Mr. Speaker, I am honoured today to stand in this House on behalf of the constituents of Cambridge, and North Dumfries in my riding, to speak to the government's various budgets.
I will speak to Bill C-48, but I will also make reference to the other budget, the NDP-Liberal alliance, which I feel must be stopped in order to save Canada from the economic perils of overspending and job loss.
The Liberals have introduced an institutional type of child care legislation that they say will cost $5 billion over five years. That is $1 billion a year, but yet unbiased experts say that will never happen. The Canadian Council on Social Development says that the program will need at least $12 billion per year. That is an $11 billion shortfall. Where do we expect that extra money to come from? It will come from taxpayers, on the backs of taxpayers.
The offer that the Liberals have made is only for some children, not all children. What about all the other children who will be left out of the program? I am gravely concerned that too many parents in my riding will have to drive over an hour to partake or use one of these publicly funded centres. I am also concerned that there will be huge waiting lists, as there are in the Quebec system, and the extreme budget overruns into the tens of billions of dollars will occur at the expense of taxpayers.
Who chooses which children get to participate in this program? If we cannot afford health care today, how can we afford such a ridiculous over-funded endorsement. The Conservative Party has a much better plan that will work to address the needs of all parents without bankrupting all taxpayers. The Liberal system discriminates against stay at home parents, shift workers, and those living outside larger centres and ethnic traditions.
We now live in a country so overburdened with tax that one parent must work just to pay the family's taxes. We will put money directly into the hands of parents, so they can make their own child care choices. We believe that Canadian parents want and deserve child care options. It should not be up to the government to dictate the only option for parents nor how children must be raised. The only option that I have is to vote against something that removes choice, is completely without proper funding, and as such will either immediately or eventually let parents down.
I also have serious and grave concerns about our firefighters, police, border security personnel and corrections officers. Rather than redirect wasteful spending to shore up and protect those who are required to protect us, the government still refuses to cancel the failed and completely useless gun registry. Despite grand Liberal promises to reduce costs for a registry that was only supposed to cost $2 million in the first place, Canadians continue to see their hard earned tax dollars poured into this black hole.
We think that money should be put into the hands of our police, so that they can get criminals off the street. The government promised to put in place a national sex offender registry, but where is it? My riding of Cambridge, and North Dumfries, has over 200 offenders. Recently, one reoffended and the police had no idea that he had been returned to Canada.
The Deputy Prime Minister's office officials said that the police should have been told. The Canada border security said something completely different. The fact is that the registry, if there is one, appears to be a typical Liberal program that is voluntary. Heaven forbid we offend the offenders.
I am concerned about our border officers. Liberals believe our security is okay and that we have smart borders. The fact is that we have approximately 225 unguarded roads between Canada and the United States. I stood here in the House while members opposite defended what must be one of the most ridiculous statements I have ever heard. It was something to the effect that less border security is more safe.
That is not smart borders; that is dumb borders. What next? Are we going to nail pictures of guards into the booths of the rest of these border crossings? These crossings have hundreds of cars cross them, unseen, undetected and unsearched. Well, I guess that is voluntary, too. Maybe a few bucks spent here would catch all these illegal drugs and firearms this government thinks we need to register.
However, I cannot figure it out and that, too, is why Canadians will be pleased that we cannot support this budget. People are growing sick and tired of policies that put criminals ahead of victims, lawbreakers ahead of law abiders.
It is businesses that create jobs and the hardworking Canadians who drive our economy. It is these very people who have had the door slammed in their faces by the new NDP-Liberal alliance. This deal shows just how out of touch these parties are with real Canadians. This is simply a massive spending exercise by the Liberal government in an attempt to cling to the perks of power.
The NDP and Liberals think that businesses somehow take these tax cuts and stuff them into mattresses, and that they have billions of dollars in surpluses stuffed away in trust funds and trust accounts inaccessible to Parliament. However, the fact is these businesses reinvest. They build another wing to their factories. They buy more equipment. They spend money to become competitive, and guess what? They hire people to fill those new wings and to operate that equipment.
This budget proposes that we buy what looks like $10 billion in clean air credits from other countries. That will not give us one molecule of clean air for my constituents in Cambridge. The asthma rate in southern Ontario is at a life threatening increase. It is a life threatening danger to our children and a preventable burden to our health care system. I cannot support a budget that pretends to emphasize clean air and provide environmental protection.
I cannot support a budget, or this budget in particular, or the new NDP one frankly because it would kill jobs at Budd Automotive and other vital industries all across Ontario and Canada. It would not guarantee one molecule of clean air for Cambridge, Kitchener or Waterloo, which is very important to me. It would not provide one more doctor, save one life or help anyone secure a job.
I support the Conservative Party plan that would give parents choices, allowing them to make decisions on how their children would be raised. That is the way I believe it should be done. I support the Conservative Party plan to fight crime and criminals, and to protect our borders, not just talk about it. I support the Conservative Party plan to reduce taxes and put more of these huge surpluses back into the pockets of the very people who earned them and know best how to spend them.
Canadians need truthful fiscality. They deserve transparent accounting and accountability. Neither of these budgets, frankly, is good enough for Canadians. I understand the members opposite cannot do better than this, but Canadians deserve better just the same. I cannot support this budget or the other budget.
