Tony Martin

[The Budget, February 28th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the member's question. He is in fact someone who cares about these issues. I say to him that my most fervent wish at this time is that we actually get to that study.

The committee has been studying employability, which is an important issue as well, for quite some time. I am hoping that within the next few weeks we will get to study poverty. Then we can look at jurisdictions in the world where there are national poverty strategies that are working, so that we might see in them something that we might bring back and then together put a strategy in place that will serve Canadians well into the future.

[The Budget, February 28th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I do appreciate the comments of the member. In fact, I do want to recognize that he made the effort to visit Sault Ste. Marie to look at some of the industry there which I think presents a wonderful opportunity for not only my community but the country.

While sitting on the human resources committee, I have heard the Conservatives say many times that the best answer, and I think their only answer, to poverty is a job. I think a job is important and it would help a lot of people if they had one, but what does the member have to say to the 650,000 people who have a job, who are working full time year round, but still live in poverty in this country? Studies have been done in some of our biggest cities. The cost of living has risen and the minimum wage has remained stuck and those 650,000 people still find themselves unable to pay the rent and feed their kids.

He talked about the $70 million in the budget that is dedicated to helping our first nations in terms of their struggles and challenges in dealing with poverty. It is a mere pittance, a drop in the bucket, particularly when we look at the amount of money that was talked about around the Kelowna accord.

When we consider the fact that the government has now put $350 million into nuclear development and only has $70 million for our first nations communities, we begin to understand where the priority lies with the Conservatives.

[The Budget, February 28th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I happily share my time today with my colleague, the member for Victoria.

Back on October 17 in front of the Parliament Buildings there was a rally to make poverty history. A number of groups from across the country are fighting diligently every day to try to raise the spectre of this terrible blight on our society. I saw a banner which read, “Poverty is a government policy”, testimony to decades of neglect by consecutive Liberal and Conservative governments making other choices than to make poverty history here in Canada.

Then the next day in the House I said we should make fighting poverty a government policy. We in this caucus believe that we need to make fighting poverty year-round work with action, funding and a real plan.

Here in Ottawa, poverty remains government policy and the official opposition refuses to stand up to this agenda and defeat a budget that in fact abandons the poor.

We have spoken in the House before about budgets being visionary documents, setting out priorities for a country and its people. This budget represents more of a nightmare than a vision for the three million people on low incomes and the many more millions who find themselves squeezed and often but a paycheque or two away from joining either the ranks of the poor on social assistance or the 650,000 working poor in this country who work full time all year, often at two or three jobs, and are unable to make ends meet. Is this not crazy?

How can the government be satisfied that there are people who go to work day after day, week after week, all year long, and find that their pay still does not cover the necessities of life, such as food, clothing and shelter? There is nothing for them in this budget.

When we look at this budget and its poverty measures, we discover that the budget delivers to individuals earning $15,000 per year an expected mere $215 in reduced taxes in 2008-09 and those earning $150,000 will pay $3,265 less in taxes.

We hear the government members speak to the budget and their only initiative to respond to any of the challenges that we face as a country is reduced taxes. That is what it does for the less well off, the marginalized and the at-risk in this country.

There is no recognition in this budget of a national poverty reduction strategy. There are no measures to significantly reduce poverty in Canada. There is no strategy. There are no targets. There is no investment in affordable housing or child care. There is no expansion of the working income tax benefit, which does not even help those working full time at minimum wage the way it is right now. There is no expansion of the national child tax benefit. There is no concrete assistance to our first nations communities where poverty is particularly rampant.

Listen to the commentary from those working to make poverty history in our country.

KAIROS: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives said, “The 2008 federal budget provides help to those who don't really need it and little help to those who do”.

Robert Arnold, president of the National Anti-Poverty Organization, NAPO, stated:

As in 2007, the word 'poverty' in the Canadian context is mentioned once in the budget. Contrast that with dozens and dozens of references to 'tax burden' and 'tax relief'. It is as if the Harper Conservatives believe that poverty is non-existent in this country. They would appear to care more about padding the fortunes of the wealthy than offering immediate and lasting support to the poor.

From Campaign 2000, the national coalition of over 120 partners working to end child and family poverty in Canada, we heard:

The federal budget passed up the chance to offer the almost 800,000 children living in poverty in Canada a shot at a better life.

Ann Decter, national coordinator of Campaign 2000, said:

It's another missed opportunity. There are provinces on the move on poverty reduction. They'll be much more successful when our federal government also steps up to the plate with a comprehensive Poverty Reduction Strategy. The time was right for a bold move.

The Canadian Housing and Renewal Association said that the budget leaves one and a half million Canadians in a housing crisis:

When [the finance minister] stood to deliver the Conservative Government's 2008 budget today he left 1.5 million Canadians in desperate housing need on the outside looking in. These are the families living in housing they can't afford, isn't safe, isn't healthy and is bursting at the seams due to overcrowding. The budget also ignored the desperate plight of 200,000 people experiencing homelessness.

And this is one of the harshest winters in a long, long time. Doug Currie, Prince Edward Island's social services and seniors minister, said:

Finance Minister...budget offers little to Prince Edward Island in terms of funding to support affordable housing, catastrophic drug programs and poverty reduction.

It is not just members of Parliament in this party who are saying this, and as important as they are, the organizations working valiantly to reduce and eliminate poverty, but Canadians from coast to coast to coast are saying this as well.

As an MPP in the Ontario legislature, I remember the days of the so-called common sense revolution and its architects, including the current finance minister and Premier Harris. Anyone disagreeing with their narrow ideology was dismissed as a “special interest”. Well, that puts 93% of Canadians at odds with the minister and his budget with respect to poverty reduction.

A Globe and Mail/CTV poll asked: How important is it that the federal budget help the poorest Canadians? Fifty-eight per cent of the respondents said it was very important; 35% said it was somewhat important; only 4% said it was not too important; and 2% said it was not at all important. Some 93% of Canadians said it was very important or somewhat important to help our poorest citizens.

I want to recognize that there were but a few good measures in the budget, crumbs unfortunately, when it comes to the challenges facing our country vis-à-vis social inclusion. There is $110 million for mental health demonstration projects and an exemption to allow seniors who collect the guaranteed income supplement to retain more of their earnings if they are in the workforce.

The NDP has called for a comprehensive national poverty reduction strategy including raising the national child benefit to $5,000 a year; investing $1.2 billion in not for profit child care; building 200,000 units of affordable housing over 10 years; increasing the federal minimum wage to $10 an hour; boosting the working income tax benefit to $2,400 a year; fixing the employment insurance system so the unemployed get the support they need.

While we present this very comprehensive national strategy, the Liberals today are walking around the House with their fingers in the air trying to figure out which way the wind is blowing. They say that poverty reduction is a priority for their party. They even had a photo op in front of the Parliament buildings at the rally to make poverty history last October, but when they are challenged to stand up and oppose this budget, the leader indicates there is nothing in this budget worth defeating the government on.

I challenge him and the official opposition to tell the three million Canadians on low income, the 93% of Canadians who want help for the poorest Canadians, to stop the Conservative ideology. Liberal politics are failing the poor and a poverty reduction strategy.

We in the NDP caucus are going to stand up and vote against not only this budget, but the whole strategy and agenda of the government, particularly where it affects those who are most at risk and marginalized in this country.

[Health, February 26th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, the Sault Area Hospital emergency doctors group has given notice that they will withdraw their services April 1. They are no longer willing to accept substandard care for their patients. In addition, thousands of orphaned patients will have no access to primary care. This crisis is not unique to Sault Ste. Marie and Algoma.

Will the Minister of Health respect the integrity of the Canada Health Act by engaging with the Ontario minister of health, health care officials and doctors in my community to resolve this crisis?

[Community Development Trust, February 15th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians' confidence in the economy and the Conservative government is heading south.

We on this side helped convince the government to immediately fund the communities that are hurting in the forestry and manufacturing sectors. The government finally agreed. It did not have to wait for the budget.

When will the communities in northern Ontario see this money? They want to know what process to follow. What is the holdup?

[Health Care, February 15th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, public health care is in crisis. There is a shortage of staff and beds, and millions of Canadians are without doctors.

In Sault Ste. Marie, 12 emergency physicians have warned they will withdraw their services as of April 1, citing unsafe patient conditions and too few doctors. The hospital CEO calls it the worst situation he has seen. This is happening coast to coast to coast.

Our party has campaigned for long term care and home care programs to help alleviate this hospital crisis. We have called for innovative solutions: a health care training fund to add 16,000 practitioners as quickly as possible; a national tracking and assessment authority; multidisciplinary teams, including nurse practitioners; retaining health care professionals; accommodating foreign trained workers; and helping students with financial relief.

Let us stop giving big business the corporate tax breaks that do not help Canadians and let us spend the money on health care.

[Questions on the Order Paper, February 14th, 2008]

What funds, grants, loans and loan guarantees has the government issued in the constituency of Sault Ste. Marie from February 6, 2006 up to today for all departments and agencies that have electronic capacity to search for and sort financial information?

[Petitions, February 13th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I am presenting a petition similar to my colleague from Winnipeg on the security and prosperity partnership talks among the United States of America, Mexico and Canada.

The petitioners are particularly concerned about its impact on our ability to protect our water. We know that south of the border, folks are getting thirsty. It worries us that they are eyeing our resource and our stewardship of that. If this is on the table at the security and prosperity partnership discussion, then we want to know more about it. We want it to be more open and public, to have debate in the House and to have it approved by the Canadian people, not just a group of well placed minions behind closed doors.

The petition is signed by 150 people from across the country.

[Questions Passed as Orders for Returns, February 8th, 2008]

With respect to Old Age Security, what are the government's policies and procedures concerning the case of a person born in Canada with no government records available to support the birth, in terms of recognizing that birth to approve pension payments and the recognition of residency for a person who was born in Canada and has lived in Canada their entire life but there are no records available?

[Committees of the House, February 5th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, it goes back to the Conservatives' very ideological stance where business and industry are concerned, which is to let the market decide. If we had decided that was the way to go back in the early 1990s, there would be no Algoma Steel to be bought up by Essar Global and to be looking at further investments in our community and contributing to the economy of northern Ontario. There would be no Spruce Falls in Kapuskasing putting out paper any more.

As a matter of fact, I remember at that time the then leader of the official opposition in Ontario, Mr. Harris, who went on to be the premier of Ontario, saying to let the steel industry go, that it was a buggy whip industry. All of us who lived in Sault Ste. Marie and who lived in northern Ontario knew that those industries were still viable, that people were still out there buying steel and making things out of steel and steel needed to be made somewhere, so why not in our communities? Why not northern Ontario when it comes to manufacturing? Why not the Niagara Peninsula? Why not make things in Hamilton and Welland that we can sell in our domestic market and the world market? An example would be the wonderful job the workers in Windsor do in making cars. They have invested so much time and energy in training and getting the knowledge they need to be the best at what they do.

Here is a government today that has thrown up its arms and said that the market will decide. If the market is to decide on so many of those fronts, as it is, and government does not come to the table and give some leadership, if it does not provide some resources and enter into sectoral strategies, we will be the drawers of water and the hewers of wood as is so often spoken of in those books written about Canadians by people who know nothing about us.