Monte Solberg

[Taxation, December 11th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, is the Prime Minister prepared to beat up on people simply because they expect him to keep his promises?

[Taxation, December 11th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, last night the Prime Minister tried to browbeat a waitress from Montreal simply because she had the nerve to call the Prime Minister on his bogus GST promise. At least the tape does not lie.

Is this Prime Minister so arrogant and so out of touch with reality and so contemptuous of the electorate-

[Excise Tax Act, December 10th, 1996]

No.

[Excise Tax Act, December 10th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak once again to Bill C-70.

First I must decry the fact that the government has moved time allocation, a form of closure, on this piece of legislation. I need to point out that since the fall session began, the government has pushed through precisely nine bills and here we are ramming

through important pieces of legislation in the last week. That is completely unacceptable.

I have to speak to some of the accusations made by the member for Gander-Grand Falls. I would simply say that if he was not completely misleading the Canadian public, he certainly was quoting hon. members out of context and I must set the record straight.

The hon. member from Gander was saying that the Reform Party wanted to raise taxes. Let me make it very clear that our party will provide the average family of four in this country with a $2,000 tax break by the year 2000, $15 billion in tax relief for Canadians. That is part of our fresh start platform.

The hon. member also spoke about the government's record of low interest rates. I have to address that. The reason we have low interest rates is that this country's economy has been so soft. That is why we have had low interest rates.

Noticeably the member did not speak about unemployment. I would think someone from Newfoundland must address unemployment. In 1995 the G-7 said that Canada had the worst record when it came to unemployment in the G-7. Out of all seven nations Canada had the worst. Why would a member from Newfoundland not address something like unemployment? That is ridiculous. Obviously the government's record is so bad that the hon. member could not bear to raise the issue of unemployment.

By the way, the Reform plan would take 1.2 million low income Canadians completely off the tax roles. I want to make that clear. Somehow the member for Gander-Grand Falls left people with the impression that we were going to tax low income Canadians more. We are going to take 1.2 million low income Canadians off the tax rolls. These are people whom the Liberals are currently taxing, including the member for Gander-Grand Falls who has voted in favour of every budget the government has brought in.

The member for Gander-Grand Falls apparently is no friend of the unemployed. He is no friend of working Canadians who are being taxed to the hilt. I think the member for Gander-Grand Falls has a lot of explaining to do to his constituents.

Specifically on Bill C-70, we need to remind people that this bill came about because of a broken promise, a very sorry beginning for this legislation. Going back to before the last election, members on that side of the House said: "The GST is completely unacceptable. It is terrible. We will rip it out if we become government".

The member from Gander spoke of the finance minister. The finance minister when he was in opposition said that the GST was terrible and that they did not want to have anything to do with it. The Prime Minister has been in this place on and off since 1963, 33 years. You do not even get that much for murder in this country but he has been here that long. He sat here knowing very well that there was a possibility the Liberals could form the government and he said: "We do not want to have anything to do with the GST".

What happened on October 18, 1993? The current Deputy Prime Minister said on national television in a CBC town hall meeting that if the GST was not gone, she would resign. She led everyone to believe that the Liberal government would get rid of the GST. We know that individual MPs campaigned on the promise to get rid of the GST.

What did the Liberals do? Did they get rid of the GST? The record is very clear. The government did not get rid of the GST. Instead because it had no takers for its harmonization proposal, and it was desperate to come up with a reason or a justification for breaking its promise, it ran out to the Atlantic premiers with $1 billion and said: "Please come on board so we can say that we fulfilled our promise in some way, shape or form".

A billion dollars. And what was the result? Now a tax regime is being established in Atlantic Canada that is going to visit all kinds of sorrows on the people of Atlantic Canada. Beyond that, it creates all kinds of other problems. It is extremely divisive. When one area of the country is rewarded with a $1 billion compensation package but other areas are told that they are on their own, what happens? We get division.

We get problems with national unity obviously. That is the government's whole approach to the issue of unity: divide and conquer, split people apart. The government has done it from day one and continues to do it. Lately it is talking about distinct society again. I cannot believe it, but it is part of its whole approach.

What does this harmonized sales tax do specifically in Atlantic Canada? The government claims it will create jobs but the facts simply do not bear that out. We know already that stores are closing in Atlantic Canada because they cannot afford to implement all the necessary changes associated with bringing the harmonized sales tax to Atlantic Canada.

Greenberg stores is based in Quebec but has stores throughout Atlantic Canada. It is closing stores because it cannot bear the start-up cost of this new harmonized sales tax. Seventy-nine jobs are already disappearing in New Brunswick. It just escapes me that we are not hearing from New Brunswick MPs. They are not standing up and saying: "We have to do something to protect these jobs". Somehow the members from New Brunswick are strangely

silent. Where are they? Why are they not standing up for their constituents?

If something like that were happening in my riding or anywhere in Alberta where all those Reform MPs are, or in British Columbia or any Reform constituency I would like to think that those Reformers would stand up even to their own leader and government and say: "This is unacceptable. We will not put up with this. We have received clear direction from our constituents and they do not want us to vote in favour of this legislation". But the Liberals are like sheep. They are completely quiet. They have been cowed by the Prime Minister and the power of that office, which is ridiculous. It is absolutely counter to democracy.

The hon. member for Gander-Grand Falls spoke about democracy. He is a member who has spoken out in the past and has been relegated to the very end of the row, almost out the door. He can stand up and try to revive his flagging career all he wants knowing that the minister of fisheries may not be long for cabinet. However at some point he apparently wronged the Prime Minister in some way and now he has been relegated to being almost out the door and probably has no chance of getting anywhere which is unfortunate. That is how this government deals with people who do not toe the line.

Let me speak about some things that will happen in Atlantic Canada as a result of Bill C-70. We have received letters from the Retail Council of Canada, as have hon. members across the way. It has warned about the tax in pricing aspect of Bill C-70, about how it will hurt many large retailers. It has talked about the millions of dollars it will cost. In a very up front manner it said that those costs will be passed on to the consumers in Atlantic Canada.

Consumers will bear the cost of the deal that is being implemented in Atlantic Canada because the government was so desperate to come up with some kind of rationalization for not fulfilling its GST promise. Atlantic Canada has to pay for the government's broken promise. Atlantic Canadians have to pay literally out of their own pockets for this broken promise. But that is not all. Right now we are only talking about the large chains. What about the small businesses?

Greenberg stores is not a large company and it is laying off 79 people with another 71 possibly going. The other day I heard a story about a Halifax businessman who sells magazines. Approximately 8,500 journals come into his store on a weekly or monthly basis. Because of this legislation he will have to change the price on every one of those magazines. I do not care how hard a person works, that cannot possibly be done every week.

Does the government care about all these common sense objections to this deal? Again the government members are strangely silent. Where are the members from Atlantic Canada? Where is the member for Halifax who sits in this place and so often speaks up? She is strangely silent. Not a word. Why are they not standing up for their constituents? Why are they not standing up when they know it will cost jobs, when it means higher costs for consumers? I would think that is a basic responsibility of any member of Parliament.

What about the defence minister? He represents a riding in which one of the Greenberg stores closed. Should he not be on his feet as a cabinet minister? Should he not be defending his own people?

I cannot believe they are allowing this to be pushed through on closure without so much as saying this is wrong, we have to at least fix some of the details. They are silent.

Other bodies have spoken of the problems this will cause in Atlantic Canada as well. The Real Estate Association of Canada talks about a $4,000 increase in the cost of a new house in Atlantic Canada. What is the government doing?

There has been no initiative from the government coming forward and saying "we are going to deal with that, we will fix it". It is going to let the people of Atlantic Canada bear a $4,000 increase in the cost of a new House simply because it had to rush through that deal to try to save the Deputy Prime Minister. That is unacceptable.

If you make a mistake, as the government, if you break a promise, why do you not acknowledge that you have broken a promise, throw yourself at the mercy of the electorate and take your medicine? To try to somehow cover it up and then make people in Atlantic Canada, the most vulnerable economy in the country, pay for it is cruel. I do not know how else to put it.

As we near the end of this debate, sadly the government has pushed through closure. I urge hon. members across the way to somehow screw up the courage to stand and defend their own constituents. Sixteen thousand people in New Brunswick alone have signed one petition in opposition to this legislation.

If hon. members across the way will not listen to me and my colleagues in the Reform Party, perhaps they can somehow find it in their hearts to listen to their own constituents. That is the least the people of Atlantic Canada can expect from their MPs.

[Finance, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, it is a real pleasure to speak to the prebudget debate.

I begin by acknowledging the chair of the finance committee who has always been extremely fair. He was fair again and did a good job of conducting things, speaking from a logistical point of view. Again, he has always been more than fair to members of the Reform Party.

Unfortunately I cannot say very many good things about the government members' report on the prebudget hearings. Frankly, I think there are a lot of problems with it.

I just complimented the member on how he ran the hearings, but it was fairly obvious to me and my colleagues that many witnesses had the big problems with the whole process surrounding the prebudget hearings. People who travelled on either leg of the prebudget hearings will acknowledge that we had to cancel all kinds of sessions this time round simply because witnesses did not show up. Apparently there was some confusion but also people did not see the value of appearing before the finance committee once again.

In fact, there is no question in my mind, if people ever knew they no longer know why we are having prebudget hearings. My

experience has been that a lot of people came and put forward issues that had absolutely no chance of being accepted by the government. It is acknowledged in the government's report that many social groups advocated all kinds of ideas that simply were not on.

It is incumbent on the government, if it is going to invite people to come and speak before it and spend hours putting together a presentation, that it says outright that there is no chance that those types of ideas are going to be accepted. In other words, there were no clear parameters for the debate. It is even acknowledged in the document. It states:

If anything, the success of the Government's approach has intensified the debate and transformed it. Advocates of spending cuts now argue that even deeper cuts can be and should be made to create room to reduce taxes on the deficit. On the other side of the spectrum, the advocates of higher taxes on corporations and "the rich" to finance deficit reduction now argue more vigorously for this approach and for the restoration of spending programs.

The Committee has preferred to avoid these extremes, supporting instead the approaches that are working and which are supported by the broad mainstream of opinion as demonstrated in its hearings.

There is a quote from Jordan B. Grant, chairperson, Bank of Canada for Canadians Coalition. It states: "You have savings of about $4 billion. Our immediate suggestion is that in this budget you put the $4 billion back into the economy".

Obviously Mr. Grant, whom I certainly do not agree with, was invited to the hearing, took some time to put forward a report and then has it dismissed out of hand. It should have been very clear early on that the government had a particular vision and then asked people to debate it. That is not what happened. People spent countless hours putting together reports and then they were completely ignored.

Meanwhile, we had all kinds of other people who should have been invited before the committee and simply were not. I speak of the C.D. Howe Institute, a well known and very reputable organization that comments on all kinds of economic matters, that was not invited. Neither was the Fraser Institute invited, one of the most prominent institutes with respect to economic matters in the country. The Atlantic Institute was not invited. It just delivered a report on the effect of the $185 billion in subsidies of various kinds to Atlantic Canada. That report had a very high profile in the media but strangely it was not invited to appear before the finance committee.

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation attempted to appear. There was a little bit of a mix-up with respect to it appearing and its delegation said it would put it off for a little while. The people at finance said: "That was fine, put it off until next week when we return from our trip and perhaps you can come then". As it turned out that was the end of the hearings and its delegation never had a chance to come forward. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation, that speaks for about 83,000 people in the country, never had a chance to appear before the committee and bring forward its members' views.

Do not take my word for it. I want to quote from the Alberta Chamber of Commerce "Policy News and Views" dated November 25, 1996. Chamber president Cheryl Knebel states: "We were extremely disappointed by the way this year's consultation process was organized. We came prepared to speak to budget specific issues like program spending, the deficit-debt, interprovincial trade barriers and regulatory overlap".

Ms. Knebel continued: "There is an expectation within the business community that when the government asks for advice on the budget process it is prepared to seriously consider views pertaining to the issue". She paid me a personal compliment which is nice, but is it is not the point. She goes on to say: "He pressed to refocus the debate on the need to eliminate the federal deficit and reduce the debt as a fundamental means of addressing every other issue in government but there was just no support".

Obviously the whole thing is way off track. If you do not have goal any answer is equally good. People can say whatever they want. If there is no clear vision it does not matter what people say because the government has not laid down the parameters. It has not told the people what it wants. It is pretty difficult to get input when people do not know what the input is on.

Clearly the process is flawed. People were not coming out. The media was not very interested this time round. This should be exposed for the sham that it really has become even though initially perhaps the intentions were good.

I want to mention a couple of things about the report. I mentioned a minute ago that the government members on the committee had written in their report that the committee has preferred to avoid extremes. I am talking here on the one hand about spending reductions and tax cuts, and on the other hand about increasing spending. It supported instead the approaches that are working and which are supported by the broad mainstream of opinion as demonstrated in its hearings.

The government claims that these are working. Canadians are not working. If these approaches are working so well, why are Canadians not working? Unemployment stands at 10 per cent. We saw this in the Friday unemployment numbers. The premise rather obviously does not bear scrutiny.

If these approaches are working, why has the government's record on child poverty been so poor? It has gone to great lengths in the document to talk about the need to address child poverty. On the other hand it says its approaches are working. It is fairly clear they are not. By the government's own numbers we know that child poverty has actually become far worse under the Liberal government.

In 1989 a motion was moved in this place which said there are one million children living in poverty and that poverty should be eliminated by the year 2000. Today the number is 1.3 million. It is worse by one-third. I do not understand how the government can say that these so-called extremes, like cutting taxes, is somehow out to lunch. Looking at the empirical evidence, the government's approaches have not worked and we have to start casting around for some new ideas. That is exactly what the Reform Party has tried to do and we offered that in our minority report. I see my time is up.

[Taxation, December 5th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, the fact is that Reform would put more money into health care. We would fix the programs that the government has destroyed, the $7.2 billion in cuts to transfers. Reformers believe by the way that real compassion is not putting money into welfare; it is getting more people off welfare.

The CGA says the 20 per cent reduction in UI taxes would create 68,000 jobs by the year 2001. As a matter of fact, the Reform plan calls for a 28 per cent cut in UI premiums. Imagine how many more jobs that would create. Today the Liberals on the finance committee are saying that UI taxes cannot be lowered. Will the finance minister ignore the recommendation of the finance committee and lower payroll taxes to create the jobs that Canadians so desperately want?

[Taxation, December 5th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I must say in response to the previous question to the finance minister that an extremist is anyone who happens to be winning an argument with the Liberals.

The Certified General Accountants have produced a study that confirms what Reformers have been saying all along, that lower taxes create jobs, real permanent jobs, not the McJobs that the infrastructure program allegedly created. The CGA say a $4 billion personal income tax will create 108,000 new jobs by the year 2001.

Given the overwhelming evidence that lower taxes create jobs, will the finance minister agree to start lowering taxes so that Canadians can have those jobs that they really do deserve?

[Taxation, December 3rd, 1996]

The reason they cannot is because of this government's tax policy, and I remind hon. members across the way to check out the latest Angus Reid and Decima polls.

The average Canadian family pays 36 per cent of its income to provide food, shelter and clothing. The tax burden takes up another

whopping 46 per cent. That leaves Canadians with 18 per cent of their income to purchase all those luxuries out there, things like a car to go to work, a telephone and a bed to sleep in.

When will the government realize that this tax burden is crushing Canadians and eliminating their options to live a decent life? When will the government cut taxes?

[Taxation, December 3rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, 70 per cent of women are in the workforce today. Only 30 per cent want to be there.

[Taxation, December 3rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, if people want to know how much importance the Liberals place on parenting, they should check out the government's family tax policy. It is a tax policy that forces the single income earner with a $60,000 income to pay $7,000 more in tax than the same family where both parents are working outside the home. In other words, the government policy on parenting is to tax parents $7,000 more, a parenting tax.

When will the minister recognize the gross injustice of this inequity in the tax system and quit punishing families who choose to raise their children at home?