Mr. Speaker, it will be no surprise to you, since we opposed the budget presented a while ago, that we will oppose its implementation for a number of reasons. I would like to discuss a few of them. I know that I have ten minutes and I will try to highlight as many as possible. At any rate, the Bloc Québécois has a whole host of reasons for objecting to the implementation of this budget.
First, the government has decided to spare rich taxpayers with the result that the middle class and the working class will pay for a good part of their budget in the end. I have a number of examples.
The Bloc Québécois had asked that people making more than $150,000 per year pay an additional 2% in taxes in order for them to contribute their fair share to debt reduction and permit the government to function. They have the means to do it. We had also proposed an additional 3% tax on income of $250,000 or more per year. The government did not accept this proposal. Yet, these two measures would have contributed $4.8 billion to the public treasury. The government decided to ignore the Bloc Québécois proposal.
The fact that the rich can cash in their stock options and pay tax on just half of the income costs the government $1 billion every year. We know who this government is choosing to support. It is certainly not the people who, day after day, have to live on minimum or average wages. They will be the ones filling the government coffers, and not the rich who, I believe, have been given many favours.
There are also the big organizations. The banks and oil companies are, I believe, the most important organizations in Canada. This budget does not make them contribute. These banks are allowed to continue sending their profits to tax havens. Big oil companies are allowed to continue benefiting from tax loopholes, even though they do not make the required contribution to the public purse.
The government's focus is clear. It is protecting those with more money and the big organizations that make a great deal of money and it is asking the middle class and small taxpayers to make the largest contribution to the tax base.
The government's use of the employment insurance fund is an example of a great injustice. In 2008, a separate bank account was created for the board. The government has just closed that account and created a new one called the employment insurance operating account. I remind members that this fund owed $55 billion to workers, the very workers who pay into it, and also to the small and medium-sized business who pay into it. As a result, with the creation of this new account, the slate was wiped clean. We can forget the $55 billion that has been stolen from EI over many years. We will never see it again. It disappeared into the government's current accounts, and that is that.
What is worse, the Conservatives are prepared to plunder another $19 billion from that fund themselves by 2015. This government is just like the previous Liberal government in this respect. Instead of paying back those who overpaid or relaxing the EI rules to help benefit those who need it most, especially during these tough economic times, the government has emptied the account.
The same goes for women and the status of women file. We saw absolutely nothing for women in this budget or its implementation act. Not only is the government not reopening the Status of Women offices that were shut down, but it is also allowing other injustices to continue. Incidentally, I am currently in talks with the government regarding preventive withdrawal.
In a supposedly forward-thinking society, why are women in federally regulated jobs not eligible for preventive withdrawal? That is not the case in Quebec. Women in provincially regulated jobs are eligible for this benefit. Because of the federal labour code, thousands of women are forced to either continue working or claim employment insurance benefits, which penalizes them.
The Quebec system is generous: women receive 90% of their net pay during preventive withdrawal. If their jobs are hazardous, they can stay home and take care of themselves. That is not how it works in Ottawa. Their income drops to 55% because they have to rely on the employment insurance system. If a woman claims employment insurance benefits too soon, she will not be able to stay home for as long after her baby's birth.
Women make up 52% of voters, yet they are a completely neglected segment of the population.
There are other elements with which we disagree, such as support for the forestry industry. The government gave $9.6 billion to Ontario's auto industry, but just $177 million to the forestry industry in Quebec and British Columbia. It is clear that the government's priorities do not lie with Quebec. This is extremely unfair to Quebec.
The same applies to the aerospace industry. Quebec's aerospace industry amounts to 55% of Canada's aerospace industry. There are figures for the industry's economic benefits. The government is no longer supporting Quebec's aerospace economy. It is giving out military contracts here and there, contracts that represent huge sums in the aerospace industry, sums exceeding $16 billion. The government recognized the critical mass of Ontario's auto industry, but it did not do the same for Quebec's aerospace industry. Right now, businesses are not getting enough funding from the federal government.
The federal government's support for Quebec's forestry and aerospace industries is negligible compared to its overwhelming support for Ontario's auto industry.
The same is true when it comes to the environment. We see where the government's interests lie. Creating a carbon exchange is out of the question. Yet it would be very easy to bring in such a measure. Nor does the government want to restrict the greenhouse gas emissions produced by the big oil companies, which, as we know, are its darlings. Not only is this harmful to the environment, but the government is losing out on the money it could levy from big oil companies, which can afford to pay. We are coming full circle, and it is the middle class and the poorest citizens who contribute the most to the tax base.
Nor can we forget the guaranteed income supplement. For several years now, the Bloc Québécois has been calling for the guaranteed income supplement to be paid automatically to the people who qualify, rather than telling them they have to apply for it. People can be cheated out of it for several years, yet the retroactivity applies for only 11 months. The money given to these people would go right back into the economy, since they are a poor group of people.
I could go on for some time, because the budget contains 50 or 60 points that we do not agree with. I outlined five of them here today. For these reasons and all the other reasons I have not had time to mention, the Bloc Québécois will vote against the budget implementation bill.
