Debates of May 7th, 2013

Situation in Syria

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

(Motion agreed to)

Bill S-8—Notice of time allocation motion

[Peter Van Loan, Conservative, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the safe drinking water for first nations act would allow our government, in co-operation with first nations, to ensure safe access to drinking water and to ensure the effective treatment of waste water and the protection of sources of drinking water on first nation lands.

However, I would like to advise that an agreement could not be reached under the provisions of Standing Orders 78(1) or 78(2) with respect to the second reading stage of Bill S-8, an act respecting the safety of drinking water on first nation lands.

Under the provisions of Standing Order 78(3), I give notice that a minister of the Crown will propose at the next sitting a motion to allot a specific number of days or hours for the consideration and disposal of the proceedings at the said stage.

The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-60, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 21, 2013 and other measures, be read the second time and referred to a committee, and of the amendment.

Bill C-60—Economic Action Plan 2013 Act, No. 1

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the Minister of Finance for once again introducing a budget that would put us on track for jobs, growth and long-term prosperity.

Low taxes are an integral part of our budget, and we are on track to balance the budget by 2015-2016. Economic action plan 2013 would announce more savings in government spending, totalling $2 billion by 2015-2016. We would implement a number of very important measures here.

I would also like to talk about how our economic action plan would help Manitoba, and indeed all the provinces of Canada, manage the important infrastructure demands and services to Canadians that are so important to our country's economic well-being. Federal support to the provinces has reached historic levels of $62 billion. Federal support to Manitoba is at an all-time high of $3.4 billion, up 21% from under the previous Liberal government.

Indeed, the total Manitoba provincial budget is funded 40% by the federal government, and it is still raising taxes. Our Conservative government has done this while keeping taxes low and maintaining the transfers. Unlike the high-taxing NDP and Liberals, our Conservative government believes in low taxes and leaving more money where it belongs: in the pockets of hard-working Canadian families and job-creating businesses.

Since 2006, we have cut taxes more than 150 times, reducing the overall tax burden to its lowest level in 50 years. While the NDP opposite thinks governments can spend money better than citizens, it is our firm belief that citizens should spend as much of their own money as possible.

We have cut taxes in every way the government collects them, including personal taxes, consumption taxes, businesses taxes, excise taxes and much more. This has meant savings of more than $3,000 per year to the average family of four. We have done all this while maintaining the transfers to the provinces.

We stand in stark contrast to the NDP Government of Manitoba and its NDP colleagues in Ottawa. The Manitoba NDP is now raising the provincial sales tax to 8% to pay for its years of fiscal recklessness. Its federal leader in the House wants to create a carbon tax to generate another $21 billion for further irresponsible spending.

Manitobans and Canadians are quickly coming to realize that the tax and spend ways of the NDP are not sustainable. To repeat an important point, one simply cannot spend oneself rich.

We can see the difference in approaches when we look at Manitoba versus Saskatchewan. A two-income family of four earning $60,000 in Saskatchewan will pay an estimated $1,593 to its provincial government in income taxes, PST and the gas tax. The same family in Manitoba earning $60,000 will pay a mind-boggling $4,525 in taxes to the Manitoba NDP government.

Our Conservative government has taken the alternate path for the past seven years. We have paid down $37 billion of the debt. Our fiscal responsibility and aggressive debt reduction have placed Canada in the very best possible position to weather the global recession. This is something the NDP simply does not understand.

It is in our country's best interests to have a strong fiscal position to weather any downturns that may occur. While other countries continue to struggle with debt that is spiralling out of control, Canada is in the best fiscal position in the G7. Our net debt to GDP ratio is 35.8%, the lowest level among G7 countries.

While the NDP and Liberals want to engage in reckless spending, our Conservative government is on track to return to balanced budgets in 2015-2016. That plan is working. Indeed, in the last two years, we have cut the deficit by more than half.

Budget 2013 would build on these efforts to reduce government spending, by announcing an additional $1.7 billion in ongoing savings. Overall, measures taken by this government since budget 2010 would result in total ongoing savings of roughly $14 billion. Unlike the parties opposite, the Liberals and the NDP, and I assume the Greens, our Conservative government will not raise taxes on Canadians to balance the budget.

What are the benefits to my home province of Manitoba? We have the Canada jobs grant to help more Canadians find high-quality and well-paying jobs. We have tax breaks for manufacturers who buy new machinery, and an extended hiring credit for small businesses. There is a record $70 billion of federal investment into infrastructure across Canada over the last few years.

There are major investments in research and technology and new tax relief for Canadians who give to charities, adopt a child or rely on home care services. Import tax tariffs have been eliminated on many everyday items that Canadian families buy.

Economic action plan 2013 also confirmed the Conservative government's continued all-time record support for hospitals, schools and other important health and social services. In 2013, the federal transfer support to Manitoba is planned to be $643 million higher than under the former Liberal government.

My province tends to flood from time to time, given our geographic location; our government has also delivered $100 million in advance payments to the Province of Manitoba for the flood of 2011 under the Disaster Financial Assistance Act. It is estimated that once all the costs have been tallied, the federal government's share will be close to $500 million under the DFAA. Our Conservative government has gone beyond that by announcing another $99 million for flood mitigation across Canada in 2012 to help prevent future damage to infrastructure, homes and farms.

In terms of agriculture, we are doubling the current deduction limit under the restricted farm loss income tax rules from $8,700 to over $17,500. This is of huge benefit to many young producers and farm families when some members work off the farm and may have built up farm losses.

We are increasing the lifetime capital gains exemption to $800,000 from $750,000. This would make it easier for our Canadian farmers to plan for their retirement and transfer family farms to the next generation.

We are investing $165 million in Genome Canada, which has developed new technologies for the agricultural sector.

In terms of environmental initiative, I would like to compliment my colleague from West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country. He listed some of the incredible environmental initiatives that our government has undertaken. As the chair of the Conservative hunting and angling caucus, I am proud of the $10 million that has been announced for work on fisheries conservation projects in partnership with local fisheries conservation groups. This is something that our hunting and angling caucus has asked for, and it would create tremendous environmental benefits across the country. As a fisheries biologist myself, I can say that this program will do wonders for our recreational fisheries.

I would note, contrary to what the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands said, that these kinds of partnerships are now allowed under the new Fisheries Act, and we will see clear, delivered conservation benefits because of our new Fisheries Act. In terms of the environment, that is the difference between this side of the House and the other parties opposite. The Conservative environmental policy generates real, measurable environmental results on the ground; the other side just talks.

We have supported clean technologies. The Nature Conservancy of Canada would receive $20 million for the acquisition of very important lands across the country. We want to make sure that the superb work of such groups as the Nature Conservancy of Canada, Ducks Unlimited Canada and the Delta Waterfowl Foundation is recognized.

I would also note that under the previous Liberal government, greenhouse gas emissions increased by a staggering 30%. We were the first government in Canadian history to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

I would also like to point out that there is a clear relationship between how wealthy a country is and how well it does in terms of environmental protection. That is why environmental quality in free market, democratic, capitalist countries is immeasurably better than in socialist countries. Socialist left-wing governments may talk about the environment or not, but the end result is a trashing of it.

As a country gets richer, it invests more in environmental protection and generates more and better environmental results. That is why, under the economic policies of this government that allow our economy and our wealth to grow, we will see measurable environmental improvement under this government for many years to come.

[Mathieu Ravignat, NDP, Pontiac, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I can see that my colleague on the other side of the House has learned his Conservative catechism very well. He can probably recite the formula perfectly. The problem is the formula just does not work. There are as many unemployed now as there were before the recession.

What the member fails to recognize is that the litmus test for any economic policy is the creation of jobs. Where are the jobs?

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure where my friend has been, but one of the most common complaints of the business community is that we have lots of jobs but not enough workers to fill them. That is why the Canada job grant is so important. It matches what employers need with the skills that potential workers have. The Canada job grant program will allow Canadian workers to acquire the skills that employers need.

I would also point out that Canada's economic record is the best among the G7 countries by far. Our Conservative environmental and economic track records speak for themselves.

[Ted Hsu, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Mr. Speaker, what my Conservative colleagues say about taxes is just plain wrong.

Earlier today the Prime Minister claimed, as have other members on the Conservative side, that every family of four would save $3,000 a year in taxes. It turns out that the family that saves $3,000 in taxes is a family of four with two working parents making an income of $100,000. I do not know about others, but that is way above the median income in my riding. Furthermore, the share of the national debt of that family of four has increased by $16,000 in the last five years, so those tax savings are totally illusory.

Furthermore, the member for Toronto Centre told us last week that the Conservative government is actually increasing overall taxes. The member for Toronto Centre told us that in March 2010 the government voted to raise taxes by $720 million. In April 2012, the government voted to raise taxes by $3.6 billion. In March of this year the Conservatives voted to raise taxes by $3 billion.

Many falsehoods are being claimed by the Conservatives as they cross the country trying to sell this budget.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure about the question there, but as I have the floor again, I want to reiterate the importance of creating a climate for business and economic growth.

Public policy matters. Letting Canadian entrepreneurs and Canadian businesses go about their jobs of creating wealth will make our country strong, generate income for vital social programs, fund retirement benefits for seniors and make our country better overall to withstand any economic perturbations that may happen in the future.

[Brad Butt, Conservative, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to rise in the House today to speak to Bill C-60, an act to implement certain measures contained in the budget presented in the House on March 21, 2013, by our very capable Minister of Finance.

The bill is about continuing the important work—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Kyle Seeback]

I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member for Mississauga—Streetsville, but we are still on questions and comments. I apologize. I thought you rose to ask a question.

The member for Saanich—Gulf Islands has about 40 seconds for a quick question.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member referred to the criticisms from this side of the House about what the current Conservative administration is doing to environmental laws. I want to put to him, as I did to the member for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, that he must bear in mind that both John Fraser and Tom Siddon were Progressive Conservative ministers of fisheries who very strongly criticized the destruction of the Fisheries Act in Bill C-38. The changes in Bill C-38 will not create better fisheries management or protection of habitat, and although it is great to see a small amount of money going to small NGOs through conservation partnerships, it is woefully inadequate, given the cuts to science and habitat protection.

[Robert Sopuck, Conservative, Dauphin—Swan River—Marquette, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am a very strong supporter of the changes we made to the Fisheries Act and to environmental laws.

What we did was eliminate needless duplication. What my hon. friend and members across the way do not appreciate is that project proponents and businesses today build the very best environmental standards into the design of their projects from day one. Environmental processes had little to do with that. Our environment will continue to improve under the new environmental laws that this government has put in. The member can take that to the bank.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions among the parties and I believe that, if you were to seek it, you would find unanimous consent for the following motion: That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, Bill C-413, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (judicial discretion), and Bill C-414, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (cruelty to animals), be withdrawn from the Order Paper.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Does the hon. member have the unanimous consent of the House to propose this motion?

[Some hon. members]

Yes.

No.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, in anticipation of my colleague's speech, which I look forward to and will stick around for, I want to talk about this particular budget implementation bill. It is a little smaller than what we are used to. I think it was my mother who said, years ago, when it came to my being her son, “It is a little smaller than what we are used to.”

However, there is something about this particular budget that continues the narrative, the theme, of not so much what is in it but what is also not in it in terms of the Canadian narrative of compassion, of a great place to be, of the nation where we choose to bring up our children. We think this is the greatest nation in the world, obviously, and we truly believe that this particular budget is not in keeping with the spirit of our nation in many respects.

I want to give the House a quick example of what I am talking about. It is one of the things we are talking about when it comes to this budget implementation bill.

Mr. Speaker, there seems to be some confusion on the other side of the House. I do not know if they want to settle it, or perhaps—

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Is it a bit noisy for the hon. member? I hope the hon. member remembers this tomorrow during question period.

I will just ask members in the back on the government side to take their conversations out of the chamber so that the hon. member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor can be heard.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I accept your comment with the utmost humility, as you are quite right.

I talked about the narrative of this nation and how in many respects, the bill is not in keeping with it. I am the heritage critic. There are many aspects of heritage I have seen over the past year and a half that have caused great trouble. One in particular is with regard to Library and Archives Canada. I have a paper sent to me from a gentleman by the name of Jim Clifford. He is involved with ActiveHistory.ca, and he brings up some very salient points:

Library and Archives Canada also experienced a wave of job losses last summer with the termination of twenty-one archivists and archival assistant positions, a fifty per cent reduction in digitization and circulation staff, and the elimination of the interlibrary loans program. The cuts compounded past reductions in the LAC budget and the series of “modernization” policies that have reduced public access to archival materials and compromised the ability of LAC to acquire new records.

This is a legitimate concern, because instead of saying that we are going to pare down the budget, look at a substantial review, look at practices within certain departments that are inefficient and eliminate them or put them on hold until a later date when we can afford them, the Conservatives, like many governments nowadays, are saying that they are going to make these cuts, and it will be better for them. They will give them less food, but they will feel more full. Where is the logic in that?

Library and Archives Canada is a good example. They claim that it will be that much more efficient and that much better for the end-user, in this case, anyone who wants to find out about the history of this country and the story behind who we are. They are going to have trouble doing that. There is less service.

Parks Canada land across this country, millions of square kilometres, are some of the greatest places in this country to experience what it is to be from this country, whether it is the mountains of the west coast, Wood Buffalo National Park and the sensational scenery there, Ontario, or even the national park where I am from, which is Terra Nova National Park. Parks Canada was hit the hardest by layoffs in the civil service as a result of last year's budget. It was $29 million annually, resulting in an estimated 638 job losses. This is quite a hit to take.

What we expect from this particular implementation bill and other bills that follow is the transparency to say that this is how we are going to pare down these services. What the Conservatives do not do is to seek the advice of those who are involved in day-to-day operations, as illustrated by Library and Archives Canada and Parks Canada. Now we see, paramount to a lot of things in Bill C-60, that it also contains this measure.

I received correspondence from the Independent Media Arts Alliance about the presence of the Treasury Board in negotiations in crown agencies. Here is what it says:

The arm's length relationship is so fundamentally important to the Canadian Council for the Arts and other institutions.... It greatly undermines the spirit and principle of the crown corporation, which while having a direct connection to the federal government is meant to be “shielded from constant government intervention and legislative oversight and thus generally enjoys greater freedom from direct political control than government departments”.

There we see a fundamental difference. Fittingly, over the past six to eight years, we brought to the Conservatives problems with certain crown agencies. The answer was always that they had no direct control. What does this mean now? If something happens with a crown agency, can we say that this is not true any more, because they have direct control over certain aspects? We are now telling Treasury Board that it must get involved in these collective agreements. That is step one. What is next?

Will the mandate of the CRTC also be controlled from the PMO or other sources? This is our fear. I think many Canadians understand that this is a fundamental step backward, certainly over the past four or five years. This particular government does not want to involve itself, yet it does. It is trying to play this side and that side of the story.

Budget 2013 imposes a net tax increase of $3.3 billion in the next five years. One of my hon. colleagues across the way said in the House about two years ago that a tax is a tax. It could be a fee. It could be an adjustment in how we pay fees in this country. No matter what it is, if the government raises the amount of money extracted from the general public, it is a tax.

Some were talking about the so-called iPod tax. Interestingly, with the change recently in tariff regulations, we find that the price of iPods and other items like that are going up. To quote my hon. friend in the Conservative Party, a tax is a tax is a tax. Who is doing the iPod tax?

This is the iPod shuffle. There are many other shuffles we continue to deal with in the House. They appear in the fine print. Over the past three years, budget implementation legislation has always contained fine print that we talk about in the House.

It was the same with EI changes. We did not realize there were changes until people called my office and said that they had to take a job that was an hour's drive away. A women who lived in St. John's told me that she was told that she would have to go to Clarenville. Here was the catch. After taking a ferry for 30 minutes, she would have to drive three and a half hours to get there.

If people have problems with employment insurance, they have the right to appeal. The umpires and the appeals process are being cut. It is being pared down to the bare minimum, which will also make it extremely difficult for these people.

I started by saying that $3.3 billion in the next five years will be an incremental increase. There are safety deposit boxes; dividend tax credits; the deduction for credit unions, which will be crippling for many rural towns' financing; tariff increases; the general preferential tariff, which I spoke about earlier, which is the new iPod tax; character conversion transactions; trust loan trading; mining expenses; life insurance arrangements. The total increase is $5.5 billion.

It is rather disingenuous when the Conservatives put out the same line over and over again. They keep saying that it is their low-tax plan. At some point, people will say, and certainly in my riding they are saying it, that they are not buying that any more.

In this particular instance, when it comes to Bill C-60, some things are positive, but by and large, most things are negative, and therefore I will not be voting for this particular piece of legislation.

(Bill C-413. On the Order: Private Members' Business:)

Second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights of Bill C-413, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (judicial discretion) — Mr. Joe Comartin.

(Bill C-414. On the Order: Private Members' Business:)

Second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights of Bill C-414, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (cruelty to animals) — Mr. Joe Comartin.

Criminal Code

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions among the parties and I believe that, if you were to seek it, you would find unanimous consent for the following motion. I move:

That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice of the House, Bill C-413, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (judicial discretion) and Bill C-414, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (cruelty to animals), be withdrawn from the Order Paper.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

Does the hon. member have unanimous consent of the House to propose this motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Speaker, Conservative, Andrew Scheer]

The House has heard the terms of the motion. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?