Madam Speaker, I want to say a few words in the debate before the House today on the bill to implement the budget. Of course the budget came down a couple of months ago and now we have the bill to implement the budget. It gives parliamentarians a chance to raise concerns about the budget before us today.
I want to highlight a number of issues that I think are important. What we have now in the country is a budget that has a surplus and every year the Minister of Finance automatically puts the surplus at March 31, the end of the fiscal year, to the national debt.
I believed for a long time and still believe that it is important to pay down our national debt. Let me say that in coming from Saskatchewan and representing the New Democratic Party, I know that it has been a long legacy of the NDP in Saskatchewan to have a government that is fiscally responsible, quite the opposite of what we see from the right wing Conservative-Alliance-Reform types, where in Saskatchewan under Grant Devine, a Conservative premier, they ran up a huge deficit and a huge debt which really made things very difficult for the people of the province.
Having said that, I also have a private member's motion before the House that would allow Parliament to have flexibility as to where the surplus would be spent. I have a private member's bill that would set up what is called a fiscal stabilization fund. We have this in Saskatchewan and in some of the other provinces as well. The surplus would go into the fiscal stabilization fund and Parliament itself would decide where the surplus would go; it would not automatically go to the national debt. We might put part of it on the debt, part of it into program spending and part of it on tax cuts or whatever the priorities of Parliament or the government of the day would be.
Today we do not have that option. Under our laws in the federal House of Commons, it is automatic that every single penny of the national surplus goes automatically to the national debt.
As I recall, a couple of years ago the surplus was around $17 billion. It went automatically to the national debt. I think that if we had properly reflected the priorities of the Canadian people the majority of that $17 billion would not have gone to the national debt. The majority of that $17 billion would have gone into program spending, particularly in health care in Canada.
We have in the country now a real crisis in terms of the funding of health care by the federal government. The federal government on a cash transfer basis transfers only about 14% of the cost of health care to the provinces. That is on a cash basis. The other 86% of the cost is paid for by the provinces. When medicare first came into operation in this country and became a reality, it was cost shared on a fifty-fifty basis by the federal government and the provinces. The federal government put up 50% of the cost and the provinces put 50% of the cost. Today it is 86% from the provinces and about 14% from the federal government.
The problem is that when we have a huge surplus that could be going in large part to health care or many other priorities it is going instead entirely to the national debt. I think that is one change that should be made. A chance to raise that comes today when we are speaking about how budgets are implemented. One of the problems we have is that we do not have any flexibility. Parliament does not have any flexibility at all, because once we hit March 31, the national debt goes down by whatever the surplus is.
I also want to raise a couple of other issues that I think are very important in terms of implementing the budget. We have in our country a very large social deficit. I am talking about health care. The Romanow report has identified a deficit in terms of federal funding on health care and where that money should be going.
What we need is a transfer of several billion dollars extra per year to the provinces to make sure we have national health care that is accessible to each and every Canadian. I do not want to see the day in Canada when we have private health care competing with the public sector. The Canadian people want a very strong public health care system from one coast to the other. It has to be well funded. There has to be equal accessibility for all Canadians no matter what province they live in, no matter what part of the country they happen to come from. That is why the federal government has to be the institution, the government in the country, that provides around 50% of the funding eventually to make sure there is equality of access, equality of service and equality of treatment for each and every Canadian.
We could get that if we had more of the federal surplus and more federal government priorities going to health care in Canada. I believe that is very important. It is something I would certainly like to see.
In terms of the social deficit, for a long time the Liberal Party has promised a national child care program. Again we do not have any action in terms of national child care in Canada. That is another priority in terms of spending that the federal government should be looking at very seriously. If more money were put into child care and health in this country it would also stimulate the economy and create jobs, which in turn would create more economic activity, and more money would come back to the coffers of the federal government, the provinces and municipalities. It would be a win-win situation for the Canadian people.
The other thing I want to mention very briefly in terms of spending is that there is a huge infrastructure deficit in Canada. I think it was the mayor of Winnipeg who pointed out recently that this is one of the great shortfalls of the budget before the House. He was talking about the $57 billion infrastructure deficit in Canada. That is $57 billion and in the budget only a few million dollars were put into the infrastructure of Canada. These funds, if we had an adequately funded infrastructure program, are needed right across the country for cleaning up our water supply, for municipal sewer and water projects, for roads, for bridges and for many other projects in my city of Regina or in any other city or town across the country.
I think the need in Regina in terms of infrastructure, as well as for some small towns in my riding, is in terms of the safe treatment of water facilities. In my riding, for example, there are 12 different Indian reserves and first nations bands and some of them need extra help in terms of safe water.
These are some of the areas that we have to put more money into. Again that should have happened in the budget that is before the House. That is why I vote non-confidence in that federal budget and vote against it.
In addition to infrastructure, health and national day care, we need more federal money transferred into education. Education in Canada is a jurisdiction shared by the provinces and the federal government, but the federal government has a responsibility to provide more money and more funding to post-secondary education so that everyone, again regardless of where one lives, has equal access to education. That is not the case today. There are many universities in many provinces where the tuition fees are much too high for the average Canadian family to send their children to university. Without universal accessibility to higher education, we are creating a two tier system for Canadians in terms of financial discrimination. Part of that solution would be if the federal government were to transfer more money for post-secondary education.
The other area is agriculture. We have a farm crisis. Farmers are underfunded in terms of cash. We are fighting the American farm bill. We are fighting against the European farm program. In fact, these programs in Europe and the United States are so massively funded that many Canadian farmers are going under because of them. I know that our treasury cannot compete fully against the treasury of Brussels or the treasury of Washington. Some of these subsidies are massive.
I do not have all the information with me today, but when a Canadian farmer in Saskatchewan or Manitoba sells grain, only about 10¢ on the dollar for the grain that is sold comes from the federal government. If that farmer were in Montana or North Dakota, instead of 10¢ on the dollar I think it would be 50¢ or 60¢ on the dollar coming in a subsidy from Washington. We have this tremendous discrepancy between what the American farmer receives from Washington and what the Canadian farmer receives from Ottawa.
If we had a national farm program that had some reflection of the cost of living and the cost of production built into it, we would have a stronger farm economy. If the stronger farm economy is there, then the farmers are better off, the small towns are better off, the cities are better off and all of Canada is better off.
These are some of the priorities that I think the federal government should take a look at in terms of its budgeting process. Some may say that I am talking about spend, spend, spend, but I am really talking about investing, investing, investing in very key social and economic sectors of our economy. At the same time, we have to bring down the national debt. We can bring down the national debt by putting a smaller amount toward the national debt. I am also talking about budgeting in the reality of having a balanced budget. I do not want to go back into debt and have deficits in this country. We do not need that, but with a smaller amount going to the national debt every year we would have more money to invest in important social programs and agriculture.
The other way of getting more money for the social deficit, first nations people, agriculture, social housing and all the programs we need is by investing more money in these areas. Through it we would stimulate the economy. We would create more economic activity and more money would come back to the federal government in terms of national revenue through the provinces or municipalities. Part of it pays for itself just by the fact that we would be investing money in areas of need. That stimulates the economy and creates jobs.
As well, I do believe that the $100 billion tax cut announced by the federal government on the eve of the election in 2000 was a tax cut that went too far in terms of bringing down taxes too rapidly for wealthy Canadians. Part of that $100 billion over five years could have been spent more wisely in terms of putting money into education, health care and other important needs in the country.
These are things that are important. When I am in my riding and talking to people, the most important issue is not cutting taxes for a wealthy millionaire. The most important issues are making sure that we have a very strong health care system, a good education system and affordable housing for each and every Canadian.
I want to also mention that the budget did make some changes in terms of the airline industry. A while back, in response to security issues after 9/11, the federal government brought in a security tax of $12 for a one-way domestic flight in Canada, or $24 return. If we look at the revenues the security tax brings in, we find it brings in much more revenue than is needed for enhanced or additional security at any airport in the country; in fact it brings in two, three, four and five times as much or more at many airports in Canada.
What happened after a great deal of protest by the Canadian people, by passengers of airlines and by members of Parliament, is that the budget cut the airport security fee in half, from $24 to $12 on domestic flights. My point is that at $12 for a return flight, it is still higher than what we see in the United States and many other countries. It is becoming a way for the federal government to raise money by a special user fee for people who fly in Canada.
Flying has become more expensive. In fact, the Nav Canada charges are going up again with another fee increase of 6.9%. We have airlines in trouble, such as Air Canada. We get hit with the airport security tax, a special fuel tax, Nav Canada tax, and the goods and services tax, so the price of the ticket keeps going up and that makes it more difficult for people. That again is an issue in terms of keeping a national airline. We have to do what we can to make sure that Air Canada remains solvent. I believe that we should not have privatized Air Canada in the first place. I think the federal government now should look at taking a huge equity share or part of Air Canada to make sure we preserve a national airline.
These are some of the issues that are really important.
I would like to mention something else. A few days ago, I read some statistics in the newspapers about the income of Canadians. There is now a great gap between the rich and poor in Canada, and it is more serious now than 5, 10 or 20 years ago. If I remember correctly, there has been a 12% or 13% increase for the richest people in Canada over the past 10 years, but the poorest have stayed at about the same level of income as 10 years ago, with perhaps a 2% or 3% increase.
We should do more as a nation and as a parliament. There must be more equality between the rich and the poor. I know that the Canadian Alliance has done a lot of lobbying in order to get tax cuts for the richest people in our country, for our country's biggest corporations. The Canadian Alliance's lobbying convinced the former finance minister to provide big tax cuts for the wealthy.
There have been tax cuts for the wealthy and big corporations, but the poor have had the opposite treatment. I represent a riding where there are many poor people. According to Statistics Canada, my riding is the second or third poorest in Saskatchewan.
A big tax cut, where wealthy people get thousands of dollars less on their taxes, does not do very much for a poor person living in north central Regina, or a poor person living in a first nation band, or some poor person living in a small village, be it in Saskatchewan, Quebec or anywhere else in the country.
The time has come that we turn our attention to the issues of poverty. I could not help but notice an article in the Hill Times on a survey done a while ago. It talked about the sexiest MP, and I am not talking about the minister responsible for Canada Post or my good friend from Brandon—Souris, even though he is very high on the list. I am talking about another question that was asked. What is the area that has been most overlooked by parliamentarians? It turned out to be child poverty and kids living in poverty.
It is a real crime that over the last decade when the economy started to improve, after about 10 years of Conservative rule when the economy was going downhill, that the issue of child poverty and poverty in general was not addressed by Parliament. That is a real challenge.
It is a real challenge for Canada's Parliament to intervene with regard to poverty, not just child poverty, but poverty affecting all Canadians in this country.
Those are some of the issues that are really important.
We have a great country. We have tremendous potential. We have wonderful resources. We can produce the most food of any country in the world and we have a small population, a population that is well trained and well skilled. More money should be put into training, education, research and development to become better skilled. With these resources, we can be second to none in the years that lie ahead.
It is important, as we go ahead and make progress and develop economically, that we ensure it benefits all Canadians, not just those who are in the top 20%, but all Canadians no matter where we live.
