Jake Hoeppner

[Customs Tariff, March 11th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, it has been a good experience for me to be involved with this bill, a new experience for a farmer who just knows how to turn tractor wheels instead of turning politicians.

It has been really gratifying to see this bill go through the House in a smooth order. We have had some very good debate. We have looked at some issues. I have expressed, as my colleagues have, that there are some concerns. We believe fully that the hon. minister will take these concerns to heart and be vigilant about them.

I have followed the career of the hon. minister somewhat in his previous business experience and I always appreciated his comments. I know that he always stressed that we had to have black at the bottom instead of red. If he watches this bill as intently as he did at that time for his profession and makes sure that the majority of times the Canadian government will be in the black with these trading relationships it will be a benefit for the country.

I have faith in this hon. minister that he will do that because he is a Canadian, as we Reformers are. We have very strongly made the comments in this House that we are for free trade but that we also believe in fair trade. That is one of the stipulations that the hon. minister has to accept. We will be critical when it is not fair trade but we will support him very strongly in freer trade with these underdeveloped countries.

I really enjoyed the debate in this House. Where I have made a few mistakes I hope hon. members will forgive me and bear with me so that in the future we can operate this House and continue to make decisions that are positive for this nation as a whole because that is what we are here for.

[Customs Tariff, March 11th, 1994]

Mr. Chairman, I thank the hon. minister. When I look at the trade figures we have with other countries, not just underdeveloped countries, my concern is that the Canadian government seems to have been a very poor trader. We have deficits with the majority of countries. The United States is practically the only country with which we have a trade surplus.

The government should be vigilant. We should make trade deals with these countries that benefit us to some extent. We cannot be at the short end of the stick all of the time. With the $500 billion deficit we already have, we have to improve our trading practices to increase revenue.

I would ask the minister and the government to be very vigilant in improving our trading practices because we have to become better businessmen.

[Customs Tariff, March 11th, 1994]

Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask a question of the hon. minister. I see in my notes that on an annual basis we lose about $156 million in preferential tariff reductions. With expanded trade as a global community, has the minister done any projections on how much of an increase it will be? We are trading more and more with these countries. Is there any way he can project what kind of an impact it would have on our economy?

The more preferential products we bring in, the more we have to consume. They also reduce the revenue side for the government. I would appreciate it if the minister would give me a bit of a guideline on that point.

[Customs Tariff, March 11th, 1994]

I have a supplementary question, Mr. Chairman.

The Reform Party is quite favourable to freer trade, but we have to look at our manufacturers so that there is fair competition. I feel some kind of monitoring should be going on so that our consumers do not have to pay the price and a few importers get rich by making sacrifices on these tariffs. We have to be fair in this trade if we are to have this type of trade.

[Customs Tariff, March 11th, 1994]

Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask the minister whether there are any guidelines for or any monitoring done of the products brought in by these preferential tariffs to ensure that our consumers benefit from them and to ensure that they do not get lost in the retailing or the reselling after they have been imported by the importers. Could he comment on that, please?

[The Budget, February 25th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I rise in the House today to share the concerns of my constituent, Betty Maxwell, of Neepawa, Manitoba, who comments: "The government has given us a middle of the road budget and with the economic traffic we have that is a very dangerous place to be. We have a budget that is long on rhetoric and short on substance".

Instead of attacking government spending with serious cuts it is actually increasing spending. If this increased spending only brings unemployment down one-tenth of 1 per cent in the first year, it confirms that previous governments by overspending $500 billion have put us at this rate of unemployment.

This budget is very reminiscent of those of previous governments with rosy predictions and miscalculations that Canadians have never been able to rely on. With optimistic forecasts for growth and lack of deficit reduction, it is back to the old philosophy of counting the chicks before they are hatched.

[Excise Act, February 22nd, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the hon. member's comments. It almost astounds me that we fail to realize what really has caused this problem.

In the 1970s when the government of that day allowed 24 per cent interest rates, allowed farmers and businessmen to be put out of business, I stood beside graves of people who committed suicide because of the overspending and overmanipulation of the political system. Today he makes a very emotional speech. I wonder what he is going to tell his future great-grandchildren when they have no food to put on the table and they shoot each other because of it. Who will they blame then?

It is because the governments of the last 25 years have not been able to make a decent decision to enforce laws, where thousands of people died in two world wars, that is why we have this problem today. We had better realize it or we will go down in history as some of the worst decision makers ever in the country.

[Grain Handling, February 22nd, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, on January 31 I urged the Minister of Human Resources Development to declare grain handling an essential service. Because of his failure to respond immediately, the grain industry is now experiencing devastating losses of more than $10 million. The canola, flax and rye business may have been lost permanently. The elevator system is operating at 90 per cent capacity, leaving many elevators plugged.

The strike's impact on grain flow to the west coast is difficult to measure in dollars, but it is expected to take until June for wheat barley movements to return to normal.

Now longshoremen at the port of Montreal and grain handlers at Lakehead are in a position to strike.

The federal government must immediately enact legislation that would declare grain handling an essential service to prevent any further disruptions that would compromise our western economy.

[Excise Act, February 22nd, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the hon. member's comments. He has pointed out very vividly that there are two big problems in this situation. One is overtaxation and the other is the law enforcement side.

I am wondering if the hon. member could comment on how we should deal with the law enforcement issue. The overtaxation issue I think we have dealt with because we have made it unprofitable to smuggle cigarettes. These same people who have been doing that will now be unemployed. I do not think they paid into the unemployment insurance fund. Will they now take a job at the minimum wage or will these people go somewhere else and smuggle other products? Are we again going to lower those taxes to do away with that issue?

Now we have lost revenue and probably created a health problem. When are we going to address the issue of law enforcement? That is the big problem that we have to look at because these people are not ordinary law-abiding citizens.

[Excise Act, February 22nd, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate that question also. As the hon. member will probably realize, Snowflake is one of the best known smuggling ports in Manitoba. I do not think that it is the price of the American product that really has caused this underground economy.

It is the taxation on these products that has made it so lucrative. It is not just cigarettes in Manitoba. Liquor smuggling is twice as bad I would say as the cigarettes. If we look at the statistics which tell us that 90 per cent of liquor sold in hotels or restaurants could be smuggled, we start wondering what is next.

Another issue that we are addressing right now is gasoline. As the hon. member will know the drive across the border to fill up your tank is very lucrative or has been. With regard to farm production costs, it would make a lot more sense to take the tax off of gasoline so we could import our gasoline that we exported out of the country at probably two-thirds of the cost of what we are paying today.

This is what I have been trying to point out. I do not think the cost of the products is really the big issue here. It is the overtaxation of these products. A lot of these products we produce in Canada, export them to the United States and then smuggle them back in because of the taxation problem.