised to improve the system and create an economic component in Canada.

How does the government expect to support this initiative without any money?

What is the reason for excluding them?

What message does the government send to the people of Canada through its budget? Is it the one that the Prime Minister had been preaching all along, that bilingualism is the god that failed? Is that the legacy of the government?

We live in a country in which citizens should be able to count on fair, equitable and accessible services in both official languages, whether they live in Penetanguishene--a Franco-Ontarian community near Toronto that, in the 1960s, had to fight to receive services in its language--or in Alberta, the Prime Minister's home province where more than 438,000 francophones live.

I challenge the government to honour the Official Languages Act by pursuing the implementation of the action plan for official languages that was announced in March 2003 and for which $751.5 million was set aside. This includes the promise to respect language rights in the area of early learning programs and the expansion of educational and other services in the preferred language.

I would like to remind the government of its obligation to respect the Official Languages Act. Otherwise, legal action could be taken against the government, pursuant to the changes made to part VII of the act in November 2005 through Bill S-3.

Language is the social and economic foundation of our country. Language allows us to expand our global markets beyond traditional markets and into emerging economies. Knowledge of the two official languages expands the experiences of future generations and will provide us with a Canadian workforce that has the facility to offer service in the two official languages as a choice in small towns, large urban centres and every region of this great country.

This government must not default on this obligation.

[Jim Flaherty, Conservative, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the comments of the member opposite. She talks about promises that were made. After 13 years this is what the former government offered: promises that might happen, maybe, that did not go through the House, that were not passed, election promises. Now some members opposite have the nerve to stand in the House and say those promises, after 13 years, somehow had some value to the people of Canada.

What a difference now. What a difference, in only three months, to have a government that made commitments in an election campaign, get elected, keep it commitments and act to fulfill those promises, not idle promises after 13 years in government.

All we saw were commitments by the party opposite, which were scattered all over the place. It was going to do this, this was a priority, that was a priority. What a change in only three months to have a government focused on priorities, as the Conservatives have in their budget, such child care, security, opportunities for Canadians, the military, security in our country, more RCMP officers, all the things that Canadians are concerned about, rather than a plethora of idle promises by the government opposite.

Finally, there is control over spending where the percentage of increased spending is within the growth in the economy. It was done within three months after 13 years of the members opposite being in government. That is not to mention the efforts by the members opposite to save the GST.

The Liberals are going to lose that one. Canadians want to see the GST lowered. I am sure they will want to reflect on that. I am sure even Mr. Easter from Prince Edward Island will want to think about whether the people in Prince Edward Island would want a point off the GST, which the budget provides.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Order, please. I would remind hon. members and the minister who just spoke to try not to refer to people in the second person. We refer to each other in the third person here and not by name.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I see that my colleague opposite angers quickly. I understand why: the Conservatives are in a tough spot and are putting the ball back in our court.

The Conservatives have now been in power for three months. My colleague has been working on his budget for at least that long and we have seen the results. One cannot always send the ball back to this side of the House.

I would just like to mention, since my colleague invited me to do so, several items on which we worked very hard. They were not promises but concrete accomplishments, as in the case of landmines. Those of us who were in the Liberal government at the time even influenced the entire world to adopt international landmine laws.

Let us speak about the deficit left by the former Conservative government in 1993. Our Liberal Prime Minister erased that deficit.

Let us speak about fiscal balance, for which the Conservatives are so proud. Who brought in the fiscal balance in the first place? We paid off the $55 billion of debt that was left by the Conservative government.

When we talk about promises, we are talking about concrete facts that we brought in as a government. The lowest unemployment rate in history was through the Liberal government. The largest tax cut in history was through the Liberal government. The list is very long. I just wanted to talk about some very concrete examples of what the Liberal government did when it was in power.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I always listen with interest when I hear the Liberals over there say that they left this government in such a good fiscal state.

The fact is that the debt the country struggled with for nine years under the Conservative government was in fact Liberal debt. That is just a plain fact. All we need do is to look back at the history of when those huge deficits started. Who was the finance minister who really pushed that? It was Mr. Chrétien.

The fact is that it was just simple compound interest growth and Conservative policies that gave the government the capacity to finally address the issue. Unfortunately, the Liberals came to power after that and they squandered the money. The debt is almost $500 billion. If we would have had a Conservative government along the way with fiscal policies, that debt would probably now be $400 billion instead of $500 billion. The Liberals squandered it all over the place.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague across is showing his Reform roots. He ought to look at pre-1993 history. We had a debt but we used the money wisely. We did not have a debt that was doubled by the previous Conservative government. In those few years we managed to reduce the debt by $55 billion. I think that speaks for itself.

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, Minister of Public Safety]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to address elements related to the budget today. I am thankful that our Minister of Finance understands budgetary issues, what goes into the thinking behind putting a budget together and how that can best affect Canadians and our country.

I will be sharing my time with my colleague, the member for Souris—Moose Mountain.

I would like to philosophically for a couple of minutes look at the tone of this budget. I grant that there are areas that need to be addressed and which any party would address. These are areas related to the environment that we are actually addressing with $2 billion over the next couple of years and areas related to the needs of aboriginals and our first nations community. Many of those areas are being addressed in a very vigorous way on the monetary side. There are those broad social areas which I think would be addressed perhaps in different flavours and with different emphasis by all parties.

What makes a Conservative budget distinctive is a recognition of the importance of individuals, the respect for individual rights and freedoms which carries and runs deeply in the Conservative mindset and also reflects into individual responsibilities.

We will find that these are not perfect philosophical lines. The lines blur between political parties. What we find in general, if it is a truly Conservative budget is, first, that the social needs are being met and attended to. What gives it a distinctive flavour is a trust in the individual, in individual people, families and communities, that lead to a certain emphasis on, for instance, approaching problems and pressures with tax credits.

Philosophically, the difference between the governing party now and the previous government and the NDP is very clear. We trust families to be able to make decisions about where the money would be best used for their child care, for instance. Whereas a Liberal government, or a socialist party such as the NDP, would tend to not have the same level of trust in individual wisdom so they move to a more collectivist mode. We see, therefore, that when it comes to child care they want a program that is government run, government institutionalized and focuses solely on government institutions.

This government trust families to know what their individual needs are and how best they can spend the money. We allow the money go to individual families in terms of this child care credit. Throughout this budget we see credits for people recognizing individual initiative and individual capability.

A Conservative budget will tend to be less invasive in terms of massive government programs dictating to individuals and even to businesses that they should go this way or not go anywhere at all.

We see that reflected in the credits for small business. Rather than coming up with a program of trying to pick winners and losers, and governments historically, we can say, have the amazing capability to often pick the losers instead of the winners, rather than helping small business with a massive program of subsidies, we approach by raising the limit that a small business can earn before it even has to pay taxes.

We take that approach in the general corporate rate, lowering that, and we take that approach with hard-working citizens across the country, raising the limit before they even start to be taxed. Instead of picking and choosing certain seniors' programs that are needed, we take the approach of raising the amount of money that seniors can bring in before they start being punished by the government for being hard-working and entrepreneurial. The distinctive flavour in a Conservative budget is more trust in individual citizens and less invasiveness into the lives of our citizens.

I and many others in the House have said many times that the first responsibility of any government is the safety and security of its citizens. I am pleased that the Minister of Finance and our Prime Minister have seen the area of safety and security as one of the five key areas that needed to be addressed.

We recognized that more RCMP officers were needed on our streets so I endorsed $161 million in funding over the next two years in the budget for the training of 1,000 more RCMP officers. We also recognized that with that comes the capability at the depot in Regina to train those people so we added another $37 million for that particular purpose.

I am pleased to see that we responded to the concerns of our border officers from coast to coast who wanted to be equipped and protected at dangerous moments in their jobs. Their jobs can be very dangerous when armed people approach the border. We were committed to ensuring our border officers were well trained in the areas of arrest and seizure and equipped with sidearms so the budget contains the first down payment on that.

Along with that, we committed $303 million to ensure low risk travel so individuals and businesses could access the border through technological means. We wanted to ensure that prosperity happens through and across our borders just as much as security does.

Those were the elements the finance minister and our Prime Minister saw as being needful in our communities.

The fact that we would come out with a policy position, and not just state the policy but actually back it with the funding, recognizes what we will be doing through the Minister of Justice in terms of certain convictions that will carry mandatory sentences.

We have seen the tragedy of handgun crime in this country. Another police officer was tragically slain last week. We are getting serious about serious crime because that is what our citizens want us to do. However we will need some increased capacity to deal with those who will be in jail longer. Because they will be in jail longer we will make programs available to them that were not available to them when they received shorter or conditional sentences.

We are not just dealing with the criminal aspect in terms of incarceration as part of the budget and we are not just increasing capacity, we are making an extra $20 million available for programs for youth at risk.

Those are the types of initiatives we are taking in a balanced way. Those are the types of things that I believe, partisanship aside, most Canadians will continue to support.

I would now like to talk about how the budget has been resonating in my own constituency. For the most part, there are no perfect budgets but this budget by the finance minister is close to perfection. I have been door-knocking in my constituency on a regular basis and most people, by and large, like the balance of what they are seeing in the budget. It is interesting to see that reflected in polls across the country but I sense it at the doors in my constituency.

There are areas that they are hoping to see as the budgetary process continues. In some of the meetings I attended this past weekend in my constituency, people in the agriculture community were acknowledging the significant increase of $1.5 billion to the agricultural community. How is that playing out on the ground, in the fields and in the orchards?

I had a meeting with Joe Sardinha, the head of the British Columbia Fruit Growers Association, who plays a significant role in agriculture. He made some important observations about how the CAIS program was really not equipped to deliver to the fruit growers in their time of need. He pointed out that the inventory evaluation program really did not serve the fruit growers as it might serve somebody in the grain and oilseeds business. I have brought forward those suggestions.

The finance minister asked us to give him feedback on what we were hearing about the budget so we could improve it, if need be, as we move along.

I have had meetings with mayors and councils right across my constituency and they are glad to see what is in the budget for the infrastructure fund and specific projects still come to mind. We need a passport office in my constituency. These are the things people are telling me as I go door to door, people who are dealing with everyday realities.

From the infrastructure fund, as we move toward the Olympics, yes, there are certain projects. The South Okanagan Event Centre is a project that would encompass many other constituencies in the entire South Okanagan. These are issues that people will continue to be looking forward to and for which we will continue to make the case.

At a meeting just this weekend, the mayor and councillor were pleased to see us going ahead with the infrastructure fund and that we have growth in our area because the Okanagan is the most beautiful place in the world to live. We will address those areas of growth.

I am glad that the budget addresses many of these areas. We will continue to bring our concerns forward. We are glad to see that not just the fiscal needs but the social needs of Canadians are being met by this budget.

[Charles Hubbard, Liberal, Miramichi, NB]

Mr. Speaker, if time would permit, I would like to some day debate the hon. minister on his concept of what the individual is and what the rights of the individual are as opposed to the needs of our government and society. It is very different on that side of the House from what it is on this side of the House.

The hon. minister also alluded to the fact that he had nearly the perfect person as Minister of Finance. There have been certain perfect people in this world, but they have often met with very disastrous results. I certainly hope he is not alluding to probably the only perfect one who has walked this earth.

In terms of what we have heard this past weekend in our relationship with our counterparts in the United States, there is a great need in this country for us to make a quick move in terms of getting passports for people in order to make sure our economy continues in a very effective way. We know that is going to cost money. We know that it is quite costly to the Canadian people today, at about $85, to pick up a passport.

Maybe the hon. minister could give the House some information on whether or not his department is coming up with a better way and a cheaper way so that most Canadians will have good access to our American neighbours when the need comes next year.

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, Okanagan—Coquihalla, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would look forward to a prolonged discussion on that balance of individual and collective rights. As I said, as Conservatives, our budget has the balance about right.

In reference to the near perfection of my colleague, the Minister of Finance, I am sure the member opposite realizes that at times it is necessary to introduce a little levity into the equation here. The Minister of Finance can deal with his own state of perfection. That is something he will have to answer for.

In terms of the problem related to the border and the WHTI, the western hemisphere travel initiative, it was our Prime Minister who made this a priority issue at the Cancun meetings with President Bush. President Bush and our Prime Minister each designated a person to deal with this. I will be working with Secretary Chertoff. He is head of Homeland Security in the United States.

We already have what we could call a concession, but let us not use a pejorative sense either way; we have agreement on the U.S. side that alternative documents will be acceptable. It does not necessarily have to be a passport when the congressional law kicks in on January 1, 2008. It does not necessarily have to be a version of their national identity card.

That is why we are now engaging officials to work on what documents would be acceptable and why we are addressing that question, but the U.S. side has at least said it is going to work on some alternatives.

We are not aggressively pursuing at this time what would be seen as a national identity card. We are encouraging Canadians to get a passport. It is the quickest way to make sure of getting access across the border, but for now, and for the next year and some, at land borders, a driver's licence and birth certificate will suffice. After January 1, 2008, there will be an extra requirement. We are working on those alternative documents now.

[Roy Cullen, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Okanagan--Coquihalla knows full well that the alternative documentation in lieu of a passport has always been on the table. What Canadians might not know, though, is the way in which the government has caved in to the U.S. administration in terms of the western hemisphere travel initiative.

Perhaps it was because the U.S. administration promised some resolution to the softwood lumber deal. Is that not interesting? Because the U.S. president had an option last week, and that was not to launch the extraordinary appeal of the NAFTA panel. President Bush decided to do that, so I am not sure what the exchange was, because on both counts, Canada is not very well represented.

I do have a question for the Minister of Public Safety. There are a number of initiatives in the department, I am sure, that I could not find in the budget. One is for measures dealing with counterfeit goods. Goods are coming into Canada and jeopardizing the safety of Canadians, whether they be pharmaceuticals or electrical equipment.

There is also the idea of creating some kind of accountability at our borders for people who might feel that they are being wrongly or unfairly treated. I did not see anything in the budget to deal with this. I know that was an initiative of our government.

There is also the Port of Prince Rupert and the need for customs officers there. I did not see any money in the budget for that.

I wonder if the minister would comment on those items as well.

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, Okanagan—Coquihalla, BC]

Mr. Speaker, there is nothing wrong with the partisan remarks and I will address them in kind, but I just cannot overlook the partisan remarks related to the border initiative and the documents.

In fact, what the member said is just not accurate. This congressional law, this law passed by Congress over two years ago, went absolutely unaddressed by the former Liberal regime. We raised it here, working with other opposition parties at the time, so much so that we actually forced a debate here in the House last fall to get this matter addressed. The previous Liberal regime ignored it.

It is a fact that we did have a major agreement and somewhat of a concession from Secretary Chertoff and others that alternative documents would be acceptable. We have to work on them and define what they will be, but they will be acceptable. That is because of our Prime Minister making this a priority.

The member opposite is asking why it says nothing in the budget about border issues, about where there might be areas where consumers who cross the border feel they are not being dealt with properly. I would say to the member, bring me the instances where that happens, because we address those. We do not need a budgetary item to demand or ask for proper service at the border. I have been able to take up a number of issues related to how people felt they were not properly treated at the border. Two hundred and sixty thousand people a day cross the border. That is 90 million border crossings in a year. There are going to be one or two people who will be upset.

If members will get that information to me, we will address it. We have done it in the past and we will continue to do it.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I want to make some comments with respect to the budget. It is a budget that targets individuals and is mindful not only of individuals but of families, the very foundation of our nation, and especially of young families, those who are attempting to make a start in life and contribute to our society. This is the budget that targets this group, the young growing family. And I can say that 90% of the budget targets individuals as opposed to corporations or businesses.

This weekend, I had the privilege of being in Maryfield, Saskatchewan. There I met a mom who had a child of three and was expecting another child in four weeks. This budget means $2,400 to that family in rural Maryfield, Saskatchewan, $2,400 to help them out, in an area where there are not many day care centres, but there is the struggle of farm families trying to succeed on the farm, with many working off farm to try to make ends meet.

While I was in Storthoaks, Saskatchewan, at a coffee shop, I met some moms there. Among them they had eight children under six years of age. At that table, this budget means $9,600 in assistance from the government to help these moms raise their children. This assistance is not a small matter. It is a significant matter in many rural places and in many centres that do not have day care centres.

The members opposite have been somewhat concerned about the fact that there have been significant tax breaks given as opposed to program spending; I think it is $2 in tax breaks for every dollar of spending. Somehow they take issue with that and indicate that it is moneys that are somehow owed to them; they consider it to be their money and not the taxpayers' money.

We have to keep reminding ourselves that the reason the money comes here in the first place is that it comes from ordinary Canadians, from taxpayers who are overtaxed and overburdened, taxpayers who work real hard, try to make ends meet, are on the treadmill of life working 10 to 12 hours a day, six days a week, and who send in thousands to this particular establishment. They are saying that they need some reprieve, some relief. It is refreshing to see the taxpayer taken into consideration to the extent that this particular budget has done it.

Many of the arguments the Liberals make are that they also had budgets wherein they made promises, but we find that most of those promises were promises into the future. Four or five years from now, that is when the big dollars were going to be spent, but there was very little in the first or second year.

Our budget provides tax relief in the first and second years, tax relief that we can see and understand. It is not a complex budget in that sense. This government makes a promise. If we were to look through our Conservative election campaign and at our platform, lo and behold, we would actually see this being translated into the budget in real ways.

How refreshing to see a headline in the paper that reads “Promises Delivered”. Promises made and kept: that is a refreshing concept in politics. It is a refreshing concept to say what we mean, mean what we say and actually act upon it in a short period of time.

This budget is not a budget that defines the Prime Minister or the government. It is a budget through which the Prime Minister and the government define the kind of Canada we want to see--

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Order, please. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member, but it being 6:15 p.m., it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the subamendment now before the House.

The question is on the subamendment. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the subamendment?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

All those in favour of the subamendment will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

All those opposed will please say nay.