Dave Chatters

[Income Tax Act, September 24th, 2003]

That was distracting, Madam Speaker.

To now send the parliamentary secretary in with the presentation that he made to sell this as some kind of a bold initiative by the government to make the oil and gas and mining sectors more competitive is offensive. Of course, all the arguments that the parliamentary secretary made were quite true. It will do all of the things that he suggested it will, but all of the things that he said were true when the corporate tax rate was reduced for everybody else back in 2000. This sector should have enjoyed that same reduction then because it will in fact make those sectors competitive with other countries around the world, in particular with the United States.

I know we are going to hear cries, and we have already heard some, that this is a tax break for that nasty oil and gas industry and all the other things that we hear over and over again in the House. The truth is that this is an extremely competitive industry. It is an extremely capital intensive industry, particularly the mining sector.

In the last number of years, the oil and gas industry has been reasonably healthy, but it can only stay healthy if it can stay competitive and certainly the mining sector has been struggling. In our mining industry, some of our best experts have been driven out of this country by these kinds of oppressive tax regimes and driven to other countries around the world. We are only now beginning to see some return.

That was a result of an insensitive government that did not provide a competitive tax regime where a company could attract investment to this country and produce our natural resources profitably not only for the companies but also for the governments involved in a major kind of way.

For the government to suggest now that somehow it is listening to the industry and it is going to do the right thing for the industry is offensive. That should have been provided to the industry when the other sectors received the same reduction. The parliamentary secretary did speak at some length about the importance of the industry and I would like to touch on that as well because the resource industries and the oil and gas and mining industries are extremely important to the economy of this country and huge contributors to our GDP.

The oil and gas industry alone produces overall, with the spinoff benefits, approximately half a million jobs in this country and produces untold wealth in the form of taxes to governments, which is a huge contribution to governments. Certainly if one cares to compare the resource industries, for example,--and I am just picking one that I think is an effective comparison perhaps--the automotive industry in Ontario is hugely important to the economy of Ontario.

The government pays a lot of attention when the industry speaks and when the industry has problems, but when we compare the two the natural resource industries are comparable in every way in terms of job creation and taxes they pay to government, and I would suggest a considerably higher return in the form of taxes to governments than the automotive industry. In terms of investment in the economy, one would find that the automotive sector invested about $22 billion, which is the figure I have, over the last 10 years.

When one looks at the oil and gas industry alone over the last 10 years, not even counting the mining industry where there has been huge investments in diamond mining in the Northwest Territories and some other sectors, there has been $80 billion of committed investment in the sector. It is important to the Canadian economy. I cannot understand why back in 2000 the industry was singled out for that kind of discrimination. It certainly affects industry when we are looking at projects.

For example, there is an environmental hearing process going on in Fort McMurray right now on one of the latest proposed projects in the tar sands. Some $8.7 billion of investment is being proposed. That investment was in some doubt for some time because of this kind of discriminatory tax regime that the government was imposing on it, and proposing to impose on it through the Kyoto accord.

I am delighted to see that both the process and the project is moving forward. It will return in spades the investment that those who boldly took to invest that kind of money in a project that will not return any of their investment for up to five or six years.

We have heard and will continue to hear criticisms of the industry. Every time the price of gasoline spikes we hear the outcry that big industry is gouging consumers. The reality is that over the last few decades the oil and gas industry has provided us with some of the lowest priced energy in the world in the form of gasoline. If government taxes were taken off gasoline, Canadians would enjoy some of the lowest prices in the world. Until recently, the security of supply has been unquestioned. However the supply is always available at a reasonable price.

These resources are non-renewable resources; they are a finite resource. Unquestionably, the price of those resources and the products produced from those resources will rise over time. They will continue to do that, and that is not unhealthy to our economy. As those prices rise, because of the scarcity of the resource and the rising demand for the resource, that will allow us to seek out other cleaner forms of energy and more reliable sources of energy. The truth is that around the world the supply of fossil fuels has probably peaked and is in decline. Even the huge resources of the Middle East have probably seen their peak and are in decline there as well.

There are growing concerns in Canada and around the world about the effect of fossil fuel use on our environment, and a lot of other concerns are coming forward. We are beginning to look elsewhere for other forms of energy. Without the wealth and the jobs, and the standard of living that fossil fuel resources have allowed this country and other countries around the world to enjoy, we would not have the ability, the resources, or the wealth and the brains to explore and find other newer and cleaner sources of energy.

I expect that even as we move to those newer and cleaner forms of energy that fossil fuel energy resources and the mineral resources of this country will continue to be used more and more in value added products and all kinds of things that affect the everyday lives of Canadians all the time. Therefore, the future is probably bright not only from an environmental point of view but certainly from an energy supply point of view.

However, getting back to Bill C-48, our party will be supporting it. I would have wished that there would have been the kind of support in the House because of what the bill is trying to do. A grave injustice was imposed upon those industries some years back. I would have hoped that the House would have dealt with this issue at all stages in one day and passed the bill.

I am afraid, because of the time it took for the government to introduce this initiative and to bring the bill forward in the limited time we have before the government decides to prorogue and make the transition to a new Prime Minister, that the bill could get caught up in that process. That would be a terrible shame. It needs to be done quickly because it is a matter of fairness. It is not a matter of giving anyone anything that the rest of the country does not have. We should do it quickly and we will be supporting the bill.

[Income Tax Act, September 24th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this bill.

It was a very interesting presentation that the parliamentary secretary made. Obviously it was a very technical presentation prepared by the department and I am sure that 90% of Canadians would have great difficulty understanding what he was talking about most of the time.

The reality here is that this bill is about correcting an injustice that was done to these resource industries back in the 2000 budget. The now leader of the Liberal Party in his 2000 budget reduced the corporate tax rate in Canada from 28% to 21% and he excluded the oil and gas industry and the mining industry from that reduction. That was clearly discriminatory. It was unfair. I stood in the House and I expressed that view then and I express it now.

[Parliament of Canada Act, September 22nd, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, it is always refreshing to hear the bubbling enthusiasm of the member's endorsement of a government initiative, no matter how thinly it is disguised as being genuine.

However I certainly agree with the member that we all would like to see public confidence in elected members of Parliament and appointed members of the Senate to be beyond reproach. However I do not know how the member can muster this kind of enthusiasm after the 10 year record of the government, when there were allegations against the Prime Minister and the golf course and the hotel loan; a defence minister resigning; a couple of solicitors general resigning; advertising contracts given to friends; and the list goes on and on. All of this is happening at the same time as the Prime Minister tells us that his current ethics counsellor would do the job and would restore the confidence of the Canadian public in the government and in elected members.

After all we have heard all day long in this debate, with everyone pointing out its shortcomings, what is it in Bill C-34 that gives the member that kind of enthusiasm in his support of the bill?

[Petitions, September 22nd, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the second petition is also from my constituents and asks Parliament to take all measures necessary to protect the rights of Canadians to freely share their religious and moral beliefs without fear of prosecution.

[Petitions, September 22nd, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to present today.

The first one is from members of my constituency and asks Parliament to pass legislation to recognize the institution of marriage in federal law as being the lifelong union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others.

[Nuclear Amendment Act, 2003, September 22nd, 2003]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-449, an act to amend the Nuclear Energy Act and the Nuclear Safety and Control Act.

Mr. Speaker, this is a fairly simple bill. It simply splits responsibility for Atomic Energy Canada Limited and the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission into the responsibility of two ministers instead of one, because in my opinion there is clearly a conflict of interest to be both the marketer and the public safety supervisor of the nuclear industry. I am proposing to split that responsibility in two.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Petitions, June 11th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition to present today from constituents of the community of Athabasca. They ask the House to reaffirm the decision on the definition of marriage in the motion that was passed in the House in June 1999 defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The petitioners ask the House to reaffirm that definition.

[Agriculture, June 11th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the Alberta minister of agriculture, who has signed on to the APF, has stated that any BSE compensation package has to be a compliment to NISA and that NISA alone will not address this crisis.

Why is the government refusing to offer immediate assistance to feedlot operators who are going broke?

[Agriculture, June 11th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the plan of the industry and now the plan of the premiers for BSE compensation was delivered to the Prime Minister on June 9.

Premier Campbell was not overstating the BSE economic crisis when he said, “If something is not done immediately, the feedlot industry as we know it will disappear”.

Could the Prime Minister tell the House why he has not agreed to compensation in view of the fact that the APF cannot provide immediate help?

[Canada Elections Act, June 10th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, as we have seen over the years in this place, when the government passes this kind of self-serving legislation it often ends up before the courts. The legislation is then either struck down or it costs the public treasury millions of dollars to defend the legislation.

The Liberal Party president, Stephen LeDrew, suggested before committee that parts of the bill were unconstitutional and went against the charter.

I would ask the minister how much the government has budgeted to defend the bill against court challenges.