Matthew Kellway

[Business of Supply, June 20th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, there are many places to find money to support and show our respect for the seniors of this country who are living in poverty.

The one thing we must do is deal with the issue of corporate tax cuts. I find it very interesting that a government that has authored this budget and prides itself on fiscal responsibility has lowered the corporate tax rates with the aid of the Liberal Party of Canada to such an extent that we have effectively a $6 billion tax transfer to the U.S. treasury every year. The foregone revenue to this country from those corporate tax cuts could very easily go to support seniors and lift many others who live in poverty out of poverty, including children.

[Business of Supply, June 20th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the motion put forward by the member for London—Fanshawe and in admiration of her commitment to the plight of the approximately one-quarter of a million Canadian seniors living in poverty.

I rise to speak today out of respect for our country's seniors for the motion and the issue it addresses is most fundamentally that of respect. It is about recognizing that our good fortune as Canadians comes to us, not as a matter of chance or inevitability, but as a result of the work and the very many sacrifices of previous generations.

It is our parents and grandparents but mostly, it should be noted, our mothers and grandmothers who are the subject of this motion. We know intimately how hard they worked for what we today enjoy.

This motion proposes that we demonstrate our respect for the seniors of this country in a truly modest way, simply by ensuring that they do not live in poverty. That is all.

Yet, that is a lot because to be lifted out of poverty matters so much to those who live in it. It means enough food to eat, a decent place to live, the ability to pay for some basics and a retirement with a little less worry and perhaps even a little more pleasure. As much as anything, it means a little dignity at a time in life when dignity can be so easily lost and so difficult to recover.

That, one would think, is not much to ask of us, and it is not. The motion before us asks us to confirm that ending seniors' poverty in this country is fiscally feasible. It most certainly is. It is our good fortune that this moral imperative of ending seniors' poverty is also something easily done and easily affordable.

The government budget calls for expenditures of more than $280 billion for the upcoming year. This motion contemplates a tiny fraction of that, something in the range of about one-tenth of 1% of total expenditures. In fact, the expenditure required to lift seniors out of poverty is even just a fraction of the adjustment for risk that the government has built into its planning assumptions. Lifting all seniors out of poverty amounts to about 20% of the $1.5 billion annual planning cushion in this budget.

Further, I would note that since this budget was first tabled in March of this year, the government has revised its deficit projection downward by $4.3 billion in 2010-11 and revised it upward by $2.7 billion in the subsequent year for a net deficit reduction of $1.6 billion. All of which is to say that there are margins of error in this budgeting process, all of which highlight the fiscal modesty of this proposed initiative to lift seniors out of poverty and the fiscal feasibility of doing so.

Now it is not difficult to anticipate a response to this motion, and we have heard it already, that would suggest that this economy, owing to global economic uncertainty, is as of yet fragile, that there are threats to our economic recovery and that therefore we cannot assume that revenues will emerge to cover the cost implied by this motion.

However, the largest threat to both the pace and extent of economic recovery in Canada is the adoption of the kind of economics that informs the government's budget. It is of considerable curiosity that the government, in response to the recession, embraced, however tentatively, the need for fiscal stimulus, yet now, with our economic recovery so far from complete and under constant threat, as the government acknowledges throughout its budget document, the government embraces an economics of fiscal restraint. Service cuts and corresponding public sector job cuts are easily anticipated.

Although we hear members of this House trumpeting job creation numbers almost daily, this motion is a good context for reminding the House and all Canadians that we remain 300,000 jobs short of our pre-recession employment figures.

In the motion we have before us is the opportunity, not only to repay the critically important debt owed to the seniors of this country, but also the opportunity to assist in a very effective way with the economic recovery.

I would urge all those contemplating the fiscal feasibility of this motion to refer to the annex to the government's seventh report to Canadians on the economic action plan. That annex sets out the economic multipliers associated with various forms of fiscal stimulus. Interestingly, it identifies fiscal stimulus targeted at low-income households, such as seniors living in poverty, as having the highest economic multiplier. That is the greatest propensity for creating jobs of all the measures examined.

We, of course, do not need economists to tell us this. We know it is a matter of common sense that if we put money in the hands of people living in poverty it will be spent to ensure that basic needs are met. To reiterate, we are talking today about one-quarter of a million seniors in this country whose basic needs are not being met.

We have in this motion the opportunity to do the right thing by the seniors of this country while, at the same time, adding stimulus to the economy struggling to recover and creating jobs for a Canadian workforce struggling to find work.

We have many options open to us to support fiscally the implementation of this motion. At present, for example, the government seems set to continue with its schedule for corporate tax cuts, dropping the rate to 15% by 2012. These cuts will reduce revenue by billions in this fiscal year, with further revenue losses accumulating annually as we move forward. However, a recent study has demonstrated the impotence of corporate tax cuts in Canada as a means of stimulating domestic economic growth and job creation. The study shows that capital spending in Canada by large corporations has been in decline for about 25 years, irrespective of the drastic cuts to corporate tax rates over the same period of time.

Interestingly, even the annex to the economic action plan that I previously referenced shows the relatively tepid and delayed impacts of corporate tax cuts. The annex makes it clear that corporate tax cuts have but a fraction of the impact of fiscal stimulus measures such as the very one contemplated by the motion we are presently discussing. Moreover, the corporate tax cuts result effectively in the transfer of billions of dollars to the U.S. treasury as a result of the differential in the corporate tax rates of our two countries, billions of dollars that could be used to lift seniors and many more Canadians out of poverty.

However, if it does not please the government to lift seniors out of poverty by eliminating or even delaying its schedule of corporate tax cuts to large and, in many cases, immensely profitable corporations, I would point to the government's military procurement plans as another source for funding poverty relief for seniors in Canada. The Canada first defence strategy contemplates a total of $490 billion of spending over the next 20 years on a wide variety of military infrastructure and hardware, including, of course, the F-35 fighter jets. According to the government's estimates, as controversial and contested as they may be, the 65 F-35 fighter jets that the government intends to purchase will cost taxpayers $9 billion, at an estimated $75 million to $85 million apiece.

It is an incredible understatement to suggest that there is ample room here for lifting seniors out of poverty without compromising our national security. The issue here is clearly one of priorities and not of fiscal feasibility.

It seems to me that every good policy has a sound principle upon which it rests. The principle underlying the motion before us is obvious and compelling. It is about respecting what others have built for us and acknowledging our debt to them for the country we inherit from their efforts. This is not just something we can do. It is something we must do.

I urge, therefore, that the members of this House support this motion before them.

[The Budget, June 9th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the Minister of Finance for his commendations. I would point out that we have 300,000 more people unemployed in this country since before the recession.

In return, I would also commend to the Minister of Finance the website of the Department of Finance that shows the economic multipliers for various forms of investment. The website shows that the economic multiplier attached to corporate tax cuts is about 20¢ for every dollar invested. That very same website for the Department of Finance shows that other investments the government had the opportunity to make through its budget have multipliers that far exceed that, including investments in public infrastructure and fiscal infrastructure, which would be very useful in the city of Toronto as we severely lack in urban transit.

[The Budget, June 9th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, clearly in a city as big and expensive as Toronto, the government's budget promises to the seniors of this country is wholly inadequate. The $1.50 or $1.60 a day, whatever it works out to, is offensive to the seniors of this country living in poverty.

I would like to take this opportunity to talk about other communities within Beaches—East York and across this country who are also living in poverty. What people need more than anything else are jobs, and what the government fails to provide to people in Canada are jobs.

The government's single job initiative, corporate tax cuts, has failed to provide jobs for Canadians. The government will be aware there are studies that show that the highest tax cuts occurred back in the 1980s, and investment in capital spending in this country has been declining since, irrespective of corporate tax cuts in this country.

[The Budget, June 9th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to advise you that I will be splitting my time with my colleague from Davenport.

Earlier today I had the opportunity to extend my deepest thanks to the people of Beaches—East York and to my family for supporting my desire to represent the people of Beaches—East York in this House. Allow me to extend my thanks to the hundreds of volunteers and staff who gave up their time and family life to support our successful campaign in Beaches—East York. It is my hope that I am able to justify their time and effort by my conduct in the House.

Let me begin my comments by saying how proud and humbled I am to be sitting as a member of the official opposition among such a large NDP caucus, a caucus full of such talent, potential and accomplishment and, importantly, optimism. Let me also extend my congratulations to all members on that side of the aisle and a few more on this side of the aisle on their success on May 2. Their sense of pride with their accomplishment on May 2 is manifest.

I would like to suggest that for all of us, as we get on with the business of this House, modesty and humility is more the order of the day. We have failed too many Canadians too often and for too long, so the challenges that we must confront and conquer are now formidable, and increasingly so, but a tremendous opportunity presents itself to us.

It is the opportunity, in a House with this particular partisan configuration, a majority government without the support of the majority of Canadians, to reach across the aisle to invite all members of the House to work together to address these challenges.

It is an opportunity that threatens to elude us shortly by way of the government's commitment to its regurgitated budget. From where I stand in this House, this budget has been seen and already judged and found wanting by the people of Beaches—East York precisely because it did not address the challenges that I have referred to.

It is a budget that leaves seniors in poverty when we have before us both the opportunity to and the imperative of lifting all seniors out of poverty immediately.

It is a budget that fails to address the needs of families for affordable and accessible child care when we should be providing single-parent families, two-parent families, working families as well as families without work, access to the affordable child care that they need to make ends meet.

It is a budget that continues to hang enormous debt around the necks of young Canadians who choose to pursue an education when we should be helping the young people of this country fulfill their potential and, in doing so, fulfill the promise of this country.

It is a budget that continues to leave new Canadians socially and economically isolated, their education skills and energy going wasted when we should be keeping our promise to all those we invite into this country to make use of their skills and energy, and in doing so, engage them in our collective effort to build always a better future for this country.

It is a budget that fails to put workers back into empty factories, businesses back into empty storefronts, and consumers back into shops when we should be using the resources of the Government of Canada to grow a competitive economy with good, well-paying jobs and secure pensions.

It is a budget that ignores the plight of our cities, the fact that our cities are vastly underfunded and carry a $123 billion infrastructure deficit, and have become places of stark, economic disparity. Our cities should be recognized as places with tremendous potential for cultural creativity, for economic ingenuity and growth, for energy efficiency, and a meaningful response to global warming. Our cities should be at the forefront of our national agenda.

Finally, this is a budget that is short-sighted in that it is nothing new. It seems in fact to be something of a tradition passed on between Conservative and Liberal and Conservative governments. Both minority and majority governments have, for years and years, carried on without looking to the horizon to see how to navigate through the challenges ahead, to see the critical issues that will inevitably and profoundly reshape our future.

And so, we have a budget that pretends that there is no health care crisis for this country's seniors and their families. Time after time, seniors in Beaches—East York talked to me about their struggles, trying to provide care for their partners because there was no other care available.

Time after time, people my age answered the door, wanting to talk about their difficulties providing care for their parents while raising their kids. Very often the conversation turned to the need for the government to provide help with the growing need for psycho-geriatric care.

We have a budget that pretends there is no climate change crisis. Islands are sinking below water in our oceans and seas, the permafrost is thawing below communities in our north, and the government carries on giving taxpayer money away to big oil corporations so that we hasten that process.

It is very clearly the expectation of the people of Beaches—East York that the government of this country think beyond tomorrow. We will never leave our children a great country if we do not do so.

I urge the government to seize the opportunity that we have before us. I noted at the beginning that we have an opportunity to recover our vision to build a great country. We can begin modestly, one practical step at a time. I believe it to be our responsibility to do so, and it is very clearly the expectation of my constituents that we do so.

[Beaches—East York, June 9th, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I rise in this chamber today to speak for the first time as the member for Beaches—East York. I am incredibly proud to do so and I am incredibly grateful to the people of Beaches—East York for the privilege to serve as their representative in the House.

On May 2, the people of Beaches—East York said to me, “Go forth to represent the values and priorities of this community in the House of Commons. Do your utmost to build a generous and compassionate country—a country worthy of those who have gone before us and of those that we have brought into this world”.

I look forward to that challenge and to working along side all those in the House who share in it.

There are many to whom I owe thanks, but most certainly we only get to this place with the support of those who love us. Therefore, I reserve my deepest thanks for my parents and my kids, Emily, Hannah and Rory, and my wife Donna who does the heavy lifting back home so that I might be free to do my best for Beaches—East York in this House.