Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the member for Acadie—Bathurst for sharing his time with me.
I want to talk about what the budget means to the people who live in Surrey North which is the constituency that I represent, as well as to talk about health and disabilities, the areas for which I am the NDP critic.
What does the budget mean for the people who voted for me? Corporate tax cuts for people in Surrey North are not going to make any difference in how they make ends meet in their lives.
Every budget is about choices. As a result of the choices that the Conservatives have made, working people will have a harder time making ends meet where I live. I know that because the Conservatives chose to tax the family allowance and eliminate the young child supplement.
The real choice in child care is no choice. That is the real choice. Everyone would like to see a larger child allowance of $1,200 for an enhanced child allowance. That would be fine, but let us not play the shell game and pretend that it is child care because it is not child care. Every experience we have had says that business is not going to pick up those incentives and produce child care spaces at the very understated price that has been quoted by the Conservative ministers.
What happens to children over the age of six where the $1,200 stops? Where then is the choice in child care for those children? Are they old enough now to be able to go home by themselves with a key? What about before and after school child care? There is no choice in child care. It is a shell game.
There is no investment in lower tuition fees and student grants. What will that mean in my riding? That will mean that fewer students will have an opportunity to go to college or university.
Another choice the Conservatives made is to spread the funding for the Pacific Gateway Initiative over eight years instead of five. That means that a very important economic part of Surrey which is the South Fraser Perimeter Road will be spread over a longer period of time, which brings sound economics to Surrey because goods get to ports faster.
However, instead of assisting that, the government has spread the amount of time over a longer period, so that the economic boom will not come to Surrey sooner. The budget forecasts a surplus of $83 billion over the next five years. Now is the time to invest in communities like Surrey North that are on the edge and need that additional support.
What does the budget mean to people with disabilities? What is needed is what is absent: home support, education and skills training, and supports in the workplace. It is appalling that supports for people with disabilities are absent from the budget.
What does the budget mean for the health and wellness of all Canadians? If health care is one of the government's top five priorities, why was it barely mentioned in the budget document? I think it took up about three or four paragraphs at the very end of the rest of the discussion.
If it is so important, where is the plan? Where are the imperatives? How is the federal government going to work with the provinces? Where is that information? What is needed is absent. What about critical wait times for alcohol, drug and mental health rehabilitation beds, where persons actually wait longer than they do for many of the surgeries that people are talking about? Again, this is absent from the budget. Where is the national prescription drug strategy recommended in the Romanow report? It is absent.
We have people in this country who die in one province because they cannot get a drug when it is available in the province next to them. That is unconscionable. There is no money for improving home care and for improving long term care which everybody knows is one of the keys to reducing critical wait times.
The best parts of this budget are the investments the NDP secured in the last minority Parliament: spending increases for affordable housing, investment in post-secondary education, and money for improving transit. Those were all NDP initiatives.
Not only is this budget a missed opportunity, but there will be many vital missed opportunities for Canadians and for people in Surrey North as a result of this budget.