Madam Speaker, as I rise to speak today, I think I owe the House a little bit of an explanation because as I speak members will hear my voice tremble and see my hands shake. The reason is simple. It is not that I am frightened; I am damn angry. I am angry at what is hidden in this document that is hurting the workers, the families and the seniors in my community.
In light of the times, we had a chance with this bill for a dawning of a new age. We could have joined with what is happening south of the border. Clearly, there is a new day dawning in that country. It is not without some turmoil, following two right-wing Republican governments, but times are changing. The U.S. federal government, with the lead of the new Obama administration, is very clearly with its people.
That is a role our federal government should play. It should be with the Canadian people. Day to day it should show the Canadian people where government belongs in their lives. Instead, it is trying to withdraw government from their lives. Times of turmoil such as these are the most important time for government intervention in our economy. Here in Canada our government could have chosen to join that progressive view that is coming out of Washington and out of the U.S.
The government could have had provisions which aided municipalities by addressing the huge $122 billion infrastructure deficit. The government could have recognized the need to lift municipalities in a time of crisis by paying, along with the provinces, for measures to address the significant infrastructure problems. Clearly, many municipalities simply cannot afford the one-third upfront cost of sharing in these projects.
In addition to truly missing a huge opportunity for real national leadership, Canadians once again were hit by backdoor politics. During a time of crisis, the Conservatives have moved to advance their ideology by inserting into the bill provisions that are detrimental to our environment, to women and even to students in universities.
Bill C-10, if we listened to the rhetoric, was supposed to be about stimulus. Why are there so many non-monetary provisions in this document? Why in the world are there no significant measures for seniors, the people who built our country, who are the very backbone of Canada?
I want to tell a story, which I have told before in the House but it is worthy of repeating. About two months ago, maybe three now, a man in his mid-seventies came into my office with tears in his eyes, talking about a letter he received from the government announcing a stupendous increase to his pension: 42¢ a month. That says so much about how the government and previous governments have looked at seniors as an invisible group in our country.
Today I met briefly with the National Pensioners and Senior Citizens Federation. Its members had a brief they were trying to present to the government. Where was the government when it was asked to protect seniors from poverty? These seniors cannot even get a hearing from the minister. They have a brief that outlines measures they believe from their experience would protect seniors. For instance, when a senior's husband or wife passes away, if they have no other means but OAS and CPP, why are we condemning them to poverty? Why are we doing this as a country? There must be other ways to ensure dignity for seniors in their final years. There is no time that it is acceptable in Canada for one single senior to sleep on the streets of our country.
The government can give away $60 billion in tax breaks to profitable corporations, and I stress the word “profitable”. It is not even helping the companies that are in trouble. It is giving it to the profitable corporations. By doing so it is taking billions of dollars out of the fiscal capacity of our country, money that could have gone to help our seniors and the unemployed.
It cannot even set aside a $1 billion out of that $60 billion for the seniors of our country, and I will tell the House why. The seniors of Canada are an invisible population. They are certainly invisible to the Conservatives. They are not flashy, like the friends of the Cadillac Conservatives that we see around here, but I guarantee that members will be hearing more from seniors and they will be hearing more from me as the seniors critic for the NDP.
If the House wants to hear just how removed from working people and seniors these Conservatives are just listen to the remarks of the Minister of Human Resources when she said on January 30:
We do not want to make it lucrative for them to stay home and get paid for it, not when we still have significant skill shortages in many parts of the country.
In Hamilton, this so outraged the Hamilton District Labour Council that it put out a media release calling for the minister to resign and I support that recommendation. In Hamilton, 8,000 of my friends and neighbours lost their jobs in one month alone, January, with another 17,000 last year. Households across Hamilton are reeling as our industrial sector gets hammered again and again.
Seniors on retirement incomes in Hamilton East—Stoney Creek are watching and have watched their savings disappear. They are questioning what is going to be done to protect their pensions. To show the grossness of some of the taxation policies of this country, a man came to my office who took the responsibility to bury his cousin who was single. He took that responsibility and paid for the funeral. He was not a man of means. Imagine his shock when he found that the measly death benefit from CPP was taxable. He had taken that responsibility and he had to now pay tax on it.
On the environment file the Conservatives' ideology once again rears its nasty head. They have amended Bill C-10 which, in their words, will streamline the Navigable Waters Protection Act. This should alarm anyone who is used to Conservative spin. This is code for removing many environmental safeguards at a time when Canadians want their government to move to protect the environment, not be part of its devastation.
This ideological war continues with further attacks on women's rights which follow the pattern set when they discontinued funding for the Status of Women in the last session. Now it is pay equity that is under attack.
Clearly, the budget fails students. It fails seniors. It fails the workers of Canada and that is why I will not be supporting the budget. I will do everything in my power to ensure that those people who are left behind learn about the disgraceful measures contained in the budget.
At this point my frustration level is getting to the point where I am starting to lose my place, but that never means for a minute that I will lose my passion for the workers of Hamilton, for the citizens of Hamilton, and the people who have been sold out by the government and its new partners, the Liberals.
