Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to see you in the chair again today. I am happy to be able to add my comments on our opposition day motion today and to voice my concerns about the whole issue of the G8 and the G20.
I have been in the House for more than a decade. It sounds like an awfully long time, yet it does not feel quite that long. In that period of time I have taken part in a variety of debates on nearly every topic of public interest, including crime prevention, the environment, health care, day care, early learning, and of course, something that is very important to me, the cities agenda.
I have worked hard to make certain that the views of the people of York West are front and centre on the national stage.
I believe that the debate in which we are participating today strikes at the very heart of what elected officials must be mindful of as they make their daily decisions on behalf of Canadians. The issue is one of financial accountability, something that I believe is at the core for all of us in elected office throughout Canada, regardless of the level.
I am guided by the understanding that government has no money of its own. Whatever flows into the treasury must first flow out of the hands and the households of Canadians and their families.
While today's debate, on the surface, is about the soaring and unprecedented security costs associated with the upcoming G8 and G20 summits, in real terms, this debate is about the supremacy of Parliament when it comes to ensuring that the people's money is spent in an appropriate manner. I say it again: It is the people's money.
By extension, it is also about making certain that the government understands that the public purse is not a bottomless pit to be used without regard for the consequences. That means serious regard.
Before the rhetoric on the other side gets silly, let me be clear about what I am saying. I am not against the fact that Canada is hosting the G8 and G20. I think we are all very proud of that. In fact, I think any opportunity to showcase Canada to the world is a positive thing. Canada has a great deal to offer by way of our international leadership and that so-called soft power that should be flexed at every opportunity to promote peace and understanding.
After all, because of the fiscal responsibility and determination demonstrated by the Chrétien and Martin regimes during the nineties, Canada's fiscal situation is enviable around the world. I say enviable with one caveat, which is the fact that the current government has abandoned all pretense of fiscal restraint. In just three short years, it has taken Canada from a record of 10 consecutive surpluses, record surpluses, to the largest deficit in the history of this great nation of ours.
In the nineties, as a result of the out of control spending by the Conservatives, the Liberals were forced to deal with a $42 billion deficit. Once the national books were balanced, with the help of Canadians all across this country of ours, then finance minister Paul Martin declared that the government had cut up its credit cards and was no longer going to be living on borrowed money.
Using this analogy, instead of adopting that prudent Liberal approach to public finance, the Conservatives applied for several new credit cards, secured a line of credit, and took out a second and third mortgage on the house. Live for today seems to be the philosophy permeating the front benches across the way, regardless of their talk.
It is this turnabout that has prompted me to rise today to address the cost of security arrangements for the G8 and the G20. I believe and accept that the government needs to take steps to ensure the security of visiting world leaders. I even accept that certain infrastructure modifications are needed to accommodate two summits, not one. Was building massive arenas and making changes to the infrastructure of Muskoka an excuse to bolster the minister's riding? I would suspect that the people in Muskoka will have a lot to say about that when the next election comes, regardless of the benefit to them.
That is precisely why I was not overly concerned when I read supplementary C estimates connected to the most recent federal budget. Those estimates contained a call for $179 million to accomplish these things. It was a lot of money, but it sounded reasonable, given the task.
When we talked about it and asked the questions, it was explained that the $179 million would go to things like the RCMP and various other security-related agencies and initiatives. I accepted that number, as did many other people, and I trusted that the government would stick to its word. I should have known better. It turns out that this trust was horribly misplaced, yet again.
Last week, parliamentarians learned from the media that the government had overspent that budget by more than six times. We heard from the media, not from government directly, that spending on the summits had spiralled out of control. If the government had been on its game, as it relates to openness and transparency, would it not have advised Parliament directly that it had overspent the security budget by more than 600%? It is not a minor thing.
The total cost, so far, has now exceeded $1.1 billion, and that is prior to the event happening. To put that into perspective, the cost so far of Canada's G8 and G20 security is more than 20 times the amount spent on the G20 summit in the U.K. The 2005 Gleneagles G8 summit in Scotland cost $110 million, and the estimate for the 2008 G8 summit in Japan was $381 million, which is a long way from our $1.1 billion. That makes Canada the biggest spender on international summits ever. Who was the government trying to please?
In my opinion, the ballooning and seemingly out-of-control costs are being caused by three things. First is that total government mismanagement and lack of strategic foresight has caused massive and unprecedented budgetary overruns. Second is that expenditures that do not necessarily relate to summit security are being slipped onto the tab in the name of security. Third is that the government is planning to impose an overblown security crackdown, the likes of which the world has never seen and which is very much unlike Canada.
While I would assert that none of these options are acceptable, one or a combination thereof must be the case. Unless, of course, the government would care to offer a believable explanation to the contrary, I am forced to believe that the government has wasted billions on various pork-barrel projects and has called it security. I am forced to believe that the government has abandoned any notion of public accountability in favour of the “get whatever you can” approach to public finance. I am forced to believe that the Conservatives have extended their long-standing disregard for Parliament to the rest of the Canadian population at large. That is what I am forced to think, but I would welcome any reasonable explanation the government might actually have today.
The government has been trying to test-balloon various possible excuses for its obviously caviar tastes, including asserting that questioning summit security costs is an unacceptable act, as if it is in the order of treason to question the expenses. It implies that those questioning its out-of-control spending are unpatriotic. My personal favourite is that it had to spend money, because if it did not, the Liberals would call it names. Wow, that says a lot about the government.
I would submit that this is not the way we should operate in the real world, nor is it the way we should operate the Government of Canada. I believe that most Canadians find this to be excessive and inappropriate at best, and suspicious and reprehensible at worst.
Imagine if one went to the grocery store with a budget of $100 and came out having spent $600. For most of us, there would be dire ramifications for our household budgets. For most Canadians working each day to make ends meet, this scenario would bring into question our ability to pay the other bills for the rest of the month. Sadly, the government did not scramble to correct its overspending. It did not take extraordinary steps to stem the blunder. No, the government just kept spending the people's money at a historic rate.
Again, could members imagine if we did this and acted this way in our own households? I would submit that overspending our budgets by more than six times and then borrowing to cover the shortfall can only be described as reckless and shortsighted. It is essentially paying one's Visa with one's MasterCard and then having the bill sent to one's grandchildren for payment.
My constituents know that world leaders must work co-operatively if we are to address the many international problems effectively. Given that, the people of my riding of York West can and will accept that the Government of Canada must do its part and pay its fair share to bring these leaders together on a regular basis.
However, what we cannot accept is waste, mismanagement, and possibly, even total incompetence. Canadians want to know that fiscal prudence is the underpinning of government policy. These so-called Conservatives are anything but fiscally conservative.
The motion before us today essentially does two things. It identifies that we find the cost overruns associated with the G8 and G20 summits excessive and unacceptable, and it demands that the government provide an accounting to Parliament of the money it has already spent. Put another way, because the government is clearly devoid of any ability to do any advanced planning, general accounting, or even basic math, MPs want to check the receipts to make sure that all is as it should be, which is part of our job.
My constituents and all the people of Canada want to know how this could have happened. Is someone's nest being feathered? Is the public purse being used for partisan advantage for specific members or ministers? Is the government being gouged? Has the cost of security increased so dramatically in such a short period of time? Did the government intentionally lowball the original estimate and in effect mislead the House in the budget?
These are questions that need to be answered, and for that we need the government to provide a detailed breakdown of how the money earmarked for security is being spent. I, for one, would also like to know how the security budget was permitted to spiral out of control, and I would like an explanation of how the bleeding can be stopped. I do not believe that this is an unreasonable request.
The government can label me unpatriotic, a bully, or ignorant of the nuances of international security as it likes, but I do not care. My job is to ask the questions and to hold the government accountable.
As I said earlier, I have been a member of the House for 10 years, including as a member of cabinet. I have worked as a public servant for a good portion of my life, and I have served a number of community and charitable causes. In each of these roles, whether on a volunteer or elected basis, financial accountability, openness, and transparency were watchwords of my conduct and were the expectations of everyone.
The government was elected on a platform of accountability but seemingly ignored those lofty promises the minute its limousine doors slammed shut. Its commitment to transparency has evaporated faster than the bubbles in the Dom Pérignon.
In its brief tenure as government of this land, it has sought total control of everything under its jurisdiction. It has bullied and fired public servants and officers of Parliament. It has dragged its feet on the release of public information and has been excessively tight-fisted with information, suggesting that Canadians have no right to publicly oversee the activities of their government.
You yourself, Mr. Speaker, have even had to intervene to ensure that Parliament is not reduced to a rubber stamp but remains supreme, a tool of the people. The motion today, or more accurately put, the government's resistance to it, is yet another example of its overly aggressive and closed-minded approach to public administration.
I stand here today asking the government to come to the table. It has obviously made errors. I am not sure how else one can describe budgetary overruns on this scale. I am asking it to be mindful that $1 billion is a lot of money, money that all Canadians have worked hard for, and it should not be spent without regard for how it was obtained. That $1 billion could have helped construct hundreds of affordable housing units. It could have increased old age security for seniors. It could have purchased new equipment for schools or hospitals. Many things could have been be done with that money.
These summits will last only a few days, and with such a short lifespan, security is costing hundreds of thousands of dollars per hour. That level of incompetence is embarrassing and unacceptable. Government has no money of its own, as I said earlier. Whatever flows into the treasury, first flows out of the hands and households of Canadian people. We should not have to point that out to anyone.
I remember when the Reform Party made its first appearance in the House of Commons. It consisted of an angry lot that constantly derided Liberals, such as former Prime Minister Trudeau, for spending too much. Looking back, I wonder how those former Reform MPs rationalize the behaviour of the current government.
From a spending perspective, the current Conservative government makes Mr. Trudeau look like a penny-pinching fiscal moderate. The Liberals have never spent on the scale that we are seeing today. To the contrary, when Mr. Chrétien assumed the reigns in 1993, he faced a Conservative legacy of red ink that threatened everything we as a nation held dear. He did not shy away from the tasks he was sent to do and in just a few short years, Liberals turned the ship around.
The massive $42 billion Conservative deficit was eliminated, billions of dollars of national debt was erased, strategic investments were made, taxes were cut for those who needed relief, and the $13 billion surplus was passed to the incoming Conservative regime.
Rather than follow the responsible lead that we set down before them, the Conservatives licked their lips, abandoned the alleged Reform mantra of smaller government, and got to work playing politics with the people's money.
Short-term, visionless, partisan politics replaced responsible, long-term planning and fiscal prudence. Again, the Conservatives set their sights on spending the taxes that our grandchildren have yet to pay. I find it somewhat ironic that the word “conservative” in the small “c” sense is generally understood to mean restraint. In the context of the government's recklessness, I would far sooner be called a fiscal Liberal.
At least it is a label that I could defend to my grandchildren, who will be the ones responsible for paying the bills left by this co-called Conservative regime. It is time for fiscal prudence, long-term budgetary planning and deficit reduction to return to this place once again. It is time for us to stop spending beyond our means, cut up the credit cards, and stop borrowing to make the minimum payments.
I want my legacy to the next generation of Canadians to be more than pages of red ink. The government can start that process today by calling for a full accounting of its overspending in the names of the G8 and G20 summits.