Debates of June 3rd, 2008

Budget Implementation Act, 2008

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that speech was almost unbearable it was so misguided and so rife with political spin, doom and gloom. I do not think that is what Ontarians want. I do not think it is what Canadians want.

When he talks about massive surpluses that the Liberals ran, it is certainly not because they were good spenders. There were three budgets in the last year that there was a Liberal government in Canada. There were three budgets with a 14% spending increase in one single year.

This government has done a lot for manufacturing. We have done a lot for industry and what the finance minister was saying was that the province of Ontario has an opportunity before it to harmonize its sales taxes, and to get its corporate taxes in line. I know the member agrees with it because he is on the record saying that reducing corporate taxes is a powerful tool to stimulate industry in Canada.

Now he stands in the House, having followed what the finance minister has done, which is exactly what he called for, and asks, why is he not helping? He has helped; he has helped a lot. What the member fails to point out is the fact that when the Liberals were running massive surpluses, they were doing it on the backs of Canadians.

It was excess taxation and the reason why he laments the EI change. This is what I would love to hear him respond to, why when they were in government, did they operate EI just as a tax? It was tax and spend, tax and spend. That is what they did.

That is why they are upset about the EI change because it is another tax that they will not be able to spend. It is another slush fund they will not be able to access any more. That is what the Liberal Party is upset about, is it not?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, on this side of the House we have abundant confidence in Ontario. We have confidence in hard-working Canadians. What we are lacking confidence in is the stewardship of the government and the Minister of Finance. That is the problem. It is not the fault of Canadians. It is not the fault of those who were laid off today. It is not the fault of others who have been laid off for months, and many more to come. It is the fault of the government for its incompetent management of the economy.

I would ask the member, why does he think it is competent to tell Canadians that Ontario is the last place to invest? Who is the one expressing a lack of confidence in Ontario? It is not this side of the House. We have every confidence in Ontario. It is the Minister of Finance who tells domestic and international investors that Ontario is the last place to invest. How is that expressing confidence in the Canadian economy?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with awe to the member for Markham—Unionville's speech. In one breath he is denouncing the Conservatives, and rightly so, for the discretionary powers that the bill would give the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration while asking, why should we trust the Conservatives to exercise that kind of discretionary power? It is appropriate criticism of the legislation.

In the next breath he says that Canadians should trust the Liberals, when they are re-elected and form government, to change the legislation and excusing the fact that right now, last night and coming up soon, they will have the opportunity to defeat the change here in the House of Commons.

Last night they chose to be absent rather than see those immigration sections pulled out of the legislation and defeated last night. Yet, he says that we cannot trust the Conservatives with this extra power, but Canadians should trust Liberals some time down the road to undo this terrible change.

Why will Liberal members not stand up on their own two feet and defeat the legislation now while they have that opportunity if this immigration change means anything at all to them?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member raises a very good issue as to why Canadians should trust Liberals rather than Conservatives when it comes to immigration. Let me compare two prime ministers, a Conservative Prime Minister, the incumbent, and a former Liberal prime minister by the name of Pierre Trudeau.

The incumbent Prime Minister in a quote, I do not have it exactly in hand, talked about new Canadians living in ghettos in western Canada and not integrating with western Canadian society. It is hardly a point of view to inspire confidence or trust among immigrants. Whereas Pierre Trudeau was the one who introduced multiculturalism and opened Canada's gates to immigrants.

We on the Liberal side are in the legacy of Pierre Trudeau, and that is why Canadians will and can trust the Liberal Party when it comes to immigration because we are the party of immigration. It is the current Prime Minister and many in his party who have displayed anti-immigration sentiments which bubble to the surface from time to time.

[Martha Hall Findlay, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, before this budget, we Liberals had in fact recommended a few things, one of which was a recommendation to lower corporate taxes. I have to say we are glad the Conservatives took that good Liberal advice. Unfortunately, we had also recommended a number of other things, among which were some recommendations to deal with infrastructure.

The prior Liberal government had allocated $10 billion to debt reduction. Do not get us wrong, we are all in favour of reducing debt, but not when the walls are cracking and the roof is leaking.

Liberals had recommended that of that $10 billion, $7 billion would go to infrastructure. We had also suggested that $3 billion go into a contingency, which would have been a continuation of the Liberal prudence of keeping a few billion dollars as an annual contingency. Unfortunately, the current Conservative government did not take that particularly good Liberal advice.

The rest of this budget, in large measure, does in fact reflect past Liberal initiatives, albeit what we see is extremely watered down. I would, however, like to highlight a significant concern, notwithstanding all of the finance minister's rhetoric and recent efforts to, quite frankly, mislead the Canadian public. Only two weeks ago, in fact, he was quoted as saying that the Canadian economy is growing in every region of this country, yet we have now learned that the Canadian economy in the first quarter of 2008 has declined.

I would like to remind the finance minister that two quarters of shrinkage makes a recession. Therefore, notwithstanding the finance minister's rhetoric, false support, and statements encouraging the view that somehow the government has been a strong economic steward, the opposite is true.

I will go back to the infrastructure deficit. In this country we have an infrastructure deficit of $123 billion. That is a lot of money. In fact, two cuts of two points in the GST over the course of 10 years and one point a year would have been worth $6 billion. That is interesting math. Adding interest to that, $6 billion a year per point is $12 billion. That would have meant the ability to reduce and eliminate the infrastructure deficit in this country over the course of the next 10 years, but no.

What we desperately need in this country are the initiatives to encourage a strong economy. Virtually every economist has acknowledged investment in infrastructure is critical. It is critical to enhance productivity and I will add that productivity is critical to global competitiveness in the growth of our economy.

Productivity does not mean working harder. Canadians work extremely hard as it is. However, productivity does mean working better, more effectively and efficiently. It is absolutely acknowledged everywhere that in order to encourage productivity, we must in this country address the infrastructure deficit. The current Conservative government has not done so.

The government now faces a challenge given the cuts in the GST, the imprudent management of the current economy, and the fiscal situation in this country. Not only has the economy shrunk in the first quarter, and not only are we in danger if it happens in the second quarter of officially being in a recession as we have not invested in the critical infrastructure and other investments in innovation and research and development that are so critical to enhance a Canadian economy but we have also seen that the economy as a whole is now suffering.

Notwithstanding all of the rhetoric, the government has simply not done what it should have been doing, what we have been asking it to do, and what this country deserves.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, obviously the Liberal Party has difficulty understanding that the Canadian currency has gone up significantly and that does affect our GDP number since we are a major exporting nation. Nominally. when our dollar goes up, vis-à-vis foreign currencies, that does affect our GDP but that does not mean the economy has shrunk. The member, however, does not quite understand how currency volatility can affect those things.

We will see how that comes out in the second quarter because I really do not buy into the Liberal doom and gloom. Canada has a great economy. We are moving forward, led by constituencies like mine, of Peterborough. We work very hard and we will continue to make the economy very strong.

During clause by clause at the finance committee, the Liberals voted with the government members to limit debate on every amendment brought forward to five minutes. They then abstained on every vote that was brought forward.

The government has a position on Bill C-50. Whether they agree or not, the NDP members have a position. They have made that clear and they stand by their convictions.

The Liberals stand in the House today and make speeches. They pretend to counter positions when they really have no position at all. They have no plan. I am sure the NDP will agree with me when I say that the Liberal Party is void of any plan whatsoever. The Liberals simply pretend to have a separate position from the government but put no solutions forward whatsoever.

I do not think doom, gloom and spin is a good position for a party that hopes one day to be government. Maybe the Liberals will come up with a platform because they sure do not have one right now.

[Martha Hall Findlay, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will remind the member opposite that I just finished explaining a very significant recommendation that the Liberal government had made with respect to infrastructure investment, which the current Conservative government completely ignored.

I will repeat what I said. We support the concept of reducing debt but not when the walls are cracking and the roof is leaking.

How can we trust a finance minister who, only two weeks ago, assured Canadians that everything was wonderful, that they should not worry and, arguably, with a little pat on the head to Canadians? He said that they should not worry, that the economy was doing great and that the Americans were the problem and they are suffering. The finance minister said that two weeks ago and, sure enough, in the first quarter of 2008 the American GDP grew and the Canadian GDP shrank.

Notwithstanding the efforts by the member opposite to somehow connect currency, he has exhibited a sorely lacking understanding of economics.

How can Canadians trust the finance minister and the government when only two weeks ago they were trying to assure Canadians that the economy was growing when we have clear evidence now that the Canadian economy shrank in the first quarter and is in danger, if it happens in the second quarter, of officially putting Canada in a recession? Is that Conservative government prudence?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the member for Willowdale.

She also talked about the issue of trust. Her colleague from Markham talked about the way the Liberals do not trust the Conservatives with the discretionary powers around immigration that are in this legislation. However, at the same time, the Liberals are asking Canadians to trust them to fix it when they get back into power, whenever that happens.

Why should Canadians, who have an application or a relative's application in the immigration backlog, trust the Liberals to fix that when that backlog was developed by Liberals? When 800,000 of the 900,000 applications in the backlog occurred under the Liberal administration, why should any Canadian who is concerned about immigration, trust the Liberals to fix that backlog problem?

Why should any Canadian, who is concerned about immigration, trust the Liberals to fix that when they have the opportunity to make sure these changes do not go ahead now and they are not using that opportunity to defeat the legislation or to see changes made in the legislation?

[Martha Hall Findlay, Liberal, Willowdale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will respond to the member opposite by pointing out two things.

First, the very fact that there are immigration provisions in the budget implementation bill is a significant Americanization of the Canadian process. It is not something we are supportive of at all. It should not be in the budget implementation bill in the first place.

I will also add that trying to deal with a backlog by only addressing new applications does not deal with the backlog at all. There is absolutely nothing in the provisions put forward by the Conservative government that will, notwithstanding all the rhetoric, deal with the backlog.

This country needs some very concrete proposals and funding associated with those proposals to legitimately deal with the acknowledged backlog of immigrant applications that we have in this country.

We need skills and we need people willing to put those skills to work. We need that backlog addressed. The Conservative government, notwithstanding all of the rhetoric, has put nothing in the bill to address that backlog.

[Jean-Yves Laforest, Bloc, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Mr. Speaker, today I would like to repeat, on behalf of the Bloc Québécois, the position we have maintained since the budget was introduced. The Minister of Finance asked to meet with the opposition parties, and we met with the finance critics and deputy finance critics to inform them of the Bloc's positions and demands concerning the budget. But we were extremely disappointed to discover that the budget presented by the Minister of Finance did not contain a single measure that would truly address the demands of the Bloc Québécois and, in particular, of the people of Quebec. The Bloc Québécois members in the House of Commons represent the majority of ridings in Quebec. The Quebec nation and the people of Quebec expected much more from a federal budget.

I will remind members of the conditions we set for supporting this budget. We called for direct and immediate assistance for the manufacturing and forestry sectors. I will go into a bit more detail later, but there was nothing of note in this budget for these sectors. The budget does not offer adequate and fair assistance for the workers and communities affected by the crisis in the manufacturing and forestry sectors. It does not provide for any measures to reimburse the seniors who were swindled out of the guaranteed income supplement. The Conservatives made a promise about this during the last election campaign—yet another promise that was not kept. The Conservative government keeps breaking promises from one session to the next. It continues to take a polluter-paid approach, instead of adopting a polluter-pay approach. It refuses to do a 180-degree turn on the environment. The environment is very important to Quebeckers.

Once again, there is nothing in this budget to address that. It does not provide for any major investment in culture, nor does it do anything about the ideological cuts already announced by the Conservative government. Worse yet, it reiterates the government's plan to set up a single securities commission, an idea that has met with strong opposition in Quebec. Hardly anyone supports the idea of setting up a single securities commission. It is clear that the Minister of Finance and the Conservative government have chosen to give market forces free rein even though market forces are working against people in Quebec.

With their laissez-faire policy, the Conservative government and the Minister of Finance have slashed funding for many programs, suspended others, and encouraged cheap imports by leaving loopholes in trade laws and not acting on the recommendations of the trade tribunal. Everyone is talking about globalization nowadays, and this House's failure to do anything has given competitors the window they need to gain strength.

Quebec's economy is becoming less and less competitive, and job losses are piling up. There is nothing in this budget to help Quebec. That is clear. For example, Quebec's manufacturing sector, which used to be one of the province's strengths, has been turning into one of its weaknesses since early 2003. In Quebec, 148,000 jobs have been lost, 35,000 of those in 2006 and 43,000 in 2007. Some 78,000 jobs have been lost since the Conservatives came to power. That is significant. Those 78,000 jobs were lost in Quebec's manufacturing sector, one of our key sectors. The budget offers nothing at all to support this sector.

Rather than do something to alleviate the crisis, the Conservatives are making it worse with their laissez-faire approach. All they have done is lower corporate taxes. Cutting corporate taxes for companies that do not pay taxes because they do not make a profit is meaningless. That is the truth.

Overall, in 2007, businesses in Quebec did not turn a profit, so the tax cuts do not apply. One of these days, the minister is going to have to admit that these corporate tax cuts have not put an end to the devastation in the manufacturing and forestry sectors. At the same time, these cuts have enabled the oil companies to save millions of dollars.

A major share of the $14.1 billion in tax cuts the Conservative government announced in its economic statement last fall will go to the oil companies. Once again, by not taking action or by bringing in measures designed solely to reduce corporate taxes, the government is not helping a truly fragile sector in Quebec.

The banks are another sector that has received generous treatment from the Conservative government in this budget. While the oil industry in western Canada is rolling in dough, the manufacturing industry in Quebec is going through a serious crisis. High-quality, well-paying jobs with attractive benefits that created wealth in the manufacturing sector are being lost in favour of unstable retail jobs and self-employment in Quebec and Ontario.

According to the TD Bank, laid-off manufacturing workers will lose an average of $10,000 of income annually if they take jobs in the service sector.

I can give a striking example. In my riding, in Shawinigan, the Belgo pulp and paper plant, which employed 550 well-paid workers, closed last fall with almost no notice. The company closed a plant that paid very good wages. I am convinced that the Toronto Dominion Bank's statistics are accurate for the workers who found other work. They found new jobs, but at much lower pay.

The region's whole economy is suffering, and the same scenario is being played out all through Quebec. Well-paying jobs are being replaced by jobs in the service sector that often pay minimum wage or very low wages.

Meanwhile, after bringing down a budget that does nothing to help industries in trouble, the Conservative government is telling us that jobs are being created. But these are poor-quality jobs that pay much less, with the result that Quebec is becoming poorer.

The minister must stop spouting his Conservative propaganda and admit that the employment shift from the manufacturing sector to the service sector, to retail for example, has cost Canadian families more than $1 billion in revenue in 2007. That is a lot of money.

In addition to the strong Canadian dollar, which is bringing down the Quebec manufacturing sector, the financial crisis affecting the global economy will reduce Quebec manufacturing exports, thereby exacerbating the crisis they are already facing. The proof is in the numbers.

In the first three months of 2008, Quebec exports fell by 6% compared to the same quarter last year. Statistics therefore clearly show that the manufacturing sector is really suffering.

This Minister of Finance, who advocates economic Darwinism, says again and again that his government did what was needed by lowering corporate taxes. This drop in Quebec exports means lower profits and lower taxes, but lower taxes do not help a business that is not making any profits.

As I was saying earlier, the Conservative government's economic laissez-faire approach with this budget does nothing to help businesses that are not turning a profit—and that is generally the case in Quebec at this time. We definitely do not see how anyone could support this budget.

Yet the minister had the means to do something. Instead he chose to let things take their course, once again. Instead of allocating $10.2 billion to pay down the debt, the Minister of Finance could have put forward direct assistance measures to help the manufacturing and forestry sectors survive the crisis. This was a true error in judgment. Good judgment seems to be quite rare in this government.

The manufacturing sector needs a boost from the government in order to overcome the extremely rapid rise in the value of the Canadian petrodollar. The Canadian dollar is currently at par with the American dollar.

It is no coincidence that it has reached that level. It is in fact because of overproduction, the production of oil and the extremely generous help the Conservative government is giving that industry. That is what is behind the rising dollar, but, in the meantime, the adverse effect of all this is that the manufacturing industry in Quebec is suffering. The industry has a much harder time being competitive when our dollar is on par with the U.S. dollar and it is therefore less able to face international competition. Again, the government helps the oil industry, which harms the manufacturing industry in Quebec. What is more, the government is not doing anything in particular to help that industry.

The federal government, through the Minister of Finance, preferred to lower taxes rather than to help businesses make the necessary investments. For a long time now, we have been calling on the government to help by providing loan guarantees or doing something to support businesses, whether through subsidies or loan guarantees, in order to help them become competitive. The Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology had listed the conditions that would enable the manufacturing industry to survive, but the Minister of Finance ignored them all.

The Conservative government continues to allow the oil companies to benefit from major tax breaks through accelerated capital cost allowance. The minister said they would gradually abolish that measure. He gave himself until 2012 or 2013. If nothing is done for Quebec by then, what will remain of its manufacturing and forestry industries?

The minister has to take his blinders off and acknowledge that instead of adopting this laissez-faire attitude and focusing on the debt, he could have taken $3 billion or, at most, $4 billion out of the $10.2 billion to truly help the manufacturing industry. The hon. member who spoke before me said that when we are on the brink of bankruptcy, it is time to take action. When the roof is leaking, it is time to plug the holes. That is what the Conservative government is refusing to do.

Currently in Quebec, I cannot say that the roof is leaking, but it does not look good. It needs good support for some renewed vigour. This laissez-faire attitude and focus on the debt used by a government full of dinosaurs—those are not our words, that is what journalists called them the day after the budget was brought down—is causing the de-industrialization of Quebec and Ontario. The government could, for once and for all, adopt the real industrial revitalization strategy the Bloc Québécois has been advocating.

While the manufacturing sector is reeling from rising energy costs, oil companies reap record profits and the minister continues to subsidize them. Had he demonstrated a minimum of leadership, he would have immediately abolished the tax benefits given to oil companies and proposed real strategies to encourage research and development, particularly by introducing refundable tax credits. Will the minister wake up one day and abolish the tax incentives for oil companies and replace them with refundable research and development tax credits for the manufacturing sector?

At present, this government is a menace to the Quebec economy. By giving significant tax incentives to oil companies, failing to put in place a real plan to fight greenhouse gas emissions and introducing an equalization formula that only takes into account one half of oil and gas revenues, it has added more measures that favour the oil sector. These actions, which are irresponsible in terms of the economy and the environment, inflate Canada's petrodollar, and that, in turn, dampens the considerable efforts made by Quebec and its manufacturing sector to weather the economic disruptions affecting global markets.

Once again, could the government and its minister consider the interests of the Quebec nation rather than concentrating solely on quenching the thirst for oil of its Republican friends in the U.S. and encouraging Canada's bad environmental behaviour? It is not too late to take action. In spite of this budget—dubbed the dinosaur budget—the government could establish a plan to truly support the manufacturing sector.

The Government of Quebec has allocated $620 million—I will move on to another topic shortly—to support the manufacturing and forestry sectors, while the federal government injected $2 billion over three years for all of Canada. In light of the Government of Quebec's enormous effort, how can the federal government contribute so little?

It is very disappointing that the federal government allocated just a billion dollars over three years when it had a $10.2 billion surplus that it could have used to provide real support to the manufacturing sector.

As if that were not enough, it turns out that the $1 billion trust, which will subsidize jobs lost between 2005 and 2008, adds up to about $2,275 for each job lost in the manufacturing and forestry sectors in Quebec. In Alberta, that same amount over three years adds up to $20,000 per job lost. Clearly, that is not fair.

The government made a big show of announcing its $1 billion trust, but the trust is completely unfair to places where the manufacturing sector is really important. Alberta will get $20,000 per job lost, while Quebec will get $2,200. That is really unfair. Add to that the fact that industry is flourishing in Alberta. With an industry in such good shape, they do not need $20,000 per job lost.

How can the minister justify such an under-achieving, poorly designed plan? He has completely failed to understand the economic situation in Quebec.

I would also like to talk about another budget issue: the fiscal imbalance. The Conservatives pride themselves on having resolved the fiscal imbalance. However, the Séguin report in Quebec, which all Quebeckers agreed with, identified three major, specific deliverables with respect to resolving the fiscal imbalance.

The first was a new equalization formula that took into account total revenues of all provinces, which is not in this budget.

The report also recommended eliminating federal spending power in areas under provincial jurisdiction. We were expecting a bill during the last Speech from the Throne. Will this bill be introduced before the end of the session? This was a promise from the Conservative government. Will we see yet another promise broken? They talked about this in the House yesterday.

The federal government is having a hard time understanding real needs when it comes to its spending power. We need to talk about more than just shared-cost programs—there are none anymore—as it announced. It makes no sense. The Quebec government made it clear that it would not support the bill that we are waiting for. Will the government introduce the bill? It is important that the government keep its promises, or at least try to.

Now back to the fiscal imbalance. I was talking about the Séguin report. It also recommended replacing cash transfers with equivalent sales tax and income tax points.

If we talk about the manufacturing and forestry sectors or the fiscal imbalance—which the Conservatives committed to resolving and claim to have resolved—we are still nowhere near the point where the Conservative government has truly thought about the needs expressed by Quebec, specifically in terms of a key component of its economy, the manufacturing sector, and in terms of the fiscal imbalance, which is still far from being resolved. There is nothing about this in the budget. The Bloc Québécois will vote against the budget, that is obvious.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I enjoyed the member's speech. I will talk about two egregious errors the Conservative government has made relating to humanitarian aid.

First, as incredible as it may sound, the government has reduced the amount of money available for the prevention of polio, and this is unacceptable. If the government supports polio prevention, it can stop a child from being crippled for life for 60¢.

My second point is this. Tomorrow an important decision will be made by the Thai-Burma border commission about food in the refugee camps. There are 140,000 people at risk. They are about to go on a starvation diet. Their rations will be cut to half of what the World Health Organization says a person needs to live. Something has to be done about that.

The Conservative government has been asked numerous times to help. Only $1 million from Canada is needed and the other $6 million would come from the other donor countries in a year. The prime minister of Burma made this point to our Prime Minister when they met a few weeks ago and talked about this crisis.

Would the member support the Conservative government and help lobby it to somehow reinstate this funding? It does not necessarily have to be in this budget, if that is difficult. It can be done through the supplementary estimates. Will the government at some point reinstate money to its previous level for polio prevention for what could be a humanitarian crisis? Will the government solve the urgent crisis in the refugee camps in Thailand by adding the $1 million a year, for which all NGOs involved have asked? The prime minister of Burma, who is in exile, has also asked our Prime Minister for this money.

[Jean-Yves Laforest, Bloc, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to tell the member for Yukon that obviously, as I said earlier, the Conservative government favours one sector at the expense of many others. When it directs its encouragement only to the oil companies with its tax cuts and subsidies that are targeted to them, when it focuses its political strategies on economic development in that sector at the expense of many others, we can see that it conveniently forgets to provide adequate support for a number of sectors that should receive much more from a government that inherited a $12.5 billion surplus.

It is true that money is very poorly allocated. The government should not overlook its humanitarian aid obligations, which have been completely left out of this budget. I fully agree with the member's comments on this matter.

[Laurie Hawn, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence]

Mr. Speaker, I am an Alberta MP and I sit in the House every day. I listen to members of the opposition, particularly the Bloc, trash the oil and gas business. Frankly, it does get a little tiresome.

It is an accident of geography that Quebec has hydro power and that Alberta has oil and gas. The best thing for the Bloc is that it is allowed to stand up and be sanctimonious forever in the House.

Has the hon. member any appreciation of the number of jobs and the economic impact that the oil patch in Alberta, and now Saskatchewan, has on the prosperity of his province? Does he know the number of manufacturing jobs that have been created for Quebeckers, the amount of money that goes into social programs for Quebec and the amount of the Quebec pension plan that is invested in the oil and gas business?

I think the best thing to straighten out the attitude of the Bloc members would be if they discovered oil and gas in Quebec.

[Jean-Yves Laforest, Bloc, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to point out to the member for Edmonton Centre that when he talks about the members of the Bloc Québécois imagining things, he should remember that the members of the Bloc Québécois were elected by a very large majority in Quebec, and that democracy will require them to listen to us. Quebeckers are the ones who elected us, and they want us to make demands on their behalf.

He spoke about the many jobs that have been created in Alberta, and compared this to hydroelectricity. Earlier I spoke about the issue of equalization; the government only includes 50% of revenues from natural resources in the equalization calculation, even though we know that some calculations in Quebec take into account all the revenue from hydroelectricity, a sector that has never received assistance from the federal government.

We do not need lectures from anyone on this subject, especially not from the Conservatives.

[Peter Julian, NDP, Burnaby—New Westminster, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I was very pleased to hear my Bloc Québécois colleague's presentation. Everyone knows that the Bloc Québécois supported the Conservative Party on the last two budgets. This time, Bloc members will follow the NDP's lead, which we very much appreciate.

My colleague talked about all the economic consequences for Quebec. Let us have another look at the softwood lumber agreement. The Bloc Québécois supported it and that led to the haemorrhaging of jobs in Quebec, including Mauricie, Abitibi and Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean. Thousands and thousands of jobs were lost because the Bloc supported the Conservative Party, as did the Liberal Party, on the softwood lumber agreement, which basically auctioned off Quebec's softwood lumber industry.

I would therefore like to ask the hon. member if he regrets the fact that the Bloc Québécois supported the softwood lumber agreement, which led to such massive job losses in Quebec.

[Jean-Yves Laforest, Bloc, Saint-Maurice—Champlain, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have two things to say to the NDP member.

First, I would like to address his comments regarding the Bloc having supported two budgets. I would remind him that the NDP also supported the first budget. Liberal and NDP members remained seated during the vote and, oddly enough, both said they forgot and had not realized their mistake. Even if it was a mistake, they must accept it and admit that they nonetheless supported the budget. Those are the facts.

Second, I have no regrets about the Bloc Québécois supporting the softwood lumber agreement. I personally consulted the numerous businesses and mills in my riding of Saint-Maurice—Champlain, which employ many workers. I toured my riding before votes were held on the agreement. I visited the majority of businesses and workers and most of them told me that there was no choice, that they were at the end of their rope.

I agree with my colleague that the agreement was not perfect. However, in the end, we had to sign because people could no longer survive.

Had the government, whether Liberal or Conservative, provided loans and loan guarantees to companies before then, they could have coped with the serious problem. However, they were on their last legs and could no longer survive.

We listened to Quebeckers, supported the agreement and have no regrets.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to have this opportunity to speak in the third reading debate on Bill C-50, the budget implementation act.

It is not without some disappointment that I rise this morning to speak in this debate, largely because of what happened last night at the report stage votes on Bill C-50.

Last night we had the opportunity to show our displeasure with two key components of this legislation, the changes that it would impose on employment insurance and the immigration measures that are included in the bill.

Last night we were voting on two series of amendments that the NDP strongly supported. I know the Bloc also supported them; in fact, they proposed some of the amendments that we voted on, and the NDP proposed the other set. The amendments would have made significant changes to the legislation that we are debating this morning. They would have deleted the problematic sections pertaining to immigration in this legislation. They would have changed the provisions dealing with employment insurance in this legislation.

Unfortunately, we were robbed of that opportunity by the Liberal Party. Twelve members of the Liberal Party voted against the legislation last night, despite their protestations that they strongly oppose these provisions and that they are speaking up for Canadians who are concerned about immigration policy. Unfortunately, that was not enough to affect the outcome of the vote last night.

It is actually shocking that despite their protestations, the Liberals find it difficult to come to this place and express the opinion that they expressed to Canadians across this country and instead say, “Trust us. We will change it when we come to power”. We do not know when that is going to happen.

The reality is that last night was the opportunity for the official opposition, the Liberal Party, to exercise the power that it does command in this Parliament and to see that the legislation was changed, to see that the problems were fixed, to see the Liberals standing up to speak for those Canadians who are concerned about the changes to immigration, for instance, in this legislation. Instead, they chose not to do that. I think that is a very serious problem.

I do not think there is anything more important that I do in this place than rise in my place and vote on important legislation that is before the House. I take that moment very seriously. I wish more members of the Liberal Party would take that moment seriously. We have that opportunity in this minority Parliament. It is important that when we say we are going to seek changes, as the Liberal Party did, when we see problems with legislation that we exercise the power we have in this place, but that is not what is happening.

Sadly, the bill is at third reading now and we are debating the bill that the Conservatives proposed. We are debating again the immigration and EI measures that are so problematic and so significant, that imply such significant changes, and which we really do need to address.

I thought it was ironic this morning in debate that a Liberal member said that we could not trust the Conservatives to exercise the discretionary authority around immigration that is in this legislation, that we could not trust them to have that kind of discretionary power, and at the same time said that Canadians should trust the Liberals some point down the road to fix the legislation.

The opportunity is here now. The opportunity was here last night to make those changes. Clearly, Canadians cannot trust the Liberals to put their votes where their mouths are on this immigration issue in particular. That opportunity was lost last night. It is very serious. I think many Canadians will have something to say to Liberal members of Parliament about that.

With regard to the bill before us, one of the significant changes that is in this legislation is regarding the operation of the EI fund.

We have heard very strong language used, particularly from this corner of the House, about the implication of the changes in this legislation. Some members have said that there is a theft under way, that money is being stolen from workers and employers in Canada as a result of this legislation. I have to agree with members who use that strong language, because it is a very serious proposition that we are debating in this legislation.

In recent years there has been an accumulation of a $54.1 billion surplus in what is taken in in EI premiums over what is spent on EI payments and on training programs related to EI. That is money that has been collected in good faith from Canadian workers and from Canadian employers to run the employment insurance program.

The legislation is proposing that a new Canada employment insurance financing board be established. The board's job will be to set rates and cover payments for employment insurance. There is a significant change in all of this because the operation of the board will be more related to general economic trends rather than the needs of individual workers, which is the current bias of the operation of the EI program. That is a significant change.

The other significant problem with what is being proposed is that the reserve fund that is being established to cover changes in the economic climate and a rising unemployment rate will only be $2 billion. That is the reserve fund that is being established as a result of this legislation.

We know flatly that is just not enough. We have strong supporters in that opinion. The Auditor General has been very clear in saying that $10 billion to $15 billion at a minimum is necessary to ensure that any economic downturn can be accommodated by the EI fund. The former chief actuary of Canada has said that $15 billion is necessary to accomplish the same thing. Yet the proposal that we have before us only sets aside $2 billion.

When there was $54 billion collected from workers and employers over the years and we are only setting aside $2 billion, what is happening with that other $52 billion? That is a serious problem.That is why some members have been led to call this a significant theft and claim that that money is being stolen from workers and employers in Canada.

Rather than propose this kind of measure, there was a time when the Conservatives were in opposition when they actually proposed that the $54 billion should be repaid to the EI fund recognizing that this was money collected from workers and employers in Canada. Sadly, they have lost that impetus to do the right thing, to do justice to workers and employers in Canada to ensure that that money was used for the purposes for which it was collected. They have done a complete about face and are now willing to write off that $52 billion completely, and in doing so, make a very inadequate accommodation for the possibility of an economic downturn.

I think all of us are nervous about that right now. The Conservatives talk about people who are preaching doom and gloom. I do not think any of us want to preach doom and gloom, but I think all of us want to be aware of the signals that are out there. There are many people who are concerned about the possibility of recession and the possibility of an economic downturn.

Without a strong EI program we know that is going to make any downturn more problematic for Canadians. Many of us believe that the EI program that exists today is a mere shadow of what it once was. Many Canadian workers are finding it difficult when they are laid off to get by without the kind of EI program that we have had in the past.

The news today from Oshawa, the city where I was born and in which I grew up, is not good. The truck plant is being shut down and a thousand more auto workers are going to be out of a job. That is a very significant development. It is a real depletion of the operations of General Motors in Canada. It is a significant blow to Canadian workers, losing a thousand more well-paying manufacturing auto industry jobs, jobs that have great benefits, that have pensions attached to them. The shortcomings of the EI program are going to make it more difficult for workers in places like Oshawa who are losing their jobs today and in the coming months. It is a very serious problem. We should be using that $52 billion to ensure there are programs to assist workers as job losses happen and assist them with job retraining. That is not what is going on. That is not the direction the Conservatives are choosing.

If there is a reason to not support Bill C-50, that is one excellent reason. I put it to the member for Oshawa and the member for Whitby—Oshawa, who proposed this legislation, that I do not know how they could turn their backs on their constituents at this terrible time in their community. I do not know how they could not be taking every measure possible to ensure that programs are in place to assist them as these very difficult closures happen.

It is not just in the auto sector that this is happening. It is happening in the forestry sector in British Columbia.

We have seen many communities in British Columbia dramatically affected by the loss of forestry jobs, such as the community of Mackenzie, for instance, and many other communities in the interior of British Columbia, as well as communities on Vancouver Island and even communities on the lower mainland, where mills have closed. They all have seen the difficulties associated with the changes in the forestry industry, yet there has been precious little assistance from the government.

The EI fund is of less assistance than it might have been at one time because of the changes that have been introduced to it. That is a significant issue in British Columbia.

We know about the ongoing litany of hundreds of thousands of manufacturing jobs that have been lost in recent years in Canada. Those jobs are gone. Gone with them are the high wage rates, the benefits and the pension plans.

The government says constantly that it has created many other jobs. We know that those jobs that have been created have been largely service jobs. They are largely minimum wage jobs or pay slightly above minimum wage. They do not have the same kinds of benefits. They do not have pensions associated with them.

There can be no substitution of those kinds of jobs with the kinds of jobs we are losing all across this country, the jobs that pay great wages and have excellent benefits and pensions associated with them. It is a very serious problem.

Our EI critic, the member for Acadie—Bathurst, has often described the situation of eligibility for employment insurance today. Only 32% of women workers are eligible and only 38% of male workers are eligible. Hundreds of thousands of Canadian workers are ineligible for EI benefits. These are people who are out there working in the economy and yet do not qualify for EI.

As well, any time there is the possibility of a downturn in the economy, localized or national, provincial or regional, we know how important having a strong EI program has proven to be over many years and decades in Canada. Sadly, we do not have the same commitment to that program today. This legislation is not going to help that at all.

We also know that when we are trying to address poverty issues in Canada, family poverty and child poverty, EI is a crucial piece of the grouping of policies and programs we need to see a decline in poverty in Canada. Sadly, when we do not treat EI with the kind of respect it deserves as a program central to that effort, it is actually an outrage. It is an outrage that we would not give it that place of importance in all of this.

This legislation also includes the controversial amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that would give the minister, among other things, greater discretion in whether or not to accept immigration applications. There is a problem with the fact that this is here in the first place.

This change should not have been included in the budget implementation act. It is a serious change to immigration law in Canada. It should have been on its own. It should have been stand-alone legislation so that it could have had the direct attention it deserves because of the significance of the change it implies.

It should not have been buried in a budget implementation bill. I hope the Conservatives will reconsider that kind of tactic in future when they are bringing forward other legislation. It is not appropriate to bury something on a completely different topic in this kind of legislation.

This change the Conservatives are proposing is very important to people in my riding. I have a significant new Canadian and immigrant population in my constituency. Any change to immigration law is keenly watched in my constituency.

Giving these kinds of discretionary powers to the minister is inappropriate. We should not be giving the minister this kind of discretionary ability to ignore applications.

We fought long and hard to ensure that any immigration application submitted was considered. That change was a major victory for people who care about the exercise of immigration policy in Canada.

This legislation would undo that. Again, if there is a reason for not supporting this legislation, that is it. This turns back the clock on important gains that have been made in the past with regard to immigration policy and the immigration application process in Canada.

The reality is that this change is promoted as a way of dealing with the immigration backlog, which is at about 900,000 applications or more right now. This will not do anything to address the backlog because it does not apply to most of the applications in the backlog. It does not really do what it is being sold as attempting to do.

I think it is a bit of false advertising on the part of the Conservative government to say this measure is somehow going to improve the backlog, because it will not. It will not even really touch it. We need greater processing capacity to deal with the backlog. This bill does nothing to address that.

There are a lot of problems with where the Conservatives are going on immigration and this bill highlights all of those problems. The new emphasis on temporary foreign workers is a huge change in Canadian immigration policy. In the past, we have encouraged people needed in our economy to come here as permanent residents. We have put them on the track to becoming full citizens of Canada.

European countries, for instance, have relied on a guest worker policy. We have never gone in that direction. When we see some of the social problems that have occurred in Europe as a result of that kind of guest worker or temporary foreign worker policy, we are lucky that Canada has not gone in that direction.

However, that is where the Conservatives are going now. In fact, they are reducing the number of places in the overall immigration target available to economic immigrants for family reunification in favour of temporary foreign workers and students. They are encouraging them to apply for permanent residence instead.

That is not going to help the backlog either. We are not going to alleviate that backlog if we keep taking away places that could be considered for family applications in the system.

It is a real problem because family reunification has been one of the strong points of our immigration program. It has been one of the successful points of our immigration program. One of the reasons people have chosen to emigrate to Canada over other countries is that the possibility of having family members join them here was held out as a significant promise to them when they came to Canada.

We let that program wither at our peril, I believe, because in a world that is increasingly competitive with regard to immigrants, we cannot afford to give up any of the competitive edges that we hold over other countries when it comes to attracting immigrants.

I believe the government is bent on reducing the emphasis on family reunification. The first time the former minister of citizenship and immigration appeared at the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, he left reunification out of the list of reasons why we have an immigration policy in Canada.

He talked about the economic needs of Canada, nation building and protecting vulnerable refugees, but he did not mention family reunification. It is significant when a minister fails to list one of the key objectives of Canada's immigration program over many decades. That was a significant indicator.

If people go to the immigration website, as I did a little while back, it is hard to find in any of the general descriptions of Canada's immigration policy a reference to family reunification. It has dropped off the opening pages of the website. Again, it is a very serious downgrading of the position of family reunification in Canada. The changes proposed in this bill will only feed into that.

I could have talked about some of the things that this bill does not address and should have. It does not talk about any new program for housing in Canada. We know that is a significant problem all across this country. Affordable housing and homelessness are very serious issues that Canadians want addressed and they are not in this bill.

I could have talked about how the Conservative government, with this legislation, is lowering overall corporate tax rates but raising overall individual corporate tax rates. That is inappropriate as well.

I could have talked about the loss of income that Canadians have suffered since 1989 and how these budget measures do nothing to address that. It is only the very wealthy who are doing better in this time period. Everyone else is taking a hit, particularly those at the low end of the income scale.

I could have talked about gutting the fiscal capacity of government by over $200 billion, which the government is in the process of doing.

I could have talked about the funding cuts to the important programs that would have addressed some of the important social needs of Canadians. Those programs would make it possible for Canadians to collectively address some of the social problems that exist in this country.

There are a lot of problems with this legislation. We in this corner will be voting against this legislation once again. We will stand in our places to do that and to keep our promises to Canadians on what we think about this legislation.

[Dean Del Mastro, Conservative, Peterborough, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to address the member's comments. I do not agree with a lot of what the hon. member had to say, but I do respect the fact that he stands and votes in the House and makes sure that he represents his constituents.

In May 2008, BMO Capital Markets economist Doug Porter produced a paper on 10 reasons to “feel good” about the Canadian economy. I would like to quote a bit of what he said. He ticked off our low inflation rate, rising real incomes, healthy government surpluses, record high employment rates, record car sales, a strong TSX and rising trade surpluses as positive economic benchmarks.

He said:

The glass is much more than half full in Canada. So instead of obsessing about a temporary bout of cyclical weakness, driven entirely by our largest trading partner, Canadians should instead be embracing the world of [economic] opportunities that still await.

This is the economic reality. We understand the Liberal spin on the economy right now and why the Liberals feel that way, but the member did cite something.

The member talked about low income Canadians and Canadians who are struggling to pay their bills. I would love to ask the member a specific question about the Liberal carbon tax plan, which we have heard the Liberals muse about. I know the NDP does not agree with this because those members know how much it would hurt low income Canadians, families and seniors relying on fixed incomes, and I would love to hear the member's comments on it.

I also wonder if he would like to talk about his disappointment with Liberal members who claim to disagree with the government but do not show up and vote.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the member quoted an expert who said incomes were rising in Canada. I beg to differ. A lot of research shows exactly the opposite. In fact, my colleague from Burnaby—New Westminster has been a long-time spokesperson for the analysis of that trend, which is directly opposite to what the member for Peterborough talked about.

I want to quote what the member for Burnaby—New Westminster said yesterday here in the House in describing the situation:

When we talk about middle class families earning between $40,000 and $60,000 a year, they have lost a week's income each year and every year since 1989. Lower middle class families earning between $20,000 and $40,000 a year have lost two weeks of income....

The poorest of Canadians, including unemployed Canadians, have seen a devastating fall in income [over that period]. They have lost a month and a half of income since 1989 for each and every year. We are talking about a catastrophic fall in income....

There is ample evidence from Statistics Canada and other organizations to show that incomes are falling for over two-thirds of Canadians and that it is only the very wealthy who are doing better in this time period. The legislation that we are debating today and the policies of the Conservative government do nothing to reset that balance and ensure a fairer distribution of income in Canada.

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the preamble to Bill C-50 states that “the Government of Canada is committed to meeting the challenge of global economic uncertainty” and so on. I would like to ask my friend whether he was surprised that this document makes no mention of regional economic uncertainty. I am talking about the whole country, but my friend will understand that one sector in my riding is particularly affected, and that is the forestry sector.

As we have seen, the trust did not meet the needs of foresters in crisis, who are self-employed workers who own private woodlots and manage our forests, the lungs of our planet. I imagine that there are also such forestry workers in the province of the hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas. Yet they have been completely left out of the budget.

Why does this bill contain nothing for this sector of Canada's and Quebec's economy?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the question from the hon. member because she has raised a very important point. I did speak about the importance of the forestry sector in my area and in British Columbia, and the number of communities that are suffering under the terrible demise of the forestry industry in British Columbia.

We have seen precious little assistance and in fact we have seen the opposite of that. We have seen the sellout of the softwood lumber industry by the policies of the government in recent years. We have seen little assistance to communities that are struggling with the decline in the forestry industry in British Columbia, so I am not surprised that the same thing is happening in her community and in regions in Quebec.

It is a very serious problem and these kinds of economic uncertainties are not a priority. The Conservatives are not doing the kind of regional development that is necessary. They are not addressing the specific problems that are facing the forestry industry. They have not had a good plan to deal with the pine beetle in British Columbia nor have they stopped the export of raw logs, and have not ensured that there is secondary production in Canada. They are not ensuring that the EI program meets the needs of people in the regions.

The calculations for the EI rates, the number of weeks for which workers are eligible, do not correspond to the areas of need in many of our communities and many of our regions, and in fact lump people in with other areas of higher employment and therefore limit their benefits. I have often heard the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan talk about how that affects forestry workers in her riding. They are seeing the end of their EI benefits far sooner than they ever expected given those kinds of changes and the inability of the current EI program to respond to the needs of those communities and workers.

It is a serious problem across the country and we are not getting that kind of leadership from this government.

[Nathan Cullen, NDP, Skeena—Bulkley Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to pick up on my colleague's excellent point about the employment insurance program. The reason I emphasize the word “insurance” is that it is meant to be a program which establishes some sort of back up, some sort of insurance policy for workers and businesses.

The idea is that, at its foundation, businesses and people working for those businesses contribute to an insurance fund. Why would anyone take out insurance under any type of notion or policy other than to provide assistance in time of need?

The forestry sector, in particular, but there are others, manufacturing sector across Canada in Quebec and Ontario and other places, is in need of assistance right now. Everyone, from I think all four corners of the House, has recognized time and again that the EI program needed fixing. There were problems with it.

Rather than actually fix it, what has the government done? It has gone in the opposite direction taking more than $50 billion out of the program that was intended for insurance, that was put aside for insurance, and the government in this bill is crafting a law to rob that money from the workers and employers who put the money in, in the first place.

It would be like a family taking out a certain level of home insurance, $1,000 let us say, and the government fixing the law and saying that it would pay $100 of the actual insurance and the other $900 the government would take away for other purposes.

I would ask my hon. colleague, when workers, communities and employers look for this assistance, what type of response are they going to get from the government? What kind of answer are those families and workers going to get from this government?

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I think the legislation provides part of that answer. They are not going to get any of that kind of assistance. The government is not going to make sure that the program even has the capacity to offer that kind of assistance if there is even a further downturn in the economy in Canada.

The program, we all know, is a shadow of its former self. This is not just this government that has been doing that. The Liberals loved to play fancy, fast and free with the unemployment insurance program. They started us down this road during the time that they were in power. In fact, back in the 1970s there was a crisis in the Trudeau government when a minister resigned over the first attempt to gut the unemployment insurance program at that time.

Many Canadians saw that the Liberals could not be trusted either at that time to ensure that there was a program there that was really going to provide workers and communities with the kind of assistance that was needed in the time of an economic downturn and in time of unemployment.

The program is a former shadow of itself and I do not think that the language that we use is strong enough or could be strong enough. Words like “stealing” from workers and “theft” have all be used in this debate and I think they are entirely appropriately used in this debate because $52 billion has been taken from workers and employers in Canada, money that should have been used to ensure their economic security, to ensure their training, and it is gone.

[Gerald Keddy, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency and to the Minister of International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, this budget debate has gone on long enough. The NDP members continue to rail against it. We are delaying $1.5 billion in spending that is in jeopardy and that Canadians are waiting for. They continue to delay, to confuse, to obfuscate, and to live in a land of make-believe. It is unacceptable.

Therefore, I move:

That this question be now put.

[Larry Bagnell, Liberal, Yukon, YT]

Mr. Speaker, I would just like to ask the member the same question I asked the Bloc. There are two crises pending related to financial affairs.

One is on polio. The government has reduced the money for polio. We are talking about very small amounts of money. It is actually shocking that 10% of Canadians are not vaccinated, and for only 60¢ we could stop a child overseas from being in a wheelchair for the rest of his or her life, or in poor countries even crawling if they do not have wheelchairs.

Therefore, I would ask if the member would join me in lobbying the government to reinstate the money for fighting polio, in some form. Maybe it would not be in this budget. There are different ways of doing it. It is such a small amount of money, it could be done in supplementaries.

The second thing is that tomorrow, the Thailand Burma Border Consortium has to make a decision on the fact that rice has increased three times in cost and 140,000 people in refugee camps in Burma are going to have their rations cut in half of what they need to survive. The six types of food they get now will be cut to just simply rice and salt, and they will get half enough rice in a day to live.

I am just wondering if he could also help me encourage the CIDA minister to provide an additional $1 million a year from Canada. Canada has been funding this for 10 years already, but we would need to add $1 million. There is another $6 million shortfall but the other donor countries would follow suit, I am sure, if Canada led.

I am hoping the member would join me in lobbying the government for these small amounts of money, one way or another, whether it is in the budget or some other form, to solve these humanitarian crises that have arisen.