Barry Devolin

[Petitions, October 19th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions today regarding the need for further research and development into bioartificial kidneys in Canada. A large number of my constituents, including one in particular, have spent a great deal of time researching what is being done with bioartificial kidneys in the United States. Apparently there are researchers there who would like to do work in Canada, but do not have adequate resources here.

[Petitions, October 19th, 2005]

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

The first petition deals with the subject of martial arts. Several of my constituents have concerns with section 83 of the Criminal Code and would like to see it amended, so that there could continue to be martial arts competitions in things such as karate, judo and tae kwon do.

[Extension of Sitting Period, June 23rd, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I think I heard the member opposite say that, on the basis of his argument, it would be sufficient grounds for voting against this motion which will come before us tonight. I am curious whether for him it will actually be sufficient grounds to vote against it?

[Extension of Sitting Period, June 23rd, 2005]

I take that as a no.

[Extension of Sitting Period, June 23rd, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think the government House leader answered the question from my colleague from Regina—Qu'Appelle. It is very simple. The government House leader suggested that we all ought to respect the wishes and the votes of this Parliament and yet it has been widely reported this morning that if the government loses this vote today, the government House leader will go back to the Speaker and ask for the same thing, by different means, effectively ignoring what Parliament has asked for today, and ask that we be recalled next week.

I put the question back the same way. If the government House leader is challenging us to live by the results of today's vote, does he have any intention of doing the same thing?

[An Act to Authorize the Minister of Finance to make Certain Payments, June 16th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I am a rookie. It is not self-professed. I have been here for less than a year, so I am not a self-professed rookie; I actually am a rookie, for at least two more weeks.

In response, I want to clarify two points. The first point I was making was on the kind of deal making which led to Bill C-48, the notion that people sit in a room and make a deal and before they come out, they not only agree to what they will put on paper, but they agree on what both parties will say, “You say this, and then we'll say that we made an offer” or they did not make an offer, but I guess that is another story.

It is the same as when Dalton McGuinty, the premier of Ontario, came to Ottawa with great fanfare. He spent many hours behind closed doors with the Prime Minister. Quite frankly, I think that is what delayed the Prime Minister from actually getting to Europe in time for the VE Day celebrations in Holland. It is the same thing. The two came out thumping their chests about $5.75 billion. Before Premier McGuinty got back to Toronto, the Liberals here in Ottawa were already backpedalling, saying, “It really is not $5.75 billion. We were already going to spend this. We were already going to spend that”.

That is my first point and the first part of my answer, which is that it is so disingenuous the way that this was presented to the Canadian people. Either it is a lot or it is not a lot. It cannot be both at the same time.

In terms of the way that Bill C-48 was conceived, my point is, it is not whether there is detail around implementation. My point has to do with before the fact, rather than after the fact. There was no due diligence. It is impossible to believe that there was a sufficient amount of due diligence that would require many experts, many bureaucrats and ironically, the Minister of Finance himself to decide whether a $4.6 billion expenditure was prudent and reasonable, could be afforded and was structured properly.

That is what I am referring to. When I say there is no detail, this very thin piece of paper is proof that it was a deal cut by two guys in a hotel room one afternoon.

[An Act to Authorize the Minister of Finance to make Certain Payments, June 16th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in today's debate on Bill C-48. I have listened to presentations that have been made here today and in the past.

As members know, I am a rookie member. As one of my colleagues pointed out, I am approaching the end of my rookie year. It is my understanding that Bill C-43 is actually the budget, that the government goes through a budgetary process every year, and this year when that document came forward, it was named Bill C-43.

The Minister of Finance spent months working with his officials and stakeholders to develop a fiscal framework that would serve as a budget for the country for a year. Bill C-43 is called “An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 23, 2005”. First reading was on March 24.

It is important for Canadians who may be watching this on TV tonight to remember that there is one budget, Bill C-43. That is the budget and it has been passed. I might add that when this was brought forward in the wintertime both the Bloc and the NDP quickly said they were going to vote against the budget. It was very clear to us as the official opposition that if we opposed the budget we would actually trigger an election in the wintertime.

While we did not support everything in the budget, and while there were several provisions we liked that did not go far enough or fast enough, we concluded that we did not want to defeat the government and cause an unnecessary election at that time. We abstained on that bill.

Subsequently there have been a couple of changes made to Bill C-43. That has caused our party to vote in favour of it. As we have said all along, it is not perfect, but it takes several steps in the right direction and we can live with it. That is really what it boils down to. Some of my caucus colleagues had to hold their noses when they voted for it, I think, but at the end of the day we did vote to support Bill C-43.

Bill C-48 is not the budget. It is not a budget, it is not the budget, it is not part of the budget, it is not an amendment to the budget and it is not a supplement to a budget. It is an illegitimate child conceived in a hotel room in downtown Toronto between the Prime Minister and the leader of the NDP; I can picture the two of them sitting there on the ends of two beds talking about what they were going to do.

They drafted Bill C-48. It would be interesting for Canadians to actually see a copy of Bill C-43. It is 110 pages long and filled with all kinds of complicated language and references to other supporting documents. If they were to see a copy of Bill C-48, they would see that it is only two pages long.

The rigour that went into the budget and the legions of bureaucrats who spent time knitting this together as something that could work for Canada were not in that hotel room. There were only two people in that hotel room and they wrote something that even in both official languages is only two pages long.

I have had some debate with my colleagues about whether this was initially written on a napkin; we debated whether it was and then whether they had to use both the front and the back of the napkin to get it all down. We all know that not so many years ago the previous prime minister presented what was essentially a handwritten note on a napkin and suggested that it had legal status and the people of Canada should have believed that it was a legitimate document.

Bill C-48 was a deal cooked up between the Prime Minister and the leader of the NDP and it served no purpose other than trying to defend the Prime Minister and keep him in power for a few more months. That is the bottom line. I would argue that the brevity of this document, the fact that there is almost nothing here, is proof of that point.

I remember when this came out. The leader of the NDP crowed that it was a great deal for Canadians. He crowed that it was a great victory for his party. He threw that $4.6 billion number around. He crowed about the fact that the corporate tax cuts he disagreed with had been removed.

Since that time it has been interesting to watch the government backpedal on this, saying that it is not really $4.6 billion, that the government will only spend the money if there is an unexpected surplus. Given that the government is setting the budget, one would think if it was being honest with Canadians and there was going to be surplus, it would know about it in advance.

Presuming that the Minister of Finance actually intends to deliver what he said he was going to deliver in the budget, there will not be an unintended surplus, in which case this will never happen. It raises the question as to whether the Prime Minister was being disingenuous with the leader of the NDP, whether the Minister of Finance was being disingenuous with the people of Canada, or whether it was the leader of the NDP who was being disingenuous with the people of Canada. That is on the spending side.

On the tax cut side, the leader of the NDP crowed that he had killed the corporate tax cuts. One of the parts of the original budget that we supported was the idea that there were corporate tax cuts. We thought they should have been introduced more quickly and that the cuts should have been deeper, but we at least agreed with the principle that we needed to move in that direction. We thought it was something we could work with moving forward.

The NDP ideologically disagreed with that at the time and that was to be expected. The leader of the NDP puffed up his chest and said that the NDP got the corporate tax cuts killed. Now we hear the Minister of Finance saying that is not really true, maybe they will be taken out and maybe they will not, but even if they are, they will be reintroduced later.

Again I ask the question of who is not telling the truth in this story. When we consider what the leader of the NDP has said, what the Minister of Finance has said, and what the Prime Minister has said, they do not add up. Somebody is being misled. Either this is meaningful, it means something and real consequences will come as a result of this bill, which is what the NDP suggests, or as the government now suggests, nothing very substantial will come as a result of this, “We will put the tax cuts back in somewhere else. We were honest with Canadians when we laid out our initial budget. We are not expecting an unexpected surplus and we can only spend these dollars if there is an unexpected surplus, so it actually does not meaning anything”.

In conclusion on this point, I say to Canadians that Bill C-43 is the budget. Bill C-48 is not the budget. It is a deal that was cut later. It is a piece of legislation before the House. Many of my colleagues today have argued very eloquently that their problem with this bill is that there was no due diligence, that there is no plan. There is $4.6 billion in proposed spending with no provisions for how that money is going to get spent. That is a very legitimate concern.

At the end of the day this bill is a political convenience, a piece of politically convenient politics. The two principals that negotiated it are arguing almost the opposite outcomes of what it is going to mean. It behooves all members of the House, in particular those in the opposition, to exercise their due diligence. It is part of our responsibility as members of the House, as watchdogs on the government, to make sure it is spending our money properly and doing things in the proper way.

It is inconceivable to me that anyone would suggest that Bill C-48 was developed through any appropriate or reasonable process or that there was ever any due diligence or anywhere close to the amount of due diligence that was necessary. The irony, of course, is the actual title of Bill C-48, “an act to authorize the Minister of Finance to make certain payments”. Someone should have put in brackets “the Minister of Finance who was not even there when the deal was done”.

My last point is that all Canadians know that there was great stress between the previous prime minister and the previous minister of finance, but I do not think the previous prime minister ever took the feet out from underneath his finance minister the way the present Prime Minister took the feet out from under his finance minister with this shoddy piece of legislation.

[Child Care, June 10th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, cash-strapped provinces and municipalities deserve to know what is further down the road on which the minister wants to take them.

I am glad he raised the issue of health care. When the Canada Health Act was introduced, Ottawa agreed to pay 50% of total health costs. Today that contribution has been slashed to less than 15%, mostly by the Prime Minister.

With the federal contribution starting at less than 10% for day care, how long until Ottawa totally abandons provinces and municipalities to carry the entire cost of this program themselves?

[Child Care, June 10th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Social Development has admitted many times that the $5 billion promised for child care over the next five years represents only a tiny portion of the total cost anticipated. Using Quebec as a cost model, this national day care scheme could easily top $12 billion a year.

It is easy for the minister to wax poetically about the next great social program but Canadians want to know, overtaxed Canadians want to know, who does the minister expect to pick up the tab, the provinces, the municipalities or parents themselves?

[Supply, June 9th, 2005]

Madam Speaker, I listened with interest to the presentation by my colleague from the NDP. My first point is that I would not confuse interest or passion in an issue with heightened rhetoric and shrill commentary in the House. Many people feel strongly about this, they express those views and opinions calmly and articulate their views in a responsible way in addressing the problem.

I feel strongly about this. I have spent many hours and days, particularly over the past few months, in committee considering and deliberating these changes. As I said, I come from a rural riding with a relatively high unemployment rate. I come from a rural riding with a high seniors rate. This is relevant to me. That is one of the reasons why I support this motion.

My second point is that the member suggests it is a bad thing if the parties oppose the motion, but it is also a bad thing if the parties support it. In terms of support or opposition to the motion, what does he want? He apparently does not want us to support it. I presume that if we were planning to oppose it, he would not want that either.

Specifically, with regard to the motion before us and the vote we have in the coming days, what does he want all the other parties to do?