Steve Mahoney

[Supply, February 11th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure I got the date. Was it 1995 he was referring to?

[Supply, February 11th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Shefford is perhaps a minor exception to some of my criticism. In fact, in September 1997 the member moved a motion that was debated on November 19 which read:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should review the level at which the child benefit is indexed.

She has at least shown some sympathy prior to this debate for the issue of child poverty. I give her recognition and credit for that as perhaps being a small beacon of light in a party that searches for an identity. Perhaps it should have made her the leader instead of Mr. Clark.

[Supply, February 11th, 1999]

Whoops would be putting it kindly. The leader of the Conservative Party was just about kicked and had to be protected and taken away. The message was that the leader of the Conservative Party created this mess in the first place.

Was he not a former prime minister? Was he not a member of the Brian Mulroney government? What did they do for us then? They would stand here and say: “That was then and this is now. We have changed”.

They will not be uniting the right in a couple of weeks although I appreciate we hear rumblings that might occur. Why not put forward some positive resolutions to deal with housing? They must have the ability to contact the premier of Ontario. He might return their phone calls. I am not sure he would return mine. They could contact him and say “Why have you gutted the housing programs and passed everything on to the municipalities? Why do we not work together to try to come up with a national housing strategy?”

If they put that forward in this place they might find that there is not quite the criticism or the cynicism that exists when we see this motherhood and apple pie in their trying to wrap themselves in the issue to prove that they are a kinder and gentler party than when they ruled the roost under the infamous Prime Minister Mulroney. We do not see that kind of positive suggestion.

The budget is coming down in the next few days, next Tuesday. The Prime Minister, the health minister and the finance minister have said that it will be a health care budget. There will be a substantial investment in health care, in medicare, in taking care of sick Canadians. Recently an accord was signed, interestingly enough, by all 10 premiers including the Premier of Quebec.

Lest I be accused of neglecting the Bloc, let me refer to a comment made by one of its members who said that the best thing that could happen to the country would be for the government to be defeated. The best thing that could happen to the country would be for a strong, united country working together to solve poverty. The only way that could happen would be if we were able to witness the historical demise of the Bloc.

Would that not be a lovely day for Canada? Then we could have motions and debates that could rebuild this great country, build on Confederation, deal with health care, deal with balancing budgets, paying down our debt, reducing taxes and building housing for the poor. These are things the government cares about.

We do not talk in rhetoric. We talk in action. They will see more of it on Tuesday when the new budget comes down. They will continue to see the kind of leadership Canadians have come to expect from the government over the balance of the mandate of this term.

[Supply, February 11th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to address this motion today, put clearly by a party in search of an identity, in search of policies, in search of anything. It has been searching for a leader and I think it is still looking for him. I saw him coming through the gallery earlier today, or maybe it was a look-alike.

It would appear that having gone through the metamorphosis of being in government under Brian Mulroney, having led this country into record deficits, massive debts and doing nothing whatsoever for poor people in the country, it is now on a policy hunt, so it put forward a motion which I would have thought would have come from the NDP.

It is interesting to hear the New Democrats, particularly the previous speaker, defend the government of Mr. Romanow. We should give credit where credit is due. Mr. Romanow balanced the provincial budget. It is too bad that Mr. Rae in Ontario did not go to the same school as Mr. Romanow. That was a New Democratic government, leading by its adopted principles, which intentionally ran up deficits of $10 billion every year. It kept piling up the debt and left the once strong and healthy province of Ontario, arguably one of the engines of economic growth in this country, over $100 billion in debt.

To hear the New Democrats in debate on a Conservative motion on poverty cite an example of great economic leadership by a New Democratic government is really rather ironic. To try to pretend that they have the answers on how to run the ship of state financially is really quite laughable.

I want to focus on the Conservative motion which is before us. The solution, the solution du jour we might call it, the solution of the moment, seems to be that the way to help poor people in this country is to cut taxes. It really is an interesting notion.

At least members of the Reform Party are upfront. They would cut taxes and have a flat rate right across the land. They think that in some miraculous way that will trickle down and solve poverty. The rich will get richer and somehow, according to the Reform Party's mentality, that will help the poor. We know that is not the case.

In the case of the Conservative Party, it is suggesting in the motion that we increase the basic income tax credit, index the tax brackets and index the child tax benefit. Most of the people who are truly poor in this country do not pay taxes in the first place. Even Homer Simpson would understand that.

I am at a loss to understand how this party in this motion could try to perpetrate the fraud upon the people in this place and the people of Canada that the solution is simply to reduce taxes and that will make poverty disappear.

That party could have made some constructive suggestions. It could have recognized, as we all do, that we have a void in the provision of social housing. We have a responsibility, and I am hopeful that our government will work with provincial governments and municipal governments to put in place some serious housing programs, which I know will be opposed by Reform. That is a given. Anything that is in any way constructive, that in any way would deal with social policy, will be opposed. We know we will have that battle.

If the Conservatives really want to find a new identity and do something to help solve poverty in this country they should recognize what their leader recognized yesterday. I dare say, he was assaulted, insulted and might have been attacked if it were not for the RCMP intervening. The new leader of the Conservative Party found out yesterday that popping in for a photo op might not be the smartest thing to do when one has an angry mob on one's hands.

What did they say? I will not use the words. I heard them on CPAC. They are not for family hour viewing, so I will not repeat them. In any event, expletives were hurled in the face of former Prime Minister Clark. There was also a Reform member who tried to get a photo op with all of these folks, thinking that by snuggling in and cuddling up and being warm and friendly these folks would realize that Reformers are really not the big, bad right wingers from the west. The Conservative leader might have realized that this was an opportunity to forge some kind of coalition or position or relationship with these folks. They got a very blunt message.

[Waste Report, February 11th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the most recent edition of the member for St. Albert's so-called waste report indignantly claims that the Department of National Defence is nickel and diming us into the poorhouse by spending $1,033 to replace a lost tricycle. “It must have belonged to a general's granddaughter”, the hon. member writes.

It turns out that this tricycle was a military cargo transporter used by soldiers to assist victims of the Saguenay region flood in 1996. Only the Reform Party would believe that helping Canadians who are being ravaged by floods is somehow a waste of money.

I have some advice for the hon. member. He should check his facts and do his homework. Until the accuracy of the member's publication improves I will continue to relegate it, the copy of the waste report, to the wastebasket where it truly belongs.

[Supply, February 4th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, it is truly the irony of all ironies that the Bloc would find itself supposedly in its somewhat twisted myopic view of this situation to be the defender of the Canadian Constitution. It leaves me almost speechless, something that does not happen to me very often.

The reality is what the Bloc is doing is playing parochial, provincial politics, nothing more. As the premiers talk with the Prime Minister, it is deathly afraid that they might come out of that meeting with some kind of agreement which the people of Quebec will say is a good agreement, that they might actually make a deal that they will be able to go back to the people of Quebec and indeed all people in Canada and say we have done what is right for all Canadians.

That is what the Bloc does not like. Anything its members can do to undermine the credibility of this place, the credibility of this great country, is what they are about. It is truly shameful.

[Supply, February 4th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I want to give the member some sense of confidence that very little of what I say is inadvertent. I can assure him of that.

I also want to make a point with reference to the comment that it was the Conservative government of Ralph Klein that did these wonderful things.

This is the same government in the province of Alberta that imposed user fees on its own citizens until this government said no, we will not transfer the money to you. You cannot violate the terms.

With regard to the province, the member has obviously been watching the advertising machine of the Progressive Conservative Party which is filling the airwaves full of twisted untruths.

Costs have been driven through the roof, no question about that. This requires more money in health care. This government is committed to that and the member, in spite of his rhetoric, will see that commitment very soon.

[Supply, February 4th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member cares to check the record in Hansard , he would see that my comments did reflect that it was the courage, the dedication and the hard work of Canadians that allowed us to balance the budget.

He wants to give great credit to Mike and Ernie, the golf pros. He wants to tell us that they figured out how to solve this. On the one hand he says to give the credit to the Canadian people, but on the other hand he wants to ignore the hard work of the people of Ontario. It was through the sacrifices of the citizens of Ontario, as a result of Mike the Knife and Ernie the Golfer who took the money out of the health care system in the province of Ontario, and that member should understand that.

[Supply, February 4th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I do not intend to disappoint them now.

It really is ironic. Maybe the Bloc would help me out a little. I was originally scheduled to be in my French class between 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. The whip's office called and asked me if I would like to speak on the opposition day motion. I said I sure would. Maybe the Bloc can replace my French lesson by helping me with a few words in French.

How does one say “myopic” in French? How does one say “double standard” in French? How does one say “parochialism” in French? How does one say “provincialism” in French? How does one say “hypocrisy” in French?

Mr. Speaker, perhaps the Bloc could help me by giving me a brief French lesson on those five words. I would replace those five words with one word in English, which would be Bloc. The Bloc would meet the standard and the definition of all those words with regard to this issue.

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Lac-Saint-Louis today.

While the motion put forward by the Bloc meets the standard or test of all five of those words, it does not address five other issues. Those are the issues that fundamentally are the cornerstones of our health care system.

The other day I was taken to task by some of the hon. members opposite when I said in this place that Canadians are fundamentally proud of their health care system. Of course they realize there are problems, just as I realized when I and a member of my family arrived at the Mississauga hospital by ambulance a couple of weeks ago.

They realize there are problems when there are three patients in beds in the hall with ambulance attendants required to wait with those patients until they can be transferred to a specific bed in a room. We are tying up three crews of ambulance workers. We are making people who are in some cases extremely ill sit in a public hallway on a gurney or a bed waiting to get proper attention. There is something wrong with that. This government knows that. The Canadian people know that.

Would members opposite expect us to sit back and allow a provincial government, such as in my province, to hand back a 30% tax cut which benefits the wealthiest members of society in Ontario, while it cuts health care? They can blame the federal government if they wish. And politically, heading toward an election this spring or next fall, I am not at all surprised that they would do that.

The reality is that the partnership spoken about in our Constitution, the partnership that is being negotiated as we speak in this place, the social union that is being negotiated is all about establishing some fundamental principles. This party and this government believe in those principles and will never transfer any kind of responsibility or ability to the provincial level to negate those principles of public administration, accessibility, portability, universality and comprehensiveness. That is the foundation of medicare.

I find it truly amusing when I listen to the member from the Bloc claiming that she would like to see this party sitting in opposition. I would like her to tell us what that solution would be. Would she like the Reform Party with its two tier system to be in charge of health care in this country? I highly doubt it. She would recognize that representing a party that is based on provincial values only that the Bloc is incapable of forming a national government. Obviously it goes without saying the Bloc would have some slight difficulty electing members outside la belle province.

Would the member recognize that the Tory government under Brian Mulroney left a legacy of $42 billion which required the serious attention by this government to the deficit and that took every ounce of effort and courage by the Canadian people to eliminate it? Would she like to see the party of Brian Mulroney back in power? Or is she naive enough to believe it would be the New Democrats?

The New Democrats had their crack at governing in the province of Ontario at a time when I was in opposition to Mr. Rae and company. They had their crack at showing the country what they could do with a reasonably sized government, and the damage that occurred under their stewardship. Would she really believe the New Democrats are going to form a national government?

We do not hear the other side of the issue. She would like to stand and say get rid of the Liberals. I understand that. That is the opposition. That is the best thought she has had today. She does not know what to counter it with or what to replace it with.

The reality is this federation works. In spite of the utterances of members of the Bloc, in spite of the fact that they would destroy this country, it works because the federal government is committed to working with the provinces, with the private sector, with the local community. That is very important.

I assume that by this motion the Bloc would have us abdicate our responsibility. This is not about respect. It is about abdication.

There is a section of the federal government called the federal health protection program. Would the Bloc wish that this government should simply walk away from that program? It is a program that monitors disease and tells us about the best ways to prevent or control illness or injury for Canadians throughout the country. They prevent and they respond to public health emergencies.

There was a tragedy in my own community not long ago when a teenager came down with a case of meningitis and died. Imagine the panic, the sense of fear in the community, the demands to the regional municipality, not to the province and not to the federal government, but to the community's medical officer to immunize everyone in the community. We have to balance that fear. Is it realistic? It sure seems so when we have a teenager at home who might contract that deadly disease.

The federal government through the federal health protection program can work with local health delivery agencies to deal with that kind of emergency. I do not think what the Bloc is talking about takes into account the extremely important work that is done in working with local health authorities who really deliver it on the ground.

I know I have a just a few seconds left so in closing, I want to say that this could be a historic day. As the Prime Minister meets with the premiers it is my hope on behalf of my constituents and all Canadians that calm will prevail, that some intelligence will come around that table to understand that the federal government cannot do what the Bloc would like us to do which is to wash our hands of our responsibility in health care.

This government will, I believe on the 16th, make a major commitment to the Canadian people in the area of health care funding. Canadians can continue to feel confident that Canada has one of the finest health care systems in the world, a system which is portable, accessible and affordable for all.

[Supply, February 4th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I find it rather ironic, interesting to say the least, to listen to someone from the Bloc quoting our Constitution. It is somewhat ironic to listen to someone who would destroy the Constitution, who would simply tear the country apart to lecture the government on the interpretation that we have to live by the rules that that member would like to destroy. The irony is palpable when we listen to that kind of debate.

What we are talking about here is respect for a Constitution that lays out partnerships and does not take an issue as important as health care—and I will get to the Reform Party in a minute.