Peggy Nash

[Business of Supply, April 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the hon. member for Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques.

I am pleased to speak to this motion today which draws a line between the cuts to regulations and funding developed for the public good and cuts to public oversight that affect the well-being of Canadians. There have been comments today, and referred to in this motion, about the terrible situation in Walkerton, Ontario where people lost their lives because of lack of public oversight, due to cuts to public infrastructure funding that should have ensured that the public was protected with respect to water safety.

I trace this back to the federal budget of 1995 where the Liberal government of the day made massive cuts to funds that it would transfer to the provinces, and at the time bragged that with these massive cuts relative to the size of the economy, public spending in 1996 and 1997 would be lower than at any time in our country's history since 1951. Of course, that was prior to medicare and prior to many other programs which we subsequently brought into place. So it gives us a sense of the massive extent of the cuts that were made by the federal government, and the off-loading of debt that went, in essence, to the provinces and then was off-loaded to cities and the people of Canada. We saw the impact directly in Ontario. We certainly saw it in my community in Toronto where there was greater homelessness and greater poverty, and people were placed more at risk.

Now in its budget, the government is going down a similar path. It is cutting on the pretense of streamlining. We heard the member opposite a few minutes ago talking about getting greater efficiencies, streamlining, trying to reassure Canadians that all that is happening is basically good economic housekeeping and that there is nothing here that will jeopardize any protection or safety for Canadians. I remind Canadians that it is the government that was not particularly frugal or efficient in its spending of $1 billion when the G20 came to Toronto or when the G8 was in Muskoka and the minister was able to find great ways to squander money in his own riding. We have noticed a lack of efficiency and accountability for the dollars that Canadians send to Ottawa when we see the various budget estimates around the F-35s and multi-millions of dollars' difference when the Conservatives are talking about their pet projects. We can see how cavalier they are in public spending when they pass a crime bill that will off-load billions of dollars to the provinces when crime is declining across the country. So the Conservatives seem to want to be frugal when it comes to protecting the public but, as we have seen with $16 glasses of orange juice for cabinet ministers, not necessarily frugal when it comes to their friends or their own personal spending.

Getting to the matter at hand, Canadians ought to be very concerned about the content of these changes, but also the way they are being brought in. It is a government that seems ideologically bound to off-load what it does not take an interest in, to privatize what it can turn over to its friends and to abandon the notion of accountability when its preference is to centralize power and leave decision making to ministers or to groups behind closed doors.

I think there is a real concern with the lack of accountability and the way so many changes are bound into the budget implementation act of more than 400 pages, a third of which deals with changes to environmental protection. There is a real concern about undermining democracy. I say that because there are changes the bill seeks to make that ought to be in a separate bill to be properly examined and debated by the environment critics and the environment committee. That is the proper way to make those kinds of changes as well as other changes that the budget implementation act proposes.

For example, the previous speaker reassured us on the issue of food safety. On the contrary, what the government is putting forward is an erosion of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. To be specific, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is facing overall cuts of $56 million. As we already have outbreaks of listeriosis, it seems to me that food inspection is an area where we would want to invest more money, not cut $56 million. We need food safety oversight today more than ever.

In fact, the government is taking away the oversight of the Auditor General from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. The Conservatives are making the CFIA exempt from a mandatory review by the Auditor General. This is what I mean by a lack of accountability. It is very troubling for Canadians that we do not have the rigour of oversight of the Auditor General for our food inspection agency.

This paves the way for private contractors to do the work of food inspection. Therefore, the fox is in the chicken coop. I think that Canadians ought to be very troubled by the privatization of our food inspection. I prefer to have someone acting in the public interest rather than private profit to be responsible for food inspection. That seems obvious to me. The fact that the Conservatives want to make this change to privatize food inspection should set alarm bells ringing throughout the country.

The Canadian Medical Association Journal has long pointed out key failings in our food safety system. It warned Canadians in an editorial on April 12 of last year to eat at their own risk. It said, even prior to this budget, that it was very concerned about the lack of oversight.

The Food and Drugs Act would see a streamlining where the Minister of Health would be able to exempt products from the regulatory process. That seems a bit troubling. The minister would have the power to issue marketing authorization to exempt a food, or advertisement with respect to a food, from certain provisions of the act. Again, this is about concentrating more power in the hands of the minister without proper regulatory oversight.

As well, the bill would provide for Health Canada to adopt any industry regulations as law without proper parliamentary oversight. I believe this would be very problematic if there were no policy to go with this change to prevent conflict of interest. There is tremendous potential for us to get into trouble with this.

There are many areas, such as: the cuts to search and rescue; the slashing of environmental protections; and the gutting of environmental assessments to speed up major projects, namely pipelines. There are sweeping changes. Canada is already an international pariah when it comes to the environment, but the Conservatives are making massive changes, of which I know my colleagues will put forward more detail. The Conservative government is missing opportunities not only to protect Canadians but to green our economy and invest in new opportunities with renewable energy and energy efficiency. We are lagging behind many other countries in doing this.

I believe that this budget implementation act should be of great concern to Canadians and I think that the motion raises important points in terms of protecting public safety.

[Business of Supply, April 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the leader of the Liberal Party for his commentary, reminding us of some very important history in the province of Ontario and the potential impact of the budget that the government has brought in recently.

I would also like to ask him if he thinks, as part of that history lesson, that we can also draw a line back to the 1995 Liberal budget that drastically cut transfers to the provinces and then led many provinces to try to balance their books by cutting programs, such as the ones around water safety that he described? Does he also draw a link to past federal Liberal budgets?

[Fisheries and Oceans, April 27th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I was at the finance committee because we were discussing the budget implementation act, not environmental regulations.

However, the Conservatives did not stop at cutting the Environmental Assessment Act, not when protections for fish habitat are standing in the way of higher profits for their friends. This bill dismantles decades of work to ensure industrial development does not destroy our fisheries.

The Conservatives did not campaign on gutting the Fisheries Act. We know Canadians did not ask for weaker protection for fish habitat. Therefore, will the minister tell us who lobbied him to gut the Fisheries Act? Who is he responding to?

[The Environment, April 27th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, also hidden in the budget bill is a full frontal assault on environmental protection. The bill would exempt many projects from examination, shut concerned citizens in groups out of pipeline reviews, give sweeping powers to the minister to green-light projects in spite of impacts, and much more.

Why is the minister hiding such significant changes in a 400-page budget bill? Is it because he knows that Canadians oppose this reckless attack on our environmental protection?

[Study on Income Inequality, April 25th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today to speak to this motion of income inequality. One of the fundamental tenets of the NDP is the promotion of a more equal society and therefore we will be supporting this motion.

Increased inequality is one of Canada's greatest challenges. Most Canadians' real wages have remained stagnant for several years now. In fact, the average income of Canadians has increased by only 5.5% over a period of 33 years.

According to the Conference Board of Canada, income inequality is growing faster in Canada than it is in the United States. Much of this growing inequality can be attributed to an increase in the revenues of the richest 1% of the population. Canadians who belong to that 1% have increased their share of the nation's total revenue from 8.1% in 1980 to 13.3% in 2007.

In fact, Canadians in that 1% are responsible for nearly one-third of all total income growth between 1997 and 2007. This growth occurred at the expense of other income groups.

This increase in equality of the 1% has had serious implications for the majority of Canadian families.

Lars Osberg at Dalhousie University argues that over the period from 1981 to 2006 the life experience of most Canadian families has changed. The new normal has been that entering cohorts of young workers have earned less in real terms than their parents' generation did at the comparable age.

We also now see double the unemployment rate for young Canadians. The national unemployment rate is already far too high. Our young people are also facing a much tighter job market. Conservative budget plans call for unemployment to actually rise. Women, aboriginal people, racialized communities and recent immigrants also suffer from disproportionate poverty relative to other Canadians. Such inequality has societal consequences.

In 2009 a groundbreaking book on inequality by British scholars Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett demonstrates that inequality, more than GNP or GDP, has a significant impact on a range of social indicators, indicators like health outcomes, such as the average life expectancy, and in other measures of human development, such as rates of literacy, teenage pregnancy or incarceration.

I see this growing poverty, this growing inequality, in my own neighbourhood, in Parkdale—High Park, where people suffering from poverty, from mental health problems, from lack of housing are seeing their condition worsen.

This is not the legacy that we should be leaving to the next generation.

Before the mid-1990s, Canada's tax and benefit system was just as effective at stabilizing inequality as those of Nordic countries, offsetting over 70% of the rise in income inequality. However, the impact of redistribution has declined since then. The OECD found that taxation and benefits now offset less than 40% of the increase in inequality.

The Conservatives tend to focus on an economic spinoff model with respect to income distribution. They seem to think that higher incomes for the rich will ultimately trickle down and benefit the rest of us. However, tax cuts for big corporations and the richest Canadians have resulted in rising income inequality, stagnant economic growth and increasing unemployment. They are really on the wrong track.

Moreover, several university studies have concluded that census data are critical to accurately measuring income inequality. The elimination of the long form census will interfere with our ability to tackle the problem.

The Liberals presided over increased income inequality when they were in power during the 1990s and 2000s. They have also consistently supported Conservative budgets that have led us down the wrong path. We saw during the Liberal government the most massive cuts to our social programs, which had serious and dramatic effects in increasing inequality.

Even when the Liberals had the financial ability with surplus budgets to make positive changes, they cut the national housing strategy and the funding for housing. They cancelled the national minimum wage. They failed to create a national child care program. They also failed to make serious and meaningful investments in our infrastructure.

The motion introduced by my colleague from Kings—Hants is a starting point, but the suggested study is limited in the taxes it would examine. Inequality is not influenced only by personal income tax and transfers. It is also influenced by consumption taxation, corporate taxation and international taxation. The motion would be stronger if it included some of these items in the scope of the study. Furthermore, there is no reason that this study should constrain the tools with which we can combat inequality.

It is important to learn from our mistakes, Liberal and Conservative mistakes, mistakes made around the world, and identify precisely what has contributed to the increasing inequality in the latter half of the 20th century.

The specific references to the welfare trap and the disincentives to paid work in the formal economy may open the way to unduly focusing the study on the characteristics of the poor and/or the unemployed as a cause of inequality. This is typically the manner in which the Conservatives approach the issue.

A stronger, more progressive approach would look at the full range of micro and macro economic and structural determinants of inequality, such as income redistribution through taxes and transfers, access to and the process of collective bargaining, access to education, health care and other social services, especially mental health services, structural changes to Canada's industrial composition, the government's role in employment transition and regional inequalities.

The suggested study also limits itself to recommendations to improve equality of opportunity. This is not consistent with the rest of the motion. If we are to study income inequality, there should be recommendations regarding the reduction of inequality.

Income inequality is a serious problem with serious consequences, and Canadians want us to take action.

According to the results of a recent EKOS poll, Canadians' primary concern is inequality. Another recent survey shows that 77% of Canadians believe income inequality is a serious problem, and that they are ready to do their part to find a solution.

The occupy movement gave rise to a major public debate in many western nations about income inequality. The OECD stated that governments like Canada's should do more to reduce income inequality because inequality undermines growth and social cohesion.

The OECD's 2011 report also underlined “the need for governments to review their tax systems to ensure that wealthier individuals contribute their fair share of the tax burden.”

One of the fundamental goals of the NDP is a more equal society and even in its present form, the motion is consistent with that goal.

New Democrats have a long history of fighting to reduce inequality and fighting for equality. Unlike the Conservatives, we will not work actively to increase inequality. Unlike the Liberals, we will not say we want to reduce inequality and then do the opposite.

Supporting the motion will be a continuation of our decades of work on income inequality. Canadians can count on New Democrats to work for a prosperous Canada for all.

[Pensions, April 25th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, since Nortel entered bankruptcy in 2009, its workers have seen their pension plans devastated, their disability income lost and their health benefits vanish.

Now, the predatory vulture investors who bought Nortel shares for 12¢ on the dollar are trying to claim the full dollar value with interest, draining funds needed to pay for the benefits of former Nortel employees.

How is this possible? It is because the Conservatives, like the Liberals before them, have refused to amend our bankruptcy laws to protect employees from predatory investors.

This situation is shameful. It is wrong to put these speculators chasing a quick buck ahead of the hard-working Nortel employees who spent a lifetime building the company.

Nortel pensioners want the government to amend the bankruptcy laws and move pensioners and disability recipients to the front of the line.

Is anyone over there listening? Will anyone from the government stand up and do the right thing for Nortel pensioners?

[Pensions, April 24th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, once again we have excuses and evasions, but they still refuse to give us the figures. The minister can dance around the facts all she likes, but Canadians deserve a real answer, Canadians who rely on OAS.

While the government claims this cut is necessary, most experts and economists disagree. Why is the government refusing to back up its claim with real evidence, and why will it not just tell us exactly how much it expects to save by raising the OAS age? It is a pretty simple question.

[Pensions, April 24th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, scandals are unacceptable to the NDP, just as they should be to the Conservatives. Changes to old age security are also unacceptable. Even though the Conservatives never talked about pension reform during the election campaign, they are now proposing to raise the eligibility age to 67. The Minister of Finance says that this will save money, but he does not specify how much.

The question is simple: how much money will they save?

[Ethics, April 5th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, we are not talking about a former minister. We are talking about a minister's former employee.

The minister of dubious ethics set such a low ethical bar that it seems to have had a trickle down effect on his employees. That is what happens when a minister calls every major scandal a learning experience but takes no responsibility.

Using a government credit card to play the slots in Las Vegas on the taxpayers dime is wrong. When will the minister finally take responsibility for his many ethical failures, including this one?

[The Budget, April 4th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, the member's question raises two issues. The first relates to the shipping of raw bitumen out of the country when Albertans are saying that there should be upgraders in Alberta so the bitumen can be processed there.

However, when we talk about exportation of raw bitumen and a pipeline going through some of our most sensitive wilderness areas to tankers and through dangerous and very sensitive coastal waters, against the wishes of the people who live and work in that area and care passionately about the environment, it is unbelievable the government would want to ride roughshod over the wishes of that community.