House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2006, with 80% of the vote.
Employment November 25th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, blah, blah, blah. That is not the right answer. That is not the answer at all.
Statistics Canada has the answer. It says that at least part of the problem is high payroll taxes in Canada. The minister takes credit for interest rates that are set in the United States. When is he going to start to take the blame for high payroll taxes that he has direct responsibility for?
Employment November 25th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, Statistics Canada reported yesterday that the number of full time jobs in Canada has declined by 230,000 during the 1990s.
Meanwhile, the jobs that were created were either part time jobs or jobs that people had to create themselves after they were laid off. In the U.S. employment grew at almost twice the Canadian rate and those were full time secure jobs.
How can the finance minister be proud of his job record when the job creation record is so much better in the U.S.?
Balanced Budget Act November 24th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to seek the unanimous consent of the House to make this a votable bill.
Balanced Budget Act November 24th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to speak on Bill C-375. It is a good bill and I think the Reform Party can support it.
I am very happy to see that my colleague, who calls himself a social democrat, can agree with somebody like me or I can agree with him as somebody who is a fiscal conservative on the need to have balanced budgets and to put some limits on government. Limited government is what we are talking about here.
My friend across the way spoke a minute ago about the government's great political commitment. Its political commitment had nothing to do with balancing the budget. The fact is government took the easy way out.
In the last five years this government has raised revenues by $37 billion. It dramatically cut transfers to the provinces by $7 billion. It is talking about its commitment to health care. There is no question this government has slashed health care more than any government in Canadian history.
To hear the rhetoric coming from the other side is pretty hard to take. I cannot believe the parliamentary secretary stood up with a straight face and shamelessly said his government has a deep commitment to health care. What a joke. It is unbelievable.
I want to talk specifically about my colleague's Bill C-375, a balanced budget act. There are some key points I want to touch on. Effectively the bill serves to prevent the government from producing budgetary deficits as of April 1, 1998. A deficit of less than $3 billion in one financial year must be followed by a surplus equal to that amount the following year. I think that is quite reasonable.
A deficit exceeding $3 billion may be occurred over more than one year but only in the event of a natural catastrophe, economic collapse or military conflict. All that is very reasonable.
Deficits for any financial year would have to be estimated during the debate on the budget. I think that makes a lot of sense. We need some frank talk about just how big deficits would be or even surpluses.
For deficits incurred under the provisions which are required to be made up over a maximum period of six years, I think the first 75% of that has to be made up in the first three years. There are other great points in this bill.
I think one of the most important points is the one that my friend from the Bloc alluded to near the end of his speech when he talked about the need to have a report from the minister to the House annually on the impact of changes to accounting. I completely support my colleague from the Bloc on this.
What has happened over the last several years is that the finance minister and the finance department have broken the generally accepted rules that have been laid down through consultation with the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants and the auditor general simply so that they can run surpluses they can use for their own political ends.
What we have here is the government in a fundamental conflict of interest position. It is time to end that. We need accounting rules that are binding on the government so that we do not have situations where the government uses the finances of the country for its own cynical, manipulative ends, and that is what is happening here.
My friend across the way was talking about the member criticizing the government for being too cautious. That is completely untrue. We are criticizing the government because it has been calculating and manipulative with the public's finances. We think that is completely unacceptable.
The Reform Party does have a long history of promoting this type of legislation. We do believe in limited government. We do believe there need to be restrictions on government. We do not have blind faith in the government. We know that governments of all kinds are typically stupid. The governments that are the most stupid are the ones that do not recognize how ignorant they really are. Therefore we feel we need some limits on what they do so they cannot go stumbling into areas where they do not belong. We do not want them to stumble into deficits. We do not want them to blow the public's money, which has been the situation for many years in this country.
My friends across the way talk about how they have been successful in balancing the budget. I remind them that they have done it by raising taxes and in doing so they have lowered disposable income for Canadians. We think that is the wrong way to handle it.
While we support this legislation coming from our colleague from the Bloc Quebecois, the Reform Party has called for another companion piece of legislation to go with this which would place a limit on expenditures. We do not want to see governments balancing the budget by continually raising taxes as this government has done. Taxes have gone up. Revenues have gone up by 32% since it came to power. They have gone up by some $37 billion. That is not growth in the economy. The economy has not grown by 37% over the last few years. Far from it. It has been very sluggish. But the revenues have been growing because they are coming out of taxpayers' pockets and that is not acceptable.
We would support companion legislation or an amendment to this legislation that would require the government to introduce legislation mandating government spending limits. That is from the Reform Party policy book, the point being that not all balanced budgets are equal. We believe that we must balance them not by forever increasing revenues through higher taxes, but by putting a limit on spending.
In the last parliament, in 1996, a very learned colleague of mine, Dr. Herb Grubel, who was the member of parliament for Capilano—Howe Sound, brought forward a private member's bill calling for a constitutional amendment that would have entrenched balanced budgets. There is a tremendous amount of merit in that idea. It is difficult to get any kind of constitutional agreement in this country, let alone on a piece of legislation like Dr. Grubel was proposing. But having said that, it is the right thing to do.
I want to touch on a couple of the points he made. He said that if we have a constitutional amendment it is more difficult for governments to tamper with it. Specifically, he called for the government to balance its budget every year. That is what he was proposing. His argument was that we could have a contingency reserve attached to that so that if there ever was a need to increase spending for some unforeseen reason we would be able to do that.
Second, the spending would be limited to today's levels and only increased to reflect population growth and inflation. That was the spending limit aspect of that legislation. It is a great idea. There is no need for spending to grow beyond population growth and inflation once we get to the point where we have the proper amount of spending.
The final point was that if either the budget is not balanced or spending limits are exceeded then those MPs who supported going beyond those spending limits, or supported spending us back into a deficit position, would be financially penalized. That makes a lot of sense. That is what they do in Manitoba. The entire cabinet faces financial penalties if the government runs a deficit. It is a wonderful idea.
We must remember that at the end of the day this is taxpayers' money we are spending. We cannot continue to tax people into poverty like we have done in this country over the last 20 years and especially over the last five years. It has to come to an end. We need to impose some real penalties to ensure that people do not continue to run deficits and that governments like the one across the way do not continue to raise taxes forever and ever.
The Reform Party also calls for a referendum on any tax increases. We are saying no more tax increases. If a government wants to increase taxes it should have to go to the public in the form of a referendum.
We support this private member's bill. We wish it was votable. We would go a step further in a couple of areas. But having said that, we find it eminently supportable. It is a real positive sign that members on all sides of the House understand the need to have balanced budgets and that balanced budgets should be entrenched in some kind of legislation. We have to place limits on government. Government is not all knowing. It is not omnicompetent. It is not always working in the best interests of the country. One way to ensure that we prevent the government from doing wrong is to put limits on it and this proposal would do just that.
Points Of Order November 24th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order to seek unanimous consent of the House to table the labour force update I made reference to in question period.
Unemployment November 24th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, today StatsCan issued a scathing indictment of this government's job creation record. It said that since 1989 the government has given up 228,000 full time jobs and that the only job growth has come from part time employment and the self-employed.
What is the big reason? The big reason is high payroll taxes.
When is this government going to get the message? When is it going to obey the law and cut EI premiums by $7 billion? When are they going to wake up over there?
Unemployment November 24th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, you ask a stupid question and you get a stupid answer. Today StatsCan—
Apec Inquiry November 19th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, that is an absolutely ridiculous reply to that question.
The minister knows that Fred Toole said that Hugh Stewart was going to take a hit or a fall. The question is who is he taking it for?
When is that minister over there going to tell the solicitor general that he has to resign? When is he going to do the honourable thing and resign?
Apec Inquiry November 19th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, how many sworn affidavits is it going to take before the Prime Minister fires the solicitor general? How many sworn affidavits does it take? How many?
Apec Inquiry November 19th, 1998
Mr. Speaker, Fred Toole said that the solicitor general said that Hugh Stewart was going to take the hit or the fall. That is what he said.
I wonder where the solicitor general is. Maybe in the sweat lodge. Why are the Liberals going to such lengths to protect a minister—