Reed Elley

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague has hit the nail right on the head. This government is taking money out of Canadian taxpayers' pockets, whether it is giving minimal tax relief or not. It is taking money out through things like the CPP. I suspect this government will find other more innovative ways to take more money out of the pockets of Canadian taxpayers through user fees. Things which we used to get basically free from government we will now be charged for. The government will find other ways to do this so it can continue on its big spending spree.

How could the government do it otherwise? It would not be able to do it. It has to have more money coming in to pay for the money that is going out. It will do it somehow.

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

I cannot tell the hon. member how much, but I can say that they felt that it would certainly have been a whole lot more if this government had been listening to Canadians.

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the most important person to consult in this whole thing is the Canadian taxpayer.

I went back to my riding last week and held town hall meetings all across my riding. I sat down with Canadian taxpayers to whom I give a lot of credit and who have the intelligence to look at this budget and say whether it is really helping them. All I can say in answer to the member's question is that those people have told me that the ordinary average Canadian on the whole feels they are not getting enough tax relief out of this budget. For 27 years they have been paying for these deficit budgets by Liberal and Tory governments and they feel it is time that the government finally rewarded them.

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, it is with a great deal of pleasure that I take part in my very first budget debate since having been elected by the voters in Nanaimo—Cowichan this past spring.

One might have hoped that it would be under much better circumstances. However, having seen what the finance minister has brought down, I can only draw one conclusion. Canadian taxpayers have been robbed of debt and tax relief and the Liberals are going on a spending spree once again. It is a shame. In fact the budget is not just a shame. It is a sham.

I could not believe my ears when the finance minister stood in the House to declare that in effect the deficit battle had been won by his government. I know they go to great pains to disclaim that but that was said.

Nothing could have been further from the truth. It is incumbent upon us as opposition members of Parliament to keep pointing out that the government was able to hopefully balance that budget only on the backs of working men and women. They are the ones who have been paying an extra $33 billion in taxes since the Liberal government took office in 1993.

What is the reward for the sacrifices Canadians have made? What are taxpayers getting now that the books are supposedly balanced and the government expects to start running surpluses? One short word, nothing. What they should be getting is broad based meaningful tax relief. They deserve nothing less. They are telling me as their representative when I go back to the riding that they are disappointed in the budget because they did not got that relief.

In 1993 Canadian taxpayers paid $107 billion in income tax. This year we will pay close to $140 billion in taxes to fund the big red tax and spend Liberal machine. The chequebooks are out again.

In order to be in a situation where the government could even contemplate a balanced budget, let alone a surplus, program spending for 1998-99 came in at about $103.5 billion. Just as taxpayers have eliminated this deficit the government is resorting to the same tax and spend policies that got us into this mess in the first place.

This year the Liberals will spend $161 billion. In fiscal year 1999-2000 they will spend $167 billion. Finally, projected spending for 2000-01 will be about $173 billion. Most of the money being spent over 1997 levels is money that could go toward paying down the debt or providing Canadians with real meaningful tax relief.

The Liberal government does not seem to get it. Canadians are being squeezed and they desperately need tax relief. Is it any wonder that come tax time each year more and more of us feel like we are taking one step forward and two back?

Take, for instance, my son in Calgary who has a wife, a little girl and another on the way. As a construction worker at the low end of the wage scale he has had trouble making ends meet even in boom town Calgary which knows something about eliminating debts and deficits and having the lowest taxes in Canada. Why? It is mostly because the federal government still takes so much out of his paycheque that he does not have anything left over.

The deficit battle is won on the backs of people like my son and other Canadian taxpayers who have endured 33 tax increases by the government since 1993. The budget holds hardly any hope for any change.

The most insidious tax of them all is the bracket creep. It was a present from the Tories and one which the Liberals have enjoyed using against Canadians as well. By keeping the Tory bracket creep tax, the Liberals have turned a blind eye to preprogrammed tax increases. Why could they have not done something about that?

Bracket creep, since the Liberals have taken office, has taken an accumulative $13.4 billion in new and higher taxes out of our pockets. That is not acceptable. Indexing for inflation in 1997 would have prevented an automatic $860 million personal income tax increase. This represents an increase totalling $4.3 billion over the next five years. This tax just keeps on taking and taking out of the pockets of Canadians.

Statistics Canada reports that between 1989 and 1995 real after tax family incomes fell by $3,461 from $41,084 to $37,623.

Here is another graphic example of bracket creep. An individual taxpayer earning $30,000 a year in 1993 whose income increases just at the rate of inflation will end up paying $1,581 more in federal income, CPP and EI taxes after he files his return this year.

We have to see that there are social consequences to this budget as well. By not providing tax relief and by failing to pay down the debt, the government jeopardizes the social programs that we have in this country. After adjusting for the government's liquid assets the net public debt will stand at around $583 billion by the end of fiscal 1997-98.

This mountain of accumulated federal debt requires interest payments. Interest payments on the Liberal and Tory mortgage amount to $46 billion for this fiscal year. Canadian taxpayers will pay approximately the same next year to service the debt.

Think in terms of social spending what $46 billion represents. It represents the entire annual budget for the four western provinces. It represents the entire annual budgets of Quebec, P.E.I. and Newfoundland. It represents enough to pay for all Canadian hospitals, physicians and drug costs for an entire year.

We have to do something about the interest payments on this debt. It represents enough to provide every poor child in Canada with a $30,000 a year endowment. Do you see how important this is? As I said at the outset, this budget is both a shame and a sham because it fails Canadians.

Until we pay down the debt, we cannot free up that money which is being used to pay interest on the $583 billion debt. Surely the lost opportunity that these interest payments represent should be reason enough to commit 50% of any surplus to debt reduction.

I urge my colleagues across the way to think of what this means to Canadian taxpayers. Those of us over here are intent on finding out what our constituents feel about this. I asked for people to write to me and let me know how they would spend the surplus, if there ever was a surplus in this country. I would like to read a letter.

Dear Sir:

I would like to give you some input from some taxpayers in your riding on the issue of what to do with any government surplus (if in fact one ever occurs). In short, think deficit reduction. Yes we feel heavily taxed and yes we feel some services have been cut a little too far and our take home pay buys less than it used to, but the $600 billion national debt is a disgrace and a millstone around the necks of all Canadians. It will be even worse for future generations if we don't face reality and deal with this debt.

That is from Bruce and Deborah Maher in my riding.

Public debt charges will eat up 33 cents of every revenue dollar in the current fiscal year or 69 cents out of every personal income tax paid by Canadians.

In 1997 the average Canadian taxpayer will pay about $3,285 a year in taxes just to pay interest on the debt. Large debt burdens also force interest rates higher. This increases the cost of mortgages, automobile loans and household items like washing machines and refrigerators, and carrying credit card balances.

Debt reduction frees up a fiscal dividend for reinvestment in the Canadian economy. This can be done in the form of strengthened social programs, lower taxes or a combination of both.

Cutting the debt in half would put about $1,600 back into the pockets of every average taxpayer in this country. Or the government could even give a mix of tax relief. Anything would be better than what we have.

The government could provide an 8% reduction in personal income taxes, or something it promised a long time ago, the total elimination of the GST. The Liberals could finally honour their 1993 election promise to scrap that hated tax. This could only be done if the Liberals reduced the accumulated federal debt by half. Given the most recent offering by the Prime Minister, I do not think this is likely to occur at any given time.

Sadly this budget does nothing to help ordinary taxpaying Canadians. If anything it impoverishes them further by increasing the tax burden. If that fact is not now readily apparent to taxpayers, when we all sit down and start filing our income tax in the next month or so, then reality will hit us once again.

I cannot support this budget.

[Questions On The Order Paper, March 9th, 1998]

With respect to the Participaction program, what has the government determined to be the total cost to the Canadian taxpayer in each of the last five recorded fiscal years for money spent by this organization on advertising and other promotional activities related to its mandate?

[Taxation, February 24th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberals across the way gloat but they gloat at the taxpayers' expense and all Canadians know that.

In my riding and in every community across this country there are families that are struggling to make ends meet. Year after year they see more of their income taken away in taxes. These are the people who balanced the budget, not the Liberals. They are the ones who will pay off the Liberal-Tory mortgage. Canadians deserve a break.

Why is the Prime Minister treating the taxpayers' surplus as if it was his own money and already blowing it on new spending?

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, February 12th, 1998]

Madam Speaker, it is sort of a miracle, in view of the fact that the government over there has once again put time allocation on the free speech of members of Parliament representing their constituents, that I am able to speak at all. I like to participate in miracles. I am glad to have this opportunity to speak.

I live on a dairy farm. It is not a western grain producing farm but it depends very much on the free movement of western produced grain. I have some idea of what farmers across western Canada are facing.

It is a privilege to speak during this report stage of Bill C-4, an act to amend the Canadian Wheat Board.

I want to at least give the government a bit of credit for being consistent. This legislation was flawed in the last session as Bill C-72 and is still flawed. Perhaps one of the biggest shortcomings is that the legislation will not bring about voluntary participation in the Canadian Wheat Board. This means farmers still will not have the freedom to choose how they want to market their grain.

Bill C-4 gives Canadian wheat farmers no options. Thousands of farmers have told the government they are not happy with the Canadian Wheat Board monopoly. These farmers want the right to market their product themselves and Bill C-4 simply ignores those demands.

Like so many initiatives by this Liberal government, it is window dressing. Bill C-4 is a poor attempt by the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food to make it appear as though it is responding to farmer demands for change. By doing so and by effectively doing nothing, it has dodged the real issue of marketing options, and the minister's attempts to placate producers with this legislation could backfire.

The Canadian Wheat Board's grip on the sale of wheat and barley is an extremely controversial and divisive issue among Canadian wheat farmers. Yet the government fails to recognize that this controversy will not simply go away. As a result, farmers on both sides of the issue are growing increasingly frustrated because the minister will not deal with the situation.

The minister has adopted a zero sum approach in this matter, an all or nothing attitude. Instead of establishing mechanisms which would allow farmers to choose how their grain will be sold, the exclusion and inclusion clauses in the bill leave no room for compromise. These clauses mean that various grain producing groups could eventually vote to have their product included in or excluded from the Canadian Wheat Board. This means that a particular grain product is either in or out. There is no middle ground for farmers who are on the losing end of a vote concerning the inclusion or exclusion of a particular grain product. Far from preserving the Canadian Wheat Board, this situation could ultimately destroy it as one producer group after another chooses to get out from under its thumb.

These concerns are not new to the Liberals. Nor are they without merit. In fact the government ignored recommendations from its own western grain marketing panel. In July 1996, after a year long study, the panel told the government that the Canadian Wheat Board should operate more like a private company.

It went on to say that the board's monopoly on the sale of wheat should be reduced and that its monopoly on export feed barley should be ended. Yet, with an all or nothing display, the plebiscite that the minister finally permitted for barley growers early this year gave farmers little choice.

Basically they were asked “Do you want to go or stay with the Canadian Wheat Board?” There was nothing in between. What kind of choice is that? The plebiscite charade has left farmers more frustrated than ever.

We know how dangerous it is for governments or government agencies to try to settle issues by wording questions that influence the outcome. We saw that in the latest of Quebec's never ending referenda. The point here is that attempting to influence the outcome never helps to settle the issue. It just makes it worse.

Bill C-4 would allow for the election of 10 members to the new board of directors. However, this is not enough, as a fully elected board of directors is necessary if the voice of farmers is truly to be heard.

For example, if just three elected directors were to shift their vote to align with the five government appointed members of the board, the majority of directors elected by the farmers would find themselves outvoted. So much for democracy.

The ability of the directors to represent the farmers who elected them is in doubt. That is one of the reasons I fully support Motions Nos. 42 and 43 to this flawed bill.

Just like CSIS, Canada's secretive spy agency, the Canadian Wheat Board does not have to answer to the Access to Information Act. It cannot be audited by the auditor general. How can the directors act freely if they are bound by this secrecy?

In addition, the directors would not hold ultimate authority over the Canadian Wheat Board. That is because the agriculture minister and the finance minister would.

In effect, the corporate plan, which includes all the businesses and activities of the Canadian Wheat Board, as well as its annual borrowing plan, would have to be approved by the Minister of Finance. This means that even though the Canadian Wheat Board would no longer officially be a crown corporation, the federal government's grip would actually be tighter from a financial point of view.

The directors could also be denied liability protection if they were to speak and act freely on behalf of farmers. Directors would only be covered for liability if they acted in the best interest of the corporation. This creates an automatic conflict of interest as any instructions given to the Canadian Wheat Board by the federal government are defined as being in the best interest of the corporation.

If a director does not follow government directives, will they be held liable for not acting in the best interests of the corporation? I would suggest that there are some serious consequences which the government has failed to address in the bill.

The bill would also mean that a province planning to make changes demanded by a majority of its farmers is out of luck. Bill C-4 is binding on the provinces. Because this is the case, the federal government should have consulted with the provinces on the reform of the Canadian Wheat Board. This was not done and the Liberals charged ahead on their own. The message from the federal government clearly says “Forget it. We are in charge here”.

In addition, the Canadian Wheat Board is being left wide open as a target in international trade negotiations. This legislation will not satisfy our trading partners that the Canadian Wheat Board is independent from the federal government. This is significant because countries like the U.S. are pointing out that the Canadian Wheat Board, with the large degree of involvement and control by the federal government, gives Canada an unfair trading advantage. This will make the Canadian Wheat Board a target during the next round of trade negotiations at the World Trade Organization.

Is this the best the Liberals could come up with? There are approximately 110,000 grain farmers in the prairie provinces and parts of British Columbia. The Canadian Wheat Board controls $5 billion in sales annually. Even with the significance of these numbers it is hard to believe that the government has simply introduced this recycled legislation.

It is not just Reform MPs who are opposed to the legislation. As I mentioned earlier a majority of grain producer groups oppose Bill C-4. In fact they have been busy since the House last debated the legislation. The coalition against Bill C-4 has continued to pressure the agriculture minister to take the opposition amendments seriously. The list of member groups opposed to the legislation includes, to name only a few, the Canadian Canola Growers Association, the Flax Growers of Western Canada, the Western Barley Growers Association, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and the Western Canadian Wheat Growers Association. How much more does the government want?

As well, almost 100 witnesses stood before the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-food to comment on its predecessor, Bill C-72. Virtually all farm groups appearing told the committee that this was a fundamentally flawed piece of legislation.

What has the government done? In one word, nothing. Like so many other Liberal promises the government's legislation is similar: long on style but short on substance.

In conclusion I want to serve notice that I will not be supporting this piece of government legislation. I further urge members on both sides of the House to vote against Bill C-4 at third reading. It is clear the government has been consistently wrong on how to best address the needs of Canadian wheat farmers, and this bill is no exception.

[Petitions, February 11th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present to the House, pursuant to Standing Order 36, a petition on behalf of 41 petitioners from my riding of Nanaimo—Cowichan and Vancouver Island. It concerns the multilateral agreement on investment.

The petitioners indicate that they believe negotiations have been conducted behind closed doors and that most politicians, professionals and ordinary citizens in Canada know little or nothing about the MAI.

They ask that parliament impose a moratorium on ratification of the MAI until full public hearings on the proposed treaty are held across the country.

[Questions On The Order Paper, February 10th, 1998]

Since inception of the GST ans with respect to outstanding GST accounts as at the end of the last recorded fiscal year, what has the government determined to be: ( a ) the total number of outstanding accounts; ( b ) the total amount assessed to these accounts; ( c ) the total number of litigation's against these accounts including those in process now; ( d ) the court costs and collection costs associated with these accounts; and ( e ) the total number of seizures excercised by Revenue Canada in collecting amounts owed on these accounts?

[Dairy Industry, February 3rd, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, on behalf of dairy farmers in my riding of Nanaimo—Cowichan and indeed dairy farmers all across Canada, I call on the ministers of revenue, agriculture and international trade to get their act together.

They have the power to put a halt to the importing of butteroil-sugar blends which are replacing the use of domestic ingredients in the production of Canadian dairy products.

Since 1995 the import of butteroil-sugar blends into Canada from the United States, Europe and Mexico has doubled every year, resulting in the loss of tens of millions of dollars to Canadian farmers.

The ministers of international trade and revenue will know that the butteroil-sugar blend is created in a manner intended to circumvent tariff agreements covering the importing of most dairy products, yet this $50 million a year assault on the pockets of Canadian dairy farmers is allowed to continue because the ministers in question will not reclassify the butteroil-sugar blend.

It is time the government ended its foot dragging and stepped forward to protect the interests of Canadian dairy farmers.