Debates of May 14th, 2015

Second Reading

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, as the member would well know, it is our Conservative government that has restored fiscal balance. We have done this through long-term transfers to the provinces. They are historic transfers. This year it was nearly $68 billion. There has been a 62% increase since the Liberals were in government. That is an increase of more than $3 billion and almost 63% since the Liberals. Federal support for health, education, and social services has increased some 59% since we formed government.

I know that the member is a member of Parliament from a great riding in Quebec. There is a very important contribution to the province of Quebec. The federal government has increased transfers to the province of Quebec.

We believe in collaborative government, where we work with our provinces. I wonder if the member can now stand in his place and speak to the advantages these additional transfers to the province of Quebec have brought to the province and to his riding. Would he indeed reconsider his position and the rhetoric we have been hearing in the House on this budget and actually stand up and support his constituents in his riding by supporting this budget?

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, standing up for my constituents is exactly what I am doing in speaking out against this bill.

I find it curious that the parliamentary secretary is talking about a government that works with the provinces.

When he talks about a 59% increase over 10 years, I thank the miracle of compound interest. In fact, if the member crunches the numbers, 59% over a period of 10 years is not all that much.

Why was I smiling about his comment on this government's collaboration with the provinces? Let us take a look at health transfers. There is no collaboration. Ottawa and the provinces had a health agreement, but the government did not renew it. It even refused to sit down with the provinces to renegotiate these transfers. Negotiation involves discussions and collaboration. The government unilaterally imposed a reduction in the growth of health transfers. These are important, especially since health care spending is growing at a higher rate than inflation. Cutting growth from 6% to 3% means that the provinces will see their transfers reduced to half what they were under the agreement that had been signed and negotiated. We are talking about a $36 billion cut in the coming years. Quebec is losing out, as are all of the provinces.

I would like the parliamentary secretary to reconsider his support for this budget bill and the government's policies.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for his excellent speech and his very hard work as a member of the Standing Committee on Finance. It must be so hard sometimes, knowing how the Conservative government operates. I can talk more about that later during my own speech.

I would like my colleague to comment further about something. He talked about measures in the budget that the NDP supports, such as the tax cut for small and medium-sized businesses in Canada. We support that measure because it was our idea. The Conservatives took a long time to act on it. All the same, I would like my colleague to explain how the NDP would have implemented that tax rate. I know that the Conservatives are making our small and medium-sized businesses wait for the tax cut. I would like my colleague to talk about how the NDP would start trying to help Canada's entrepreneurs right away.

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier for that question because it is relevant.

Both the Conservatives and the Liberals rejected our proposal to cut taxes for small businesses. The initiative in the current budget implementation bill does not go as far as the NDP's proposal. When we moved our motion, which was debated for a day in the House, we wanted an immediate reduction from 11% to 10%, and then to 9% when finances allowed, such as in a budget surplus situation.

What the government has put on the table is a plan to gradually reduce small business taxes over a period of time that is twice as long as what was proposed in the NDP motion. I feel that the government has shown bad faith. For one thing, it voted against the principle of cutting taxes for small businesses. For another, it is taking much longer to implement the tax cut than an NDP government would have done.

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to share my time with the member for Burlington, if I that is agreeable.

Mr. Speaker, there is one initiative that stands above all others in this budget bill, because it would allow millions of Canadians, from all backgrounds and walks of life, to work hard and plan ahead to become more self-reliant, and even wealthy, over time. This is the bright future Conservatives want for all Canadians, especially our children and grandchildren. Ordinary people would have the independence that is available only to wealthy people now. That initiative is the tax-free savings account limit being increased to $10,000 a year.

Tax-free savings accounts are the most powerful savings vehicle in Canadian history. They will allow hundreds of thousands of ordinary working people to actually become millionaires.

Here are 10 reasons the Conservative government, in this bill, has the only plan for Canadians to conserve their earnings, build personal wealth, and be financially independent in their senior years: tax-free savings accounts.

Number one, they help our youth understand the importance of saving. What is the most important gift for financial success and security we could give our children and grandchildren? It is teaching them to be self-reliant and to work and save for their future using the power of compound interest. It is teaching them to not spend what they do not have, to not get buried in charge card debt and interest, to pay their bills on time, and to save for life's priorities, like education, a home, and their retirement.

The ratio of debt to net income is 1.6 for the average family in Canada right now. It is the highest ever. However, it gets worse. What happens when the interest rates go up, as they will? Hundreds of thousands of families will be trapped in monthly credit card payments at an 18% interest rate, or higher, that they will struggle to pay down.

By promoting saving as part of our culture, instead of credit card debt, we can help spare millions of young people from this interest rate trap that never ends.

Eleven million Canadians have opened their own tax-free savings accounts so far and agree with us. Every Canadian over 18 should try to save in a tax-free savings account. They should not be misled by the subterfuge of the Liberals, who are telling Canadians that tax-free savings accounts only help the rich. That is absolutely not true. It is never okay to mislead Canadians like this. It is shameful.

Here is the truth about tax-free savings accounts. Sixty per cent of those Canadians who have invested the maximum in tax-free savings accounts to date earn less than $60,000 a year. By whose standards are these people rich? No one's.

More than half of the Canadians who have opened tax-free savings accounts and have saved in them earn $40,000 a year or less. That is 5.5 million people. Are they rich? Certainly not.

The Liberals are setting us all up by saying that they will only increase taxes for the rich. What do they mean by that? Who is that? It is everyone who earns over $40,000, which is the vast majority of Canadians. They want to get their hands on that $6,600 our government has cut from the average Canadian family's tax bill.

The federal Liberal leader has already announced, on May 4, the Liberal plan to cancel our increase for tax-free savings accounts to $10,000 a year. That is a tax increase of the most foolish kind.

Number two, tax-free savings accounts are the great equalizer. Canadians who do not earn over $100,000 a year have only one way to become financially independent: save, invest, and watch their money grow. That is what tax-free savings accounts facilitate.

With tax-free savings accounts, ordinary Canadians who work and save can become wealthy. For example, a skilled tradeswoman electrician who took full advantage of her tax-free savings account limit from age 20, with a modest 4% return on stocks, could receive her first million dollars tax free by age 61. That is 13 years sooner than it would be without a tax-free savings account.

Tax-free savings accounts also grow our economy. When people open tax-free savings accounts with Canadian securities, their money goes to invest in Canadian enterprises that create jobs here in Canada. Businesses expand. Economic activity is boosted. That growth, over decades, could easily replace any lost government tax revenues from tax-free savings accounts.

Here is the problem. The Liberals and the NDP believe, and they want all Canadians to believe, that money not in government hands is not benefiting Canada. This is a Marxist hangover. It is nonsense.

Here is the truth. Money invested by Canadians is money that is loaned out to industry and job creators to help build Canada. Entrepreneurs are our most important creators.

This is reason number four: they support innovation and job creation. With tax-free savings accounts, entrepreneurs can tap into their accumulated tax-free savings to create new industry and replenish their accounts later as their businesses grow.

The fifth reason is that tax-free savings accounts are fair because the government should not tax all people's money twice. It saddens me to see our seniors, the people who built Canada, trying to live on interest on their savings that gets eaten up by inflation and then taxed. They are just falling further behind. With tax-free savings accounts, the federal government is forgoing the double taxation that prevents Canadians from growing their most important lifetime savings, leaving them one little pile of their own money to grow without interference. Canadians deserve that.

The sixth reason is that tax-free savings accounts shine a light on how ordinary Canadians have been robbed of their right to affluence and self-reliance. Big-spending governments, like both opposition parties would create, are addicted to spending and borrowing. Just look at Ontario right now. The Liberals and New Democrats believe that all money belongs to the government and Canadians just get to use it for awhile and governments can tax it back any time they want, any way they want, whenever they want. The Conservatives believe that money earned after tax belongs to the people who earn it. They should have at least one special account that the government has no right to touch, or even its growth, ever again.

The seventh reason is that tax-free savings accounts help ensure better health care for Canadians. Canadians who want to be able to afford choice in their own health care in their senior years should be saving as much as they need in tax-free savings accounts. The most hysterical socialists at the Broadbent Institute are playing the fear card, claiming that health care is threatened if the doubling of tax-free savings accounts is approved. They have no shame. The exact opposite is the truth.

The fact is that governments only cover 60% of our total health care costs. Canadians pay the rest, if they can afford to, such as dental care, chiropractic care, naturopathic care, homeopathic care, long-term care, blood tests, vitamins. We pay more for drugs than we do for doctors. We pay for long-term care. Let us face it, the nanny state is a failure.

People can save in the TFSA and be self-reliant so they are not left without the money they need to pay for these things. By saving $7,000 a year from age 25, at a modest 5% rate of growth, a 65 year old would have $887,000 to handle any such bills. No government could ever do that for them. If that same person saved $10,000 a year and got a 5% rate of return, he or she would have over $1.2 million. This drives the socialists crazy. They cannot stand that ordinary people could be that independent. Who would need the nanny state? That is why the socialists hate TFSAs and would get rid of them if elected.

The eighth reason is that TFSAs reduce the underground economy. TFSAs are registered savings plans. The government knows about them. They will help bring our considerable underground economy above ground by making it more attractive to invest in Canadian companies because the growth is tax free. The government will get more tax income from the companies that grow out of the investments and from their employees.

The ninth reason is that tax-free savings accounts support the flexibility of future governments to act. The Broadbent Institute claims that by 2080 the government will be short $15 billion that it otherwise would have had. That completely ignores the fact that some of those billions of dollars would have remained in the underground economy. It also ignores the multiplier effect of those dollars invested back in the economy and the fact that our economy, by that time, would be as large as $15 trillion. Therefore, $15 billion would be about .001% of such an economy. This is simple math. If governments are ever low on money, they can always raise taxes, reduce spending or borrow if need be. Tax-free savings accounts do not hinder any of that.

The tenth reason is that tax-free savings accounts at $10,000 a year are the absolute best deal Canadian taxpayers have ever been offered. They will motivate Canadians to work, to be entrepreneurs and employ others, to save and to be self-reliant. We can build a much greater nation with millions of citizens like that, and that is what we would do with this budget bill.

[Ève Péclet, NDP, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would just like to give my colleague a basic lesson on the difference between a non-taxable amount and a taxable amount.

My colleague talked about the new universal child care benefit, which will benefit all parents. However, that benefit is taxable at the end of the year when families have to do their tax returns.

In other words, a family that receives about $750 from the government will be taxed—this is taxable income, after all—and will have just a little under $200 left at the end of the year.

Why do my colleague and the Conservative government want to tax families?

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the member has it all wrong. Our party is about lowering taxes on families. That is what we have been doing since we became the government in 2006. In fact, the amount we have lowered taxes for the average Canadian family since 2006 is $6,600 every year. With this budget, we now have lowered taxes in 180 different ways. That is what we are all about and I think the taxpayers know that.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I believe the member is the one who has it all wrong. The government's taxation policy does favour Canada's wealthy. Using his example of the tax-free savings account, let me give him a dose of reality.

A good majority of the constituents who I represent will make individually somewhere between $20,000 to $40,000 a year. Out of that, maybe 5% will have contributed the maximum last year to their tax-free savings accounts. Compare that to those who make over $200,000 a year. There it would be close to 35% who maximize it, and the government has chosen to double that benefit. That tells me the people who benefit the most are the wealthiest in Canada.

That is why I say the taxation policy favours Canada's wealthy. It is not fair taxation policy. Could the member explain how that discrepancy is fair?

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think the hon. member was listening to my speech. The point is that the only way that people who never have an income over $50,000 in their whole working life can ever become independent and have the freedom that wealthy people have is if they are able to save in a tax-free savings account. The growth within that account is never taxed. It is extremely powerful savings plan to help people have that independence later in life. That is the point of tax-free savings accounts.

There will always be people who earn more money than others. However, why are the Liberals trying to create a class war in Canada? Why are the Liberals picking on our doctors, lawyers, union leaders and other business people and even people in the arts? Why are they targeting them and trying to create a class war? I think it is because the Liberals just cannot stand that highly accomplished people earn more than others and they do not make a very large voting base, so too bad for them.

[Earl Dreeshen, Conservative, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to respond to some of the questions I just heard and give the member an opportunity to talk about those. Of those who have maxed out their TFSAs, 60% earned less than $60,000, which is contrary to what the member opposite just said. There are 856,000 Canadians age 65 and over who have maxed out their contributions. Another 1.3 million age 55 and older have done the same. Therefore, it is a tool being used by those who are in the lower and middle incomes. Could the member comment on the actual facts?

[Terence Young, Conservative, Oakville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, those are the undeniable facts. People understand the power of savings with compounded interest in a tax-free savings account. However, if people ever want to know what a potential Liberal budget would look like federally, all they have to do is look at the province of Ontario right now. Ontario Liberals just announced two major tax grabs, the pension tax, which would take about $2 billion out of the pockets of people and employers, and the carbon tax, which would be another $1.5 billion. Then they are going to sell off portions of Ontario Hydro to try to raise another $4.5 billion. Imagine that on a national scale and imagine—

[The Acting Speaker, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Order, please. We only had a limited amount of time on that last round.

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Burlington.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from the riding of Oakville for sharing his time with me today. I am very honoured to stand to speak to Bill C-59.

I have made an attempt to speak to all of the budget bills that have come before us, whether at the time the policy is introduced or during the implementation bills. There are normally two. One is in the spring, after the budget has been presented in the House, to implement what is in the budget, and other measures. There is also, normally, an implementation bill in the fall, which I know will not happen this year because we will be out on the hustings, asking people to support us.

It is my pleasure to be here, particularly this year. Over the last number of years, I have been advocating with our finance minister and finance officials for changes to the RRIFs in terms of the minimum withdrawal. I did not come up with that on my own. I want to thank the over 40 individuals who came to my office over the last year or so to talk about the issue of the level of required withdrawals they had to make from their RRIFs. This is not an organized lobby. They are individuals and their families affected by the existing rules.

I also want to thank the member for West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, who heard the same thing. We were very active with our colleagues on this side of the House on this issue, encouraging them to speak to the finance minister and financial officials about the possibility of looking at the withdrawal rate on RRIFs.

I was very excited to see that in this budget we have actually moved on it. Under the current system, the minimum withdrawal is 7.38%, and that will go down to 5.28%. Why is that important? Why did those 40 people come to see me, and what does it mean to them?

We have a couple of programs for retirement savings. We have the RRSP and RPP to encourage individuals to save for their retirement. Part of that encouragement is to give them tax relief for the amount of money they put away for their retirement.

A few years ago, the program required people to move that money from an RRSP, or the other savings program, into a registered retirement income fund. I believe the age for that was 68 or 69, but we moved it to 71, knowing that people had some more time and did not need the money that early. The fact is that people are living much longer than when this program was introduced decades ago. People need their retirement money to last longer. They need to be able to stretch it out to meet the needs they will have if they make into their 90s. Many of my constituents are making it into their 90s.

In my riding alone, the senior cohort is not only growing, it is actually the majority. That is over 55; it is not everyone over 71, However, that cohort is growing and moving forward and we need to be there now, making the changes now, so they can take advantage of it.

There is an excellent chart in the budget, which I would like to read into the record. Regarding the changes that we would make to RRIFs, or registered retirement income funds, let us look at the difference that it would make to an individual. Let us make the assumption, as the budget does, that it is $100,000. An 2% inflation rate is built into that, and the return on investment in their income fund is at 5%. Some will do better, some will do a little worse, but this is our chart.

At age 71, one would have $100,000. At age 80, under the existing rules, one would have $64,000 left, but under the new rules of this budget implementation legislation, it would be $77,000, a difference of 20%. This is a significant difference that those individuals could hold on to for the retirement funds that they need for basic living. Under the current rules, at age 85, it would be $47,000, which would go to $62,000. Many of my constituents are living into their nineties these days. At age 90, under the current rules, it would be $30,000. Under the new rules, it would be $44,000, and so on and so forth. It caps at $20,000 at 94 years of age.

This is important because people are getting older in all ridings in the country, not just mine. We expect individuals to save for their retirement. The other option is to look to governments to support everything, but it cannot afford it. The government will not have the tax base to support the growing bubble of retirees who are coming with the baby boom. We have tools for saving, whether that be the tax-free savings account, as previously mentioned, or the registered retirement savings plan, which encourage people to save for their retirement so they will have less reliance on government to support them.

However, what was happening in my riding, because of the minimum, at 7.38%; because of good planning, good strategy and my constituents working hard, understanding their future and saving money; they were being required to take money out, reducing the cash flow that they would need in the years to come.

In the past, we would think that someone 71 years old would have another decade and a half left here. However, people are living longer. Last year I lost a grandmother at 97 years old. I have a grandmother still with me who is 97 years old. I have had two grandfathers aged 89. I have known four great-grandparents. People are living longer, but I will let members know that it does not mean that I will be in this seat for another 40 years.

[Some hon. members]

That is not true.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I know that members hoped I would get re-elected for another 40 years, but I do not think that is going to happen.

I appreciate the fact that this government, through this budget bill, has recognized the importance of retirement savings and that it is our constituents' money. They have not paid taxes on it, because they use the system we put in place as a government to encourage people to save for their future. However, we now have recognized that they will need that money for a longer period of time.

Let us be honest, the government of the day will get its taxes. The plan for RRSPs is that when earnings are higher, money is put away and one would receive a reduction on taxes at that time, but when one takes that money out, one would pay taxes on it then. We would expect to be earning less when we take the money out and therefore the tax rate should be slightly less. However, what was happening in Burlington, and I believe across the country as we heard from the MP from West Vancouver, because the marketplace was not performing as well in terms of the stock market, people were taking their money out of RRIFs and actually losing money. they were unable to get the return on that money that they could have if they had left it there. They lost money in their income funds, and then we were forcing them to take that money out, which became a double-edged sword. We have recognized that and have made some significant changes to the registered retirement income fund, which is great for savings for seniors across this country.

Therefore, I am very proud to be supporting Bill C-59 and we look forward to having the bill passed and in place for this fiscal year.

[Pierre-Luc Dusseault, NDP, Sherbrooke, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to be able to ask my colleague a question after his speech on the Conservatives' new-found passion for balanced budgets in 2015.

In Bill C-59, they have introduced a balanced budget act to require the government to balance the budget under certain circumstances.

Is my colleague prepared to make this measure retroactive, so that it applies to the Conservatives' last seven deficit budgets? Five of them would not have been accepted, according to the circumstances outlined in the budget implementation bill that allow a government to incur a deficit.

Would my colleague be prepared to make this proposal retroactive, so that cabinet ministers would have to pay out of their own pockets for all the Conservatives' deficit budgets that did not comply with the bill they are introducing today?

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in the implementation bill there is a part implementing the balanced budget act. It states that if a country, or the world in our case, is facing a recession or a depression and the economics of the day require governments around the world, including Canada, to spend more than they are taking in, to have a deficit to stimulate the economy in order to create jobs and make sure that Canadians have the wealth they need to continue, the bill actually provides an exception for that to happen.

The finance minister of the day would come forward to the finance committee and discuss the issues of the day. That is included in the bill.

I stand behind it today. I stood behind it three years ago. Balanced books is the way governments, businesses and households should operate.

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

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the hon. member's last response on balanced budget legislation. He is quite right. As it is defined in the legislation, balanced budget legislation would only apply during times outside of recession.

Given the fact that we have not been in a recession, statistically, since the spring of 2009, would the government accept an amendment to the legislation to make it apply retroactively? As such, the cabinet and the Prime Minister would, of course, have their pay docked every year since 2009. During that period of time we have been outside of a recessionary period and the government has actually added $160 billion to the national debt. Would he accept the spirit of the legislation and support an amendment to make it retroactive?

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if we look back at the deficit reduction plans of all the parties in the House over the last number of years, which I have done relatively recently, the only party that had an actual deficit reduction plan was the Conservative Party. The Liberals want to spend more money. The NDP members always want to spend more money. New Democrats believe it grows on trees and somehow it grow back. It is like “the books balance themselves”, I guess.

[An hon. member]

That was the Liberal leader.

[Mike Wallace, Conservative, Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that was what the Liberal leader said.

The fact is, we did have a recession. We did have a deficit and we had a plan to pay it back and we met our obligations. We have balanced the books. We have balanced the budget in this fiscal year. We promised that.

[Françoise Boivin, NDP, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, first, and it really is a first, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier. This is not the first time I have shared my time, but it is the first time I have remembered to mention it. I therefore have the honour of sharing my time with this excellent member.

I quite liked the speech by the hon. member who spoke before me. He is also the chair of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights. I felt like telling him that it is not that we always want to spend more money. We want to spend Canadians' money on Canadians, whereas the Conservatives do not mind if that money is spent on a corporation.

It is all a question of nuance, and that is the big problem with Bill C-59, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on April 21, 2015 and other measures.

In the House, we are facing a time allocation motion—the 96th—which prevents members from across the country from speaking to such an important issue as the budget implementation bill. This bill is over 180 pages long and affects many laws. I especially want to talk in the House about other measures contained in controversial Bill C-59.

Since I do not believe that we will have the time to debate the bill at length, I will talk about three divisions that are of particular interest to me. I am referring to division 10, which concerns the parliamentary protective service, division 18 on the abolition of the long gun registry, and division 20, which deals with sick leave and disability programs. I will start with the last one I mentioned, namely, the division on sick leave and disability programs.

Since this bill was introduced, and even before that—the budget gave us a taste of what was to come—we have had the clear and distinct impression that the Government of Canada was set on what it was going to do, even though, over the years, it had made a commitment to its employees across the country who serve Canadians. I am a labour lawyer. We know how negotiations work. You give and you take. That is what negotiating is. In the end, you come to an agreement. Each party compromises in order to reach an agreement or a collective agreement. That is what happened in negotiations in previous years.

Now, with the stroke of a pen, the Conservatives have decided to take back what they had given to people, who for their part had also given up something in return. Thus, the government won concessions on some things over the years by giving these much talked-about sick benefits and a certain disability plan, that it is now taking back. That is not very democratic.

In my humble opinion, this could definitely be challenged in court and it is certainly not a way to treat those who are working here among the lawmakers in Parliament and delivering services to all Canadians. Make no mistake: this is a blatant lack of respect. When I hear the minister and the President of the Treasury Board saying that over 200 negotiation meetings have already been held, I think to myself that the Conservatives are very good at throwing all sorts of figures around, whenever and however they want, because they lump in pretty much anything and everything. They certainly did not hold intelligent and productive negotiations in good faith on this issue.

What is worse, this is like me saying to someone that I am going to negotiate with him, but then I just go ahead and do whatever I want, even if he does not in any way support my decision. That basically means that there will be no negotiation. That is what this provision of division 20 of Bill C-59 boils down to.

I can say that the NDP is strongly opposed to that way of doing things. If the Conservative government believes that the government negotiators were not able to negotiate the right things over the years, then it needs to do something about that. That is the government's decision. However, it should not take away from people the things that belong to them, and it should not be spreading false information. For example, it should not be saying that all federal government employees abuse the system and their sick leave. I think that is insulting to dedicated employees who work tirelessly to serve the public.

If the government wants to defend an argument, there are many ways of doing so other than spouting such nonsense. The employees who work for us should at least have our respect. This is certainly not a very respectful way of doing things. To all those who have written me to ask what our position is, I can tell them that the NDP's position is clear: the NDP does not support the government's position on this at all. We are going to vote against this measure and we are certainly going to clean up the mess. Heaven knows that there will be plenty of cleanup to do after the October 19 election.

I will now move on to the issue with division 18, which I find most worrisome. When we were debating the time allocation motion, the Minister of Finance answered a question regarding the division on ending the long gun registry. His response concerned me. Let us not kid ourselves. All of the members will hear about the letter from the Privacy Commissioner, Ms. Legault, who wrote to the Speaker of the House. She informed him of some facts that I find extremely worrisome. In short, she said that illegal acts were allegedly committed and documents were apparently destroyed, even though they should not have been destroyed and their destruction was not legal in any way. She even informed the Attorney General of Canada that the RCMP had committed this offence. Our RCMP. I get worried when these allegations come from an officer of Parliament as important as the Privacy Commissioner. Once again, we see a pattern. Just a few sentences in a budget implementation bill and the RCMP is absolved of everything it did illegally without legal authorization. That is absolutely despicable. This government claims to be a law and order government, but only when it sees fit. That is extremely worrisome.

The Minister of Finance gave a big, beautiful, super-intelligent response, saying that this was a promise the government had made in the 2011 election campaign. I listened carefully, because even though I do not necessarily share the government's views on the long gun registry, I can still admit that the Conservatives did promise to put an end to the long gun registry. I congratulate them for following through on their promise. I do not agree, but they did make that promise. However, in their election campaign they never talked about destroying data, nor did they talk about absolving those who may have been involved in the obstruction of justice or committed other offences. They certainly never talked about that.

I invite my colleagues, who have to deal with this issue with very little time, to pay particular attention to that. That is the problem with the government's approach, when it goes ahead with an omnibus bill that changes everything under the sun, even things that do not necessarily have anything to do with its main objective. I do not have high hopes in that regard.

As a final point, I would like to say a few words about division 10, which has to do with the parliamentary protective service. I encourage my colleagues to read that section. It reiterates the importance of our role as parliamentarians and outlines how that protection will be carried out. The RCMP is going to take over this task, under the authority of the Speaker of the Senate and the Speaker of the House. The bill reiterates the principle that the work of parliamentarians must never be obstructed. Once again, I feel as though I am reading one thing, but living another.

My colleague from Toronto—Danforth argued this point in the question of privilege he raised, which was recognized by the Chair but reversed by the government. I heard my colleague from Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques say that it was perhaps the last time we would have a chance to speak in the House on a budget bill. The Conservatives managed to balance the budget on the backs of just about everyone. This government has been the most undemocratic government I have seen in my life, throughout all the years that I spent following politics, as both a politician and a regular citizen.

I hope I got everyone's attention so that they will go read these three divisions. Public servants need not worry. The NDP understands them, appreciates their work, and will be there to repair the damage.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Minister of State (Western Economic Diversification)]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my colleague's comments and impassioned speech on this matter.

I would like to ask her a question about one of the provisions in the bill. It deals with the protection of intellectual property in Canada.

The protection of intellectual property is a very important part of building a knowledge-based economy, because it allows knowledge creators in Canada to protect that and put it into the marketplace in a meaningful way.

One of the sections in this bill would give patent agents privilege, which is something the Standing Committee on the Law of Patents of the World Intellectual Property Organization talked about with regard to Canada, saying in essence that in order for Canada to have a stronger intellectual property protection regime, this particular privilege should be enacted.

Could the member comment on whether this is something the NDP would support? I know the Intellectual Property Institute of Canada supports it as well, and I think it is a great thing. I hope the member supports it.

[Françoise Boivin, NDP, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am very glad that my colleague asked me that question because it proves my point.

Without necessarily getting into the wording of the title of the bill, which, again, is “An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget and other measures”, this is a typical example of something that falls under “other measures”.

Whether we are talking about security here or the issues I mentioned in the divisions I deemed important, such as abolishing the long gun registry and the amnesty given to actions that can be perceived as crime or obstruction, these aspects should be part of a separate bill so that the right committee can study all the pertinent repercussions.

As far as the issue of copyright and registration is concerned, my colleague and Canadian Heritage critic often talks to me rather passionately about how all these rights can be reconciled. It is not easy. If we make the companies happy, then the creators are not necessarily happy.

Did this not merit a respectful amount of time for consideration, either at the Standing Committee on Finance or at the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage, where this issue will likely end up and where we will not even have the right to make amendments? That is the problem with Bill C-59.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, the member talked about a real concern we have been expressing.

The member for Cape Breton—Canso, the Liberal Party's labour critic, has raised the issue of the lack of goodwill on the part of the government to negotiate in good faith with Canada's public service union.

It seems the Conservatives just do not have respect for professionalism in our public service. We have witnessed it even beyond the immediate public service in some of the crown corporations, whether it is a lack of confidence in CBC or some of the dramatic decisions that have taken place in Canada Post with regard to letter carriers and door-to-door delivery.

I wonder if the member could expand on her thoughts in regard to the general lack of goodwill the Government of Canada has toward our public servants, whether they are with crown corporations or directly with the government, and the negative impact that has in terms of service overall. We could include service centres that have been closed down over the last number of years.