Debates of June 1st, 2010

Opposition Motion—G8 and G20 Summits

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to advance the position of the New Democratic Party on the motion before the House today. In essence the motion can be boiled down to this. Is it necessary, is it essential, is it good government and is it good management of taxpayer dollars to spend over $1 billion for security for 72 hours of meetings in June to host the G8 and G20 summits?

There are a few things on which all members of the House and maybe all Canadians can agree. One is that Canadians are, as the motion says, “justifiably proud” of Canada's participation in the G8 and G20 groups. We are also proud of the fact that Canada is hosting these meetings.

I think Canadians also agree, as the motion states, that Canada is committed to “effective and efficient security for the visiting world leaders” and all of the associated delegations and Canadians themselves who will attend these meetings, whether as part of the meetings or to protest these meetings. We want to ensure that all are safe.

The question before the House is whether it is necessary, prudent and justified in today's economic climate to spend $1 billion to accomplish those objectives. I respectfully suggest the answer to that is no.

On March 3, the Conservative government tabled in the House supplementary estimates C, with the main estimates. I point out that this was not in the main estimates. It was in the supplementary estimates C, which are prepared after the main estimates. These estimates contained projected total security spending for the G8 and G20 summits at $179 million.

On May 25, a little over two and a half months later, the Conservative government tabled supplementary estimates A, and these contained $654 million in additional security costs for the G8 and G20 summits, bringing the total cost to $833 million.

The next day, on May 26, in the House in answer to a question I asked the Minister of Public Safety, the government admitted that the costs would be $930 million. Since then, reports have come out suggesting that the total cost could well exceed $1 billion. I want to talk a bit about that.

I asked a question of the member for Oxford, who sits on the public safety committee with me. I asked why the government estimated the costs at $179 million when that cost came out to conceivably six times that amount. He said that the government knew all along that the cost for security would be $900 million or thereabouts. He said that from the very beginning of the planning for the G8 and G20 summits months ago, the government knew the costs of security. We all know that summits do not get planned in weeks. They get planned over a period of months.

When I asked why that cost would not have been put in supplementary estimates C when they were tabled in the House on March 3, I received no answer, other than rhetoric, other than invective or ad hominem arguments that attacked the speaker or insulted the argument. Nobody answered the question about why the government did not put the $900 million in the budget documents on March 3 if it knew it would be that amount. Why did the government not know the cost for security?

We have a case where the government is indicted either way. Either it knew that the costs would be close to $1 billion and it purposely put in $179 million to try to hide the true cost for security for the summits from Canadians, or it did not know that and instead, through mismanagement, watched the cost for security increase by five times in a period of two months. Either way it is an improper and an unacceptable way to handle Canadian taxpayer dollars.

I want to compare the cost of these summits to the cost of previous summits. I agree we cannot necessarily have a complete comparison to other summits, because this is a G8 and G20 combined summit. We are comparing these costs to only G8 or G20 summits. That is a fair point to keep in mind. To give us a general idea of the ballpark figures that are used in meetings like this, it is helpful for us to look at them.

The 2009 G8 summit in Italy cost $359 million. The 2009 G20 meeting in London cost $30 million, although there has been some suggestion that figure may be artificially low. The 2008 G8 gathering in Japan cost $381 million. The 2005 G8 summit in Scotland cost $110 million. If we average all these figures, we will get a rough picture that security for a world-class meeting involving leaders of at least the G8 and sometimes the G20 is approximately $220 million to $240 million. That is about the average.

It is also instructive to look at the cost for security for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, which was hosted in the city in which my riding is located.

Right now the security costs for 72 hours of meetings in June exceed the entire security costs for the Vancouver Olympics, which includes 17 days of Olympics themselves, an additional two weeks of Paralympics after that and several months of preparation for delegations and athletes to arrive in Vancouver before the start of the 17 days to be acclimatized and set in the athletes village, et cetera. The Olympics involved tens of thousands of people, two venues, including Vancouver and Whistler, and many surrounding municipalities like Richmond, Vancouver, West Vancouver and Whistler. The Olympics were held in a very challenging geographical location. The sea, the mountains and Vancouver, with its close proximity to the U.S. border, all had to be secured.

Let us think about that. Would Canadians not be justified in asking why the cost of security for three days of meetings with 20 world leaders and their entourages would exceed that? Something is wrong. One does not have to be an economist, or a security expert or the Parliamentary Budget Officer to know that something is horribly amiss with the way the security budget has been handled for the G8 and G20 meetings.

I am going to break this down a bit. Let us look at the $930 million, if that is indeed what it is right now: $450 million has been allocated to the RCMP; $262 million has been allocated to the public safety department; and $63 million has been allocated for national defence. I will stop there because I have one question. What are the $262 million for with respect to the public safety department?

The public safety department is made up of five components. It is made up of Correctional Service Canada, the prison system. It is not getting any money out of this. It is made up of the National Parole Board. It is not getting any money out of this. It is made up of the RCMP. Clearly, that is not what the $262 million is for because $450 million has already been allocated to the RCMP. The department is also made up of the Canada Border Services Agency. I cannot see it getting any money out of this. That leaves CSIS. It is hard to believe that for the purpose of G8 and G20 meetings there would be any cause to allocate $262 million to CSIS. Maybe there is because the government does like to violate the civil liberties of Canadians. It does like to fund undercover officers who provoke protestors, like they did in Quebec a few years ago. We never know what is up with the Conservative government, but we do know there is something wrong with these figures.

It would not surprise me because the public safety minister stood up on behalf of the government and said that they did not want to cost the costs of its crime bills. The government wants to bring forward 18 crime bills, but it does not want to tell Canadians the cost of any one of them.

When faced with the prospect of dealing with the Parliamentary Budget Officer, who was going to estimate the costs for us if the government was not going to come clean with Canadians, the minister stood and said that the cost for cancelling the two-for-one credit for pre-sentencing custody bill was $90 million. The next day that minister said that it was $2 billion.

I hear silence in this room right now. Why? Because there is no answer to that. How could a minister of the crown say one day that the cost of a bill is $90 million and then the next day say that it is $2 billion? I do not hear any witty remarks coming from that side right now. What causes a 2000% increase in 24 hours? Is it incompetence or is it deception? It is not competence.

There are some problems with this $1 billion budget. Like most Canadians, I think there is no way we could possibly envision how the government could possibly spend $1 billion for security for three days of meetings.

Jeffrey Simpson in the Globe and Mail said:

Spending $1-billion to play host to two summits is preposterous, a case of bureaucracy gone wild, or planning gone crazy, of fear sinking itself into every official’s and security person’s heart....This siege mentality has now been used in preparing for the G8 and G20, with everyone fearing some major terrorist attack against the leaders, or against one of them. A corner of Muskoka is being turned into a militarized zone, downtown Toronto shut off, baseball games moved out of town, thousands of police and security agents mobilized, to say nothing of helicopters, planes and, for all we know, submarines in Lake Ontario....The whole thing is over the top and way too expensive for three days that bid fair to be a non-event in substance.

A New Democrat did not say that. That was said by a respected columnist, who I do not think characterizes politics as left-wing.

This is a case of bad budgeting.

I want to talk about the lack of transparency and accountability. The government is starting to lay down what could only be described fairly as a record of avoiding transparency and hiding from accountability. It was only with the threat of an election fought on the question of government arrogance and disdain for Parliament that the opposition was able to force the government to make a deal to provide secure access to the Afghan detainee documents. It still refuses to disclose the true cost of its legislative agenda on crime despite what I said earlier in my speech.

Time and time again the Conservative government has shown disrespect for Parliament and our democratic process. It prorogued Parliament twice to avoid democratic accountability. The Conservatives continue to stack the Senate with their unelected friends and ministers despite promising Canadians they would never do that. They are attempting to manipulate a vote on several bills to try to drive a wedge between politicians on all sorts of issues.

I want to talk a bit about what we could have bought for $930 million: 159,000 Canadians could have received EI for the average period before finding employment; 189,000 undergraduate students across the country could have received full funding of their tuition for a year; 1,270 new hybrid buses could have been purchased for public transit systems in Canada; 167,000 Canadians' health care costs could have been covered for a full year; 59,000 seniors could have received their guaranteed income supplement; or 158,000 seniors could have received their old age security. The estimated cost to lift every senior in our country out of poverty would be $700 million and $300 million would be left over. That is a question of priorities.

I want to talk a bit about the irony of tightening belts. The government has said that it expected every Canadian to tighten their belts. It has said that every person in the chamber was expected to tighten their belts. It asked the civil servants to forgo wage increases because they had to do their bit to tighten their belts. How about the government leading by example and tightening its belt by taking some prudent measures to lower security costs for the G8, G20 meetings?

We have heard wonderful suggestions that have come from the non-experts in the House, which the government keeps thinking is relevant, such as why do we not hold one meeting at one location instead of two? Why double the security costs in a time of restraint? Why not have one area? The G8 leaders are part of the G20. Why not have the meeting at a place like a military base, which is already secure? The optics are not good. Maybe it is not something we would want to do ideally, but in a time of economic restraint, maybe that would be a wise, prudent move to keep the costs low.

Why did the government try to get this summit put into a cabinet minister's riding in Muskoka as a way to bolster his profile in the region? I will say this here because the facts bear it out. The Conservatives have abused taxpayer dollars by putting money into their own ridings time and time again. I expected that from the Liberal government, which was corrupt and rotten to the core when it was suitably booted out of office. However, the Conservative government came into office promising something different, and it should be reminded of that and be ashamed of it.

The infrastructure funds that government members put into their own ridings is shameful. The way they exploited the Conservative logo on cheques was shameful. Trying to put a G8 or G20 meeting in one of their ridings for partisan purposes is equally shameful because they are not playing with their money. They are playing with Canadian taxpayer dollars. For a party that claims to stand up for Canadian taxpayers, that claims to talk about fiscal probity and responsibility, this is a shameful record that shows its hypocrisy.

Robert Fox, the executive director of Oxfam Canada, says:

It is painful to think a billion dollars is being spent on the security for a three-day event when we are capping commitments to international aid for the next several years because we can’t find the money. It just speaks to our priorities and the fact that when we choose to, we can mobilize resources and when there is a lack of political will, we fall short.

Again, the government tightens belts by expecting NGOs to not get any increases or not get funding for international aid, but when it comes to spending money for security, the Conservatives say that there is really no limit on what they can spend on security because they have to keep people secure. Yes, they can, but there is a limit. There is no need to spend $1 billion to do so.

The day after the minister admitted that it was a fivefold increase in security, I wrote the Parliamentary Budget Officer. We asked him to get involved in looking at this. I am proud to say that he has accepted this request. We also wrote the Auditor General and asked her to look into this as well. The Parliamentary Budget Officer has said:

We will investigate with the purpose of issuing a report for parliamentarians and Canadians...we will need co-operation from the government on information and this will need to be done in a timely manner.

I sincerely hope every member of the House, including members of the government, ensure that this information is furnished to the Parliamentary Budget Officer so Canadians can hold the government accountable

The bottom line is we have to provide security for the G8, G20 leaders. That is not in question. The question is the government's commitment to lead by example and to be a prudent manager of the Canadian taxpayer dollars. We also expect the government to be transparent and accountable.

I call on every member of the House, if they truly believe in those concepts, to join together and vote in favour of the motion, which calls on the government to do nothing but acknowledge those concepts and principles.

When governments spend money, we look into the soul of the government to determine what are the priorities of that government. When children are hungry in our country, when seniors are living in poverty, when people all across this world and in the Third World need our assistance and we tell them no, that they have to tighten their belts, then I expect the government to do the same thing and tighten its belt on expenditures that are frivolous and unnecessary.

In addition, I want to talk about what I consider to be one of the prime responsibilities of parliamentarians. We were all elected in the House. We have all worked very hard to get here. We all do our best, on all sides of the House, to represent our constituents. One of the jobs of parliamentarians is to hold the government accountable by observing its spending and holding it to account. That is what we are doing in the House today. When there is an outrageous amount furnished, like $1 billion, it is our job to get to the bottom of it. It is our job to ensure that money is accounted for and it is not a waste of taxpayer dollars. People work darned hard every day for their wages and they expect and deserve for us to spend that money wisely. I urge all members to support this motion.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development]

Mr. Speaker, I was interested in following the speech by the member for Vancouver Kingsway. We both have ridings in British Columbia and we are very proud of the Olympic legacy that was created this year.

I can remember the NDP provincial counterpart in British Columbia saying exactly the same kinds of things about the security costs associated with the Olympics and the lead-up to the Olympics. Now, after the success of the Olympics, the federal NDP is saying what a great thing the Olympics were and comparing the security costs as being quite reasonable.

This is the first time ever that we have had back-to-back summits. These summits are an international showcase for Canada. They will leverage tourism and other things. We are doing work already to ensure that happens.

If I go back to the start of the member's speech, he talked about whether these were necessary, prudent and justified expenditures. They certainly are. It is not unusual to have the estimates come in tranche, in other words, supplementary estimates A and C. That is quite appropriate. The member also talked about Public Safety Canada and those expenditures. I agree with the member, they were none of the things he suggested. They are to reimburse provincial and municipal security partners.

Why is the member politicizing this issue all over again to the detriment of our international opportunity to do good things?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for giving me the opportunity to talk further about the Olympics, because it is very instructive.

One would think that just having hosted an international gathering of the highest calibre and the highest level of security in February in Canada, when we have already purchased equipment, already trained thousands of personnel, it would give us efficiencies. If we were then holding another international meeting that required specialized high level security of exactly the same magnitude only four or five months later, that the costs of securing the second event would be lower. Canadians do think that.

One would think that the costs for securing the G8, G20 held in June would be lower than other international G8, G20 summits, where they had to create security protocol and buy equipment for the first time. That is another very critical question.

I might point out that the Olympic security costs represented another example of bad fiscal planning by right-wing governments, namely the Conservative government and the Liberal government of Gordon Campbell in British Columbia. They low-balled the security costs in the $170 million-range and again saw the costs escalate to $1 billion. That is bad accounting, bad management, bad planning and bad priorities by right-wing governments in our country. That is what it tells Canadians.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, what does the hon. member think about the way Toronto is being treated as far as the impact the summit will have on local businesses and the fact that the government is not putting out any of its dollars for assistance to compensate the local businesses for any damage to their properties?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I know the member does a wonderful job representing her constituents in Ontario. It is a great question, because small businesses, right in a critical part of the tourist season in Toronto, will be harmed by this event.

The government talks about spinoff benefits of the G8, G20. That will not happen in Toronto. It reminds me of businesses along Cambie Street in Vancouver, which were virtually crippled by the construction of the RAV Line to the airport and received no compensation.

While we were busy satisfying the interests of the government and others, we watched the interests of businesses and small businesses being trampled. That shows the self-centredness of the government, where the Prime Minister is more interested in his international stature and getting photo ops with world leaders than he is about the real interests of taxpayers, business owners and communities of real Canadians, including, in this case, in Toronto. It will not be a good thing for them.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the security will involve 19,000 police officers, security guards, soldiers, intelligence analysts, aerial surveillance and motorcades of up to 50 vehicles. Expansive three metre high security fences surround the Metro Toronto Convention Centre and the Deerhurst Resort in Huntsville, and involve airport-style security checks within wide perimeters, not to mention the effect on local business. We could have solved this problem by simply having this conference in a secure military base and we would not need any military presence on the streets of Toronto.

The issue of the $1 billion is huge when the government has a $56 billion deficit. It is closing the six prison farms in the country, which would cost only $4 million to keep going and which have a rehabilitative effect on prisoners.

Does the member have some observations about what could have been done with the $1 billion?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I talked about the priorities and what other things we could be spending this money on, such as keeping the prison farms open, or setting up sexual assault centres, or have a victims ombudsman, as suggested twice to the government, which would cost under $5 million a year. Children who are the victims of sexual abuse could have a place in every major urban centre in the country to go to. That was turned down by the government.

Here are the questions Canadians want answered. Why is this costing so much? Why are we holding two meetings in 72 hours in two locations? Why are we not using a much easier to secure location? Why are there no post-Olympic sufficiencies being seen in these numbers? Why the deceptive estimates?

New Democrats will continue to work very hard to get to the bottom of these questions, so we can get those answers to Canadians and let them judge whether the Conservative government has been prudent with their tax dollars and whether they think it is justified to spend $1 billion for three days worth of meetings in June.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

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.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, this morning a government representative, the member for Edmonton—St. Albert, admitted that he does not read The Globe and Mail, so I will have to read it for him. I want to read a quotation from Robert Fox, the executive director of Oxfam Canada. In The Globe and Mail on May 28 of this year, he said:

It is painful to think a billion dollars is being spent on the security for a three-day event when we are capping commitments to international aid for the next several years because we can’t find the money...It just speaks to our priorities and the fact that when we choose to, we can mobilize resources and when there is a lack of political will, we fall short.

It is clear that this money, as the member just pointed out, could have been used to do a lot of very good things in this country. For example, we could have purchased 1,270 new hybrid buses for public transit systems in Canada. That is just one example of the things we could have done with this money.

Would the member like to comment further on this massive waste of money when the government is in a record deficit of $56 billion?

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if the government added an extra $100 million to the original $179 million that it had foreseen for the expenses and said it was $300 million, that would still leave another $800 million that we could have invested in the people of our country.

We could have invested it in health care, ensuring that our seniors are brought out of poverty, helping to increase pensions for many of the people who are still living below pension levels or investments in our universities. There are so many areas where we could have invested that $800 million that is going to turn around and continue to put us into massive deficit. Having two locations right off the bat indicated that it was going to cost a fortune.

I will go back to that original issue of doing it in Muskoka. I am well familiar with that area. From the very beginning, to suggest that we could even have G8 and G20 summits there was pretty much ridiculous. I did not think it could possibly be done. Was it just an excuse to spend a whole lot of money in that beautiful Muskoka area? To turn around and try it at a second location, one has to expect that there are going to be huge cost overruns.

At the beginning, when the planning was done, I have to question whether that planning was well thought through. It would have been easily visible that we could not have held those two summits in the Muskoka area.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, once again, I want to thank the member for her answer.

Clearly, the Liberals are doing a public service today by bringing this opposition motion forward. While we cannot do anything about the existing boondoggle as we see it now, at least going forward we cannot make this mistake again. I would think that if there is enough of a public reaction to this, local residents in the countries where future G8 meetings will be held are going to look to what we are doing here today, as a reaction against a massive misspending of money.

We cannot have these summits in an urban environment. That is very clear. The security costs are just overwhelming. This cannot be compared to the Olympics because the Olympics are a different sort of situation.

In the future, these types of meetings are going to have to be held in more secure environments. Rural military bases are the types of environments we are going to have to be in. The costs would be minuscule.

I think the government is going to learn a very painful lesson through this process, but I see good going forward. I do not think it is going to want to make this mistake again.

[Judy Sgro, Liberal, York West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the comments are very interesting.

It is a very expensive lesson to learn. I do not think the taxpayers accept that they want us to learn lessons from overspending billions of dollars. They would much rather that the proper planning was put into place at the very beginning.

I have to put on the record that I am very concerned about my city of Toronto and the impact this is going to have on it. I have family members who work in the downtown core, and they are already being told that for at least four days before they should take their work and work from home.

It is going to cost a lot of money. It is going to have a big impact on the cost of production for many people. There is also the cost of the damages that will happen in and around the Toronto area.

Since part of the summit was already being held in Muskoka, it would seem to me that the beautiful city of Barrie would have been a great place to hold the second part of that summit. It would have been much easier to control. It is a smaller community. I think Barrie would have appreciated having that investment of money, rather than trying to hold it in the city of Toronto with all of the massive office and condominium buildings that clearly give anyone who wanted to cause trouble, and who are living on the inside of that designated area, the opportunity. I think it is an impossible job to try to secure that huge area, no matter how much money is spent.

Going right back to the very beginning when these decisions were being made, they were not thought through. We ended up with two locations, neither one particularly acceptable. I just hope that at the end of the day the summits are successful and something positive comes out as a result of them.

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a great pleasure to rise today to speak to this motion.

We are building on the success of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games and promoting Canada throughout 2010: our year in the global spotlight.

The summits will provide international media exposure for our country and are a great opportunity to showcase all that Canada has to offer as a gracious host and as a terrific destination.

Muskoka and Toronto are ready to host world-class summits.

The security plan has been developed by Canadian experts. By authority of the Foreign Missions and International Organizations Act and section 17 of the RCMP Act, the RCMP is responsible for ensuring the safety and security of all summit participants when they arrive in Canada to take part in the meetings.

As the House is no doubt aware, the RCMP has extensive experience in securing major events, such as the Sommet de la Francophonie, the North American Leaders Summit, G7 meetings and, most recently, the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.

The RCMP is leading a G8 and G20 summits integrated security unit, also known as the ISU. It is comprised of partners from the Ontario Provincial Police, Canadian Forces, Toronto Police Service and Peel Regional Police. Each agency brings valuable expertise, as well as experience drawn from past major events or security operations to the ISU team. Integration has always been an important part of the planning components for the RCMP.

By bringing together partners from some of Canada's top security forces, the RCMP and its partners have fully integrated the planning process to ensure that seamless security and public safety services are provided.

The RCMP and its partners have extensive experience planning for major events like the G8 and G20 summits. They have had significant successes with major past events, such as the Olympics, the Sommet de la Francophonie and the North American Leaders Summit.

Members of the ISU have taken best security practices from these past events and they have developed a plan that specifically addresses the security needs for the G8 and G20.

A number of factors, such as location, threat level and stature of participants play a significant role in determining a security plan and subsequent security costs.

There is currently no major event comparable to the security planning being conducted by the ISU in preparation for the G8 and G20 summits.

In terms of costs, John Kirton, the director of the University of Toronto's G8 research group, said that the cost to host the G8 and G20 in and around Toronto next month is “within range”, of what similar summits cost, adding, also, “If you want to be at the G8 table, you can't go to the washroom when the bill comes in”.

Planning for the safest and most secure environment possible is the ISU's top priority. The preparations involve extensive planning and extensive coordination in the months leading up to the summit.

One of the largest challenges for the RCMP and its partners is the significant number of summit participants.

Known as internationally protected people, Canada will be welcoming some of the world's most influential leaders. Working closely with the Ontario Provincial Police, the police force of jurisdiction in Huntsville and the Toronto Police Service, which has jurisdiction in the city of Toronto, the ISU will be ensuring that these visiting dignitaries receive the best protection Canada has to offer.

These two major events represent a considerable undertaking for all agencies involved in security operations in the ISU. We are ready. And we are confident in the plan. All these preparations have been done so that the participants will be able to focus on the importance of these meetings, not on matters of security.

We have a great advantage by being able to draw upon RCMP members since they come to any situation with excellent training and experience, and are strategically positioned across the country to respond quickly and effectively wherever they are needed.

There has been a lot of criticism from the opposition about the cost of hosting these world-class summits. Let me assure members opposite that this government, working closely with security experts in the ISU, have taken the necessary steps to ensure security costs are effective and efficient.

The creation of the ISU itself is a cost-saving measure. Planning in a joint operational structure allows the RCMP to share assets with law enforcement partners and ensures there is no cost overlap on human resource requirements. The RCMP has also undertaken internal reviews of its security plans and adjusted cost and plans wherever it was able to without compromising the security for the events. The simple reality is security costs money.

As Ward Elcock, coordinator of the 2010 Olympic and G8 and G20 security has said, the reality is that many countries have not been as transparent as Canada has traditionally been. We were one of the first countries ever to have published the all-out number on security spending for the Olympic Games. He also warned against taking at face value all the figures that have been floated in the media about the previous costs for these summits. He said:

We have been much more transparent about total costs.

Canada's Auditor General has echoed that sentiment saying:

Obviously $1 billion is a lot of money, but I think we have to realize that security is expensive. There are a lot of people involved over a very long period of time.

We may think that the meetings only last for a few days, but all the preparations involve extensive planning, extensive co-ordination for months before that, and I think we have to be very careful.

I noticed in some of the media reports there was a comparison to another number of I think it was $179 million. I think we have to be very careful in those comparisons, because my understanding is that the $179 million is really partial funding, and the way government funds these things, it was not an initial estimate of what the costs would be.

When it comes to the costs, it is very important to get the facts correct. In March, $179 million was allocated as part of the overall security budget for the G8 and G20 summits. The recently tabled supplementary estimates (A) allocated a further $654 million. As we have always stated, overall costs will be finalized following the completion of the summits. However, based on a medium threat assessment, we have budgeted up to $930 million for security.

Global security begins at home. As hosts of the G8 and G20 summits, we will be prepared to respond to any possible situation or threat. We will take all measures necessary to ensure Canadians, delegates and international visitors remain safe. This also involves testing our plans.

The ISU and its partners recently tested the security plans in an exercise that was called “Trillium Guardian”. Through Exercise Trillium Guardian, the ISU confirmed a functional, integrated command and coordination structure with effective information and intelligence sharing in support of the Canadian national security and emergency management framework for the summits.

Virtually all summit plans and procedures were tested, and it should come as no surprise that there are solid security plans in place to meet a number of potential threats to the summits.

The reality is that Canada is hosting the G8 and G20 summits in less than a month and we are proud to be hosting the world leaders. Unlike the Liberal leader who never misses a chance to run down Canada, we are focused on showcasing Canada. While the Liberal leader said he is embarrassed of Canada, we are looking forward to sitting down with our friends and our allies. We are focused on welcoming the world once again this year to our great country.

Canadians know that. Unlike the Leader of the Opposition, our government is proud of Canada's leadership on the world stage.

For example, when our Prime Minister had a successful and important visit to China last fall that also addressed the issue of human rights, the Liberal leader took the side of the Chinese and criticized the government for raising the issue. Typical of the Liberal leader who has criticized our government's principled position on human rights and instead said, in dealing with China, we should:

lower the volume...quietly.

When Iranian dictator Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered a hateful rant in the United Nations, the Liberal leader criticized the government for being absent. This is, of course, coming from the same Liberal leader who was absent from Canada for 34 years and only returned to Canada to be prime minister. It is the same Liberal leader who bashed our flag, calling it a:

passing imitation of a beer label.

It is the same Liberal leader who is embarrassed that Canada is leading on the world stage, but his failure to stand up for Canada once again demonstrates that he is not in it for Canadians. He is just in it for himself.

We are in it for Canadians. We are in it to show leadership on the world stage. We are in it to work with our friends and like-minded allies on issues of development, democracy, peace and security; and we are in it to address the gravest threat to world security: nuclear arms falling into the wrong hands.

The opposition does not get it. Global security begins at home. As host of the G8 and G20 security summits, we must be prepared to respond to any possible situation or threat. We will not be influenced by thugs who want to disrupt the summits and we are on track to host safe and secure G8 and G20 summits.

Participants have an expectation that we will provide the appropriate level of security. Canada deserves nothing less.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the member for his deliberative overview with respect to security costs, and certainly the characterization that he has given of appropriate costs is one that would be supported by all Canadians. The issue here is what is appropriate.

In consideration of all the costs associated with the other summits, these costs seem to be so out of proportion that the average person on the street is saying, how could this magnitude of “appropriate” funding be accumulated now when the experience has been that it has not been anywhere near that in other summits?

I know it is difficult to ask a question based on intelligence, but could the member share any intelligence that would be of the proportion that he has described with respect to nuclear threats, and so on, such that Canadians could say, God bless the government, that it is taking the appropriate initiative in keeping with that degree of possibility?

If that is not available, then I have to say, from coast to coast to coast, people are looking at these costs and are saying they seem to be overwhelmingly out of proportion to the appropriateness with respect to the description that has been given by the government.

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I believe the member's question is what are the comparable costs. The one example that I would point out to the hon. member is, in Japan, when it hosted the G8, the costs were $1.7 billion just to hold the G8 in Japan.

Also I think the member should take note of the Auditor General's quote that I used in my remarks, that it is the understanding of the Auditor General that security means preparation over a long period of time, testing and making sure all of the things that we are planning are going to work and we have built in the contingencies for an unexpected situation.

These are all things that at this point are estimated costs and are contingencies built into the budgeting process by our law enforcement experts in this country.

The member has heard in the remarks of the various police service organizations who are coordinating together under a special unit, and have been for a long period of time, and are using best practices from around the world. As I say, using the Auditor General's words, it is a lot of money, as the member has adequately stated, but security costs a lot of money.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, clearly this is a huge amount of money here.

In fact, 159,000 Canadians could have received EI for the average period before finding employment; 189,000 undergraduate students could have received full funding for their tuition for the year; and as I indicated before, over 1,200 new hybrid buses could have been purchased for public transit systems in this country.

This is an enormous amount of money. Clearly there is a big problem here and the government has a public relations disaster on its hands.

Does the member not agree that the government should have looked at some other solution, such as a secure military base, away from an urban environment? Does that not make more sense than putting this summit into an urban environment, which compounds the problems of security?

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the University of Toronto expert on this, John Kirton, said it most clearly in terms of the answer to the question:

The cost for each of the two Canada summits are more or less within range of what G-8 and even G-20 summits have been costing

It’s a very good investment. Most of the money has permanent benefits, well beyond the G-8.

Certainly we as a country could be very insular and not host these summits, but on a long-term basis, these are the things that build our country. These are the things that give us the international profile in a global economy to create the jobs that we need in this country.

As we showcase this wonderful land we live in and the wonderful land of opportunity that it presents to the rest of the world, and we are on the world stage in both of these summits, we are building our country. We are looking to people across the world to come to Canada, to invest in this great country, and to create the industry and jobs of the future that are so vastly important to our fellow Canadians.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I did appreciate the response that the member gave, but mine is an accounting question.

When we talk about long-term contingencies, and we have cross-referenced the Auditor General in terms of her rationalizing that long-term contingencies do account with respect to this massive amount of money, when we think of the long-term effect of the oil spill, definitely in the gulf there will be long-term contingencies that will be unbelievably high in financial and fiscal terms, but I would ask this question.

Is it the position of the government that, above and beyond the day-to-day security issues and paying for the staff and the special units and so on, if there is a regular business-as-usual approach, is it possible at the end of the summits that there may be cost overruns that in fact can accountably be paid back on the balance sheet, that the government estimated would be $1.1 billion but these things did not happen, we hope, and the figure may indeed come in lower than the initial estimate?

[Phil McColeman, Conservative, Brant, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as the member will no doubt know, whenever a project is put together of this nature, and in this case, the security of the people who will be here, the top leaders of the world who will be here, there have to be contingency funds built in for unexpected circumstances that can happen.

The other context we live in as Canadians and as world players is the constant threat of possible security breaches, security situations that have to be responded to in the proper manner, in a manner to save lives and to secure people. That is not to say that this is going to happen, but certainly those contingencies, as with any good business planning, are going to be built into a budget.

However, as we have stated all along on this side, the actual costs will not be known until the summits are over, and when they are finished, there will be a full accounting of every line item and the bills will be scrutinized of the people who have provided services. We as a government are one of the few governments that are actually showing all the costs up front and not trying to say, for example, that part of the RCMP role could be over in this category and we could keep it out of the limelight with a little bit here and a little bit there, as was referred to by the experts who have hosted other countries, so we are not comparing apples and apples.

Regarding the question of whether unused contingency funds will be factored into the final net cost, absolutely they will be. There will be an absolute net cost at the end and a full accounting for that.

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

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate. I am splitting my time with the hon. member for Malpeque.

Last Saturday I had the privilege, as many of us do on occasion, to attend the Special Olympics regional games in the Halifax area. I could not help but look at all those wonderful people at the Special Olympics who do not have the opportunities in life that many of us do. Of special concern to me are the young Canadians who, after going through high school, because of their condition, in many cases seem to fall off a cliff in terms of their opportunities. While their friends go on to college and university and jobs, a lot of Canadians with disabilities just do not have that opportunity. I was thinking of how many programs $1 billion could provide for them. A lot of people are comparing what other things could have been achieved with the over $1 billion cost for security for the upcoming summits. I am going to talk about a few others but that is what crystallized it for me.

I think a lot of Canadians are wondering why the cost of this is so outrageous and are thinking of the other things that Canada could be doing with that money. People want to know how in the world we could spend $1 billion on security alone for any kind of meeting anywhere in the world.

In 1995, the federal government, under the leadership of Jean Chrétien and the regional minister, David Dingwall, announced that the G7 would take place in Halifax. It was big news in Nova Scotia. A news article on May 4, 1995 said:

The Halifax Summit Office (HSO) confirmed today that its budget for this year's G7 Summit Meeting will be approximately $28 million....

The budget of the HSO [the Halifax Summit Office] encompasses all of the operational aspects of the Summit from staffing to printing and security.

In that article, a spokesperson for the Halifax Summit Office is quoted as saying:

“HSO estimates that fully 60% of its budget will be spent locally on goods and services ranging from accommodation to printing to the direct employment of residents”.

That G7 meeting took place just a decade and a half ago in Halifax. It was a fabulous time in Halifax-Dartmouth. There was work done. There is still legacy work from that G7 summit in Halifax. Leaders like Bill Clinton, John Major, Boris Yeltsin and others came. It went off virtually without a hitch.

My father was the premier of Nova Scotia at the time. It was a fabulous opportunity for the people of Halifax to see world leaders up close. The total cost of that was $28 million.

I want to reference a comment that was made back then by the spokesman for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation. This is from a news article dated April 30, 1995:

The federal government was wrong to put next month's G7 summit in Halifax because the city needs too many government-funded fixups, says a national taxpayers' lobby group.... The federal government “should have chosen a location which wouldn't cost that kind of money”.

The person who said that on behalf of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation is now the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism. He went on to say:

There are conference facilities available, I'm sure, in that part of the world as well as across Canada that could have hosted an event like this without spending several million dollars....

A decade and a half ago, the person who is now the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism thought $28 million was too much for an international meeting for the G7. Now the government is suggesting that $1 billion is okay.

How have we gotten to that point? There was a point in time when members who are now on the government side would say that we should value taxpayers' money. Those days appear to be gone. Now we are in a situation where we are talking about $1 billion, $930 million on security alone, plus other costs, which is not only outrageous but is well beyond the original estimates. People are asking what is going on.

In an article in yesterday's Halifax Chronicle Herald, Dan Leger wrote:

So maybe that $1.1 billion should be taken as a very expensive sign that it’s time to do away with these inflated gabfests, especially since every function of a summit other than dinner can now be done over the Internet.

The $1.1 billion might also be a sign that someone has badly mismanaged the preparations, partly because poor planning forced the use of two venues, Muskoka for the G8 and Toronto for the G20. By comparison, the G20 summit in Britain last year cost a paltry $30 million.

The last line of his article states—

[James Moore]

Not true.

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

Mr. Speaker, I guarantee this is exactly what he is saying. I continue to quote:

There are surely better ways to spend that money, perhaps on economic and security projects that last longer than a few days. Perhaps these lavish armed gatherings of the alpha dogs have finally become too expensive, even for the richest pack in the world.

Today in the Halifax Chronicle Herald there was an editorial which states:

In an unprecedented move, Canada offered to piggyback the G20 on the G8. But the logistics of accommodating 12 more delegations no longer worked for Muskoka. So it stuck with the G8, while Toronto is now hosting the G20....

The opposition rightly wants federal spending watchdogs to investigate. The secrecy around security bills must change.

We have a situation where current members of the government a decade and a half ago said that $28 million was too much to spend for a meeting of this type. Now it is over $1 billion for security alone and it might go up.

What is the comparison? People are talking about things in their areas that they could spend $1 billion on. I have mentioned young disabled Canadians and the opportunities that do not exist for them. I suspect that just about every member of Parliament who has been here any length of time has met with people in their communities who do not have the workshops or opportunities to continue to learn. We are wasting the potential of young Canadians with disabilities.

Let me talk about students. I spent a lot of time talking with students about student issues in this country. What could be done with that $1 billion? I want to thank CASAA for the information on this. We could fully pay the tuition of 23,376 of the poorest Canadians for the course of their study. We could fund 28,571 Canada graduate doctoral scholarships. We could almost quadruple the funding for the Canada student grants program, the program which the government put in place after it hatcheted the millennium scholarship foundation.

We could expand the size of the Canada summer jobs program by 10 times. Let us put this in context. This is a time of incredibly high youth unemployment. Last year there were 128,000 more students unemployed than the year before. Student unemployment is double the national average. At the same time, we have all kinds of organizations in our communities, from recreational organizations such as youth soccer, child care and seniors programs, programs that work with the disabled, boys and girls clubs, all the organizations that take advantage of the Canada summer jobs program.

At a time of stimulus, the government could have done something. I have suggested in the House and in committee what it should have done was double the Canada summer jobs program. It employs approximately 40,000 students. The government chose to add fewer than 4,000 of the 128,000 fewer jobs last year.

We could have made that $100 million program 10 times bigger. We could have employed another 400,000 students. There are organizations across this country that need help, including autism groups.

Members may recall a few years ago when the government changed the Canada summer jobs program and what a disaster that was. My colleagues on all sides of the House can attest to that. They remember what a disaster that was when it happened. There are a lot of things we could have done.

At a point in time when poverty rates are rising, 2.5 points up from about 9.5% to 11% for both poverty and child poverty, we could have done more.

Canada should be involved in meetings of this type. I am very proud of the fact that Paul Martin, the former finance minister and prime minister, was at the genesis of the G20 and pushed it. We should be involved in these meetings, but there comes a point when common sense needs to take hold.

The cost of this summit is outrageous. Canadians do not accept it. The government has to understand that. The government has to evaluate and rethink this. Yes, we need to be involved, but there are too many other things that Canadians need, especially Canadians who need assistance. When they look at $1 billion going out the door on this, they say that they cannot believe it, the government should do something about it. That is why the Liberals brought this motion forward for debate today.

[Claude Gravelle, NDP, Nickel Belt, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the cost for the G8 and G20 security is over $1 billion. That is for security alone.

Could the hon. member give me an idea of how much exactly the government is spending, not only on security, but on building an arena in the riding of the Minister of Industry and giving facelifts to a lot of buildings and land in the minister's riding? Does the hon. member have an idea of how much the G8 and G20 summits are costing as a whole?

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

Mr. Speaker, I do not have an exact number. I do not think that anybody knows the exact number, but I certainly take the member's point. Media reports are now estimating that the costs for the G8 and G20 summits could rise to over $1.2 billion. For that reason, the Auditor General has indicated that she is going to look at it.

We have heard over the last number of months about some of the infrastructure projects that have stretched not only from where the meetings are going to take place, but further out for political reasons. These improvements in infrastructure and communities are being done allegedly for the G8 and G20 meetings, but it appears they are being done purely for political reasons, entirely in keeping with how the government does business.

I do not know the exact number, but it is clear that it is over $1 billion. I suspect we will find out after the fact that it is much over $1 billion. I do not think that is something Canadians want to put up with.

[John Cannis, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I too am concerned about the $1.1 billion that is being quoted. God knows what it is going to be afterwards. Nevertheless, let us work with the $1.1 billion figure. The hon. member has worked very hard over the years on the education file as a whole and post-secondary education in particular. It intrigued me when he touched on that area in the short time that he had.

On behalf of Canada's future, our young men and women who must have a good education so that our country can be competitive, would he elaborate on how these funds could help Canada for a better tomorrow?