House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2006, with 48% of the vote.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, the best way to ensure that this money will be paid whether or not there is an economic downturn is by setting up a foundation such as the one that we just created. We just saw that with other foundations.
We want the private sector, the provinces and the municipalities to co-operate with us. Need I point out that, in Quebec, municipalities have already expressed their support for our initiative.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, again, the hon. member is mistaken. Not only do we have the existing infrastructure program, which will be implemented soon, the affordable housing program and the program for green infrastructure with the municipalities, but the foundation is a new initiative. The $2 billion budget is new money.
We are creating a foundation to ensure that things will continue, that we will continue to co-operate with the private sector under agreements such as the ones on highway 30 and highway 175.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member has made a calculation error.
When we came to power, contributions were $3.07. They are now $2.20. That is a drop of $6.8 billion. Reducing contributions puts money back into the pockets of Canadians.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, I imagine the hon. member is using payroll tax to refer to Canada pension plan contributions.
All that I can say about why we did this is that I signed it to ensure its viability. I am completely in agreement, but the hon. member ought to ask his leader the same thing. He signed the same agreement when he was the treasurer of Alberta.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, I just answered the member's question, but I have one for him.
If he does not want to count tax points as a transfer, why is it that he keeps asking for more?
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, as I just said, the government, through the Prime Minister, signed an agreement one year ago transferring over $23 billion to the provinces for health care and early childhood development. Of this amount, $2.8 billion was transferred this year.
Even more importantly, our transfers to the provinces are not 14 cents for every dollar, but over 30 cents. This is a new high in provincial transfer payments, in equalization payments.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, let us take a look at where the new spending of the government has gone to. Over two-thirds to 75% of our spending has gone to the following four areas: transfers to the provinces for health care; increased EI benefits for those who will be claiming those higher benefits; increased spending on the elderly because of an aging population; and increased security.
I ask the hon. member this. Which would he cut? The health care spending, the elderly benefits, the unemployment insurance benefits or would it be security? Which would he cut to pay--
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, the Canadian people are entitled to have the Canadian Alliance members put some consistency into what they are saying. The Leader of the Opposition stood and said that what we should have done was pay down debt. Now the opposition critic has stood and has said what we should have done was pay down taxes. They cannot have it both ways.
The fundamental fact is that over the course of the last eight months the Canadian Alliance has asked for $36 billion in additional spending. If we had done that, we would be in a double digit deficit. There would be no tax cuts and there would be no debt reduction.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's facts are simply wrong. When we look at the security charges and when we look at the taxes, the Canada and United States numbers are very comparable. The American situation is much more complex. It charges segment by segment
If we want to compare Montreal-Toronto or Toronto-New York, or any comparable fare between Canada and the United States, we will see that in fact the charges being imposed by government for taxes and security are roughly comparable.
The Budget December 11th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, there was a $7.7 billion security package. Of that, the Canadian government and Canadian taxpayers are picking up $5 billion of the costs.
The $2.2 billion that will go to air travellers will be paid by those who are the most frequent users of airlines. At the same time, we have picked up and absorbed $72 million of air security costs that previously were paid for by the airlines, money they can use to either improve their balance sheets or reduce their airfares.
Under these kinds of circumstances and given the government's financial constraints, to ask air passengers to pay for--