Madam Speaker, I will be splitting my time with my colleague from Nanaimo--Cowichan.
I am pleased to rise in the debate on the Speech from the Throne. I am particularly pleased that my colleague from Richmond is in the House given that he was elected on a platform to represent Canadian Alliance policies. I would like to hear his views on how he is advancing transportation reform on the government side, particularly given that one of the largest airports in Canada happens to be in his riding, yet we see no action from the Liberals on it.
Transportation is not just about moving people and products; it is about building a nation. Most Canadians know that by land area Canada is the second largest country on Earth, but I want to put that size into a different perspective.
Our 3.8 million square miles is roughly 52% bigger than the Roman empire was at its peak in 120 AD. The Romans knew what we should not forget, which is that to maintain effective control over such a vast territory, an efficient transportation system is necessary to facilitate the movement of people and goods and to build unity. Fundamentally the Romans understood that allowing people to visit each other and trade with each other would bind the empire together with a greater force than any army could ever muster. The system they built still inspires us 19 centuries later.
The need to bind a vast land together dominated the minds of the fathers of our Confederation. If we read the various terms of union we will see requirements to provide ferry service to link the four founding provinces by rail or in the case of British Columbia “to connect the seaboard of British Columbia with the railway system of Canada within 10 years from the date of the union”. This is in article 11 of B.C.'s terms of union of 1871.
More recent federal governments have also understood the need to bind the country together. In 1937 Parliament created Air Canada as a national instrument for providing air service. It was done so largely so Canadians could fly across Canada without having to fly through the United States. It was about building Canada and uniting Canada together. The federal government alone set up the airline to build major airports across Canada.
In 1956 the United States passed the interstate highway act and began building the world class highway network that we know today. Canada, desperate not to be left behind, decided to build a national highway network as well. Under the slogan “Finish the drive by '65”, the federal government offered to pay 50% of the cost of building the 7,300 kilometre long Trans-Canada highway. It is important to note that the federal government of the day paid 50% of the cost of building the Trans-Canada highway a full decade before the first dime of gas taxes was ever levied against Canadian travellers.
We need to think about why former federal governments built a national railway, a national air system and a national highway system. These were not exclusively exercises to spur temporary job creation projects in pockets of the country. These were necessary steps in linking our cities and towns and joining our provinces and uniting a vast sprawling country.
Previous governments understood the crucial role of nation building, but this government does not. Rather than enhance what we have or even maintain what was built by previous governments, the current Liberal regime sees our national infrastructure as a source of tax revenue. It taxes gasoline while ignoring its role in helping provinces maintain our national highway.
In the case of British Columbia for example, the federal government has collected roughly $4.7 billion in fuel taxes from motorists in the last decade. However it has returned a mere $30 million to Victoria to be spent on the province's roads, including the Trans-Canada highway which is in desperate need of upgrading particularly between Salmon Arm and the Alberta border where a number of Canadians have died because of the poor shape of the road.
The federal government taxes air passengers $24 whether they board in Toronto where passengers are screened for security, or whether they board at Vancouver's south terminal where there is no passenger screening whatsoever.
The government was warned by airlines and consumer groups that air passenger taxes, which are now up to 41% of the base price of an airfare ticket, would discourage airline passengers and result in service cuts from air carriers. We have heard that passenger numbers are down in Regina by up to 52% and in Saskatoon they are down by 42%.
We also know that Air Canada Jazz is going to cease service to St. Leonard, New Brunswick; Yarmouth, Nova Scotia; and Stephenville, Newfoundland; and reduce service to Goose Bay, Deer Lake, Wabush and St. John's. WestJet's service between Edmonton and Calgary is down 20%.
The government knows that fewer passengers are flying. It knows this for two reasons: one, because day in and day out in the House the Canadian Alliance has been telling it; and two, because its air tax is bringing in $11 million a month less in revenue than it forecasted. What the Liberals failed to understand when they put the air tax in place is that when they tax something, they get less of it. They have taxed to the point where fewer Canadians are flying, small air carriers are struggling and cutting capacity and as a result, the expected revenues are not rolling in.
This is a failure to understand the basics of economics by the Liberal government. In economics there are two ways of forecasting a policy change vis-à-vis economics and tax policy. The first is called a static analysis which assumes that a tax increase will not result in a change in the behaviour of consumers with regard to the product being taxed. The second is a dynamic analysis which takes into account the change in people's behaviour when we raise the cost to consumers to engage in that behaviour.
In 1970 MIT Professor Paul Samuelson won the Nobel Prize in economic sciences for his development of the static and dynamic economic theory. It is unfortunate that the former finance minister in his final budget failed to learn this lesson before he implemented the $24 tax on Canadians.
At the same time that the government taxes passengers it tells small airports there will have to be a new five minute emergency response time and then fails to provide any financial assistance for them to get there. The very idea that the federal government might have a role to ensure that national air infrastructure is maintained is outrageous to the government. Airports and the airline industry to the government are seen as nothing more than something to tax and suck off of.
This mindless way of managing airports and airlines has resulted in the bizarre situation where one airport, Vancouver International Airport, pays 57.6% of all the property taxes and airport taxes received by the federal Liberal government. Even to the most casual observer this hardly seems fair.
The member for Richmond is still in the House. The Vancouver International Airport is in his constituency. He crossed from this side of the House to the government side and sits on the Liberal side. Not once in the House have I ever heard the member for Richmond defending the Vancouver International Airport and the way in which it is being hammered by the federal government for the property taxes that it pays.
I listened carefully to the throne speech and did not hear a word about the airline industry or airports, or any commitment to review the industry stifling $24 air tax. I did however hear a vague commitment to fund infrastructure and I hope that it will include highways.
Just as it is important for the government to continue nation building policies of earlier regimes, it is crucial that the government recognize the nature of our country and the need to work with, rather than against, provinces in funding highways both within the provinces and within cities. I encourage the government to form a fifty-fifty infrastructure partnership with the provinces so that major projects enjoying the support of both levels of government may proceed.
If this should be unacceptable or undoable, or if the government cannot show the leadership, I propose that the government eliminate all taxes on gasoline and hand over the tax room to the provinces that rightly maintain, engineer and build roads in their provinces.
The provinces are spending the money they receive from fuel taxes on road and urban transport. Canadians from coast to coast are calling on the government to follow suit; to either partner with the provinces or give them more room to tax gasoline. They will spend it on the roads that are in the best interest of those provinces and those cities. Provinces and cities know it is in their best interest in a drastically better way than any group of bureaucrats sitting in air-conditioned offices in downtown Ottawa.
Like a drunk waking up after the night before, the throne speech was long on rhetoric and short on specifics. There is still time to ensure that the infrastructure program respects provincial jurisdiction. However if the government wants to continue to build this nation, as those who came before us did, it must address the crucial problems that I have outlined.
In 1867 Canadians travelled across Canada by rail and the government of the day built the railway. One hundred years later Canadians travelled across Canada by car and the government of the day helped build the highways. Now as we take our first steps in the new millennium Canadians are travelling across our vast nation by air and the government is taxing them and imposing new demands on airports in a way that not only fails to bind Canadians together but divides us by costs.
Nearly two millennia ago the Roman Caesars understood the need to make it easier for citizens to travel across that empire. I hope that if our government is serious about national unity, it will take a few pages from history and build an infrastructure network that will truly unite us into the future.
I look forward to hearing from the member for Richmond on how he is defending his constituency and this important airport and how the government is ripping off his constituents.
