Debates of Jan. 28th, 2009

Securities

[Denis Coderre, Liberal, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Quebec, Alberta and Manitoba are against the centralization of securities commissions. He is well aware that the term “voluntary” is a smoke screen.

If the Conservatives claim to respect federal-provincial jurisdictions, why not drop the bill and focus on the real, urgent needs of Canadians?

[Christian Paradis, Conservative, Minister of Public Works and Government Services]

Mr. Speaker, we are facing an economic crisis that is affecting the whole world. This is an international movement and now the federal government is taking a leadership role. But the reality is that if the provinces do not want to be part of it, it is on a voluntary basis.

The Budget

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Quebec is the big loser in this budget. The Prime Minister has totally ignored the needs of Quebec by turning his back on a unanimous motion by the National Assembly setting out the key demands of Quebec. Instead of helping Quebec, the Prime Minister has decided to deprive it of some major means of helping it cope with the crisis.

Will the Prime Minister admit that he preferred, for purely political reasons, to respond only to the demands of Ontario and the West and ignore those of Quebec?

[Stephen Harper, Conservative, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I have heard from a number of groups in Quebec who support measures contained in this budget, for example the Quebec manufacturers and exporters association, the Federation of Canadian municipalities and its head, the mayor of Sherbrooke, the Union des municipalités du Québec, the Coalition pour le renouvellement des infrastructures du Québec, the mayor of Laval, the president of the Fédération des chambres de commerce du Québec, the Fédération québécoise des municipalités, the Montreal chamber of commerce, the Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universités du Québec and the Conseil du patronat du Québec.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, in this budget, the automotive sector, in large part concentrated in Ontario, will be receiving $2.7 billion, while the Quebec manufacturing and forestry industries will receive but a few million. The same goes for the community adjustment fund: Alberta will get more per capita than Quebec, yet Quebec is the heaviest hit by the forestry crisis.

Will the Prime Minister admit that his budget does everything but meet the priorities of Quebec?

[Stephen Harper, Conservative, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, on the contrary, this budget meets needs from one end of the country to the other. Many interest groups in Quebec recognize this and I encourage the leader of the Bloc to heed those Quebeckers.

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

Mr. Speaker, the unilateral and authoritarian decision to change the equalization formula will cost Quebec $1 billion this year and up to $2 billion next year for health and education. Quebec's minister of finance says that Quebec's loss will be Ontario's gain.

Why has the Minister of Finance, in his budget, reneged on the Prime Minister's commitment to Premier Charest made in a letter dated March 19, 2007?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, despite the comments from my opposition colleague, Quebec's equalization and transfers are at all-time highs and growing. That is a fact opposition members seem to neglect when they talk about how Quebec was left out. In fact, this government treats all provinces equally. When we are putting stimulus into this country, it is shared across this country. We are concerned about jobs and people's livelihoods across this country.

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

Mr. Speaker, the majority of programs announced do not take into account the real needs of the regions; for example, Alberta will receive more support than it needs but Quebec will be deprived of substantial funding to deal with the crisis.

Does that not prove once more that the federal government, regardless of its stripe, defends only the interests of the Canadian nation to the detriment of Quebec?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, Quebec's support through equalization and transfers has increased 37% during our government, as a matter of fact, $8.3 billion in equalization, which is a 70% increase over three years ago. We are not leaving out any sector of this country.

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative budget, supported by the Liberal Party, cuts the taxes of the biggest profitable businesses by $60 for every dollar in tax cuts for unemployed workers.

In the past two months, 100,000 jobs have been lost in Canada. And yet, there is nothing in the budget to help more people who are not eligible for employment insurance. There is no help for the most vulnerable. Even worse, they are attacking women's rights and pay equity.

What will the Prime Minister say to all those people he has abandoned?

[Stephen Harper, Conservative, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, this budget increases employment insurance benefits and training funds for workers and the unemployed. With regard to pay equity, we have adopted the approach used by Manitoba's NDP government.

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the government is so out of touch that it brings forward a budget that does not protect the vulnerable, it does not protect the jobs of today, and it does not create the green job future that we need for the next century of employment. While the budget continues its attacks on women, it does not do anything to build social housing for families. It does not do anything about access to education or health care. The fact is it is a failure. After 100,000 jobs having been lost in the past two months, not one additional worker is going to receive help as a result of the budget.

How much further behind are people going to fall?

[Stephen Harper, Conservative, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, if the leader of the NDP would read the budget, he would see that there is substantial help for workers, for the unemployed and for the vulnerable. There is lots of money for social housing, to help stimulate our construction economy and in fact for every one of the causes he has named.

The difficulty is the leader of the NDP chose to oppose the budget before he read it. He should read it and he should help us pass it.

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the fact is the budget has done nothing to repair the litany of broken promises that we have had from the government.

It gets to the point of being tragic that the Prime Minister will make promises that he has no intention of keeping. The worst example of the cold and heartless nature of the Prime Minister's policies is when he breaks his word to those who are most vulnerable, like when he promised to increase the benefits to veterans' widows and then he broke that promise.

Can the Prime Minister tell us which of the promises that he made in yesterday's budget to people like widows who deserve some additional help he plans on breaking in the months to come?

[Stephen Harper, Conservative, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker the veterans independence program amendments were made a couple of budgets ago. I do not know how the leader of the NDP managed to miss that, but I guess he voted against it.

It is quite interesting to hear the leader of the NDP say that he is now against tax reductions for Canadian businesses. He said that in the campaign, but I remember a month ago he was all prepared to support those.

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

Mr. Speaker, the government is finally admitting that there will be a $34 billion deficit next year. Of this amount, only $18 billion will fund stimulus measures. The remainder, more than $15 billion, is the result of the Conservatives' recklessness when the economy was strong.

Will the government finally admit today that it has created Canada's first deficit in more than 10 years?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, it would take an Ottawa Liberal to suggest that paying down debt is foolish. That is not what we believe on this side of the House. That is why we took early action and we paid down $37 billion in debt. That is the reason Canada is in the good fiscal position that it is in going into this global economic recession. We are better able to fight it. We are better able to adapt to what Canadians need. We will come out of this even stronger.

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

Mr. Speaker, it is as if the fact that the government's GST cut cost almost the same as this $15 billion deficit is a pure coincidence. Is that what the member is trying to say?

The budget includes $10 billion in revenue for the sale of government assets even though not one such asset has yet been sold. There is an accounting term for this. It is called cooking the books to hide an even bigger deficit.

Will the parliamentary secretary at least table a list of the assets that he plans to sell?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, if it is indeed called cooking the books, then I guess we got a cooking lesson from the Liberals because, as a matter of fact, when Petro-Canada was put on the books, it was a Liberal government that actually booked $2 billion in asset sales in the budget prior to that.

I might suggest that when one knows a company is for sale and one knows the value of it, that is cooking the books.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, not only is it bad economics for the finance minister to sell assets in today's buyers' market, it is bad accounting to count revenues before a sale is made. Just a few weeks ago, the finance minister told a reporter that it was “wishful thinking” when the Ernie Eves government booked revenues before an asset sale occurred. Why is he now playing the same game here in Ottawa in padding Canada's books that he knew was the wrong thing to do when he was in Ontario's government?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, I guess the hon. member did not hear the answer to the previous question. The Liberals obviously did not pay attention. They do not look back in history to see what is the Liberal tradition, and that is, booking what is likely to be an asset sale.

There is no time set on this. The Government of Canada owns a tremendous amount of assets. For the first time in 15 years we are actually looking at the value of those assets and looking at whether the Government of Canada should still own them. This is in line with our expenditure management review that is dealing with taxpayers' dollars.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary is obviously not listening to the words of his own minister who said it is not just wishful thinking, but he told the reporter:

You can do that if you have process in place to sell the assets, but there was no process in place. So I knew that, within a fiscal year, they couldn't get it done.

Why is the Minister of Finance booking $2 billion in revenue for the next fiscal year from these phoney asset sales when in fact the minister not only has no process in place, he does not even have a list of assets he wants to sell?

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, we will take no lessons from the former Liberal government on dealing with fiscal stimulus, dealing with the economy.

We are actually hoping that the Liberals will support this budget. This is a budget that deals with a very serious economic crisis that has been brought on this country not by anything that is attributed to Canada.

We would encourage all members of this House to look very seriously at what we are dealing with right now, and that is our new plan to get Canada back on track.

Employment Insurance

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

Mr. Speaker, this government just missed an opportunity to improve the employment insurance system by relaxing the eligibility criteria and eliminating the waiting period. Even with an extra five weeks of benefits, the fact is that 53% of people who lose their jobs do not have access to benefits. Freezing contributions is certainly not the way to improve the system.

Does the Minister of Finance realize that by refusing to improve employment insurance, he is penalizing thousands of unemployed workers and their regions as well, at a time of crisis?