Leon Benoit

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Madam Speaker, that is a very difficult question. It is a question I think none of us would like to be facing alone, which is all the more reason that we should have had a complete debate followed by a vote in the House. That decision should be made with a lot of input from Canadians.

If we did find that such a genocide had occurred, I still believe that the three main objectives would have to be followed through on and the two conditions for the military objective would still have to be in place. In other words, is the bombing doing the job? Is it going to lead to the Yugoslavs, whether it be Milosevic or someone else, getting to the negotiating table? Is this bombing going to do the job and force that to happen?

I do not think those questions have been answered yet. It still may be effective. Even if we find this has happened, that has to be evaluated by people who know far more than I do.

Second, if the government cannot demonstrate to the House, with the input from the chief of the defence staff, that our Canadian troops are capable of carrying out the task given them by the NATO command, then why would we put our Canadian troops at risk? If it can be demonstrated and if we do find out that the bombing is not going to prevent atrocities like this from happening, if this has happened already and if there is some belief that it could be happening again very soon, then in that case I would fully support the immediate use of ground troops, including Canadian ground troops.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Madam Speaker, if the objective of this military involvement is to meet a moral obligation to protect Kosovars, clearly if an atrocity such as that has occurred, then the urgency has been stepped up another major notch. If that has occurred, we know it will probably happen again. The urgency is beyond anything I can express and certainly it is a critical consideration.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to take part in this debate, although I must start my comments by saying that it is not the type of debate that I was hoping for today.

Some members have certainly talked about this point already. A take note debate obviously does not generate a lot of interest even from members of parliament, judging from the number of people who have been here tonight. It certainly does not stimulate the kind of interest and the kind of debate we need to involve Canadians in right across the country.

Instead of a take note debate we should be taking part in a full-fledged debate which would end in a vote. The debate should be on focused issues, a clear motion. At the end every member of parliament should know that they will have to stand in the House to take a position either for or against the motion. Certainly that will increase the level of interest and will reach out and involve a lot more Canadians in the debate.

It is unfortunate that is not happening today, but we do have a take note debate and I will be making a few comments in that regard.

To summarize the objectives of the NATO involvement, I start by saying that I fully support Canada standing shoulder to shoulder with our NATO allies in actions in Kosovo.

Three objectives must be considered in this debate. The first is the moral objective. We cannot overstate the case on this issue. The moral objective is the halting of ethnic cleansing. Ethnic cleansing means killing. Ethnic cleansing means the expulsion of people from their homes, the burning of their homes, and the expulsion of people from their country. We must halt this ethnic cleansing. I do not think we can possibly overstate the urgency of dealing with that situation.

The reason we are talking about political and the military objectives is to deal in an effective way with the moral objective of ending the killing, the ethnic cleansing, and with the people who have been displaced, helping as necessary the refugees who are in camps outside Kosovo and, if need be, bringing refugees to our country, particularly refugees who feel they have no life, no home, nothing back in Kosovo. These are the moral objectives. The importance and urgency of meeting those objectives cannot be overstated.

Of course there are political objectives. These political objectives involve creating a safe home for Kosovars on their own soil. That must be the political objective of everything we are taking part in and it must be done through internationally supervised negotiation.

I have heard many people state today that they believe Russia should be involved in these international negotiations. There is a great deal of value in that and hopefully, that can be accommodated.

To meet these political objectives we have to meet certain military objectives, which is the third objective we have to deal with in this debate. The military objective has to damage the Serbs' military capability to reduce their capacity to kill, to remove people from their homes, to destroy people's homes and to throw people out of the country. We have to reduce their capacity so they cannot do those things. That has to be one of the military objectives. When we get them to that point then we can get them to the negotiating table. We all know it is only through negotiations that we can hope to put an end to this sad situation in Kosovo.

How do we accomplish the military objectives? That is where there has been a lot of disagreement in this House. There is a lot of agreement for the use of NATO air strikes in helping to accomplish this objective. I think there is a lot of support for Canada to continue to participate in these air strikes. I am really pleased at the level of support in this House for that objective.

Also as the member of parliament from Lakeland constituency, I am proud that many of my constituents from the Cold Lake air base are involved in the military operations, are involved in the air strikes. The job they are doing and the commitment they have shown are to be commended. It is important in a situation like this one to show support for the men and women in our forces and for the extremely important role they are playing and I do so right now.

There is a lot of agreement on the use of air strikes. The real difference seems to lie for the most part in the use of ground forces to complete that objective if necessary. There must be two conditions for committing Canadian ground troops. The first is that NATO demonstrate that this commitment in fact is necessary. Can NATO demonstrate that? Has it been able to do this so far? No.

We do not know whether we will need ground troops. We do not know how effective the air strikes are going to be. We have heard differing opinions on that in the House. We have certainly heard one opinion from CNN which, after the first three or four days when it could not see any progress, said it ain't working. That is not good enough. We have to give it the time that is needed. We may find that the air strikes will go a long way to solving the problem.

The second condition is that the government must demonstrate to this House that Canada can meet the commitment laid out by NATO.

Madam Speaker, I am splitting my time with the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca and so I probably only have two minutes left.

It is important that the government demonstrate to this House and to Canadians that Canadians will be able to meet the commitment and do the job that NATO delegates to them. That decision is to be made by the chief of the defence staff. That is the role of the chief of the defence staff.

It is the role of the government, the role of this House and not just the role of the governing party, to determine what Canada's involvement should be. It is the role of the chief of the defence staff to determine what our military capabilities are. That is critical and that job must be left to the chief of the defence staff.

Those are some of the military considerations.

I would like to close by asking the minister of immigration a few questions with regard to refugees and Canada's commitment to accepting refugees who have been displaced from Kosovo. What is the minister's position on this issue? It is unclear to me.

Last week the minister said that she would accept 5,000 refugees on a temporary basis. By last Friday she said she would accept refugees only if they intended to stay in Canada permanently. Today the minister is saying that she will accept certain Kosovar Albanians if they themselves express the desire to come to Canada. They would come not as refugees but through normal immigration channels. I would appreciate clarification by the minister.

I get one message from Mr. Girard who went to Kosovar and evaluated the situation and another message from the minister. It is very important that this be clarified. I look forward to the minister's clarification.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague, the defence critic for the official opposition, said that he would support the actions of NATO, and the minister also suggested should it not be enough that NATO supports this action.

When the member says it is important for Canada to follow the lead of NATO, is it not equally important that Canada be involved in the process within NATO? We have no real indication that Canada was intimately involved in making this decision in the first place.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the minister made an extremely important point in her speech that Canadians truly are very generous. They have offered to open their homes and their lives to refugees. That shows a generosity that is quite amazing in fact. It has left a very positive impression on me.

I have a couple of questions for the minister. In her speech just now and before I have heard the minister say that she will rely on the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to make the decision on whether or not Canada accepts refugees. Is the minister allowing the United Nations to make that decision for Canada?

What process will be put in place to ensure that any refugees we choose will go through the proper security checks? There is some concern in that regard.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

An extra 15 minutes, Mr. Speaker.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I would like to ask for the unanimous consent of the House to extend the time period for questioning the Minister of National Defence considering the important military component of this issue.

[Kosovo, April 12th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, very few people want war and most would avoid it at at almost any cost.

In the case of Kosovo, most Canadians agree that our involvement with NATO is a better option than allowing killing and persecution of Kosovar Albanians to continue and accelerate.

Most of us take our position more as observers than as participants, but the men and women of the Canadian forces are involved in a very direct and real way. As of yesterday we have close to 200 pilots and support personnel from 4 Wing, Cold Lake, which is in my riding, serving out of Italy. This means that families are separated for long periods of time, leaving spouses and children of pilots and ground crew wondering if their husbands, fathers, wives and mothers will return safely.

At the same time as we take pride that our personnel are among the world's best, we are also very concerned for their safety. I know that my heart and my prayers are with our members and their families as they serve this noble cause.

I have a special message to the personnel serving out of Cold Lake: “serve well and come home safely”.

[Petitions, March 24th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to present a petition on behalf of people of the Bonnyville-Cold Lake area. These petitioners are concerned with the increase in violent crime in their communities. They are also concerned with the hundreds of millions of dollars that are being spent on the whole gun registry program. They are suggesting that this money instead of being wasted on gun registration and licensing of gun owners should be spent on crime prevention programs. They have listed several crime prevention programs which they feel would be much more beneficial than the gun registry program.

[Income Tax Amendments Act, 1998, March 18th, 1999]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased today to speak to this bill, a budget implementation bill. Many comments have been made on this bill and I am sure there will be many more.

I will speak in a very general way about what the implementation of the parts of the budget that this involves will do and the impact it will or will not have on families across the country.

In the last couple of months, since the discussion and the anticipation of the finance minister's budget really started to heat up, and even over the five years that I have been a member of parliament, I have heard more and more from people who say they feel guilty as parents or as small business people who want to pass their business on to their children because they are not saving the amount of money they should be saving in order to pass the business on or to allow them to help their children as they raise their families or as they go on to pursue further education. I have heard people express the guilt they feel because they are just not doing what they should be doing to help their children and to help pass the business on. That has really been a concern for me. The guilt should not be felt by most of the people that I have heard from because, clearly, the money is just not there for them to save.

We have heard a lot of talk recently, talk backed up by chief bank economists and by the government's own pollsters, which indicates that productivity in Canada has been dropping steadily. If we ask most Canadians they probably will not understand in detail what productivity means. However, what they do understand is that their standard of living is getting lower and lower all the time. It is a key thing to remember that over the past 10 years and more, each year Canadians have had less to live on. Their standard of living has been dropping.

When I hear these people say they feel guilty because they are not saving what they should be saving to help their children with their education or to help pass their farms on to the next generation, I think it is important for me to tell them now that it really, in most cases, is not their fault.

I think it is important to note whose fault it is. It is clearly the fault of the government, for what it has done and has not done over the past five years. It is the fault of the Conservative Party, which was in office for nine years and which kept jacking up taxes. I cannot even remember how many tax increases there were, but dozens and dozens of times the Conservative Party raised taxes in various ways. It is the fault of the Conservative Party and it is the fault of previous Liberal governments, many members of which are still in the House today. They raised taxes and went on their spending sprees, and we are seeing that develop again. By doing that they have denied Canadian families; parents of children who have decided they want to further their education and farmers who want to pass the farm on to the next generation. It is very difficult. It is the fault of government which has denied these people through high taxation and low growth.

It is the fault of governments and I want people to know that. I want the people who have been talking to me and saying that they feel guilt to know that they should not feel guilty, because I know that most of the people who have talked to me about this have done everything they possibly could to save money. They are cautious in their businesses. They spend very little and live on very little in many cases, yet they just do not have money to save.

I hear members opposite hollering that that is not fair and not right. Look at the statistics. The fact is that the savings of Canadian families have been dropping on a regular basis. That happened again this year. It is happening right now. Savings this year will be lower than they were last year. This is a trend that has been taking place for some time. It is a real serious concern that has not been dealt with by the budget. It certainly has not been dealt with by the parts of the budget that we are talking about implementing here. For that reason I cannot possibly support this piece of legislation.

When I have people come to me and say they feel guilt because they are just not saving what they should be saving for all of these things that are so important to them, I have not thought of telling them that it is not their fault and that they should look at what has happened and the reality of how every year more and more of what they earn is not left with them, is not left in their pockets for them to spend as they see fit. Instead, it has been taken away by governments more and more and spent by governments on things that they somehow feel are more important than the issues that the families themselves have determined are most important.

That attitude bothers me. I think it bothers most Canadians when a government and a finance minister feel that they somehow know better than the general Canadian population, than parents, how they should spend their money and how they want to spend their money and what is important to them.

Perhaps we could change that attitude and convince the finance minister and the Prime Minister that Canadians themselves, mothers and fathers who are desperately trying to put money together to pay for university or technical school education for their children or for something that will help them get good jobs, know best how they want to spend their money. Perhaps we could convince governments to leave more money in the pockets of the people who earn it.

I want to make clear that I am not against taxation. I am not proposing that we eliminate income tax completely. I am not proposing that we eliminate all the other taxes, although I certainly believe we should eliminate some of them. I believe the level of tax now is completely out of line. When we see about half of what we earn being taken away from us by government, we know taxes are too high.

Instead of 50% it would be far more reasonable to move the total tax package down to between 20% and 30%. I think issues like health care are important to people. People do not object to the money being spent on health care if it is spent wisely. That is part of the problem with health care. Even the money that is being spent is not being spent wisely.

Another part of the problem is that the government has cut back on transfers to the provinces by almost $7 billion a year. These transfers are to pay for health care and advanced education and the funding has been reduced dramatically.

The member across the floor is saying that in the budget a small part of that was given back. That is so true. They have given a small part back and have said “Aren't we grand?” They have cut somewhere near $20 billion—I forget the cumulative amount—over the past five years and now they are to put back a billion or two over the next couple of years. That is not good enough. That is nothing to brag about. Part of the problem is that they cut back on the amount transferred to the provinces for health care, making it extremely difficult for the provinces to deal with the health care issue.

Another part of the problem is that in many cases, partly due to unreasonable restrictions on the part of the federal government, the provinces are not allowed to do what they have to do to make the system work well.

We have seen that attitude problem in this government, in the Conservative government before it and in the Liberal government before that. It has to change. If we could change that attitude we could make some real progress. We could start leaving more dollars in the pockets of the people who earn it. If there could be a quick tax reduction right now, maybe five years from now I would hear some people saying that they are finally starting to be able to save a little more. Because they are saving a little more they will be able to help the children a little with their education.

I am from a farming community so I mention farming because it is extremely important to me. I might hear people say they can save a little more because they are not paying so much out in taxes. Over half the cost of fuel is tax, which is completely out of line. Farmers also pay a lot of income tax, although it will not be much this year. They did not earn much because there is a real mess in the industry. However over the years they have paid a lot of income tax and a lot of other taxes. They are overtaxed, no doubt.

On top of that and because of that we are seeing farm families that in many cases will not be able to help the next generation to purchase the farm business and to develop it. This is a direct result of overtaxation and the complete lack of willingness on the part of the government to do something about it.

We laid out a plan before the finance minister presented his budget which would have given Canadians $25 billion a year in tax relief. It was not an unreasonable plan. It was verified as being very viable by some of the best economists in the country. We know from the work we have done that it is a very viable plan. In our plan we would make payments on the debt every year and increase to some extent funding to health care and to other key areas. That is a very reasonable expectation.

The finance minister had his chance. I do not know his motives, but if he would have had his way maybe he would have gone further toward our plan. Probably he was not allowed to do so by others in cabinet. Do I fault the finance minister for that? Yes, I do. I absolutely fault him for that because he has to be strong enough and show enough leadership to make that happen. He has to make that happen and he did not. He failed miserably.

I do not want to impute motive. I do not know the motive of the finance minister, but this was pretty much a do-nothing budget in reality. The government is talking about next year's budget already. It is trying to forget this one. We have noticed that in question period. It is talking about next year's budget and has just gone beyond this year's budget. It is unbelievable. Clearly it knows this year's budget was a failure on the part of the finance minister and a failure on the part of the government.

I just have to ask why. Was it because the finance minister did not want to do something? It may have been. The Prime Minister will be stepping down within the next year or two. I think all Canadians expect that. The finance minister will pretty much be put in as leader of the Liberal Party. Because that leadership race will be a little over a year from now, we have to think that the finance minister will want to have a knockout budget next year.

Maybe some people would say next year is good enough. There are a couple of things wrong with that. First, Canadians who are desperately trying to save to put their kids through college, technical schools and whatever, or who are desperately trying to save so they can somehow transfer their small businesses and farms to others, just cannot do it. They need that relief now. There are families struggling just to make ends meet. I am talking about food and basic clothing. There are many families in that position. They see virtually no help until next year.

What will happen next year? We have seen how cabinet has influenced the finance minister already. He may have the best of intentions to come out next year with a budget much like what we proposed. Will cabinet allow that? All the heritage minister thinks about is spend, spend, spend, and maybe put through some dumb legislation like the split-run magazine legislation. That is another issue and I will not get into it.

There are several other ministers like her. They want to spend. They think elections are bought and won. They do not really care, I guess. I should not really say that because I do not know. I know they care about the country. They would not be here if they did not. They clearly do not understand that what is necessary is to limit spending and give Canadians money or leave it in their pockets. It should not be taken from them and given back. It should be left in their pockets as much as possible. They did not do that this year. If they do not understand that and if they are not willing to let the finance minister do that, they probably will not let him go quite as far as he would want next year.

We might get a budget next year of maybe $15 billion in tax reduction. That is not good enough. Families need a reasonable amount that leaves room in their budgets to deal with a downturn in the economy and that type of thing. Our plan does that. The room is there. We will not start building up deficits again under any circumstances, yet we can offer in our package $25 billion in tax relief.

If the finance minister is willing to give $15 billion in relief over the same period, it just is not good enough. He may think it will help him win the leadership race. I think he will do that anyway, but will he win the next election based on that? I think not. It just will not happen with that kind of budget.

Canadians are starting to understand what is going on. Canadians have always known they are overtaxed, but they are starting to see exactly what the possibilities are. Finally they know too much is being taken from them, that their standard of living has dropped on a regular basis, that it is difficult to make ends meet, and that they cannot save for things that are really important to them. Now they are starting to see why. This is key to what is happening right now. Canadians are looking in more depth into the issue. They understand more and more. The government could do a lot more but it has done very little with the budget. Bill C-72 implements a budget that just does not do what it should have done. That is of real concern to me.

I say to the people who have felt guilty because they cannot save that the guilt should not be on their shoulders. The guilt should be on the shoulders of government members for not acting. They are the ones who had the opportunity to act very quickly on this issue. They could have offered $2,500 in tax relief, for example, to a family earning $30,000. That would have meant $2,500 more in the pockets of taxpayers.

Then some families might be able to put a bit into a registered retirement savings plan to further reduce their taxes. More families would be able to save a bit more so that their children could go on to a technical school, a college or a university after secondary school.

That is what that would mean. It would also mean the health care system could be improved so that waiting lines do not get longer and longer as they have been for many years now. The number of people waiting for health services in extremely serious areas is becoming larger and larger on a regular basis due to wrong actions taken by the government and lack of action by the government.

I am very pleased that Canadians in a much broader or much more in depth way have recognized that the government has failed miserably. I can safely say that if people from the Lakeland constituency or many others across the country were standing in my spot in the House when the vote is taken, they would be saying some of the things I am saying and would vote against the bill. The bill implements parts of a budget that is totally inadequate. It is a failure and I believe I am saying what they would say.