Mr. Speaker, the point I was making in such a colourful way is that basically attempting to change the Department of Human Resources Development is tantamount to attempting to change the entire Canadian federal system because this department is at the heart of every federal program, anything that deals with employment, training, social programs. We also know that HRD may well have one of the largest budgets, if not the largest, of any federal department.
That is what prompts me to say that this debate tonight goes to the very heart of the Canadian policy issue. Looking at this reform proposal concerning the Department of Human Resources Development, we can see that the impact of this reform is quite disastrous in every respect. Even from the point of view of political philosophy, this reform makes no sense.
There is an ongoing debate in Canada about the value of decentralizing political powers. I think that this policy or idea is widely held across Canada. At least in Quebec and in parts of English Canada it is regarded as good policy. The Liberal government however would rather adopt a centralizing policy, which is obvious in several bills, including bills from the Department of Human Resources Development. This is a disastrous policy thrust, as we know. I even think that a majority of Liberal members, and you might be one of them, care and will recognize that decentralizing is the key to the future of Canada's political development.
However, this Liberal government and its Prime Minister seem more bent on centralizing, which is disastrous as we can see, particularly when we come from Quebec. This human resources reform is disastrous, both from a political and economical point of view.
Although the government is trying to cut several billion dollars in social programs, a measure which will hurt the poor and the most vulnerable people in our society, it will not really save anything. These cuts are not well thought out; they are not planned; they are not part of a global vision for development. In fact, if this government really cared, if it really had a vision for rebuilding the country, it would have reduced overlapping and duplication. It would have opted for decentralization, instead of centralization.
Once again, the reforms proposed by the Department of Human Resources Development show that, in the future, there will undoubtedly be even more duplication than before. This will not result in savings. Duplication means not only that money is wasted, to the tune of hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars, but also time, energy and even human lives.
When we really get down to talking about client services and the efficiency of programs managed by the Department of Human Resources Development, we have to conclude more and more that they are not efficient. The department tries to put job creation or training programs in place to enable people to hold jobs. The department, the federal government itself, acknowledges that these training programs are inefficient.
One has to actually be there, hit the streets, the towns and the countryside to really take stock of the current disaster, the mounting frustration people are venting; people are becoming more and more concerned about what is going on because they are under the impression that politicians are not doing their jobs. And how right they are that this government is not doing its job.
And the reforms they are proposing for the Department of Human Resources Development are nothing more than expensive deviations from which no good will come. Who will ultimately pay? Now that the Liberal Party is no longer a Liberal Party in the traditional sense, but much more like a Conservative Party, there is no difference between the current Liberal Party and the Conservative Party that preceded it: their policies are identical. Inertia rules. But who actually pays for this lack of leadership, concern and good policies? The poor, the sick, seniors, students, the unemployed, welfare recipients, all of the classes in society which have no voice. They will be the ones who will have to pay. In fact, they are always the ones who pay for a government's slip-shod work.
But these people will not always be ignored. We can say this because they are a majority. A storm is brewing in the country, it is brewing because there are no jobs and no training is available. Therefore, if the patronage and the scandals like Power DirecTv or other shady issues clouding this government do not bring it down, its inertia, lack of vision and the public's dissatisfaction will. Their system is doomed to failure.
The current federal government in Ottawa has no vision. It is doomed to failure. One thing is sure, it is going to crumble under the weight of its own debt and of its shortsightedness. In fact, in Quebec we want to get out of this system because we can do a better job. One does not have to be a genius to realize we can do better than the federal system we have now.
The Department of Human Resources Development, as I said before, illustrates what is wrong with the whole federal system. This department has made presentations and introduced cutbacks, but is misleading in the way it presents its budget. It is hard to pinpoint what they are trying to do. We know the minister is confusing the issue. He would have people believe he is improving the system, but that is not the case. They talk about increasing the number of programs and the amount of money available for training or job creation, although we know there have been drastic cuts in the amounts available.
Confusion reigns in this department. As I said before, all you have to do is go down the street, go to the cities and towns and employment centres and you will see what is happening. The department's employees no longer know which side they are on, whether their job is going to disappear, how much money they have for which programs and which programs will be abolished. This is not a department with a clear vision, a sense of purpose. Confusion is spreading because people do not know where they are going.
There is some kind of trickery afoot, but I am afraid they underestimate the public's intelligence. The auditor general has often said that budgets are mainly an exercise in camouflage. It is an attempt to prevent people from finding out exactly how the money is spent. You practically have to be an expert, and even the experts cannot agree.
Cover up and concealment seem to be the order of the day. The Auditor General of Canada singled out the Department of Human Resources Development as a case in point. Confusion is rife, especially in this department. As I said before, the department is at the heart of the federal system that is collapsing under its own weight, through its own inertia and lack of vision.
How the money in the Unemployment Insurance Fund is used is another example of this now you see it, now you don't, attitude. Everyone in Canada or at least a large percentage of Canadians has the impression that the federal government is putting money, their tax money, into the unemployment insurance program to subsidize training programs and other programs provided by employment centres.
However, the federal government, as I said before, is withdrawing from unemployment insurance. The money in the Unemployment Insurance Fund comes out of the wages earned by workers. We all contribute to this fund, but the federal government is contributing less and less. However, the government still gives the impression it contributes, and it uses the money to set up training programs and job creation programs for young people. This is a very economical way to give the impression you are doing something.
Obviously, this is one way to give the impression of doing something, but not necessarily a successful one. The greatest confusion is to be found in the new programs set up in the past 12 months, particularly those announced with the greatest noise-programs for youth, young trainees or the youth service corps.
In my riding, just by talking to people in the street, who have anything to do with these programs at all, you realize that they do not know where to turn anymore. For example, in Québec-Est, 38 projects were submitted in response to the youth service corps program, because people had heard there was lots of
money in it. The youth service corps proposed 36 projects, good projects, and only two were approved.
These two projects will go through a whole slew of checks, not only locally, but at the Montreal office and, eventually, at the Ottawa office. It seems they even had to be approved by the minister himself. This is a first. Even the officials are wondering why. This is a sort of politicization. I do not think it is economic, particularly. It is a reflection of the government's desire to centralize, once again, at the very heart of the Department of Human Resources Development. Why this attempt to centralize? It is not economic. It does not even make any sense.
This streamlining the Minister of Human Resources Development is talking about is, obviously, not streamlining. Anyone taking the slightest look at the thing will realize that there is no streamlining; it is confusion.
You just have to talk to the head of the employment centre in your region; he will tell you. He does not know if he will keep his job; he does not know whether the programs he currently administers will be extended. Furthermore, he will admit to you that the existing programs funded by the federal government from the unemployment insurance fund are not working out. There is no guarantee that someone taking training at an employment centre will find work. Oftentimes, even, people taking training at employment centres have less chance of finding a job.
This all makes sense, I suppose, in the mind of certain federalists, but, in my mind, it does not. There is no streamlining, only confusion and waste.
In Quebec we are concerned because we want to create jobs and put people to work. We want to improve our society. We are not asleep. We are not sitting on our power on little green chairs thinking that everything is fine. We know there are more and more poor people, unemployed and people on welfare. There are 808,000 in Quebec, alone. It is a catastrophe. This is a lot of human misery.
It is important, for example, for Quebec to have power in the area of manpower training. The struggle has been going on for a long time, and we consider it very important. The former Quebec minister and current federal Minister of Labour sitting across from me is aware that the Quebec government has fought for full control over manpower training for a long time, even when the Liberals were in power.
Manpower training is central because it lies at the heart of this whole game being played by the Department of Human Resources Development. It is at the heart of all societal problems. The issues are job creation and training. And education is at the heart of any society. That is why Quebec is right to stick to its guns. Not only because it is important but because it is under provincial jurisdiction. Education has always been under provincial jurisdiction. The federalists in Ottawa do not understand this. They have never respected provincial jurisdiction. Furthermore, the government has never respected its own constitution. Both training and education have always been under provincial jurisdiction.
The federal government is once again using this centralization policy. The fact that the Department of Human Resources Development is increasingly trying to exert control over manpower training provides further concrete evidence of the federal government's intention to centralize powers.
Quebec-not only the Parti Quebecois but also the Liberal Party-has always unanimously expressed the need to repatriate all manpower training powers. All manpower training stakeholders, union members, even the employers' council and the president of the Business Council on National Issues, Thomas d'Aquino, a man of some renown, have argued very strongly in favour of decentralizing manpower training powers throughout the country.
Unfortunately, we still do not have that power, which clearly shows once again the impossibility of reforming the current system because of increased centralization by the federal government. The impossibility of reforming the system is one of the reasons, if not the main reason, why Quebec must achieve sovereignty so that it can take control of its own destiny as soon as possible.
