Geoff Regan

[Nutrition Among Children, May 11th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to participate in this debate. I would like to thank the hon. member for Ottawa—Orléans for bringing this issue to the attention of the House of Commons so that we could have this important discussion.

I am very happy to have an opportunity to participate in this debate around childhood obesity, something that is, unfortunately, a problem for too many Canadian families. It is an issue that was included as part of the health committee's 2011-12 study on health, health promotion and disease prevention.

The Standing Committee on Health also tabled a report on obesity in 2007 that called for a public awareness campaign, simple label packaging and the removal of transfats from the Canadian diet.

Those of us who are parents know the challenges of raising children in an age where kids are more interested in playing video games than in going outside to play catch, or street hockey, or ride their bikes. I am pleased to say that tomorrow I will be out with my 15-year-old son and his venturers company, as it is called, cycling in the St. Margaret's Bay area, partly in the riding of my colleague from South Shore—St. Margaret's and partly in the Halifax West riding. I am looking forward to that. However, I know what a challenge it is for all parents to get their kids away from their Game Boys, their XBoxes--

[Health, May 11th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Health has her head in the sand and continues to say that the voluntary reporting system for drug shortages is working. Right.

When patients show up at pharmacies to refill their prescriptions for the epilepsy drug Epival and its generic forms, it is not available. There is no information about this on the drug reporting sites.

If the voluntary reporting system is working, could the minister explain why doctors, pharmacists and patients cannot find out when Epival will be available?

Could she tell us when it will be available?

[Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, May 11th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to the speech given by the hon. member for Mississauga—Streetsville.

I wonder if the hon. member is aware of what has been said about this enormous 425 page budget bill by people like Conservative commentator Andrew Coyne, who talks about the length of it, the fact that it amends some 60 different acts, repeals half a dozen and adds three more, including a completely rewritten Canadian Environment Assessment Act.

He wrote:

It ranges far beyond the traditional budget concerns of taxing and spending, making changes in policy across a number of fields from immigration...to telecommunications...to land codes on native reservations.... So this is not remotely a budget bill, despite its name.

He goes on to say:

Moreover, it utterly eviscerates the committee process, until now regarded as one of the last useful roles left to MPs. How can one committee, in this case Finance, properly examine all of these diverse measures, with all of the many areas of expertise they require, especially in the time allotted to them?

I wonder if the hon. member would like to answer Mr. Coyne's question.

[Old Age Security, May 10th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to rise to debate on M-307. It is a subject that is very important to my constituents. Judging from the correspondence my office has been receiving from people in Halifax West, it is an issue that is very much on the minds of Canadians.

Let me begin by thanking the hon. member for Charlottetown for introducing M-307, and the hon. member for York West, the Liberal Party critic on pensions and a champion for thousands of Canadians on this very important file.

I am reminded that M-307 is the result of a petition signed by tens of thousands of Canadians who believe the neo-Conservative government is trying to disenfranchise them. Many Canadians believe their country is now in the hands of a mean-spirited government intent on punishing the very seniors who spent their lives building this country.

I am sure many Conservative backbenchers feel the same way but they are afraid to voice their true feelings for fear of invoking the wrath of the minions over at the PMO. I do not know what lines Conservative members are feeding the folks back home, but I do know what my office has been hearing from Canadians. Let me share a few of the heartfelt sentiments I have heard. I hope the hon. members will listen carefully and take seriously these comments from real people who are going to experience real impacts of this budget.

One says, “Moving the age to 67 would have a real impact on my mom. She's a single woman and a low-income earner.” There is a real Canadian with a real concern. Another one says, “I became a widow at the age of 40. I'm on disability and do not have much money in RRSPs. I find it difficult to pay my bills now. I don't know how I'll manage with a two-year interruption of income.” This is a very scary situation. That is a real problem. Some people express confusion and anxiety over the OAS changes. One of them says, “There is a concern because I'm currently on Canadian pension disability. I need to know if that will continue until I am 67.”

Perhaps in this debate, if Conservative members are going to claim they have a response to this, let them tell the House if they can point to a section in the bill that deals with this in some fashion, or a section that deals with the people who are currently on social assistance or provincial programs. Which section will provide provincial governments with the funds they will need to provide that kind of assistance for two more years, when they are already hard-pressed in terms of finances?

Another person notes, “I have spent my entire working life paying into CPP, only to hear at this point in my life that my retirement goals are not aligned to the Conservative government's fiscal agenda? I am fortunate enough to hold a good job, and I will work harder to prepare, but I can only imagine the panic of individuals who are not employed or minimally employed. What will these Canadians do, and how many more impoverished seniors does there need to be for the Prime Minister to get the message? Shame.”

This is a very important point about people who are not employed or are minimally employed, who are relying on a variety of social programs. I think of people who have work that is very physical or difficult. I think of women who have worked their whole lives, 35 years perhaps, in fish plants, standing on concrete floors, their hands in cold water all day long. The government feels it is no problem for them to work two more years after they are 65.

Is that not a problem? Is there nothing to worry about? Should we not be concerned about those kinds of people? Is that really a government that considers the reality of people living in this country every day, especially people who are older in our society?

I am reminded of the old adage that a society should always be judged on how it treats its weakest members. History will indeed judge the government and the Prime Minister appropriately, as a government that was always there to assist its rich and powerful friends and contributors, but told the rest of the people, bootstrappers, to fend for themselves, a government that said, “They can look after themselves”.

The Prime Minister, a year ago, made the following promise, “We're not going to cut the rate of increase in transfers for health care, education and pensions. That is job number one ”. Those are not my words. That is the line the Conservative leader fed Canadians in the last election campaign.

That was the election campaign in which he also said he had a contract to buy F-35 attack jets and they would only cost $16 billion. That is what he told Canadians. This is the same Prime Minister who also promised seniors he would never tax income trusts and quickly broke his word. He broke faith with Canadian seniors and imposed a tax on income trusts, totally contrary to what he had promised. This is a Prime Minister who was hanging out with his rich, elite pals in Switzerland when he decided to drop a bombshell on seniors and wipe out the dreams of thousands.

One of my constituents, describing the chaos and confusion that the initial OAS announcement caused, said the following in an email to my office, “We struggle with trying to understand how we are in this state of confusion over the OAS. We struggle to find a balance in our day to day lives despite...the chaos....All this information came to us via...the media with minimal reassurance from...the Prime Minister, who started all this fuss while grandstanding in a foreign country.”

Those are not my words. That is a person in my riding who wrote to me concerned, worried, frustrated and confused, asking why on earth a prime minister of Canada would make an announcement about pensions for Canadian seniors in Switzerland, at a meeting with the richest and most powerful people in the world. What was that about? Was he trying to show off and say, “Look at what we are doing. You are going to love this one”? Was that it?

Madam Speaker, you can see why I appreciate having a few minutes today to talk about the old age security program. I urge all members to look into their hearts, do the right thing and support this motion. They should tell the government that it should (a) recognize the contributions that the baby boomer generation has made in building Canada, (b) affirm their support for the old age security program, (c) commit to maintaining the 65-year qualifying age contained in section 3 of the Old Age Security Act and (d) recognize that the old age security and guaranteed income supplement programs, both designed to help low-income seniors, are inextricably linked and ensure they continue to have identical ages of eligibility. That is what Liberals are asking with this motion. Those are reasonable requests if we think about the future of the country and are concerned about the future of our seniors, especially low-income seniors.

Fifty per cent of the people who receive OAS earn less than $25,000 a year and 40% earn less than $20,000. That is who we are talking about. Those are the people, not making big money, not in easy jobs often, who are being asked by the government to work two more years, to wait two more years, to do without for two more years. What kind of a government is that?

[Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, May 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask my hon. colleague her thoughts on the performance of the Minister of Finance in the fall of 2008, at a time when the government was in deficit. It had inherited a surplus of $13 billion back in 2006, and it had put Canada in deficit by the beginning of the 2008-09 fiscal year.

As we all know, the recession started in the fall of 2008. By September or October it was pretty clear we were in it. However, in November, when it was very clear, the Minister of Finance brought forward a fiscal budget update, suggesting that nothing was wrong, that there was no need for any stimulus measures and no need to react to this global recession that was developing.

What sort of a finance minister fails to recognize a problem and has to be forced into taking the measures for which he now claims so much credit?

[Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, May 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his question.

I do not imagine it would be very many. I imagine that only a few of the people using the program have iPhones.

I talked to the people who run the program. In places where the program is available, many people are poor. They typically use computers and the Internet to access government programs so they can look for jobs and do various other things.

I find the decision appalling.

[Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, May 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, particularly for his glowing and effusive comments about my speech. He went on at such great lengths.

However, he makes a very important point about the old age supplement and the changes in this budget bill. In fact, I am looking forward to the debate later this afternoon—or this evening, for those living in Newfoundland or Nova Scotia—on Motion No. 307, which concerns the old age security program. I have more I would like to say about that.

The government's attitude to increasing the age that people would receive the OAS is similar to its attitude toward the CAP, the Canada access program, whereby people can get use of a computer.

In the other place, the Leader of the Government in the Senate was asked about this and said that people can use their iPhones. I do not know if she will be called Marjory Antoinette for that, but that comment does not really show much sensitivity to the real problem of people who are facing hardship in not having access to the Internet. People who have a need for OAS and GIS will be cut off by the government.

[Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, May 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have a chance to rise in debate on Bill C-38. I have to agree with at least the last point made by my colleague who just spoke, which was that the member for Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor was in fact an outstanding weatherman. He is an outstanding member of Parliament as well, although members might want to talk to him sometime about some of the stories he has about some bloopers he may have experienced during his time as a weatherman. They may be on YouTube, as a matter of fact. They would have to ask.

However, when my hon. colleague praises the current Minister of Finance, I find it rather humorous and remarkable, considering that the finance minister and the government inherited a $13 billion surplus and that by April and May of 2008, six months before the recession began, the government was already in deficit.

Members may not believe that, but if they doubt it, I invite them to Google “deficit April-May 2008”; they will find CBC and Reuters stories dated June 25, 2008, pointing that out. They could probably find out more about that later. In addition, that fall there was a further deficit.

The Conservatives have been trying to claim for a while that the deficit we have today was the result of the recession and stimulus spending. The fact is that there was a deficit in that fiscal year of 2008-09. The stimulus budget that the government brought in was not even announced until the end of January 2009, and it was for the 2009-10 fiscal year. It did not start until well after the deficit was in place. If there was a deficit for the year 2008-09 and the stimulus budget was for the year 2009-10, how can Conservatives claim that the earlier deficit was caused by the later budget?

In fact, articles even in December of 2009 talked about how the stimulus money was just getting going. There are articles about municipalities complaining about how long it was taking for that stimulus spending to get started. It took a long time.

Therefore, to claim that the deficit is a result of the recession is an outrage. The claim that this was one of the greatest finance ministers has no basis. By increasing spending dramatically, at three times the rate of inflation, the minister put the country back into deficit before the recession began. That is the context we are in when we come to this budget. That is the history of this government. It is outrageous for the government to claim that this was in any way a good finance minister. It is ludicrous.

Let me talk about Bill C-38. We even have well-known Conservatives criticizing the bill. Here are some comments from Andrew Coyne. He is not exactly a Liberal voice in Canada, but he is a well-known, respected commentator. What does he say about this? He says:

The bill runs to more than 420 pages. It amends some 60 different acts, repeals half a dozen, and adds three more, including a completely rewritten Canadian Environmental Assessment Act. It ranges far beyond the traditional budget concerns of taxing and spending, making changes in policy across a number of fields from immigration...to telecommunications...to land codes on native reservations....

He goes on:

So this is not remotely a budget bill, despite its name.

He says further:

Moreover, it utterly eviscerates the committee process, until now regarded as one of the last useful roles left to MPs. How can one committee, in this case Finance, properly examine all of these diverse measures, with all of the many areas of expertise they require, especially in the time allotted to them?

How indeed, Mr. Speaker? Mr. Coyne has made some very good points about the budget, and my hon. colleagues across the way would do well to take note of the comments from this Conservative commentator about their own budget bill.

However, let us look at the budget. What do we expect from it? What are Canadians looking to the government for in the budget bill?

After Canada experienced no job growth during the last six months, I think Canadians expected this bill to have one focus: jobs, job creation and helping our economy strengthen. Instead, what does it have? It has dozens of disconnected themes that will do nothing to grow jobs or address Canada's skills shortage.

In fact, when I think of jobs, I think of the issue of what has happened with foreign investment. This bill is a complete abandonment of the industry minister's promise of a serious review of the Investment Canada Act.

The bill has so many parts. It is 425 pages long. For those who have not looked through or read it, I will just give a sense of how big this bill is. Division 28 of part 4 does authorize the minister to communicate or disclose certain information in relation to foreign investments, but it does nothing to prevent Canada from a repeat of the PotashCorp takeover fiasco that the government mishandled so badly and it provides no advance understanding of how it would handle matters like this and no explanation for its decision.

In fact, the Conservatives pledged in late 2010, after abruptly killing BHP Billiton's hostile bid for the Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan, to undertake a serious review of the Investment Canada Act. In fact, the minister talked about having a committee do this, but iinstead we get a few lines in a 425-page omnibus bill. The industry committee will not even study this measure.

I would like to see that happen. I put a motion before the committee to have that happen. Of course, as we know, the government insists that everything involving a decision about what a committee will study be done in camera, behind closed doors, so that the media and the public cannot follow it. As a result, I cannot talk about what might have happened to that motion, but I can say that it is no longer before the committee. If I put forward a motion and it is no longer available to be discussed and it has not been adopted, I think people can draw their conclusions about what might have happened to it and what the Conservative government, having a majority, decided to do.

What happened to the promise to clarify the key test used to judge foreign takeovers, the so-called net benefit determination? That was a promise the Minister of Industry made, another promise relegated to the trash bin.

It is the same with the minister's public declaration in June 2011 that he would ask the House of Commons industry committee to review the Investment Canada Act. Where is it? Why is that Conservative members would not be anxious to do this, considering their own minister was talking about it nearly a year ago and asking for it to be done? Perhaps he is not so keen anymore. We do know that members on the Conservative side tend to do what they are told by the Prime Minister's Office and by the ministers.

This review has not happened, despite several attempts from opposition members to call for a review of the act by the committee. Instead, the industry minister gets new powers to disclose a little more information about takeovers without betraying commercial secrets. It is all well and good, but it is too bad that there is no such commitment to prevent ministers from betraying their own promises, such as the one made in this case.

The fact is that this country needs to modernize its foreign investment policies. It is too bad that instead of moving on significant change, we get half measures buried in a budget bill. That makes it very clear the government is more intent on maintaining its ability to insert its political bias into these decisions than it is on focusing on and doing what is best for the Canadian economy and Canadian jobs.

[Jobs, Growth and Long-Term Prosperity Act, May 10th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, would my hon. colleague give us his thoughts on the proposed changes to the OAS where the government has talked about this supposed crisis?

The government claims that the OAS will be unaffordable and yet it cannot really point to any expert opinion that says that. Its own government reports say that it is not in jeopardy and that there is no issue of affordability. The OECD says that there is no issue with affordability.

We know that 40% of the people who receive OAS have incomes of $20,000 or less each year and yet the government wants to make them wait two more years, which could cost them as much as $30,000 and cause real hardship as they are waiting to receive this assistance.

Would my hon. colleagues like to comment on this decision by the government?

[James Kinley, May 8th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honour Jim Kinley, a former Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia, who passed away last week.

The proud native of Lunenburg served as our province's 29th Lieutenant-Governor, holding the prestigious post from 1994 to 2000.

Mr. Kinley was also a successful engineer who started and ran several businesses, including Lunenburg Industrial Foundry and Engineering Limited, which is now headed by his son.

He served his country as a merchant mariner during the Second World War and went on to become a commander in the naval reserves and head of the Navy League of Canada.

In 2002 Mr. Kinley was appointed to the Order of Nova Scotia and awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Golden Jubilee Medal.

I know Mr. Kinley's pride in his community and commitment to his family and country will continue to be an inspiration to his wife Grace, his four children and nine grandchildren and to all Nova Scotians.