Debates of April 16th, 2007

Budget Implementation Act, 2007

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I did enjoy working with my colleague in the finance committee. He knows of my passion. I argued for the HP virus vaccine to be put in the budget and he supported that. It was in the budget recommendations and I think it is a positive thing for Canada.

On the increase in post-secondary education, the government in effect has said that we are going to go to some kind of a dedicated transfer in post-secondary education. It is nowhere near enough and it is not in any way targeted. We do not know what the criteria is for that.

That does not do anything for Canadians. It does nothing for students and particularly students most in need. That is who we should be targeting: low income families; aboriginal Canadians; persons with disabilities through things like the Millennium Scholarship Foundation, which I hope will be renewed; and Canada access grants. That is the way we need to go.

The member talked about taking a regional approach. We have to take a look at Canada as a whole. When I talk about Atlantic Canada, I am elected by the people of Dartmouth—Cole Harbour to represent them here and not to represent here to them. They sent me here with a message. They do not want me going back home with speaking points. They want me to go back and talk to them and bring their message here.

They were betrayed by this budget. If it is any consolation to the member, the rest of Canada got a bad deal too, but ours was the worse.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to my colleague's speech, and noted particularly the way in which he defends his home region.

Had the Bloc Québécois voted the same way as the Liberals on the budget, we would be in the midst of an election campaign today and Quebec would not have the additional monies promised in the budget. No one wanted an election.

In my opinion, we have a very different view of the budget. I do not know the statistics for the Maritimes, but I do know that there is significant support for the budget in Quebec because it was felt that, in the circumstances, we had to follow through.

I have a more specific question for my colleague. Does he not believe that the next step for the Conservative government should be to provide a practical framework for the federal spending power?

Under Mr. Trudeau, the Liberals formed a very centralizing government. Mr. Chrétien had the same approach. Is it not possible now for the federal government to put some limits on its spending authority so that it stops interfering in areas that do not fall under its jurisdiction and which, in the past, resulted in significant deficits?

Last of all, if the general rule applied to the fiscal imbalance was that there would be transfers of tax points, the provinces—and Quebec in particular—could use the money transferred to put in place their social policies, which may be different from those found in the rest of Canada. It is not unusual for different societies to make different choices.

We could push not only for additional money, as we did this year, but also for structural changes in order to ensure that the fiscal imbalance is resolved once and for all, including the issue of spending power. Is that not the way to go?

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, if any members understand the importance of defending and advocating for their region specifically when we come to the House, it would be our colleagues in the Bloc Québécois. They are very concerned about the fiscal imbalance.

Let me tell the House what the fiscal imbalance is that matters in the province of Nova Scotia. It is the imbalance between the rich province and the poor province. It is the imbalance between the rich Canadian and the poor Canadian.

I believe that the national government actually has a role in evening that out. The budget makes it worse, not only because it rips the Atlantic accord out of the hands of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians and Nova Scotians but because the way that money is going to go from the federal government to the provinces in the future is going to further penalize the poorer provinces.

We have always believed that a strong national government has a role to play. Constitutionally, there are differences between the federal government, provincial governments and municipal governments. We have always felt that areas like ACOA and investing in those most in need is a strong and reasonable role for the federal government to play. In the budget we see some of that being dismantled and we are concerned about it in Atlantic Canada.

[Charlie Angus, NDP, Timmins—James Bay, ON]

Mr. Speaker, last summer I had the honour of going to a number of communities in my riding to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Treaty No. 9. After about the third community I must confess that there was not much to celebrate in the fact that we have signed treaties and ripped them up the minute they were signed.

The federal government went into those communities and basically lied to the people and had no intention of living up to signed agreements. Unfortunately, we see that sad history with almost any signed agreement with first nations. So many of them have been ignored and ripped up.

In my community we have a signed agreement between the Government of Canada and the people of Kashechewan to move them off the squalid flood plain they are on and move them onto high ground, yet in the budget there is no money for first nations and nothing for education. We can buy tanks to send anywhere we want in the world, but we are going to leave Canadian citizens on a third world flood plain and there is no money, nothing for them.

I would like to ask the hon. member what he thinks about that, looking at the budget and the amount of money in the federal coffers but nothing being put forward for the most desperate people we have in our country?

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, as I indicated in my comments, the biggest gap in the budget is with aboriginal Canadians. We believe that aboriginal Canadians have been the victims of poor development over the years and in many cases the government has not had an inspired look at how aboriginal Canadians can play a role within Confederation.

The Kelowna accord was an agreement that the Government of Canada made. It has been put into the dustbin of history, and that is shameful, in the same way the Atlantic accord for Atlantic Canadians has been shelved.

I agree with the Caledon Institute that the biggest missing piece in this budget is: what are we going to do at a time of great affluence to ensure that aboriginal Canadians take their rightful place in Canada and have the opportunities that the rest of Canadians have? I think it is particularly shameful.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member will know there was a broken promise related to a wait times guarantee and the health minister advised the House that he would not be able to deliver on this until after the next election. Now we find that there are agreements coming out where instead of having funding for all five priority areas, one priority area will do it and the Conservatives are claiming that it is a promise kept. I wonder if the member would care to comment on that.

[Michael Savage, Liberal, Dartmouth—Cole Harbour, NS]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Mississauga South is entirely correct. This is a perfect example, a further example, of how the government puts politics over public policy and does not try to move the yardsticks on wait times, but tries to move the perception of the yardsticks on wait times. That leaves Canadians with a choice. If they are going to get sick in a region, they had better hope they get sick of the right thing or else they are in an awful lot of trouble and that is not right.

[Michel Guimond, Bloc, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to Bill C-52 on the budget implementation.From the outset I want to confirm that the Bloc is in favour of it. As I will have the opportunity to point out later, one of the reasons we were in favour of the budget brought down by the government was that it introduces a major step toward correcting the fiscal imbalance. However, I am tempted to say this is an unfinished symphony. I do not remember who wrote the Unfinished Symphony. In any event, it is still unfinished and we therefore we do not know the final result. I will come back to that.

Bill C-52 before us confirms that Quebec will receive, through equalization and various tax transfers, some $3.3 billion more a year, in 2009-10. It also confirms the creation of the ecotrust, which will allow Quebec to implement its plan for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

By the way, the federal Conservative government would do well to look at what Quebec is doing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Quebec's leadership role in this has not gone unnoticed on the international stage. Hon. members will recall that a French political leader recognized Quebec as a true innovator at a conference in Nairobi, Kenya. We also know that at that same conference, while the Conservative government had promised that Quebec would play a more significant role on the world stage, the former environment minister refused to give Quebec's then environment minister, Mr. Béchard, a chance to explain the difference and the avant-garde nature of Quebec. Quebec's environment minister had asked for a mere 45 seconds, but was denied. The federal government said it was speaking with one voice, the voice of Canada. And this government brags about having an open federalism. We saw in Nairobi what this government means by “open federalism”. Quebec's environment minister, Claude Béchard, just waited in the wings.

Bill C-52 also confirms the payment of $110 million for reconstruction in Afghanistan in 2007-08. Last week's sad events prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this mission must be re-evaluated, its objectives made much clearer, and we must focus our efforts more on reconstruction.

Over the weekend, I heard my colleague, the hon. member for Saint-Jean, the Bloc's defence critic, speaking to the media. He told Radio-Canada, I believe, that he has visited Afghanistan twice, but that the members of the Standing Committee on National Defence were never able to see for themselves any reconstruction work, any schools back up and running, any hospitals fixed up, or any roads or bridges rebuilt. Instead, they were confined to the air base to receive briefings—and not to say “biased briefings”—given by military personnel. I therefore believe that this $110 million for reconstruction in Afghanistan constitutes a step in the right direction, but the mission in Afghanistan must be seriously reconsidered. In any case, this is what the Bloc Québécois has been calling for from the beginning.

Lastly, Bill C-52 introduces the government's tax fairness plan, which enacts legislation regarding the new tax regime for income trusts, while allowing income splitting between spouses and an increase in the age credit.

In the time I have, I would like to focus on one area in particular, and that is the fiscal imbalance. Naturally, the Prime Minister, the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities, and the Minister of Labour and Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec like to strut through our regions boasting that they have corrected the fiscal imbalance. We believe, however, that the fiscal imbalance has only been partially corrected, as I said at the beginning.

However, they forget to talk about the one party in this House that, for years, even before the election in 2000, has been pointing out the fiscal imbalance and fighting for the correction of the fiscal imbalance. In this House, that party is the Bloc Québécois; in the Quebec National Assembly, it is the Parti Québécois. I would remind the House that it was Premier Landry who established the Séguin commission, who mandated the former Liberal finance minister—himself a federalist—to study the whole fiscal imbalance issue.

I recognize that the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities comes to our regions to announce good news. Last week, I was with him when he announced that the issue of the Les Escoumins and Trois-Pistoles wharves had been settled. But this is another unfinished symphony. As I stated in my press release after the announcement, the minister should set aside money to compensate the regions affected by the closure of the wharves and the cancellation of the ferry service. The regional economy—both Les Escoumins in my riding and Trois-Pistoles in the regional municipality of Les Basques—has suffered as a result. We would have expected the government to set aside some money for compensation of the regional economies.

The Bloc Québécois believes that the government recognized that there was a fiscal imbalance because of all the hard work that we, the sovereignists, did. The Liberals refused to even accept the term. Hon. members will recall that the former Prime Minister and member for LaSalle—Émard, who was elected in 2004—I cannot name him because he is still a member—refused to use the term “fiscal imbalance”. It was as if it gave him hives or he was afraid he would get pimples on his tongue if he said the words. He recognized that the provinces suffered financial pressures.

With regard to financial pressures, the federal government in Ottawa collects too much tax from Quebeckers for the services they get. That is the fiscal imbalance: Ottawa has the surplus, but the provinces have the needs. We, the sovereignists in the Bloc Québécois, succeeded in having the term recognized and put pressure on the government in the hope of eliminating this fiscal imbalance.

Without being overly parochial and partisan, we recognize that Bill C-52 on the budget provides initial financial results for Quebec. But it is not enough.

We believe it needs to go further. The federal transfers included in the budget are not quite enough for eliminating the needs Quebec is currently facing. That is why we feel that the current Conservative Prime Minister did not entirely keep his promise to eliminate the fiscal imbalance.

Upon reading budget 2007-08, we see that the full correction of the fiscal imbalance promised by the Conservative leader has not been achieved. The Prime Minister is completely disregarding the Séguin report, which achieved consensus in Quebec. There was consensus among the National Assembly, the Liberal Party of Quebec, the Parti Québécois and the Action démocratique du Québec. They all agree that to fully correct the fiscal imbalance would require a transfer of tax points or the GST to Quebec and the provinces. That is what prompts us to say that the budget is still unfinished.

The tax fields must be redistributed so that Quebec can increase its independent revenues and thereby have more room in terms of the choices that Quebec and the elected members of the National Assembly could make to protect themselves from unilateral cuts by the federal government.

I will conclude my presentation by speaking about one more point. The Bloc Québécois deplores the fact that the Conservative government has not made any plans to put an end to federal spending power in Quebec's areas of jurisdiction, as recommended by the Séguin report. It is all well and good to say that monies will be transferred. However, if the vicious circle resumes at the first possible opportunity and the federal government interferes in provincial jurisdictions, we are not making progress. According to the Constitution, the federal government has spending power even in areas of exclusive provincial jurisdiction. This interference must stop. In future, when there are pan-Canadian programs in place and Quebec decides to implement its own programs, it must be able to withdraw unconditionally and with full compensation each time it believes it must do so.

I would like to close by saying that the Conservative government, with its budget, now has the obligation to govern. It has a fair bit of work to do to find a definitive solution to the fiscal imbalance and to deal with the other concerns of Quebeckers.

The Bloc Québécois members will continue to fight to bring the decisions of the National Assembly to this House. On March 26, an election was held in Quebec. The minority government will have to continue working with the decisions developed in the past in the National Assembly. The Bloc Québécois will do its duty and bring the decisions of the National Assembly to this House . Defending the interests of Quebeckers is an intrinsic part of the responsibilities of the Bloc Québécois and all those elected under the banner of our party.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am very happy today to have an opportunity to speak briefly on the budget debate. I want to indicate at the outset that I am planning to share my time with the hard-working member and NDP finance critic from Winnipeg North.

Much has been said about what is and is not in the budget. I think there is a pretty broad consensus that it is a budget born out of political cynicism and that it is simply an array of broken promises and spectacular betrayals. One hears many comments about the many aspects of those broken promises and disappointments. I want to run through a couple of them in the time available.

I think every member of the House can appreciate that it takes a pretty major force to bring every member of the Newfoundland and Labrador legislature, Conservatives, Liberals and New Democrats alike, together with every member of the Nova Scotia legislature, Conservatives, New Democrats and Liberals alike, to stand together in opposition to the broken promise and spectacular betrayal with respect to the government's treatment of the Atlantic accord and offshore revenue resources.

I am not going to go into all the ins and outs, but let me say very clearly that it is no secret to anybody that what inspired this budget in general, the many choices made by the government and the betrayal with respect to the treatment of offshore resource revenues is the crassest of political objectives. It is the idea that the Conservative minority government can throw overboard anybody in any community, any constituency and any province where it does not think it can make gains to elevate itself to a majority government in the election that it wants to call at the earliest possible opportunity when it calculates that is achievable.

I do not think that this is going to stand up in history as one of the most inspirational visions for a nation. It will be up to the people of Canada to decide, but I think it is absolutely transparent that this was the driving force behind the budget.

Let us be clear that for starters, going into the budget, the government was sitting on and dealing with a surplus of $14.1 billion. Yet when we go through the things that are not even touched or addressed in the budget, it is clear that there is a complete disregard and insensitivity. One cannot even give the government members the benefit of the doubt and say that it is just out of total ignorance that they do not know of the depth and breadth of the unmet needs ignored by the budget.

There is no national housing strategy, this after the previous Liberals destroyed the best national housing program in the world over a decade ago. Nothing has been done to replace it.

There is no national transit strategy. Never has it been more important to have a public transit strategy with our Kyoto challenges and the climate change fiasco that is unfolding.

If it were not for Bill C-30 and, frankly, the leadership of my leader, the member for Toronto—Danforth, we would have no strategy, no timetables and targets. It is my leader who provided tremendous leadership in saying that we cannot face the nation or the world without a strategy, without timetables and targets, and without something meaningful to begin address climate change, the devastating impact on our country and our commitment to try to work with the other countries of the world to minimize that impact and start to rebuild alternative energy plans.

There is also nothing to repair what remains with us as outstanding damage to the employment insurance system. Again, those damages were so fantastic in areas of high unemployment that to this day people are still angry at the smashing of that unemployment insurance system by the Liberals in the mid-1990s. We still have not seen it repaired and there is nothing in the budget to address it.

There is nothing to reduce student debt or the continuing crisis of escalating tuitions.

I could go through the many omissions, but I want to dwell on two in particular.

There is absolutely nothing meaningful in the way of a national anti-poverty strategy. That is despite the fact that what we had in this budget was the opportunity to take a significant portion of this $14.1 billion surplus and ensure that we begin to reduce the gap between the haves and the have nots, to reduce that growing prosperity gap, which is growing in part because this government saw fit to continue on through and implement further corporate tax cuts contained in the past budget. It is an absolute tragedy when we look at the impact on the lives of individuals and families and literally whole regions.

Finally, I want to speak briefly about the complete failure to deal with our disgraceful record with respect to meeting our international obligations for official development assistance. I know that Conservative members are fond of jumping up and down and saying that the budget honours the commitment made by the Liberals to increase by 8% our ODA budget. Our level of ODA is such a humiliation and such a disgrace in the world today that anything short of beginning to make a major leap forward to make up for the foot dragging and the lagging by the Liberals over a 10 year period is simply inadequate.

As a matter of fact, with this budget, to the best of anyone's ability to calculate, we will be at the lowest level of international development assistance since the beginning of really tracking the OECD countries' development assistance levels. Just very briefly historically, that of course was actually making some progress under the Mulroney government and had reached 0.52%. A former finance minister's budgets dragged it down to less than half of that.

As a result of this budget kicking in, we are now going to rank 14th of the OECD countries, moving lower to 15th, and falling so short of those obligations that we do not even begin to contribute to meeting the millennium development goals. Today was a day of teachers in this country coming together to plead for the government to deliver on 0.7% or we will not even begin to make progress toward ensuring universal education for the children of the world.

This budget is a spectacular betrayal. It is a humiliation. One hopes that the government understands that the people of Canada are not prepared to reward the Conservatives with votes of applause until they mend their ways and get on a more progressive track.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member with interest. I am surprised by her tone in addressing the budget. I think the budget accomplishes an awful lot of very good things that I believe the NDP actually supports.

I want to speak specifically of education and see if I can get a response on education. The budget delivers $35 million over two years for new graduate scholarships; a $500 million annual investment, beginning in 2008-09, toward labour market training; an $800 million increase, or a 40% increase, for post-secondary education; $50.5 million over two years for the temporary foreign worker program; and $34 million over two years to ensure foreign students and skilled temporary workers already in Canada can meet health and security requirements to stay in the country. What about these specific education measures could the NDP possibly stand against?

That is not to mention the significant improvements in health care, the significant increase in health care funding, and the significant investment in the health care Infoway. I want to hear the member's response on education, but I could go on for quite a while.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, with a surplus of $14.1 billion, the government cannot spend the amount of money it is spending in dribbling a little here and a little there and end up saying that this is huge progress.

One of the problems is that we have never returned to the base funding. Huge cuts were introduced in 1995 and subsequently did enormous damage to our post-secondary education infrastructure. They did enormous damage to our health infrastructure. They did untold damage to the level of commitment to overseas development assistance. The result is that we need nothing less than major infusions into rebuilding the base and ensuring that we are not just introducing a little bit here and a little bit there and a little bit somewhere else, which effectively atomizes our capacity as a nation to really deliver on these national, universal and exceedingly important programs.

Nobody is fooled. The government can go through it and say there is some for this and some for that and some for something else, but one thing is absolutely clear. Until the funding gutted out of these important programs by the previous Liberal government is restored to the base so that year after year it is built in, then we are still going to see the erosion of the quality and the accessibility of our health, education and other social welfare programs.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I have a quick question for the member. The one item in the budget for disabled people is a registered savings plan for disabled people. Would the member comment on that?

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to address the hon. member's question on what I think about the registered savings disabled persons plan.

I can only tell him what many disabled persons have told me. They are individuals who are living with disabilities and struggling with inadequate incomes. They cannot even pay adequately for nutritional food, let alone additional costs associated with their disability, whether it is added transportation costs or added costs for technical aids or whatever.

The reaction I have heard overwhelmingly from individuals as well as advocacy groups for the disabled is that a disabled persons savings plan misses the fundamental point, which is that disabled people do not have enough money at the end of the day or the end of the week, let alone at the end of the year, to invest in a savings plan. It misses the point that today 60% of our persons who are living on the streets and homeless are disabled persons and that disabled persons make up 40% of the users of our food banks.

I think such a plan utterly misses the mark. I think it misdiagnoses what it is that persons living with disabilities most need. Like everything else, there is a little of this and a little of that, but it does not add up to anything significant or meaningful that would actually alter the lives of working people or persons who are not able to be in the workforce precisely because the nature of their disabilities and the lack of support services do not enable them to be self-supporting.

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Peterborough provokes some discussion in the House around Bill C-52, the budget implementation act. He suggests that this budget is filled with so much goodness and so many progressive ideas that we should be falling all over ourselves to support it.

Tories do that. Conservatives, just like Liberals, have done this for years. They give us a scattergun approach. They do a little here, as my colleague from Halifax just said, and a little there but they do not address the systemic issues facing this country, and then expect all kinds of support to miraculously appear.

The member for Peterborough should know better because he sat through all the committee hearings. The finance committee heard from hundreds of groups from across the country. People recommended a substantive, meaningful approach to education once and for all. They did not recommend another series of band-aids on band-aids. They did not recommend a hodgepodge of little tax cuts here and there.

Every major institution that appeared before the committee, every student organization, every professor organization, every administrative organization pertaining to education, whether it had to do with college or university, recommended that the government, once and for all, increase transfer payments to at least the point they were before the Liberals cut the heck out of education. They wanted to see transfer payments increased and an overhaul of the student aid program which is now a mess because of neglect over the last 13 years. They wanted to see a separate education transfer.

I cannot think of anyone at our hearings who disagreed with that. I do not think anybody said that we should not make education a priority and not have separate transfer funds for education. Everybody, from businesses to labour organizations, to social justice coalitions, to ordinary citizens groups, to individual citizens believe that the future of this nation rests on how we ensure that everyone, regardless of background, has access to quality education.

Members sitting on the Conservative and Liberal benches should remember that we do not have a universal education system today. We have a selective system that allows the well-to-do to access post-secondary education and those who come from families who have been able to invest in things like registered education savings plans, but it does not open doors or provide anything for those who struggle day to day to make ends meet and who have as much right to universal education as their rich next door neighbours.

The system is getting more elitist with every day that passes. If it were not for the efforts of some provincial governments, like the Manitoba NDP government that has frozen tuitions, there would be exclusive education with very few opportunities for ordinary rank and file Canadians to better themselves and look for future opportunities through our post-secondary education system.

On the most important issue facing the future of this country, this budget fails and fails miserably.

Much must be said about this bill but the most fundamental thing that has been mentioned by my colleague from Halifax and others is that it is our job as parliamentarians to ensure that we work to equalize conditions in this country. That is the role of government and of Parliament. Our job is to close the gap between the rich and the poor. Our job is to ensure that so much wealth is not concentrated in so few hands; that we see opportunities and conditions equally available and distributed in this country.

I will go back to education for a moment. Education is one of the last remaining institutions to equalize conditions in this country. Over the years, through consecutive Liberal and Conservative governments, we have seen national programs that help equalize conditions disappear, cut back, torn apart, deregulated, out-sourced, privatized and so on.

Education is one of the things that we hold on to. Health care is in deep trouble as privatization is allowed to take hold. There is no meaningful national family allowance care program because we have never come to grips with what that really means in terms of families. There is no national child care program There is no set of programs across the country that help to equalize conditions.

Although education is vital to our future, the Conservatives missed a golden opportunity in the budget. They blew it. They did not get the point that Canadians raised with us time and time again and that is if we invest at all we must invest in education.

The budget does not close the prosperity gap. It does not ensure that education remains as a national institution to help equalize conditions. It does not help those who are working hard to improve themselves and their families and are looking for some assistance from government so they can help themselves, like literacy.

Today the teacher's federations from across the country are all over this precinct lobbying members of Parliament for a number of very important objectives that we thought had been accomplished long ago but we are starting all over again, one, of course, being the achievement of 0.7% in international aid; the other being the restoration of literacy programs, the court challenges programs and programs that help women and women's equality. Those are the very issues that help people to help themselves but which the Conservatives decided to throw out the window.

After hearing from so many representatives and receiving so much testimony, the finance committee agreed that the government should restore the funds that it cut from literacy, court challenges, women's equality programs, museums, the volunteer initiative, and the list goes on. All of those programs are important for individuals and communities to help themselves through difficult times. This is not a hand out but a hand up. This is not social assistance but the tools by which they can fend for themselves and feed their families. When it comes down to it, that is the one outstanding and fundamental truth when it comes to elected representation in this country and our role as members of Parliament.

The budget has denied Canadians the opportunity to help themselves. Today we stand and implore the Conservative government to not do what we have seen happen over the last 13 years, which is that the very things that create unity in this country, that connect us, the ties that bind, are not destroyed and dismantled in the face of this compelling determination to create the survival of the fittest philosophy, survival of the laws of the jungle and a free for all in our society today.

The government must recognize that the founding principle of this country is to help one another, to cooperate and to build a strong society. That is fundamental to who we are as Canadians and that is being torn apart and being allowed to be destroyed through this kind of a budget. We cannot let that happen. It has been going on for too long.

I could go on at length about the last 13 years but I made a promise to focus on the present, a promise that I intend to keep because Canadians know that the Liberals let them down over the years but now we are on to a new scenario and we must try to do the best we can to convince the government to repair the damage that was done by the Liberals and build for a better day in the future.

I implore members on the Conservative benches who are listening here today and who, I think, are ready to ask questions, to do what they can to put back at least the funds that were chopped out of fundamental issues starting with literacy, child care, equality programs, with basic--

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Bill Blaikie]

Order, please. It is now time for those very questions.

The hon. member for Peterborough.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for the honourable mention at the beginning of her speech. I appreciate it and there is no such thing as bad publicity.

I will begin by acknowledging that it is very important to increase funding for education. The 40% increase for post-secondary education that is in the budget is what we disagree on. I think a 40% increase is substantial but I suppose the member thinks that a greater increase would have been better.

However, I would like to ask a very pointed question with respect to infrastructure. We know that Canada faces productivity concerns and I would like to bring up some specific infrastructure measures in the budget; $17.6 billion in gas tax transfers and base funding for municipalities; $8.8 billion to the building Canada fund to support investments such as core national highway systems; and $2.1 billion for the gateway and border crossings, including funding for the Windsor-Detroit corridor. I know the NDP has members who represent that very area.

There is also a $1 billion increase in funding for the Asia-Pacific Gateway over what had already been pledged. I know there are NDP members from British Columbia. These are very specific infrastructure investments that the Government of Canada has made to help us improve productivity and put Canada on a good footing. I would love to know why the NDP does not support them.

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, members of the New Democratic Party have not failed in acknowledging where there are significant steps in this budget. We have acknowledged that there is some movement with respect to infrastructure.

We have acknowledged that there is a tax investment savings plan for people with disabilities. We have acknowledged that there is finally, after much pressure from New Democrats and others, money for hazardous training for firefighters in this country. We have acknowledged that the government has agreed to change the transit pass tax credit to ensure that people who buy their transit passes on a weekly basis get the same credit as if they bought them on a monthly basis. There are little things in this budget we agree with.

We appreciate that the government chose to listen to some of our suggestions but we must judge the budget in terms of what money was available and what size the problem was. There is no better example than when it comes to infrastructure where we have a $60 billion deficit that is growing every day that we neglect it. The question then is whether the government has actually put enough into this area on a planned basis so that municipalities can appropriately address this very serious issue. I say no in the context of two budgets that produced a $22 billion--

[The Deputy Speaker, NDP, Bill Blaikie]

Order, please. There are a lot of other people rising.

The member for Mississauga South.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member is quite right. There are a lot of little things in the budget but there is a very substantial thing in the budget and that is under the fairness provisions the imposition of a 31.5% tax on income trusts. This is probably the greatest fraud ever perpetrated in the history of Canadian political life. It is a promise broken. During the last election, the Conservative Party said that it would never tax income trusts and then it turned around and did it.

What is worse is that the NDP, and that member specifically on the finance committee, supported the broken promise.

When we look at what has happened lately, it is very clear that the expert testimony at the finance committee indicated that the so-called tax leakage was a fraud. The witnesses explained that the finance minister had failed to take into account legislative tax changes in calculating the tax leakage and had also failed to account for the revenues associated with taxes paid by RRSPs, as examples.

In summary, the bottom line is that the tax leakage was a fraud but the NDP continued to support it. The member should explain why the NDP is against seniors.

[Judy Wasylycia-Leis, NDP, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, there go the Liberals again on their hobby horses. As my colleague from Timmins just asked, is the ego of the member for Wascana so tattered and embattled that his colleagues must rush to his defence and try to explain a sorry chapter in the history of the Liberal Party?

This is a perfect example. When it comes to Liberals, they would much rather stand up and defend the interests of big business and big banks than ordinary senior citizens who have not fared well by the government under either the income trust program or any others.

In fact, seniors know that if the Liberals had dealt with this issue when they ought to have, we would not be in the mess today and people would have some certainty in the marketplace and also would not have had to face the problem of $500 million or more in lost tax revenue because of the trends we were facing and the inaction of the Liberal government.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, the best summary of the budget , and the one we hear most often from people, is how so little could have been done with so much money. The Liberal Party left the government with the best fiscal situation in Canadian history and the Conservativefinance minister has spent the largest amount of money ever, much to the shock of Canadians across the country. The Conservatives cut government programs and expenditures supposedly to be more efficient and now Canadians have learned that the Conservatives have made the greatest expenditures in Canadian history. Many Canadians will not benefit, or will benefit very little, from any of those huge expenditures.

One of the previous speakers today told us about a survey on the finance minister's website asking Canadians if they benefited from the budget. Ninety-three per cent of Canadians apparently said that they had not benefited. Where did all that money go? Why is it not going to those Canadians who really need the help, and who I am sure are part of the 93% who do not feel they have been helped.

It is unprecedented that premiers are screaming that promises have been broken in a budget. When in Canadian history have we ever seen a premier take out a full page ad against a federal finance minister for breaking a promise? Another premier is suggesting he might sue the federal government. The budget is a litany of broken promises. There are a lot of expenditures in it, but not in the way most Canadians think they should be made.

I always try to be balanced in my speeches in the House, so I will try to go over some of the positive things in the budget. I will talk specifically to those things that relate to my area in the north.

We have formula financing in the north. We commissioned a study to look at formula financing and to make recommendations for the future about whether we should go back to a formula or remain on a fixed amount. Fortunately, the government followed the recommendations in the O'Brien report. The result can be found on page 119 of the budget which shows $3 million more this year than the guaranteed minimum allocation that would have been received under the Liberal government. The amount went from $537 million to $540 million. If we compare that $3 million to the $30 million the Liberals put in for economic development, or the $40 million for the northern strategy, it is not a large amount of money, but any increase for the territories is good from my perspective.

In the last election campaign when I was asked what my priorities were, I said that my main priority was to try and keep the status quo. The Liberal government did much for the north. We put in many programs. We provided assistance. As an opposition member, I was hoping to keep as much of that as possible. When the Conservatives were in opposition, they did not applaud those things. I am happy that some of those positive things for the north, and for many parts of Canada for that matter, have been kept in this budget.

Infrastructure is one example. More than $15 million was put into the municipal rural infrastructure fund in my riding and $40 million was provided for the strategic infrastructure fund. For the Canada Games centre $20 million was provided. This was one of the prerequisites for having such a successful Canada Games in the Yukon. The Conservatives have finally agreed that the Liberal infrastructure idea is a good one and have carried on with $25 million in this budget. We are very happy about that.

The Conservatives were skeptical that giving municipalities a gas tax rebate was a good idea. We fought for a long time for the government to keep it as we said we would, and the Conservatives finally agreed in this budget to provide the rebate from 2009 to 2013.

The finance minister did muse that there might be some changes in the conditions. I would like to hear very quickly from the finance minister what those changes are going to be. I am sure municipalities across Canada would like to hear what those changes are going to be. What changes are going to be made to the gas tax? What changes are going to be made to infrastructure funding requirements and conditions?

Those programs were successful and were applauded by municipalities across the country. I certainly hope the money will continue to go to municipalities.

We met with the Nunavut Teachers' Association this morning. There is a big infrastructure need in Nunavut. We hope that recreational facilities will be eligible under the conditions for the continuation of these good programs.

I applaud the setting up of a Canadian mental health commission to produce a mental health strategy. We will be watching very closely to make sure the Conservatives actually do it and that it is not another one of their broken promises.

As was mentioned earlier, there have been a number of broken promises by the government. The one on income trusts is a perfect example. It is inconceivable that the Prime Minister could promise absolutely that the government would never tax income trusts and then totally break that promise. A single mother in my riding told me that based on that promise she transferred her registered education savings into an income trust. Because of that broken promise, she lost a substantial amount of money for her child's education.

I am also supportive of the anti-drug strategy in the budget. We will be watching carefully for the results of that. It is very important for my riding. Sandra Henderson of the Yukon Teachers' Association was here this morning. I was talking to her. She was talking about mothers who use drugs during pregnancy. Doctors are saying it is resulting in children who are angry and who are very disruptive in the classroom. This is obviously unsustainable. We will be watching for a lot of progress on the anti-drug strategy and emphasis on prevention. We want to reduce the number of children with FAS and children who are affected by the use of drugs by the mother during pregnancy and other substance abuse problems.

It is beneficial for my riding that the mineral exploration tax credit of 15% is increased, but only until March 31, 2008. There was a little bit for business. Less paperwork is great. It follows up on the Liberals' initiatives in that area to reduce the paperwork burden for businesses. Although it will not help my riding a lot, the capital cost allowance accelerated write-off for manufacturing is going from seven years down to two. This is positive. A small item for seniors, the RRSP change from 69 to 71 years is good.

The national water strategy in theory is a good idea, but the devil is in the details. What are the details? What will actually help? I will be watching very closely to see if it is treading on the responsibilities of municipalities and provincial governments in dealing with water quality. When the Liberals were in government, we did an audit of all the first nation communities in Canada. We set up a plan for all of them. There are still a number of communities that have serious water problems. The recommendations have not been fully implemented. We will be looking to the government to move as quickly as possible on that, considering that it is now putting an emphasis on a national water strategy.

There are a number of things in the budget of which I am very supportive in the sense that they are there, but how they got there is sad. Previously they were all successful Liberal programs, but the Conservative government cut them or gave no indication the programs would continue. Finally, after lobbying in budget speeches and in committees, we have finally convinced the government, and the people of Canada and the NGOs have finally convinced the government that these are necessary and effective programs that should be carried on. Finally, the programs were reinstated but sadly with a smaller amount of money than they had in the first place and sometimes with a fewer eligible recipients.

A perfect example is the GST rebate. There was an uproar in the tourism industry across Canada. In fact, the cuts affecting the tourism industry have probably hurt my riding more than any other because the Yukon is the one area of Canada with the largest number of employees in tourism in the private sector. It was shocking that the government would take money from the Canadian Tourism Commission which it could have used for marketing and that the government would take away the GST rebate to tourists.

As a result, the tourism industry, as is the case for any group or organization that has limited resources, had to spend this spring fighting along with us to get that reinstated. It is fortunate that at least part of it, but not the full amount, was reinstated in the budget. The part of the program that was being put in place was the ability for conventions and groups coming to Canada to get the GST rebate. There has been some damage done, but hopefully that will be diminished and will not extend into the future. The GST rebate was not restored for individuals travelling to Canada. It is still a burden and a negative mark on our tourism industry.

A whole speech could be given on funding for museums. It is astonishing that such an underfunded part of Canada's heritage, the small museums, went through such tribulations. It is ironic that the money for large museums was increased under the national museums program, but all the small museums, which are so important to tourism across the country, are still underfunded.

There was the horrendous situation a few weeks ago of the attendance of the heritage minister at the museums conference. The conference showed the lack of faith there was in that particular funding area.

Another area I am delighted to see in the budget, but it is sad how it came about, is the aboriginal justice strategy. They are workers in the justice system. The strategy is very important and is one of the few components that is actually working. It is reducing crime. It should be a part of the justice system. That strategy was about to expire. There was no information being given. People were being laid off and projects were closing. In just a few weeks before the strategy was to expire, the government wisely decided to keep the program.

I did not hear the government telling all the police officers in Canada that their funding was expiring and they would have to look for other jobs and start closing up shop, and two or three weeks before the funding expired it was put back. The aboriginal justice strategy is a fundamental part of the justice system. It is very important. It is a tragedy that those people had to go through all that turmoil, and still only receive funding for another two years, I think it is.

The aboriginal justice strategy should be considered in the same light as police officers, prosecutors, defence lawyers, judges and probation officers. It should be a permanent part of the justice system. Canadians are looking to the government to continue the goodwill of extending it by two years by making it permanent funding so that this trauma to our justice system does not happen again. The Conservative Party talks so much about justice. Canadians expect that the Conservative Party would at least be very positive and productive in an area that has been so effective in the justice system.

I am pleased that the meal allowance for truckers was increased to 80% from 50%. This is something for which I had lobbied.

We are also pleased that the ecotrust program was put in place. Once again, this is a perfect example of something the Liberals had put in place, the partnership of the federal government with the provinces and territories to reduce greenhouse gases and emissions. The Liberal government had a $3 billion program. I compliment the Conservative government for restoring the program. However, it was only restored at $1.5 billion which is half the previous amount.

Someone in the Prime Minister's Office suggested when the program was announced that it would be done on a per capita basis. I wrote to the minister of the environment at the time and said that per capita is not sufficient in the north and that we need more than that. The northern premiers made the same case. Fortunately we did get an increase. We are now getting more per capita and we are using that to increase the electrical generation.

The Conservative cuts to literacy programs caused a big outrage across the country. I do not think the Conservatives expected the uproar from all the opposition parties and from the people that work in the literacy field. How could any responsible modern day government in the world cut literacy programs.

Fortunately, some of that money has been reinstated. Some good literacy projects have been approved in my riding and in other areas. Unfortunately, some of those projects have a time limit of one or two years. We will be looking for permanent funding for literacy. Literacy is a basic foundation for a modern society and those programs are necessary for the most vulnerable people in a modern society. Literacy is far more important now than it ever has been. As society becomes more technical, how can the poorest of the poor ever survive without a good grasp of literacy and numeracy.

The homelessness program is another on the huge list of programs that the Liberal government put in place that was very effective and helped out. These programs were cut or cancelled or the suggestion was made they would not be re-funded and, fortunately, with a lot of pressure were put back in place. Thank goodness the homelessness program that was referred to as SCPI under the Liberal government was reinstated and re-funded. I am not sure about the rest of the country, but in my particular area that is one of the most successful programs the government has ever put in place. It is very important.

Another area that I guess one could give a very small compliment for is child care. As we know, the Liberal government negotiated a $5 billion agreement with the provinces across the country. It was unprecedented that this kind of agreement could be reached for something that is very important, especially for single mothers and people who really need support in child care.

The Conservative government, as we know, promised $250 million, which is a lot less than $5 billion, to industry to create day care spaces. It found over the last year that it could not create one single space and it did not work, so it has transferred that to the provinces and territories, thank goodness. Any citizen watching can see that $250 million compared to $5 billion is a small amount. Yukon will certainly be looking forward to getting its portion, but it had already received $1.3 billion from the Liberal government. This is a small amount and Yukon certainly will not reject it, but it should certainly be a lot more.

Another area is education. It has been talked about a lot in the debate so far. I want to talk about one aspect of education and that is undergraduate students. I congratulate the government for providing scholarships for graduate students, but all the undergraduate students listening should remember that had the Liberals been elected, they would have been receiving $3,000, up to a half year's tuition for their first year of education, and in their last year of education, up to $3,000. That is $6,000.

What did they get under the Conservative government in last year's budget: a textbook. I checked with a bookstore and the amount the government gave on the textbook rebate would not even buy some of the textbooks in the store. That is a good indication of the scope of things in this budget and what is there for people.

Another good thing that the Conservatives finally put back was the Liberal program to take the working poor off social assistance. I commend them for that, but it is a far less amount of money than the amount the Liberals put in.

Finally, I want to talk about the north. The last government put tremendous emphasis on the north and I have to commend it for that, specifically the $40 million for the northern strategy and the direction that all departments in the north have a special place in Confederation. They are very important to Confederation and were given that emphasis. The only promises the Conservative government made to the north were for icebreakers and a northern port. What happened to those two promises? They vanished. They are not in the budget anywhere.

Probably the biggest disappointment that has been mentioned by many people is the lack of funding for aboriginal people. I do not think I have enough time left to go through the whole list but there was roughly $440 million. That is a tiny amount compared to the $9 billion or $10 billion which was the normal budget for Indian Affairs. The Liberals were not going to add $440 million but $5 billion in Kelowna, plus $2 billion for residential schools.

Where is the money for the increase in inflation and for the increase in the population of aboriginal people? The Conservatives cancelled the aboriginal procurement program and aboriginal languages program. Those programs lost all sorts of money. Other programs that aboriginal people used, like the non-smoking strategy, were all cancelled. I do not have to add what everyone else has said about it being such a disgrace.

There was the ANCAP program for aboriginal people to reduce emissions. There is a community in Kluane that wanted to use that program. It is gone.

In summary, there are a few good things in the budget, but as I said at the beginning, most people are asking how could spending so much money get so little results for the people of Canada?

When Canadians are filling out their income tax returns right now at home, they are looking at last year's schedule 1 where it shows they were getting charged 15% income tax on the first amount of money and this year's schedule 1 it shows 15.25%. They are wondering how could all this money be spent, the largest expenditure in history, and they get an increase in income tax, especially the most vulnerable people in society. Why should they have that increase in their income tax rate?

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate my colleague across on his speech and his focus on the north.

In the budget, fairness was addressed in a number of ways, but I do not think fairness was addressed in terms of the northern residents tax deduction. It was mentioned in this budget but for 18 years, under the Liberals, there were no cost of living increases to the northern residents tax deduction and that has left it in a position where the benefit is not worth nearly what it was in the beginning.

The Conservatives recognized that they needed to raise the lifetime capital gains exemption from $500,000 to $750,000 because it had not been done for 20 years. The same thing applies to the tax benefits that should be there for northerners. They did not do anything about it and the Liberals did not do anything about it for 18 years.

I have a question for my hon. colleague. How does he feel about being in a government that ignored this very important part of the northern benefits structure for so many years and how can he ensure that we get this back on the agenda to make sure that northerners are treated fairly in the tax system for a change?

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I would just reiterate what I said in regard to the budget, that the previous government put unprecedented emphasis on the north, with the northern strategy and with having every department look at the north. There was $40 billion for that. There was $30 billion for northern economic development.

The fact is that the Conservatives decreased income taxes not just on the northern living allowance, which fortunately is still in place, but they decreased income taxes for all Canadians, and it has much more of an effect than what the member is talking about.

However, I am glad he raised the point about the added costs in the north, the cost of doing business, the cost of living, and especially the cost for the most vulnerable people in small, isolated communities with small tax bases. They live so far apart they need that assistance. That is why we had to argue in a number of cases, and I am glad the government agreed, that we need more than just per capita funding in a number of these programs. We need base funding to cover the remote harsh climate and then per capita funding on top of that.

Carleton County Spring Show

[Mike Allen, Conservative, Tobique—Mactaquac, NB]

Mr. Speaker, last week I had the opportunity to attend the Carleton County Spring Show and Sale.

This event, held annually in the Florenceville-Bristol area, brings together people from the county who have raised their calves specifically for this show and auction.

Congratulations to 4-H'r Bethany Boyd from Johnville, the overall grand champion, grand champion Maine-Anjou, and 4-H grand champion.

The Charity Steer donated by the exhibitors raised $6,250 for the Woodstock Cancer Support Group, a very special cause. This group goes above and beyond to provide services that reach out to cancer victims in the Saint John River Valley.

I also want to mention the significant presence of the 4-H in this event. The kids from 4-H made up almost half the entries in the show and a significant number of these young people were grand or reserve champions, not to mention young Stephanie Budd whose animal will be providing the beef on our table for the next while.

I look forward to seeing the 4-H people this week when they arrive on the Hill.

Congratulations to all the organizers and volunteers who make this event happen, and to all the people who took out their wallets to support the exhibitors.

June Callwood

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, early Saturday morning past, an angel who walked Toronto's streets departed.

The late June Callwood was a prolific and awarded writer, however, it will not be in the reading salons that the greatest amount of tears shall be shed. June applied most of her boundless energies to repairing the aches of her communities.

An aching void will be felt in places like Nellie's House, where abused women and children found shelter; Jessie's Centre for Teenagers; and Casey House Hospice for people infected with HIV-AIDS.

In the 1980s, in Toronto's rough Queen and Bathurst neighbourhood, I first encountered June's inexhaustible energies and good works, and in recent years I have been honoured to have been able to call June a friend.

June has departed leaving behind thousands of friends and admirers, however, we know that as she passes through heaven's gate there will be thousands there to greet her, the thousands whose dying days were made bearable by her goodness at Casey House Hospice.