Monte Solberg

[Petitions, March 11th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 it is my pleasure to present a petition on behalf of a number of people from the Toronto area.

The petitioners pray that Parliament will enact legislation to wind down the CPP while protecting the pensions of current seniors so that Canadians can contribute to mandatory RRSPs of their own choosing.

[The Budget, March 11th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the fact is that $2.5 billion have been removed from taxpayers' pockets. The surplus belongs to them. They want tax relief.

The auditor general says that he will not sign off on the government's books because the finance minister's accounting cannot be trusted, $2.5 billion for the millennium scholarship fund.

Why will the finance minister not admit the real reason he has done this is that he is preparing for his leadership run and he needs this for a slush fund?

[The Budget, March 11th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, Canada's chief accountant, the auditor general, says the finance minister is cooking the books. That is a fact. This is so serious that the auditor general is now saying that he is very reluctant to sign off on these books, an action which he says “waves a red flag that the government is misrepresenting or distorting its financial position”. I ask the finance minister again why he has decided that his own political agenda is more important than the integrity of the public finances.

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. friend for his speech and I have a question for him.

My friend is a defender of families. He has written a book about families. He advocates that all families be treated fairly in the taxation system.

I wonder how he would respond to the government's measure to increase deductibility for child care expenses only for those families who take their children to day care. The government did absolutely nothing for all those families who choose to look after their children at home. How does the member respond to that?

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend opposite for his speech. I want to point to a statement he made when he praised the finance minister for his leadership, as he phrased it, in battling the deficit.

I want to point out to my friend that in 1995 when the finance minister brought in his budget he did make a commitment to reduce spending by $5 for every dollar in new revenue that he brought in. Imagine the surprise of Canadians when three years later they found out what actually happened was that the government brought in $2.10 in new revenue for every dollar it cut. In fact the government actually reversed completely the promise it made in 1995.

I think that is a betrayal. I think Canadians believe in a small limited government, a government that lives within its means and understands its limitations, understands that it can only do a certain amount of things.

It was taxpayers through revenues who really beat this deficit down. If we look at the numbers, we will find that 69.1% of the improvement in the government's fiscal position was due to new revenues. A very, very minor portion, about .6% of the improvement in the government's fiscal position was due to departmental spending cuts and the rest was cuts in transfers to the provinces.

Would my friend agree that the rewards of the surplus should be distributed to people on the basis of that formula? In other words, two-thirds of the surplus should go to taxpayers, .6% back to bureaucrats for increases in government spending and the remainder back to the provinces to fix the health care and higher education that this government helped destroy.

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, my friend across the way just put the best possible face on the budget, which I had expected. However, in fairness, the official opposition has to put things in perspective here.

My friend did not mention that Canadians face the highest taxes in the G-7 today, 56% higher than the G-7 average. He did not mention that in the last 15 years, between 1980 and 1995, we saw taxes in this country increase relative to GDP by 29% while they went down in the U.S., Japan, the U.K. and Germany. Our taxes have gone absolutely through the roof.

What my friend did not point out is that it is people at the low end of the income scale who pay the highest price because of this huge rise in taxes.

My question to my friend across the way is, given that the government has introduced targeted tax relief but also introduced broad based tax increases with the net effect of raising taxes by close to $7 billion over the next three years, notwithstanding its tiny $7 billion in tax relief, the net effect is still a $7 billion increase, how does that help Canadians and in particular how does it help low income Canadians?

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I just heard the Liberal member comment on the tiny impact of bracket creep. Actually it is about over $1 billion a year that it takes from taxpayers' pockets. But I point out to my friend that the government's tax reduction strategy next year will only be $880 million. In other words, bracket creep completely eliminates the tax relief the government is so proud of.

Will my friend from Nanaimo—Cowichan comment on this? Will he also comment on the huge impact that CPP tax increases will have on the pocketbooks of average Canadian taxpayers?

[The Budget, March 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Guelph—Wellington for her speech, but I do want to take issue with some of the assertions she made.

I heard her say a minute ago that we should be congratulating the finance minister for balancing the budget. Surely the member knows it was the Canadian taxpayers who balanced the budget. Revenue is 70% higher than when the government took power.

We have a situation now where the government has completely reversed its stand from 1993. I point out in the 1993 election campaign we had the Prime Minister, the then Leader of the Opposition, saying zero deficits, zero jobs, zero hope.

What conversion on the road to Damascus did the Prime Minister go through? All of a sudden, it sounds as though the member for Guelph—Wellington is somehow suggesting that a balanced budget was the government's idea all along. Quite the contrary. In fact, they spoke against it in the election campaign.

I want to point out, leading to my question, that the hon. member does not intentionally want to lead people to believe that somehow they are going to get a tax break under this government. I am certain that is not her intention.

I simply want to point out by way of a question that the member is mistaken if she believes Canadians are going to be getting tax relief under this government's proposals. I point out that if the CPP increases that came into effect January 1 are included, if the effective bracket creep that takes place every year is included, amounting to just over a billion dollars in tax increases that Canadians face, and this is all netted out, we find that we in Canada will pay $2 billion more in taxes in 1998-99, $2.15 billion more in 1999-2000 and $2.8 billion more in taxes in 2000-2001.

Given those facts, will the member acknowledge that Canadians will be facing higher taxes, not lower, because of this government's actions?

[Taxation, March 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, imagine that Canadians have to leave the country to find work. That is not uncommon these days. Now the moment they leave the federal government is forcing them to pay taxes on their Canadian assets even though they have not yet been sold.

First it was the head tax on immigrants. Now it is an exit tax on all those economic refugees who are fleeing this country because of high taxes.

How can the minister expect Canadians to pay millions of dollars in taxes on capital gains they have not yet realized?

[The Budget, March 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, that does not leave us much time.

I simply must point out that some of the assertions the minister made were perhaps a little bit misleading. First, the minister suggested that the federal government is the first government to balance a budget in 30 years. I would point out that just the other day Manitoba announced its fourth balanced budget in a row. I would point out that Alberta and Saskatchewan have done the same. I would point out that municipal governments balance their budgets as a matter of course every year. The government should not be patting itself on the back so heartily for something that is regularly done by most governments.

I would also point out that taxpayers are the ones who have balanced the budget. The member asserted that it was her government that balanced the budget. However it was taxpayers overwhelmingly who balanced the budget through higher taxes.

The minister has stated that taxes are going down. In fact when one includes the hike in CPP premiums and bracket creep, taxes have been going up each and every year of the government's mandate. I do not know how the minister can make her assertion. How can the minister assert that taxes in fact are going down? When one includes CPP premiums and bracket creep, the effect is that taxes are actually going up.