Bill C-48 (Historical)

An Act to authorize the Minister of Finance to make certain payments

This enactment authorizes the Minister of Finance to make certain payments out of the annual surplus in excess of $2 billion in respect of the fiscal years 2005-2006 and 2006-2007 for the purposes and in the aggregate amount specified. This enactment also provides that, for its purposes, the Governor in Council may authorize a minister to undertake a specified measure.

Extended Sitting Period

[Leon Benoit, Conservative, Vegreville—Wainwright, AB]

Mr. Speaker, everyday I see the government stooping to new lows. Today we see threats against members of the House of time allocation and using closure to prevent appropriate debate. It goes on and on and it is getting worse, quite frankly.

The member is talking about Bill C-48, which was so unimportant to the government that none of it was put in the original Liberal budget bill. We are talking about the NDP-Liberal budget bill. Now the Liberals have to ram it through somehow. Besides that, the budget implementation bill for last year was only passed in the House a couple of weeks ago.

As my hon. colleague has already pointed out, none of the spending in the bill would take place immediately. It would be at least a year from now before the Liberals could calculate the level of surplus, overtaxation and increase in tax and spending that the government has gone through in the past few years which makes it difficult for my children and the children of people across the country to make their mortgage payments and pay off their students loans.

The Liberals keep taxing and spending more and more and now they want to spend this extra $4.5 billion that would be added on to their insane increases in spending in Bill C-43. The member should reconsider what he is trying to do. He should in fact back off on this. I am sure that is exactly what the House leader will do.

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the motion is worded in such a way that if the House does sit an extended period of time, there would be an opportunity for the House to start back at a later date to compensate for the fact that we sat during this period of time. It is up to 95 days. It is the way the motion reads. It is quite fair to members of Parliament who might be in this place for an extended period of time during the summer, and that opportunity to do so is in the motion if the House passes it.

The purpose of the motion is to extend the sitting to deal with urgent matters with respect to the legislation before us. Once the House is adjourned, it allows for members of Parliament to go to their ridings to meet with constituents or go to different parts of the country to meet with Canadians.

I would think the opposition members would probably go around the country and talk about the fact that Bill C-48 itself should not have been supported. They are welcome to go to different cities to speak to different mayors and tell them how the money for transit should not go them, or the money for the new deal with respect to the gas tax should not flow to municipalities.

I am trying to provide ample opportunity for members opposite, once the House adjourns, to meet with their constituents and to travel the country so they can convey their message. I am sure they will find that the majority of the people whom they meet will disagree with their message.

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Hamilton East—Stoney Creek, ON]

Mr. Speaker, with respect to the hon. member's questions, I would only draw his attention to premiers and mayors across the country. They have all indicated the need to ensure that the legislation passes immediately to ensure their planning process is at play and to ensure they are able to plan effectively, knowing full well that the federal legislation has passed the House and they can continue.

I also would draw attention, for instance, to the Premier of Quebec who talked about the more than $1 billion of funding that would go to Quebec and how there is a need to pass the legislation.

While the hon. member might have disagreement with this legislation, he is perfectly able to put forward his argument. In fact, I would argue that the opposition has done that at report stage with numerous speakers. I do not know the actual number, but I think close to 70 or 80 of the members got up and spoke to report stage. I may be incorrect, but there were certainly a lot of members on the opposite side who put forward their positions, offered amendments and we dealt with report stage. Now at third reading, I am sure more speakers will get up.

The point is that the bill itself is in the public interest and that is a consideration we should all have with respect to what other levels of government are doing.

Bill C-48 needs to pass the House. It is one of the reasons for extending this sitting. If the hon. member, on reflection, would look at what is in Bill C-48 and look at the impact it has across the country, he would support the motion to extend the sitting.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have a number of questions for the House leader. He indicated to you, Mr. Speaker, that this is a matter of great national interest and great urgency.

The fact of the matter is that Bill C-48 and the provisions thereof contain, to my knowledge, nothing that will be done within the next year. All of these expenditures are subject to there being a surplus of at least $2 billion at the end of the fiscal year 2006. The urgency of this is just simply not there.

How can the House leader claim this urgency when clearly we will have more than enough time in the continuation of Parliament in the fall to debate this, to vote on it and hopefully to hear from more Canadians who are very interested in ensuring that the economy of the country stays strong and that the democratic process in this country is preserved, namely that budget speeches are not changed on the fly after they are made, destroying a long time tradition in the House?

With respect to Bill C-38, I venture again to say that this is an abuse of democracy and is one in which we ought not to be engaging. We have had literally thousands and I would suggest probably even close to a million names on petitions on this particular issue.

For the government to use an extension of a session to go in violation of what the clear majority of Canadians want in this matter and an issue which, in the words of the Deputy Prime Minister, can be solved without changing the definition of marriage, all of this can be done in a timely and normal fashion when we return in the fall session.

Calling this an emergency to extend the session is just so specious it is almost unbelievable. I would like the House leader to try to justify his move on this particular issue.

[Tony Valeri, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

moved:

That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice, when the House adjourns on June 23, 2005, it shall stand adjourned until June 27, 2005; at any time on or after June 27, 2005, a Minister of the Crown may propose, without notice, a motion that, upon adjournment on the day on which the said motion is proposed, the House shall stand adjourned to a specified date not more than 95 days later; the said motion immediately shall be deemed to have been adopted, provided that, during the adjournment, for the purposes of any Standing Order, the House shall be deemed to stand adjourned pursuant to Standing Order 28; commencing June 27, 2005 and concluding on the day on which a motion that the House stand adjourned pursuant to this Order is adopted, the ordinary hour of daily adjournment on Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays shall be 12:00 midnight.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to speak to Government Business No. 17 respecting the extension of the sitting of the House. Members are aware that the House is scheduled to adjourn on June 23.

Mr. Speaker, I would draw your attention to Marleau and Montpetit on page 347, which states:

There are times when the House may wish to temporarily set an adjournment time earlier or later than the time prescribed in the Standing Orders.

The process for a motion to extend the sitting was set out in a June 13, 1988 ruling by the Speaker.

First, the Speaker ruled that it was acceptable for the government to place such a motion under government notices of motions. This is because the Standing Orders themselves do not define what is to be in a motion from the government, nor do they limit the government's ability to place such a motion under government notices of motion.

Second, the Speaker then ruled that the government could initiate a motion to suspend the sitting provisions of the Standing Orders, and the Speaker noted that precedents and procedural authorities enabled the government to put forward a motion to suspend the sitting provisions rules.

Third, the Speaker ruled that such a motion can be adopted by a majority decision of the House. The Speaker stated that “there is no doubt that the House can amend or suspend its rules by unanimous consent and the House can also do so by a simple majority decision”.

Fourth, the Speaker then reminded the House that parliamentary reforms had not changed the practice of the House and had not rendered prior precedents inapplicable.

Therefore I would submit that the motion in Government Business No. 17 is consistent with the Speaker's June 13, 1988 ruling. It is also consistent with a motion to extend the sitting of the House which was adopted following the Speaker's ruling.

The purpose of the motion that is before us is quite simple. Urgent legislation that is before the House is being obstructed. I point to Bill C-48, the budget companion bill, that would provide for $4.5 billion in urgent funding for the environment, including public transit and an energy retrofit program for low income housing, training and post-secondary education to benefit, among others, aboriginal Canadians. Also in that bill are moneys for affordable housing, including housing for aboriginal Canadians, and foreign aid.

Yesterday the premier of Quebec asked the Bloc to support the legislation which would give more than $1 billion to Quebec. The government agrees with Premier Charest that the bill is clearly in the interests of Quebecers and, indeed, in the interests of all Canadians, and needs to be passed. I would urge the Bloc members to support the interests of Quebec and to respect the request of the premier of Quebec and support the passage of Bill C-48.

In order to ensure that we have an opportunity to pass Bill C-48, we also need to consider what the official opposition is now doing. The leader of the official opposition is blocking passage of legislation that would benefit Canadian workers, students, the environment and foreign aid. Bill C-48 maintains the principles of the government's budgetary policy. It includes balanced budgets and expenditures in priority areas, and yet we have the example of the official opposition moving concurrence motions or other dilatory tactics for the simple purpose of looking to run out the clock until the scheduled adjournment of the House on June 23.

The opposition is also preventing the House from dealing with Bill C-38. The government is prepared to support an amendment to the bill at report stage that would provide greater certainty for religious institutions under the Income Tax Act. The amendment itself would be beyond the scope of the bill and it would require unanimous consent of the House. However I would hope that members across the way would give the House the opportunity to hear that amendment and that all members would wish to support such an initiative.

The government recognizes that the purpose of debate in the House is to help people make up their minds on issues. All members have clearly made up their minds on Bill C-38 so debate itself should not be used to delay Parliament from deciding.

If we were to look back to the work done by the justice committee, although I know hon. members across the way and others would disagree, but the justice committee had detailed cross country hearings on civil marriage in 2002 and 2003. We have had extensive debate in the House on Bill C-38 at second reading. I indicated to my hon. colleague, the opposition House leader and other House leaders, that every member who wanted to speak to Bill C-38 should be allowed and will be given the opportunity to speak at second reading. I think that has happened. In committee we have heard from all sides on the bill.

I want to draw to the attention of members that an editorial in today's Globe and Mail stated:

There is nothing materially useful to add. It's time for Parliament to vote on the bill, and for all parties to let the Commons have its say.

The government agrees with that and I think it is important that parliamentarians deal with this issue. Canadians elected members to the House to work in the interest of Canadians. It is not time to adjourn. It is time to look at how we can better serve the interests of Canadians. We should continue to sit until we pass Bill C-48 and work toward passing Bill C-38, which is why the government put forward the motion to extend the sitting.

I have indicated publicly that I am giving the opposition the opportunity to show that Parliament can work. If the members obstruct the motion, I certainly think that closure is always a possibility, as provided under the Standing Orders, but I certainly hope that will not be necessary and that all members would take the opportunity to support the motion so that we can continue the work in the House and continue to serve the interests of Canadians.

Transfer payments

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, we all want to make it possible for all governments to deliver adequate services to all of their citizens.

I would note on the review of equalization that Dr. Lacroix from the University of Montreal is one of the country's leading experts on this matter. He is in fact on the commission that is examining this very matter. I understand that he was even the hon. gentleman's personal professor.

I would also point out once again that to help this situation just a little bit, Premier Charest of Quebec has urged the Bloc Québécois to pass Bill C-48.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, provincial revenues exceed federal revenues. Federal debt exceeds provincial debt. Federal transfers to the provinces are going up by $100 billion over the next 10 years. The hon. gentleman could help just a little bit by passing Bill C-48.

An Act to Authorize the Minister of Finance to Make Certain Payments

[Bev Desjarlais, NDP, Churchill, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I want to indicate to my colleague from Churchill River that I do not think there is anything more unconscionable than to hear in this House that any member of this House or any party would risk someone's life and play politics using someone's life. That was proven when an offer was made to pair, and that member should be ashamed that he would continue to do that.

I do not believe that any member in this House would do that and it is unacceptable. It is unacceptable to continue that kind of an indication to Canadians. It says very little for the humanity of each and every parliamentarian.

Let us put that one to rest right now. No one is going to allow that to happen. We might have partisan differences, but no one should risk someone's life for that, and to have it come about again in this House is not something that I am going to tolerate or sit and listen to and not address.

My colleague from across the way says there was nothing in that budget for Saskatchewan and nothing for his riding. What about affordable housing? I know the communities in his riding. I know there is a need for affordable housing. Why would the Conservatives not support Bill C-48 that has additional dollars? We have specifics for aboriginal housing, for areas with the greatest need. Why he would not support that is beyond me.

Are the Conservatives suggesting that somehow farmers and rural people in small and medium businesses will not benefit from the additional dollars for education for their families? The affordable housing dollars will mean construction in the communities throughout the country and everybody will benefit. It is unconscionable that the Conservatives would not support that, but they supported tax cuts for corporations. That is unconscionable.

[Jeremy Harrison, Conservative, Churchill River, SK]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today on behalf of my constituents of Desnethé—Missinippi—Churchill River in northern Saskatchewan to talk about Bill C-48, the Liberal-NDP budget bill.

This is a bill that was cooked up in a Toronto hotel room late at night by a desperate Prime Minister, an unprincipled leader of the NDP, and Buzz Hargrove. We have seen the result, which is a document of approximately two pages and which I have in my hand. It has three sections to it, two of which are legalese, along with one that is about a quarter of a page long and purports to appropriate $4.6 billion of taxpayers' dollars.

That is $4.6 billion in a quarter of a page, with no accountability, no idea as to how this is going to be distributed and no plan. It is $4.6 billion thrown into a slush fund. We have seen examples of this type of Liberal spending prior to this and it has not resulted in a positive outcome, whether that be the gun registry, the sponsorship scandal or the HRDC boondoggle. We could run down the list.

As I have said, it is a four page bill, two pages of which are actually blank. Will these be filled in later? What is the story with this? Is this where the hidden agenda of the Liberals and the NDP is going to be written into this unholy agreement they came up with?

I firmly believe that this sleazy backroom deal is bad for Canada and bad for Saskatchewan. It is bad for Canada in the sense that the corrupt and criminal Liberal Party has managed to cling to power for at least another few months to squander taxpayers' dollars and fleece Canadians from one end of the country to the other.

This is a bad deal for my home province of Saskatchewan. If the members of the NDP were truly serious about caring about Saskatchewan, this would have been different. We know, however, that the federal NDP does not care at all for Saskatchewan and particularly northern Saskatchewan, because there is nothing in this agreement for agriculture.

We are facing a crisis in agriculture right across the country. Producers in my riding and across Saskatchewan have been incredibly hard hit by frost, weather conditions and BSE. The farmers have been hit very hard and this deal does absolutely nothing for agricultural producers.

Why is that? If we go down the list of priorities that the NDP claims to care about, we will not see one dollar for agriculture in this $4.6 billion agreement. That is an indication of where the New Democrats' priorities lie. Their priorities do not lie with agricultural producers in this country.

I will also tell this House about another place where there is no money: in the deal with the equalization formula. We all know that Saskatchewan is treated more unfairly than probably any other province in the country. Non-renewable natural resources are included in the formula for Saskatchewan. They were recently taken out for Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia, in the Atlantic accord, an agreement which I fully support and fully agree with. Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia are now entitled to keep their offshore oil and gas revenue to use for the good of the people of those provinces.

Saskatchewan has not received that same deal. Saskatchewan is being treated unfairly. Every elected politician in my home province except one, who happens to be the finance minister of this country, agrees that the province of Saskatchewan is not being treated fairly.

Under the Conservative proposal, which would remove non-renewable natural resources from the formula, my home province would receive approximately a billion dollars more a year in equalization payments. That would make an incredibly huge difference for people in my province.

There has not been a word about that in this backroom deal cooked up by Buzz Hargrove, the member for Toronto—Danforth and the Prime Minister. There is not one word about any of this.

I want to quote a columnist named Andrew Coyne, who put together a piece the day before the May 19 confidence vote. It is very reflective of the point of view of many individuals from Saskatchewan and from my riding. He wrote:

I had thought the feeling of nausea that washed over me at the news was one of disgust. I now realize it was vertigo. The bottom has fallen out of Canadian politics. There are, quite literally, no rules anymore, no boundaries, no limits. We are staring into an abyss where everything is permissible.

Those exquisites in the press gallery who were so scandalized at the suggestion that the Liberals would stoop to scheduling the budget vote around Darrel Stinson's cancer surgery might now have the decency to admit: of course they would. It should be clear to everyone by now that this government--this prime minister--will go to any length to assure their survival in power. And I do mean any. All governments are loath to leave, all think themselves indispensable, but I cannot recall another that clung to office so desperately, so...hysterically.

The loss of a confidence vote is no longer to be taken as a fundamental loss of democratic legitimacy, but rather as a signal to spend more, threaten louder and otherwise trawl for votes on the opposition benches, for as long as proves necessary.

Indeed, it is an open question whether the Liberals would have even held the budget vote if they hadn't made this deal, or whether they would have promised one if it were not already in the works.

Impossible? Outrageous? But outrage depends upon a sense of where the boundary lines are, and a willingness to call people out when they cross them. The Liberals have been crossing these lines, one after another, for years, and their own conspicuous lack of shame has simply educated the rest of us into shrugging complicity. It's only outrageous until it happens--then we forget we have ever felt otherwise.

For example: Last Wednesday, The Globe and Mail published a stinging editorial calling upon the Liberals to seek an “immediate” vote of confidence, to call an election “now” or to put its budget bill to a “quick” vote.

“With each moment they linger,” the Globe wrote, “they will expose themselves as so desperate to hang on to power that they spit in the face of the Commons and call it respect.”

By Friday, the Liberals were still there, the government had been defeated two more times, the budget vote had not been held--and the Globe wondered what all the commotion was about. “To say the government has lost all legitimacy,” it lectured the opposition, “is a wildly disproportionate response”. Poof: all that outrage, down the memory hole. In two days.

Is it a constitutional crisis if no one understands it is?

A government without the support of a majority of Parliament has spent billions it has no legal authority to spend and dangled offices that are not in its power to bestow, in hopes of recovering that majority.

This is the type of government that the NDP is maintaining in office. It is a government corrupt to the absolute core, a government that cares for nothing except exercising power. It is a government that will lie, cheat and steal, and has, to maintain its hold on power. In short, it is a government that has lost the moral authority to govern our country. The NDP members should be ashamed of themselves.

Here is another issue. Today is national aboriginal day, as members know. I attended a service on behalf of aboriginal veterans from one end of the country to the other, a memorial service to commemorate the contributions of aboriginal war veterans who served in the first world war, the second world war, Korea and peacekeeping missions up to the present day.

This issue is incredibly important to me personally and to constituents in my riding. In my first act as an MP, I put forward a private member's motion that called on the government and the House of Commons to recognize the historical inequality of treatment that aboriginal veterans received when they returned from overseas conflicts. Unfortunately, all but two Liberal members voted against recognizing aboriginal war veterans. There was no reason for them to be voting against that.

Nothing in this deal recognizes the contributions of aboriginal war veterans. Nothing in this deal does anything to live up to Motion No. 193. The government and the NDP should be ashamed of themselves.

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to raise a question. I want to commend the parliamentary secretary who has just spoken and the member for Vancouver Centre who spoke previously for addressing the substance of Bill C-48.

I want to commend them for actually talking about affordable housing, access to education, public transit and the down payment on beginning to meet our international obligations for international aid, as opposed to being completely unconnected with both the bill itself and reality in that kind of stream of right wing reactionary verbiage from the other side.

I have a very specific question for the member, who is a medical doctor and has a lot of concern about what has happened to people's lives in the last 15 years. I think he would acknowledge the fact that there have been casualties in our society as a result of the massive unilateral cuts made to health, education and social welfare in particular.

I have a very particular question. Would the parliamentary secretary agree that with the elimination of the Canada assistance plan we have wiped out any notion of entitlement to the basic necessities in life and the concept that no one in our society should go hungry or homeless?

There is a strong, compelling argument to be made for re-establishing a legal framework consistent with our international obligations to the covenant on social, economic and cultural rights, consistent with the previous existence of the Canada assistance plan framework.

Would the parliamentary secretary agree that one of the things we need to do is re-establish the notion that people should not just be at the mercy of charitable responses, but that actually there should be some legal protection which would build a floor to enable people not to fall through and literally--

[Hedy Fry, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I have to smile when I hear hon. members opposite from the Conservative Party telling us about deficits and fiscal prudence. There is absolutely no way the Conservatives can teach us anything about budgets.

When we came into office in 1993 we were left with a $43 billion deficit by the Conservative government. We were left with an enormous debt that had a huge percentage of foreign debt in it. We did the things that were necessary so that we can now post our ninth balanced budget. We have been paying down the debt every single year.

The Conservatives keep talking about the fact that we have surpluses. I do not know if anyone in the House recalls over the last two years SARS, the fires in British Columbia or the floods in Saguenay. We had to have money to help with all of those unexpected disasters without going back into a deficit. That is called fiscal prudence. Fiscal prudence is having money available to take care of the unexpected things that come up. This government has not been talking about fiscal prudence, it has in fact been doing that.

We are proud to stand here and talk about the fact that this country is one of the best performers in the G-8 under the watch of our government. How could those members talk about fiscal prudence and then have the gall to suggest that we are in bed with the NDP to move some agenda items forward that have always been our priorities.

We hear talk about the great public and how we must listen to the public. We listen to the public. It elected a minority government because in its wisdom it believed hon. members in this House could behave as adults and work together for the common good. That is exactly what the two parties on this side of the House are doing. We have come together and talked about things that will keep the government moving along and doing things in the best interests of the public good. We on this side of the House are behaving like adults. We are trying to do the things that the public elected us to do. Instead. we see game playing going on.

Before the finance minister had even finished speaking about the budget, the hon. Leader of the Opposition stated that there was no way his party would be able to speak against it. He said that his party would never be able to bring the government down on the budget because it was a good budget.

Around the middle of April things changed. All of a sudden, the actual greed, if I may use that word, and the actual grasping nature of that party came forward. It decided to go after the government and bring the government down. The Conservatives decided not to do what the people elected us to do, which was to form a minority government in which we could work together. Instead, the games began.

Here they are now speaking to us about fiscal prudence and being very concerned about a surplus. I am surprised those people on the other side of the House know what a surplus is.

Let us look at the history of Conservative governments. I do not think the Conservatives know what a surplus is because they have never seen it before. When they do see one they do not know what to do with it. They must be upset with it because they keep going on about it.

It is the surplus that allows us to deal with unforeseen circumstances, such as those we have had to deal with over the last few years. A surplus allows us to take care of the things that nature and other circumstances foist on us while still maintaining a balanced budget and not go into deficit.

Let us talk about the Conservatives being against affordable housing. I heard a member speak not too long ago about the fact that people would rather have money in their pocket.

Somebody talked about violin lessons. There are a lot of people in my riding who would love to have violin lessons, but they cannot even afford to pay their rent, never mind violin lessons.

Let us talk about the reality of affordable housing. Housing is a basic necessity. Affordable housing is a fundamental tool by which people can afford to live, not lives of wondrous wealth, but just ordinary lives, keeping their heads above water, shelter, food, clothing. That is what affordable housing is all about.

This is not something that our government suddenly decided to adopt out of the blue. This builds on an affordable housing platform that we have had. We worked with the NDP to move this agenda forward faster. We have talked about affordable housing. We have spent over $2 billion on homelessness. Since we have become government we have spent over $2 billion on various types of housing. We are working on co-op housing, ensuring that it keeps going on and that there is new stock of co-op housing. We are fast forwarding it a little. We can afford to do that. That is what fiscal prudence did. It gave us the money in the kitty so that we can do this kind of thing without going into a deficit. This is not something new. We are doing the right thing for Canadians.

Regarding post-secondary education, if we are going to be competitive we need to understand that it is a skilled workforce that is going to give us the competitive edge that we need to exist in the 21st century. The generators, the engine of economic growth and development are people, human capital. We need to spend money on assisting our young people in getting the skills, the education and the learning they need to become productive members of society, to be able to earn good living wages and to make Canada competitive with the rest of the world.

We depend on trade for so much of our gross domestic product. Therefore, we need to have people who can work and produce. We see that there is a productivity crunch, not just in Canada but in all of the major industrialized nations. We are dealing with that now before it gets too bad. We are trying to move forward and upgrade the skills of the people in Canada, the young people and those whose jobs for various reasons are no longer valid in the new economy.

We are talking about getting a skilled workforce for the 21st century. This is something that we have been doing. We have put money into post-secondary education. We have provided for increased transfers to provinces for post-secondary education. Looking at the Canada social transfer, we have put $5 billion annually into direct support for post-secondary education, among other things. The RESP that this government initiated allows families from the day of a child's birth to put money aside so that when it is time for that child to get post-secondary education, he or she can do it.

This is what we have been doing. We have been investing in people. By putting this budget forward, we are asking for $1.5 billion extra dollars to fast forward this, to do this more quickly. Things are moving rapidly in the world and we need to be competitive and on top of education.

Regarding the environment, I am not surprised that the hon. members across the way do not accept the environment, but I am surprised that the Bloc members do not. They have always been very supportive of Kyoto and other environmental issues. Here are the people who stood up day after day in this House over the 12 years that I have been around here talking about how we need good science, when the rest of the world is moving on and recognizing global warming, recognizing smog and how many people it is killing and how many young people are getting asthma from smog. These people are saying, “Show me the science” as a sort of mantra. They are out of touch with the reality of life.

Proposing $900 million in Bill C-48 to move forward on a clean fund, to help low income families energy retrofit their homes, this is good governing. This is again in keeping with our priorities. As a government we have put in $1 billion over five years for the clean fund to encourage cost effective projects and actions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

We are talking about having worked with another political party in this House to do exactly what the people felt we should do in a minority government, to work together across party lines for their benefit.

I want to know if hon. members across the way will tell me that affordable housing is not for the public benefit and is not important for all the kinds of people, who obviously they do not have in their ridings because they do not even know that people need this. On the environment, the Canadian Medical Association was just talking about the number of children who are getting asthma as a result of smog in this country. On post-secondary education, we want our young people to have the tools they need to create something new for themselves and to make Canada competitive in the next generation.

We are paying off the debt. We have been doing this. After this, we still have $4 billion left to put toward debt reduction. We have been doing this every year. We have been putting $3 billion every year toward debt reduction. We have been trying successfully to undo the damage of the last Conservative government. We have brought this country out of the depths of despair in which people lived. People were losing their homes because of double digit mortgage rates. There was double digit unemployment. People were living in absolute despair because they did not know what they would do themselves.

Regarding leaving a debt, we are raising young people. The Conservatives would like us to leave the debt to young people to pay in the next generation.

I support this bill and I say shame to the members on the other side of the House if they will not.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

Mr. Speaker, in a previous incarnation the finance minister, the current Prime Minister prided himself on his prudent stewardship of the nation's finances.

In 1994 he stood up in this House and indicated that the days of extravagant promises and reckless spending were over, stating,“For years, governments have been promising more than they can deliver, and delivering more than they can afford. This has to end. We are doing it”. That was once upon a time and a long time ago.

The Prime Minister has abandoned the notion of prudent fiscal spending. In its place, as reflected in Bill C-48, he has adopted a reckless spending approach to the budgetary process. Even worse, the Prime Minister decided to cut a truly bizarre backroom deal with the leader of the smallest party in the House for their support, effectively allowing the NDP to dictate the terms of the budget.

To quote the respected national columnist Don Martin:

What we have now is a prime minister who mocked Layton as the leader of a tax-and- spend party that would ring up huge deficits on the national credit card, now calling the NDP's budget a fiscally prudent document which proves Parliament works.

Consider the ramifications of that. For all we do as parliamentarians, for all the debates and all the votes and for all the legislation, nothing affects Canadian families more directly than the way we spend their hard earned money. The way in which government expenditures are allocated speaks to the priorities and values of Canadians.

The Liberal government this past February presented a budget it took great pride in boasting as “Delivering on Commitments”. The introduction of the budget document praised what it described as “a balanced strategy to build a 21st strategy economy that would improve the well-being of all Canadians”. Moreover, it went on to state that a “productive, growing economy creates jobs, boosts incomes and supports investments in the quality of Canadian life”.

The Conservative Party was ready to work with the February budget. While not ideal, it did recognize the need to offset spending increases with some debt repayment and modest tax relief.

However, as the changing winds of political fortune threatened to cut short the Liberal government's rein, the Prime Minister completely ignored his own budget planning and altered it with an NDP budget that according to the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, “squanders the budget surplus and flouts responsible budgeting in favour of irresponsible spending”.

On the most important piece of legislation, one which will speak to the values and priorities of Canadians, the federal government decided to make a dramatic shift and embrace the priorities of the NDP, a party which received a mere 15% of the vote in the last election and the lowest of the three major federal political parties.

This was not a one time occurrence. Canadians have consistently rejected the NDP and its tax and spend philosophy throughout the years. Why have Canadians been so unfailing in their rejection of the NDP? I cannot speak for all Canadians, but many have seen the often disastrous behaviour of New Democrats in provincial governments.

Residents in my home province of Saskatchewan know all too well how an NDP government treats the public treasury. Indeed, an editorial just today in the Saskatoon StarPhoenix was extremely critical of the current NDP administration in Saskatchewan. It stated:

--as a government with no real strategy for the province, whose intent is to do little more than squander every last nickel that rolls into the coffers, and let the tomorrows fend for themselves.

Indeed, as the editorial concludes, “taxpayers are unlikely to see much direct benefit as the government continues on an irresponsible spending spree”.

The similarities between the federal government and Saskatchewan's provincial government are uncanny in this respect. Both have engaged in irresponsible spending sprees with no framework and with no tax relief for the taxpayer.

Every action has a consequence. Reckless spending by the state has a consequence. The Prime Minister used to know that. He spoke not long ago in the House of the trap of uncontrolled spending and how it contributed to, “the vicious circle in which our chronic deficits contributed to economic lethargy, which in turn contributed to even higher deficits, and then to greater malaise”.

That vicious circle of uncontrolled spending and increasing economic downturns has a real and disturbing cost for hard working families and individuals trying to survive.

In Saskatchewan, the years of the NDP provincial rule have taken an immense toll. The province has one of the lowest per capita family income rates for any province, the lowest number of middle aged, high income earners in Canada, a negative personal savings rate for individuals over the past four years and, most distressing, 14 consecutive quarters of out-migration from the province.

I cannot underline the severity of the out-migration problem on the future of Saskatchewan. It is not only how many are leaving but also who.

According to a recently released report from Statistics Canada, the province's two biggest cities, Regina and Saskatoon, topped the list of Canadian cities to suffer from brain drain. Regina lost 7% and Saskatoon 6% of their 2001 university graduates to other Canadian urban centres. Excessive state interference, especially in the form of reckless spending in the economy, stifles everything from innovation to entrepreneurship. More important, it drains jobs, the very jobs that those new graduates were seeking in Saskatchewan in their fruitless searches.

Unfortunately, because the Prime Minister feels it is necessary to alter the budget to suit the NDP, we will likely have an NDP economy. Maybe the Liberals should have asked what that includes or, more correctly, does not before they so eagerly signed on.

The C.D. Howe Institute recently determined that the NDP modifications to this budget would cost the Canadian economy a whopping 340,000 jobs. The corporate tax cuts that the NDP are so adamantly opposed to would have left money in the hands of companies to produce more and better paying jobs for Canadians.

Likewise, according to Dennis Gartman, a well-known investment analyst, Bill C-48 is “the worst possible signal the Prime Minister could send to the capital markets.... Capital that might have come to Canada shall now, at the very best, think twice about coming”.

Bill C-48 flies in the face of the universally recognized principle that to stimulate job growth we need competitive corporate tax rates. To quote Gartman again, he said it is “bad economic policy, plain and simple. It puts the lie to the Liberal claim that creating a competitive economy is a high priority in assuring our collective standards of living”.

Knowing all this about Bill C-48, how can anyone support it? Indeed, does anyone honestly think the Prime Minister, circa 1994 or 1998 as the finance minister, would support this legislation? Most rational people would not endorse spending a few thousand dollars on a home renovation without a detailed blueprint, let alone nearly $5 billion for major government initiatives without an adequate plan.

Will the Liberals, for instance, address the severe reservations the Auditor General expressed about the capacity of certain departments to deliver programs efficiently, the very same departments to which the Liberals want to give more money in Bill C-48? Is there an adequate plan to deal with these concerns? Was that discussed with Buzz Hargrove at the Royal York Hotel too?

It would be an insult to the millions of hard-working Canadians to endorse legislation that not only will cost billions but most likely will not meet its stated objectives. A rational approach would make certain, first, that existing money is spent efficiently and that programs can be sufficiently improved to merit further expenditures. Amazingly, the Liberal-NDP coalition is steadfastly opposed to this approach, voting against amendments in finance committee to make the spending in Bill C-48 more accountable to Canadians and to reflect a more prudent fiscal approach.

I cannot in good conscience support passage of this legislation and neither can most rational people.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate very much the opportunity to speak to Bill C-48 this evening. I have been reflecting on what impressions the Canadian people would have through what they are seeing with respect to this debate, particularly the last interchange and the comments made by the last speaker.

Something should be obvious in regard to the rhetoric that has been used in characterizing the government as corrupt and its record with respect to past budgets as abominable. To all of those informed individuals who are taking stock with respect to the impact on the Canadian public, they should be very honest in terms of recognizing that the members of the Canadian public have said two things.

First, they have said clearly that they want this government to establish clear priorities. Second, they want those priorities articulated through the budget and they want the budget dealt with. They will judge the government on the basis of that record of service through the budget to the Canadian public.

As for the polls, we do not do things solely by polls, but they are one of those instruments used to judge how people feel about what we are doing. It is clear from the polls that people want us to get back to basics with respect to reinforcing the institutions that Canadians have depended on, in particular through social programs and programs aimed at improving the environment.

Let us detach ourselves for a moment and talk to the Canadian people about what their priorities are, but not in terms of a continuous finger-pointing exercise with respect to corruption and so on. If we do this, the Canadian people in their collective wisdom will at some particular time take our record of accomplishment and our defence of those areas where we want to do better and we will be judged in totality.

I think that the fear on the opposition side, if I may say so, is the fear that we in fact will be relating better to the Canadian people than the opposition members will be. That will be based on how clearly we have articulated the needs of the Canadian people.

I find it very difficult to accept that these are not the issues the Canadian people want us to talk about when we talk about affordable housing and the impact of affordable housing as it relates to the homeless issues in the great urban communities across this country, or when we talk about post-secondary education and we have young people coming through here and reminding us. We had a lobby day, with the university students' association reminding us about the ever escalating debt that students are having to amass. When we talk about the concerns of post-secondary students, we are talking about the concerns of their parents in terms of being able to manage the aspirations and hopes that those people have.

Is that not getting back to the basics of what Canadians want to hear us talking to them about?

When we talk about the environment, look at Bill C-48 and see the extra $800 million that has been put into it, as that is relating to the ability of cities to manage their transportation and planning agenda in a more sustainable way, is that not what the Canadian people want to see us addressing through every particular instrument that we can mobilize and deliver upon to match the aspirations of those many hundreds of communities? Those are the issues that Canadians want to see us address.

This not just sleight of hand using a political manipulation. This is talking to the Canadian people. I think the opposition is afraid that we are starting to talk the right language to and the same language as Canadians.

[Rob Merrifield, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague's questions give me an opportunity to actually help him a little. I know that he has been here for some considerable amount of time, but perhaps he has missed some of what actually takes place in this place.

I have only been here since 2000, so I see things from a fresh perspective. Let us look at what happened with this piece of legislation compared to what happened with Bill C-43, which went through all the stages of the process. The committee members travelled and we dialogued with Canadians from coast to coast on Bill C-43 to see if it would address the situation of where to spend the money in this next year. Budgets are very important because they lay that out for Canadians.

This bill, Bill C-48, did not go through that process. It went through an amazing process: a hotel room with three individuals, four hundred words, no accountability, no planning and no deciding on how the money should be spent or what priorities should be set.

That is why this is an abomination. Because it did not go through the proper process, what it did was make a mockery of the budgets of this country. It also made a mockery of this place, because it was about buying votes. It was not about the Canadian people. As for anyone who gets up on the other side and says this is about the Canadian people, I will tell them that it is not. The money was spent there, but it was not for them. It was actually for buying favour to be able to keep a government illegitimately in power. That absolutely has to stop. It has to be addressed.

Who is going to address it? There is only one group that is powerful enough to address it. That is the Canadian public. Members of the Canadian public see what is going on. They understand exactly what went on here and they will address it at an appropriate time. In the next election, I look forward to explaining that to the people of Canada. The people of Canada are not fooled by this sort of thing. They will address it. I very much look forward to that.

The hon. member talked about some of the amendments. Our amendments were made to try to add some sanity to what went on in that hotel room. First of all, one amendment was about paying off the debt. That was in clause one. Clause two was to put a plan together to make sure that money was not wasted or misspent. Clause three was to add some accountability to what was going on with this piece of legislation and the dollars being spent.

That is the answer for my hon. colleague. I am absolutely appalled that he would ask such a question, because he has been around this place long enough that he should have known those exact facts.

[Rob Merrifield, Conservative, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to add my dialogue to this debate at report stage of Bill C-48 on behalf of the people of Yellowhead.

I would like to begin where my hon. colleague finished and ask a question. How did we get into this mess? How did we actually get to position where we are deciding and trying to discern what to do with this piece of legislation?

I see it a little differently than my colleague. He said that it is all about a minority government and that the Canadian people want a minority government to work. To that point, I would agree.

If that was a fact and the government wanted to work together collaboratively with the parties to bring forward legislation in the best interests of Canadians, it would have added that negotiating power and negotiations would have happened in Bill C-43, not Bill C-48. A plan could have been set out along with the criteria around that plan and how it would be delivered.

It would not have happened in a Toronto hotel room as a desperation move by a government that will go down in history as the most corrupt government to serve the Canadian public. It would not have been done with the input of the labour movement.

It would have had some of the accountability measures that we need to have in place with all legislation, particularly in light of what has happened with the government with regard to the lack of accountability and the lack of planning that we have seen. If we are to be honest in this place when we come here to debate, we should do it with the knowledge and the full understanding of what actually happened.

The NDP members decided that they were going to sell themselves with regard to their votes and prop up this corrupt government. They said “What can we get for that? Let's go into the hotel room and see what we can get. Let's name our price”.

Let us take a look at that price and take a look at what they actually got. Once the NDP members were prepared to sell themselves, in the sense of giving a vote to prop the government up when things looked very desperate, they said “Let's set our priorities”.

I know what happened with the priorities in my riding. We have gone through significant difficulty in rural Alberta with regard to the BSE crisis. Before that we had two years of drought and grasshopper problems, and Atlantic Canada and central Canada had to help to contribute to some of the causes with the hay aid program.

It was a devastating situation for agriculture. Agriculture has never been in the situation that it is right now. We have a government that has failed farmers time and time again. In fact, the farmers of my riding are so desperate that they are really not sure what to do. Many are at the stage where they are losing everything.

When a farmer loses everything, it is not just that he loses his job, but he loses his whole life and in many cases the family history. Many of these farms are generational farms. It is a devastating situation.

What is the NDP priority? There is not a word for agriculture. There is not a bit of help for agriculture. It is not only western Canadians involved with agriculture in Alberta. Agriculture from coast to coast in this country is facing the same situation and the same difficulties.

After deciding to do what was in the best interests of Canadians, surely the NDP would have this as a part of its priority. It was not so. We have seen that it cooked up this little deal with 400 words on a sheet of paper and brought it forward saying that it would bring in this new piece of legislation, Bill C-48. It has no criteria on how it will be spent. It has no accountability and no plan. I suggest also that its priorities are not necessarily in the best interests of Canadians.

If it was about a government that wanted to do what was in the best interests of Canadians, this budget would have been negotiated in Bill C-43. We have to be honest here. The honest part of Bill C-48 is that is not what happened.

How much money was actually spent in this House in the last two months for the benefit of Canadians? If we look at it from that perspective, we can see that the price tag on this was $4.5 billion. However, we have to accumulate that on top of all the announcements that the government made to buy votes, not only the NDP votes which cost $4.5 billion. We must add to that another $22 billion. A total of $26 billion of Canadian money has been spent to illegitimately prop up the government. That is the reality of the situation we are in.

However, it did not stop there because that was not quite enough. The Liberals needed the 19 votes from the NDP to stay in power. However, that still was not good enough. They had to buy some opposition members. We saw that happen, as well, in this House.

It is the most disgraceful thing because it is not about the money and it is not about where the money went. It is about respecting the role of a parliamentarian in this House and respecting the very democracy that we try to protect for the benefit of all the people back home in each of our ridings.

I have become as cynical as some of the people back home when I talk to them about politicians because it reflects badly not only on the Liberal Party and the NDP but on every one of us in this House. I almost feel like we have to go home on weekends and shower multiple times just to get some of the sleaze off from what we see happening in this House because it is not in the best interests of Canadians. It is not in the best interest of this House or democracy, or this great nation, one of the greatest nations in this world.

What can we do? We should be concerned about the content of the actual piece of legislation, Bill C-48, because of what we have seen the government do with regard to other knee-jerk reactive measures and programs. If we want to know what individuals are going to do, look at what they have done and that will tell us where they are going.

If we look at the Davis Inlet project, the government's knee-jerk reaction was to relocate the Inuit natives at a cost of $400,000 per individual. That did not solve the problem. HRDC was another scandal. The gun registry that was promised at a cost of $2 million and that has ended up costing $2 billion is an absolute disaster. That is continuing on a daily basis and a yearly basis. I think last year it cost 125 million more dollars.

Then we look at ad scam, the mother of all scandals, trying to buy off Quebeckers. No wonder Quebeckers are so slighted by what is happening because they take it as a personal slight. The government cheapened Quebeckers by the way it handled the ad scam.

Not only did the Liberals try to buy Quebeckers, in the last two months they tried to buy Canadians and then opposition members. It is an absolute abomination to this House and everything that is good about this place and good about Canada.

That is why the opposition is so upset with this piece of legislation. The piece of legislation is coming forward with no plan and no accountability measures. It will just go down as a $4.6 billion ad scam or a $4.6 billion gun registry because of what will actually happen.

If we want to know what will happen with this money, just look at what the government has done with past projects and that will tell us exactly where it is going. It is unfortunate that we see this sort of thing happen in this House because it is a terrible situation for Canadians.

How are we going to fix that? At report stage, we have an opportunity, after coming out of committee, to put forward some amendments in order to put some sanity around the ridiculous situation that we have seen in this House over the last couple of months.

We put forward a plan. We must repay the debt load that governments in the past have built up. We have to look at how we deal with that. We put forward an amendment for that one. We put forward an amendment to put a plan around this money so that we do not allow it to turn into another scandal. We want to put some accountability in there as well.

We moved three amendments that would address all three of those things and we hoped that the government would accept those as we moved forward in the debate at report stage, so that we could actually see some good come out of it.

I believe that Canada is the greatest nation in the world and I believe most people in this House and most people in this country do as well. However, it has not achieved what it should have achieved. The reason it has not is that we have a government that has not really taken the opportunity to develop, what I like to call, the Canadian dream. This cooked-up deal will take 3,000 plus dollars out of the pockets of every family in this country.

That is exactly what has happened. That is money that could have been used to raise the standard of living, money that could have been used to help every Canadian achieve their Canadian dream and be the envy of the world. I would challenge anyone to say what population of 32 million people has the amount of resources that Canadians have.

We should be the envy of the world. We should have the highest standard of living in the world, which we do not, even though we have the best of everything. The government should be leading this nation instead of being an abomination on some of the issues where it is not doing the job.