Debates of Feb. 8th, 2011

Opposition Motion—Tax Rate for Large Corporations

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

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to ask a question of my distinguished colleague from Westmount—Ville-Marie. I know he has done a great deal of work in the research and innovation area. Canada was a world leader in public investment in innovation and research from 2000-2005. In the last few years, we have gone backward a bit.

Does the member think some of this $6 billion could be more effectively used to improve productivity by investing in innovation and research?

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour for his insightful question. Think of what we could do with the money we are now borrowing to give to corporations. We could be using it in order to increase Canada's productivity and innovation.

Let me quote from Jayson Myers, President of the Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters on corporate tax cuts in the budget in 2008. He said:

This budget worries me because it sends the message that a reduction in corporate tax rates is the silver bullet for the economy. That gets you in the game. But, it doesn't give you many chips to play with as other nations are encouraging investments in technology, innovation, and skills.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time this afternoon with the member for Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing.

I am delighted to rise in the House to speak to the Liberal motion calling on the government not to proceed with further corporate tax cuts and to restore the tax rate for large corporations to 2010 levels in the upcoming budget.

Canadians are absolutely astounded that the Liberals could bring this motion forward with a straight face. The Liberals supported the last round of corporate tax cuts that came into effect on January 1. Now they are bringing forward this motion and running ads against the very tax cuts they supported. It is enough to make anyone's head spin.

The Liberals have either proposed or supported every corporate tax cut over the past 15 years. It is hard for Canadians to take their sudden change of heart seriously.

Let us review where this ideological drive to lower corporate tax rates originated. It began in 2001 with Prime Minister Jean Chrétien. It was the Liberal Party that began the biggest snow job in Canadian history by telling Canadians that we needed to reduce corporate tax rates in order to be competitive with our biggest international competitors. The Liberals said that only then would companies stay in Canada, create jobs for Canadians and thereby make everyone better off. That is the classic theory of trickle-down economics and, frankly, Canadians are tired of being trickled on.

Since 2001, the value of the corporate income tax cuts under successive Liberal and Conservative governments is $120 billion. While the Conservatives have gifted corporate Canada with $8.6 billion in tax cuts to the end of last year, the Liberals actually implemented corporate tax cuts worth more than $110 billion during their terms in office. Now they want Canadians to believe that they are the ones who want to get tough on corporate welfare bums. It defies credibility.

The one and only time that the Liberals put the brakes on their own corporate largesse was when the government of Paul Martin was on the brink of defeat in 2005. It looked like the government's budget would be voted down, but then, as now, it was the NDP and its leader, the member for Toronto—Danforth, who put partisanship aside and made Parliament work for Canadians.

As a condition of supporting the budget, the NDP demanded that the Liberals not proceed with their planned corporate tax cuts of $4.6 billion and instead invest that money into lowering costs for education, cutting pollution, building affordable housing, more transit, increased foreign aid and new protection for pensions in the case of employer bankruptcies. It is just another example in the NDP's long history of getting results for Canadians.

For the Liberals to now claim that they believe corporate tax cuts are the wrong priority is more than passing strange. Frankly, the Liberals are trying to play voters for fools and Canadians are not having it.

As Angelo Persichilli put it in this weekend's Toronto Star:

For Liberals, stopping the scheduled corporate tax cuts is the mantra, and they are willing to vote against the budget. In doing so, [the Liberal leader] will vote against the budget over something—corporate tax cuts—that is not even in the budget. The tax cut was in a previous budget, which [the Liberal leader] supported. So this year he wants to vote against a budget he supported in the past.

The Liberal leader treats Canada like a Costco store where he shops for issues to defeat the government. In September 2009, he believed the make-or-break issue was employment insurance. “Your time is up”, he told [the Prime Minister], but then he dropped the topic. In March 2010, he voted for a Conservative budget he didn't like and in March 2011 he wants to change another budget he supported in the past. What kind of alternative can we expect from a party whose leader never ends a debate on the same side where he started?

Frankly, we cannot expect an alternative at all. Liberal, Tory, it is the same old story.

Only the NDP has consistently opposed blanket, untargetted corporate tax giveaways.

Blanket corporate tax cuts come with no strings attached and do not create jobs. All too often companies just pocket the money and continue to take jobs out of Canada. Let me give three quick examples.

Despite corporate tax cuts, U.S. Steel locked out its workers in Hamilton and is now shipping its work south of the border. In Quebec, Electrolux vacuumed up the corporate tax cuts before closing operations and relocating to a U.S. state with no minimum wage laws and no overtime standards. John Deere had just cashed its cheque from Canadian taxpayers when in 2008 it closed its profitable Welland plant, taking those jobs to Mexico.

Those are but three examples. There are many, many more. The costs to Canadians are jobs, growth in the economy and massive cuts to services.

The NDP has also been at the forefront of opposing the continued tax cuts that benefit Canada's big banks.

The very banks that posted profits in excess of $15 billion in the first three-quarters of last year, received an additional tax cut of $645 million from their Conservative friends. Surely that money would have been better spent on supporting decent family sustaining jobs, investing in blue-green industries and extending the stimulus commitments that were made to cities so that desperately needed urban infrastructure renewal would not end up on property tax bills. That would require the Conservatives to choose people over profits and that just is not in their DNA.

Do taxpayers really need to keep subsidizing big oil and gas? While the Americans have moved to end oil industry tax breaks, the Conservatives continue to dish out $2.5 billion to oil and gas every year. Other jurisdictions are beginning to take seriously their responsibility to fight global warming. The government, instead, continues to subsidize some of the world's biggest and richest polluters.

Clearly, corporate tax cuts are exacerbating the problems confronting Canadians today. One of the most succinct expressions of that was in Ralph Surette's superb column in The Chronicle Herald this past weekend. Like the Liberals before them, the Conservatives want to believe that corporate tax cuts are essential for stimulating the economy, but, frankly, that is nonsense. Properly translated, what they are really saying is that they will deepen the deficit and deprive the country of infrastructure and social spending in order to advance the worldwide cult of billionaires ascendant in the hope that they will leave us a few crumbs.

The nonsense runs deep and persists, despite being thoroughly debunked. One of the debunking forces is the government's own finance department, which figures show that cutting taxes is one of the poorest ways to create jobs, giving 20¢ growth for every dollar of taxes cut. Spending on infrastructure, on the other hand, gives $1.40 per dollar spent and support for the unemployed and the poor is also around $1.40.

In addition, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives has shown that corporate taxes dropped from 28% in 2000 to 18% in 2010, while business investment per GDP has stayed exactly the same. In fact, it has hardly budged since 1981, the first year data on business investments were recorded when the federal corporate tax rate was 36%. In the 1960s, a prime time for industrial expansion in Canada, the rate was 40%. The rate is due to drop to 16.5% this year and 15% next. Measured from 2007, when the rate was 22.12%, the annual loss to the Canadian treasury will be $13.7 billion by next year. Meanwhile, it has also been pointed out that since a large part of Canada is foreign owned, a Canadian cut in their taxes is just a minor bit of bookkeeping for corporations that see this as their due, and hardly worth sending a note of appreciation to the Canadian taxpayer who will pick up the tab.

As is also known, tax is just one of the many factors that lead corporations to invest or not. Many a credulous, manipulated or ideologically driven government has ruined its public finances by chowing down on neo-con propaganda about tax cuts that date back to the Reagan–Thatcher era. New Brunswick is one, as are the U.S. and Ireland, to name a few. Need we all go over the cliff?

This is not just about the best way to stimulate the economy. It is about whom our governments serve, the public interest of democratic nations or that of a swiftly rising global aristocracy of money. The stock markets are booming again and Wall Street, fresh from sinking the world economy, is back to giving itself billions of dollars in bonuses, as is Bay Street, while the real economy does not move and in fact the signs are still that more and more people are falling into poverty.

An article in the current The Atlantic entitled “The Rise of the New Ruling Class: How the Global Elite is Leaving You Behind”, reports that there is a strong sentiment among that class that if the middle class is falling behind, ”Tough. I made billions, why can't they”. We call this the Marie Antoinette school of economics.

Many among this growing legion of billionaires are new money. The founder of Facebook, a 26-year-old worth nearly $30 billion overnight, is held up as an example. A small idea that went viral created nothing economically. It just sucked it out of somewhere else. The question is whether guys like him need a tax cut. Granted that some in the hyper-rich set are seeing the dangers and, as in the 1920s, are turning to philanthropy. at least in the United States, led by Bill Gates and Warren Buffett of course. Philanthropy takes the edge off but it is no substitute for sound public finance.

The question before us today is what we will do as Canadian legislators to protect the Canadian public interest.

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

Mr. Speaker, I want to ensure the hon. member understands that the Liberal Party and the Liberal government believed in corporate tax cuts during times of surplus. In fact, we still believe in cutting corporate taxes when there is a surplus and when we can afford to do it without putting Canada further in deficit.

Today, we are in an unprecedented $56 billion deficit and it is not right to cut corporate taxes further now.

Will the member confirm what the NDP intention is in terms of the vote on this opposition day motion? Will the NDP be supporting the Liberal opposition day motion that says that it is wrong to cut corporate taxes further during times of deficit, or is the NDP position one of supporting corporate tax cuts when Canada is in deficit but opposing them when Canada is in surplus? I find this troubling.

Perhaps the NDP has embraced Reaganomics or the trickle down notion that we are already in debt so let us cut corporate taxes and go deeper in debt. Perhaps Ronald Regan, who recently would have had his 100th birthday, is looking down at all of us today saying that he even convinced the Canadian New Democrats to embrace his voodoo economic policy.

I am not certain. I am always confused by NDP economic policy but this one is particularly troubling. Is it the NDP position today that it will support the Liberal motion or does it support cutting corporate taxes on borrowed money, the Conservative Reaganomic voodoo economic policy?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am really surprised and saddened to learn that the member is so easily troubled and confused.

Honestly, if the position that he is putting before the House is that the Liberals changed their mind on corporate tax cuts because there should not be any when times are bad, then, frankly, why last year, when we were in the worst year of this economic downturn, did they support the Conservatives who added an additional $1.8 billion in corporate tax cuts?

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

They did that for two years in a row.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

They have now done that for two years, as the member for Elmwood—Transcona rightly points out, and Canadians are paying the price.

A question should be put to the member for Kings—Hants. When did he change his mind about corporate tax cuts? Where is the consistency? When will he come clean with Canadians and explain to them that this is a position of convenience for the Liberals because that is what polls are telling them to do today?

[Christian Ouellet, Bloc, Brome—Missisquoi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my hon. colleague a question. In general, large companies make huge profits and small businesses and co-operatives make very little profit, meaning that it is not these companies that are being targeted.

Could the member explain the difference between the massive companies that make a fortune—sometimes obscene amounts of money—and small businesses? And does she not think that even if the Liberals came to power, they would have the same neo-liberal theory that is currently popular with the Conservatives?

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will answer the second question first.

I absolutely believe that the Liberals and the Conservatives have the same economic policy. In fact, if we look at their records over the last 15 years, their policies are identical, which is why the Liberals for so many years had no problem voting for the corporate tax cuts that are now being implemented by the Conservatives.

The member makes a really good point with respect to small businesses. There is a big distinction between corporate tax cuts for large corporations, which is what we have been opposing consistently, whether it be the oil and gas sector, the big banks or small businesses which, in all of our communities, are the engines of economic growth. We need to support those businesses. Those are not the tax cuts that we ought to be cancelling. We are talking about tax cuts to huge corporations that, frankly, are taking money out of Canadians taxpayer pockets and not reinvesting it in our communities.

I would remind the House of cases like Vale in Sudbury, for example, where workers were on strike for over a year. Vale and its operations in Thompson just received $1 billion from the government and yet it is throwing 600 people out of work.

In my hometown of Hamilton, as I referenced in my speech, companies like U.S. Steel also benefit from these tax cuts and yet we have 9,000 people whose pensions are at risk and 900 active workers who are now locked out. It is not producing steel but the company sure cashed in on all of those corporate tax cuts.

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am extremely pleased to be following on the heels of my colleague from Hamilton Mountain.

I am delighted to be here for the curious debate that we are having today. It is like the Liberals are having a costume party that nobody else was invited to.

We are debating a motion that is designed to get the Liberals off the hook for supporting the very corporate tax cuts that they now say we cannot afford. It is not that they oppose them in spirit, but surely they have noticed that there is less than exuberant support for these measures at the table that really counts, and that is the kitchen table.

I would like to welcome the Liberals into the fold for the day and get on with explaining why New Democrats have long been critical of across-the-board corporate tax cuts.

What we are hearing from the Liberals is that we cannot afford the current round of corporate tax cuts. This again is old news for New Democrats. We said this last year and it remains true today.

New Democrats understand that we have incurred a significant deficit in the past few years trying to keep the country from suffering the very worst effects of the global economic crisis. We understand that we are not out of the woods yet so this is no time to be handing out tax breaks to corporations that benefit from doing business in Canada and can afford to be part of the solution. That is just common sense.

We can look at other rationale for delaying or, in the best case scenario, cancelling the next round of tax cuts, and that is the fact that Canada's current corporate tax rate is already very low and not a barrier for doing business. New Democrats said this last year when the budget was being debated as well.

We are wondering where the Liberals were during last year's budget debate. That is the budget that made these cuts possible. The answer is simple. During that debate, the Liberals said that they agreed with the cuts and thus justified their vote on the budget, which resulted in the HST.

Support for these no-strings-attached measures is nothing new for the Liberals. They have a long history of providing corporate handouts. How they can imagine that a debate here today will erase such a long and consistent record is somewhat mind boggling. We knew in the last election that the Liberals were planning to go ahead with these tax measures full bore.

The leader of the Liberals told the Empire Club that corporate tax breaks were “the thing to do”. He ignored the fact that for many of these corporate entities it was just money going back into their pockets and nowhere else. He ignored, with these kinds of cuts, that there were no guarantees of jobs created or any investment, at least not in Canada.

In fairness, he had a tough audience. These are not the men and women who ride the buses and carry their lunch to work every day. These are not the people living paycheque to paycheque. These are the elite of society, the ones who will benefit from the cuts we are discussing here.

New Democrats do not think that kind of reward system is necessary or smart. We believe tax breaks should be earned. There are many good reasons to lower the tax burden of specific corporations. We may want to promote innovation through research and development. We may want to reward progressive environmental measures. We may even want to help a company that has a commitment to a community and shows a real need to lower their current tax burden. That is smart.

The difference is New Democrats do not have blind faith in corporations that they would take the money and then deliver. We just have to look at Vale for that.

We understand that corporations do not have good or bad intentions; they have interests, which is only natural. Why should they be expected to do anything that can be considered above and beyond without a carrot to lead the way? Sadly, this pragmatic view is not shared by the Liberals. They prefer to have faith in these corporations to do the right thing.

Just to be clear, it is not only this latest round of corporate tax cuts that the Liberals supported. They have supported them all, whether proposed by Conservative or Liberal governments, it does not matter to them.

Why would that be? These cuts go hand in hand with the model of global trade that both the Liberals and Conservatives helped to create. They agree wholeheartedly on the broader issue. This is why New Democrats have maintained that there is little difference between these two parties.

Both ignore the real cost of creating an economy where it is conceivable that companies will run from one favourable tax rate to another, able to do business pretty much anywhere in the world, but accountable to no one in the process. They believe this is the only way to go about doing business and everything else is doomed to failure.

We saw how fickle this model can be during the global economic crisis that began in 2008 and, more specific, in the way these policies left Ireland so exposed. Its economy collapsed pretty much overnight leaving, it indebted to the EU and IMF for an 85 billion euro bailout package with strings so firmly attached that any future government would have little room to manoeuvre for years to come.

Ireland was called the Celtic Tiger and in the years leading up to the crisis, Liberals and Conservatives sang its praise and thought Canada should follow in its footsteps. The Liberal finance critic said as much in the finance committee claiming, “We're the party of deep corporate tax cuts, and I'd like to see Canada as the Ireland of North America”.

I wonder where he stands now?

It is important for Canadians to realize that this is the real vision of the Liberal Party. The Liberals want to pretend that this is not the case because people are waking up to the true cost of these kinds of measures. It is too little and far too late for this deathbed conversion to be taken with anything less than a grain of salt.

We know where the Conservatives stand on the issue. They are the main cheerleaders for corporate tax cuts. To them, it is the mantra. Conservatives tell us that the corporations will pack up their stuff and go somewhere else if we do not give them these cuts. They truly believe that the final round of scheduled tax cuts is all that is keeping corporations in Canada. They do not seem to believe there is much else that makes Canada special or a good place to do business.

New Democrats recognize that there is a lot more that is great about doing business in Canada. Canada is home to strong, skilled, proud workers who give a full day's work and who contribute to their workplaces, their communities and their country.

The Conservative view is somewhat sad. Judging by their arguments, it appears there is a crisis of confidence in their own country on the government's benches. They truly seem to believe there is no benefit beyond the tax rate for corporations to remain in Canada.

New Democrats cannot share that view.

The Conservatives must be nervous because they are set to spend $6.5 million to promote this latest corporate gift. That is a lot of money. Even Conservatives must recognize this is a difficult issue to sell to Canadians.

I have heard smaller amounts called “exorbitant”. I can think of no end of ways that $6.5 million could help out some of the towns in my constituency. People in Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing do not need to be told what to think. They need a place to go to work. It is just wasteful to spend money promoting these tax cuts and it is grotesque to do it when so many Canadians are still hurting.

Some might ask, what can we do instead of corporate tax cuts? Are there other ways we can retain and attract business in Canada? Of course there are.

There are many ways we can make Canada even more attractive to business, ways that could help out more Canadians in the process. We could make higher education and skills training more accessible. We could improve our health care system and do more to promote to preventative health solutions so our workforce is even more healthy and reliable. We could ensure we have dependable pension plans that would not fail, thereby removing a level of responsibility from companies and protecting our citizens at the same time.

New Democrats are very interested in working with corporations to create an environment that is beneficial to the business community and Canadians alike. We do not believe sweeping corporate tax cuts create that kind of environment and we would like to see appropriate incentives in place that allow corporations to earn their tax benefits.

[Paul Calandra, Conservative, Oak Ridges—Markham, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened somewhat intensely to the member's speech. It is a bit disappointing. She talked about how we could use money more effectively. I note she voted against the gun registry, continuing that $2 billion boondoggle.

However, I will give the NDP some points for consistency. Its members have always voted against families and tax cuts for families. They voted against tax cuts for small and medium-sized business. They voted for tax cuts for individuals. They voted against every investment we have made, across the board. They voted against income splitting. They voted against reducing the GST from 7% to 6% to 5%. I will give them marks for consistency.

I know the coalition has been working very closely together over the last while and it has become very difficult, for me at least, to keep track of the Liberal flip-flops over the last while. I wonder if those members might be able to give us some advance understanding of where else the Liberals intend on flip-flopping over the next while so we can start to prepare Canadians for yet another round of Liberal flip-flopping.

We know the Liberals flip-flopped on daycare. They were going to make daycare spaces, which never happened. They changed their minds. We know they talked about free trade. They changed their minds on that as well. They changed their minds on the GST. One week they like taxes. The next week they do not like taxes. They want to tax iPods. They are not certain on small and medium-sized business. Therefore, I am not sure where they are going.

Because those members have been working so closely together, I could use the knowledge they have gained in trying to work with a group of individuals that have no principles and that change their minds constantly. I can see some of the difficulties the NDP must be having in all of this.

Does she have some advance understanding or notice of what other areas the Liberals intend on flip-flopping over in the next while?

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will let him ask the Liberals that question. We know the Liberals have been flip-flopping on just about everything these days. They have been taking some pages out of our previous platform and using those as something to run on.

I would tend to think that $6.5 million to promote this latest corporate gift is really atrocious, given the fact places like White River, Smooth Rock Falls and Opasatika actually need jobs in the forestry sector. The government could be propping up the forestry sector, but it does not want to do that. It could have tied the black liquor subsidy to the mills that were producing it, but it failed to do that.

Unlike the Liberals and the Conservatives, New Democrats are confident that there are many reasons to do business in Canada and that the sky will not fall if we do not go ahead with these scheduled cuts.

I want to talk about the rate of tax cuts in the United States. It is quite interesting. The rates in the United States, if we look at the table, Canada's total tax rate, provincial and federal, is 29.2% compared to 46.8% in the U.S. We are in fact well below our OECD comparatives. Based on all of this, why would companies want to leave Canada if we did not lower our tax rates?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the motion before us today that we are debating says:

That, in the opinion of the House, the Government's decision to proceed with cuts to the tax rate for large corporations fails to address the economic needs of Canadian families, and this House urges the Government to reverse these corporate tax cuts and restore the tax rate for large corporations to 2010 levels in the upcoming Budget.

Will the member be supporting the motion?

[Carol Hughes, NDP, Algoma—Manitoulin—Kapuskasing, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is obvious the member did not listen to my speech at all.

The Liberals only have one thing on their mind, and that is how to save their bacon. Again, if we look at the U.S. federal rate, which, by the way, is 35%, that means when a U.S. corporation active in this country is taxed on its income in Canada at 16.5%, it then passes on the difference to the U.S. treasury. What is that? A tax transfer courtesy of the Canadians. This is estimated to be worth approximately $2.4 billion this year alone.

[Russ Hiebert, Conservative, South Surrey—White Rock—Cloverdale, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate this opportunity to stand up against the Liberal tax hike proposal.

With the global economic recovery still very fragile, our government remains focused on ensuring that Canada offers the right environment to attract the business investment necessary to create more and better paying jobs, thereby improving the living standards of all Canadians.

The Liberal leader and some of his colleagues do not favour delivering the tax relief introduced by our Conservative government and passed by Parliament in 2007 to help businesses create jobs.

I find the Liberals' call today for a tax hike intriguing given their previous statements on the importance of providing tax relief for job creators.

The Liberal member for Kings—Hants used to understand the importance of tax relief when he said:

—the best way to develop and grow employment in Canada, particularly in terms of the new economy and the knowledge based industries, is not by pouring government money into specific businesses... Instead it is to reduce the tax burden—

That is exactly what we are trying to do.

I will spend the little time that I have today providing, the facts the Liberal Party is trying to ignore.

Let us be clear. Our Conservative government believes in lower taxes. The Liberals believe in raising taxes and higher taxes for families, seniors and businesses, higher Liberal taxes that will set families back, kill jobs and harm Canada's economic recovery.

Our Conservative government's tax cuts for businesses will do what the Liberals' call for higher taxes cannot, and that is to decrease the cost of business capital and increase the rate of return on investment. With more money available through lower taxes, businesses will be able to invest more in research and development, high tech, and productivity improving machinery and most important of all, in workers.

That is why since 2006 our Conservative government has implemented substantial, broad-based tax reductions that support investment, job creation and growth in all sectors of the economy.

Business taxes have been reduced from more than 22% in 2006 to 16.5% this year, and are on the way to 15% in 2012, as already agreed to by this Parliament.

However, business tax relief is just one of the tax relief measures we have introduced for the benefit of hard-working Canadians trying to make their businesses a success. There have been many others. For example, the federal capital tax, a particularly damaging tax for business investment, was eliminated in 2006. We have also reduced the tax rate applying to small business income to 11% in 2008. The amount of small business income eligible for this lower tax rate was increased to $500,000 from $300,000.

I see that my time is quickly coming to an end, so let me wrap up with a few concluding remarks.

Generating sustained increases in our standard of living may not be simple, but if we want higher wages, more jobs, and a higher standard of living, we need the business investment that results from the government's tax relief for job creators.

Canadians do not want dangerous new government spending commitments this year that would only trigger higher taxes, kill jobs and reverse Canada's fragile economic growth.

Under the leadership of our Prime Minister, our government will continue to focus on protecting the financial security of hard-working Canadians and their families and on keeping taxes low.

As Conservatives, we believe that this approach to encouraging business investment is the best way to create a brighter future for all Canadians. It is what Canadians expect of us and what we must deliver.

Accordingly, I would urge members to vote against this motion.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

It being 5:15 p.m. it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the business of supply.

The question is on the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

No.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

In my opinion the yeas have it.

And five or more members having risen:

Call in the members.

And the bells having rung:

Accordingly, the vote on this motion is deferred until the conclusion of government orders tomorrow, February 9.

[Gordon O'Connor, Conservative, Carleton—Mississippi Mills, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I ask that you see the clock at 5:30 p.m.

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

Is it agreed?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.