1983-04-20

STATEMENTS PURSUANT TO S.O. 21


Mr. Douglas Roche (Edmonton South):: Madam Speaker, I want to object in the strongest terms possible to the outrageous conduct of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) in deliberately altering his budget in order to cover up his leak of vital contents to a photographer.
First, the Minister broke his ministerial oath of secrecy. Honour, if not the law, would demand his resignation. Then by a calculated act of manipulation he changed the figures, justifying his action of adding $200 million by the claim of increasing job creation. This is both cynical and immoral. It is political trickery that will offend every decent person in Canada. What the Minister of Finance has done is to demonstrate conclusively that the Government is morally bankrupt.



Mr. Jean-Guy Dubois (Lotbiniere):: Madam Speaker, as far as the budget is concerned, there have been some comments just now on the formal aspects, but I think it is more important to emphasize the jobs that will be created. One area that has been the subject of many representations is the Canadian Home Renovation Plan. I believe that the Goverment's decision to earmark $120 million in additional funds for this program and to extend the program until March 31, 1984, was a very important one for the Department of Finance and the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), who thereby responded to requests from the people of Quebec and the Members from Quebec for additional funds for the program that would help create jobs in the construction industry. I think that in the circumstances, Canadians and Quebecers can be proud of their Members of Parliament, because their representations were effective and received a positive response from the Department of Finance.


WESTERN DEVELOPMENT FUND
Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Madam Speaker, in the 1980 Throne Speech the Liberal Government across the way said it would listen to Members of Parliament from western Canada. In the 1980 budget the Liberal Government introduced a Western Development Fund, which was a $4 billion fund to develop western Canada. In the 1981 budget the Liberal Government reduced the Western Development Fund to some $1.8 billion. Last night, as if by some stroke of magic, a puff of smoke or something, this fund was reduced to zero. There is no longer a Western Canada Development Fund. The rest of the country gets six and five while we in western Canada get zero and zero. That is the magic of the Minister of Finance.
There is no western plan, there is no western R & D, and there is no western manufacturing. About the only thing in the budget was hundreds of millions of dollars for big business. In many ways it is a Conservative budget, and the Government across the way should be charged with theft, theft of the Conservative Party's clothes and colours, for the kind of budget that it brought in last night. No wonder the Liberal Party is an endangered species in western Canada. It is about time the Liberal Government reinstated that money for the Western Development Fund.


THE BUDGET
Mr. Blaine A. Thacker (Lethbridge-Foothills):: Madam Speaker, parliamentary government is now over 700 years old. Its development is the result of a long and laborious struggle by ordinary people to elect the representatives who will make laws on their behalf, and to set the rules of accountability to be followed by those elected officials. The office of the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) is the highest office of trust and fiduciary responsibility. The incumbent must act in that spirit.
The office of Minister of Finance is especially one of trust. The present incumbent, as a lawyer, understands that concept better than anyone else. He swore an oath of secrecy on the
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Bible and on his honour. The Minister of Finance set up tight rules of security for the press and for Members of Parliament. Yet, for personal glory and publicity, he called the media into his office and then broke his oath of secrecy by opening the budget documents. As a result, the financial markets and the value of the dollar have been affected, and unfair advantage has accrued to a privileged few.
Democracy is a high and difficult enterprise requiring the highest of political standards in the conduct of the public trust. Our very way of parliamentary life is at stake. The Minister of Finance must resign.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Mr. Bob Ogle (Saskatoon East):: Madam Speaker, on November 30, 1982, a sub-committee of the House of Commons tabled a report on Canada's relations with Latin America and the Caribbean. Until now there has been no response to that report from the Government. In the report the subcommittee spoke about the stability necessary in that part of the world; it spoke for the promotion of human rights; for trade and investment initiatives by Canada in the region, and for aid and development.
I request the Government of Canada at this time to respond to this report. It is important for the Government to do so because the situation is changing so rapidly in South and Central America that, unless the recommendations are looked at now, they will become historic recommendations.
Two weeks ago there were food riots in Brazil, the economic miracle country of Latin America. Mexico has had an economic collapse. Nicaragua has been invaded by foreign forces. El Salvador is still fighting a civil war and it has one million refugees.
I recommend that the Government of this country set up a continuing north-south standing committee so that this House and the Government become aware of the realities that are taking place in our part of the world. I would also recommend that the Government renew the mandate of the sub-committee similar to the Latin-American committee so that information to the House and to the Government will continue to be provided in a steady way.
over one billion dollars. I want my fellow Members to understand the major role Canadair and its sub-contractors play in our economy and the Canadian aviation industry. I also want to point out that those who are anxious to tarnish the reputation of Canadair are contributing or will contribute to a loss of jobs in the Greater Montreal area which cannot afford to be a victim of that kind of negativism. Madam Speaker, I beg the Right Hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and the Members of his Cabinet to intervene in this matter, because Canada must continue to develop the aviation industry, where Canadair is one of the major components, if we are to play a part in this very specialized high technology sector. Obviously, corrective action is needed at Canadair, but not by killing the patient who is just starting to walk again, in this case the Challenger which is just getting off the ground. This is an industry that is generating jobs for today, tomorrow and for the future. For heaven's sake, let us not repeat the tragedy of the Arrow which had a very promising future but was literally scrapped by the Progressive Conservative Government at the time.


THE BUDGET
Hon. Roch La Salle (Joliette):: Madam Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to remind Canadians that this Government does not know the meaning of the word honour. Yesterday, for the second time in less than two months, the Right Hon. Prime Minister decided to cover for the Minister of Finance and his incredible blunder before the press. The public is not about to forget the disgraceful conduct of the Minister and the Right Hon. Prime Minister in the notorious Gillespie affair. Monday, after the consummate irresponsibility demonstrated by the Minister of Finance, the Right Hon. Prime Minister owed it to common decency and to his own credibility to ask his Minister to resign. As we all know, that did not happen. The Right Hon. Prime Minister, after a quick assessment of the facts, judged in his great wisdom that his Minister of Finance was worth an extra $200 million. Some people will say that is pretty cheap and others that the end justifies the means. However, it gets a little embarrassing when the taxpayers' money is involved, Madam Speaker.


AVIATION INDUSTRY
Mr. Marcel Roy (Laval):: Madam Speaker, I am rising in the House today on behalf of 1,200 workers who are in danger of losing their jobs, and on behalf of an industry that represents 23,000 workers in Quebec and has a business turnover or


SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASES
Mr. Stanley Hudecki (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Defence):: Madam Speaker, sexually transmitted diseases are seriously affecting the health of many Canadians.
April 20, 1983

The Canadian Public Health Association estimated recently that approximately 600,000 Canadians are affected with sexually transmitted diseases.
This increasing rate of infection is linked by some authorities to the dramatic and concomitant increase in the level of prostitution. Indeed, it is often cited as a major contributor to sexually transmitted diseases. Consequently, one approach to reduce the rate has been the consideration of the legalization of prostitution. The rationale behind this proposal is that persons in legalized prostitution would be subjected to medical examinations. However, the experience of infectious disease control medical officers is that routine forced medical examination of prostitutes in the general population is not practical, feasible, or effective.
Each of these diseases has its own specific incubation period during which the disease cannot be detected clinically or may be in a symptomless carrier state that infects but defies medical diagnosis.
In some countries minimal benefits have been reported in strictly isolated "red light" districts when medical examinations are conducted under military supervision and discipline.
It is accurate to say that compulsory, periodic medical examinations of prostitutes in a general population have proven valueless in controlling venereal disease. Indeed, such examinations may be considered harmful in that they create a false sense of security by providing spuriously favourable diagnoses.


CHARTER OF RIGHTS
Hon. Erik Nielsen (Leader of the Opposition):: Madam Speaker, at page 3 of issue 46 of the minutes of the Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons on the Constitution, this Party put forward the following amendment to the Constitution:
Everyone has the right to life, liberty, security of the person and enjoyment of property and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with principles of natural justice.
Last Monday the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), having seen the light like Saul on the road to Damascus, agreed to introduce that proposal if he could get agreement from this Party in the House of Commons. He has been good enough to provide me with the following amendment:
Everyone has the right to life, liberty, security of the person and enjoyment of property, and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.
The House will see that there has been only one change to our original proposal, that is, substituting the word "fundamental" for "natural". That resolution the Government voted against in Committee, along with its NDP allies. That resolution the Government voted against in the House of Commons, along with its NDP allies.
Oral Questions
I hope the Prime Minister will be successful in persuading the NDP to do as we do now, to accept the Prime Minister's conversion and ask him to bring that motion into the House as soon as he possibly can on our undertaking to pass it in the 24 hours that he suggests, through all stages.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Miss Pat Carney (Vancouver Centre):: Madam Speaker, I would like to ask the 200 million dollar Minister of Finance a question about his spending priorities. He told us yesterday that Canadians must borrow an additional $200 million to pay for his photo opportunity which leaked the budget. Although there are 621,000 young people out of work, he has allocated only $280 million in additional funds over the next two years to help young Canadians find jobs. Why is the Minister prepared to spend $200 million to save his own skin, and only $280 million for young Canadians?


Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of Finance):: Madam Speaker, I indicated yesterday that the additional $200 million will be provided for special recovery capital projects. This will be spent on projects that will be of benefit to the Canadian economy. This represents projects taking place all across the country that are on the books of the Departments for future years. We are advancing those projects. These projects will mean more employment for Canadians. This will mean fewer people unemployed. The money will be used to employ Canadians who are unemployed at the present time in various regions of the country.
The use of that money will be announced in the next few days and weeks. I invite my hon. friend to wait for the statements to be made by various Ministers in that regard. She will find that there are very worth-while projects to be undertaken that will significantly help those Canadians who are unemployed. Among them I hope there will be quite a number of young people.
As I indicated in my statement yesterday, this Government is spending hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars for the young people of the country. Over half of the $1.2 billion in training allowances is being spent on young people. That is the extent of the commitment of this Government to the young people of the country in whom we have faith.


DISCREPANCIES IN BUDGET PAPERS TABLED AND CIRCULATED
Pat Carney: Madam Speaker, my supplementary is also addressed to the Minister of Finance who knows very well that that additional money which he had

April 20, 1983
Oral Questions
to find to protect his reputation has not been allocated. It was added within a 24 hour period.
Yesterday we were told that the Minister was increasing the deficit by $100 million to save the integrity of his budget, through a supplementary budget speech which we were given moments before he spoke in the House. Today we find that the budget papers which we were given and which were circulated to Canadians across the country are not the same as the budget papers that were tabled in the House last night. On page 6 of his fiscal plan as tabled, there are no less than 21 changes in the documents he tabled; $100 million here and $100 million there. How many sets of books is the Minister keeping? Why can he not give Members of the House of Commons the same figures that he is tabling in the House?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member speaks about the supplementary budget speech. There is only one budget speech. It is the one I delivered in this House. That is elementary. The budget statement is the one which the Minister of Finance reads in the House when he delivers his budget speech. I also indicated yesterday that I was tabling on the Table of this House the official documents, and those documents have the necessary corrections, as the Hon. Member knows.
I finally stated that indeed there were thousands of copies across the country that would be made available at the time that I would be speaking and that corrections would be required, bearing in mind the changes I decided to make in the budget. That is all in the record. I delivered that in the House yesterday. The Hon. Member must have been outside the House when I made that particular statement.


UNEMPLOYMENT FORECASTS
Pat Carney: Madam Speaker, my final supplementary question is addressed to the Minister of Finance who might then be able to explain why the additional material he distributed to us is called "Budget Speech Addendum, insert after paragraph 1, page 3".
Again in terms of fudging the figures, the Minister in his budget suggests that more Canadians will be working in the future as a result of his budget measures. The bottom line will be 55,000 fewer Canadians working at the end of 1984 than were working in 1981 when his predecessor introduced the most disastrous budget in Canadian history. Why is the Minister so blatantly manipulating the employment forecasts and thus raising hopes among unemployed Canadians that he knows he cannot fulfil?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, I think the answer to the Hon. Member's question is quite simple and quite obvious. In my speech last night I said that by the end of 1984, 600,000 more Canadians would be employed than at the end of 1982, and that employment was expected to
grow at a steady pace during the months and years to come. I brought down an economic recovery budget, whose basic objective is to provide for a strong and lasting recovery of the Canadian economy. I hope the Hon. Member and her colleagues opposite will take the trouble to make a thorough analysis and to study carefully the substance of the proposals contained in this budget and that they will realize that, basically, the purpose of the budget is aimed at creating as many jobs as possible in our economy. However, it must be done in a responsible way, and that is what we are trying to do with this budget.


LARGER WAGE SUBSIDY PROGRAM SOUGHT FOR YOUNG PEOPLE
Hon. James A. McGrath (St. John's East):: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that young people will be the last to be hired in an economic recovery, why did the Minister not bring in a much larger wage subsidy program for young people than the $95 million he targeted over a period of two years? Why did he not bring in something like a refundable tax credit program, not only for the 621,000 unemployed young people but for the chronically unemployed, the hidden unemployed, and the discouraged workers, of which there are 120,000 in this country? Why can he find $200 million to prop up what is left of his own shattered reputation when he can only find $95 million over two years to help unemployed young people?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the Opposition is in a situation where it is repeating itself again. I am afraid I will have to repeat the answer. The $200 million added to the special recovery capital projects is going to take the form of expenditures across the country. My hon. friend has been complaining about Search and Rescue, for instance. Does he not admit and recognize that we could use some money for refurbishing our Search and Rescue helicopters? Does he not admit that we could spend more money on equipping our Coast Guard in a more efficient way? These are projects that we have not been able to proceed with as far as we would like because the funds were not available.
I have now made funds available that will allow projects like this to proceed faster and earlier than had been anticipated. That will mean work in the shipyards of eastern Canada and western Canada, and it will mean better protection for the fishermen and the people who work at sea about whom I am sure the Hon. Member is concerned.
That is what the availability of these funds will mean. It will mean more Canadians at work, it will mean more and better services for Canadians at work, whether they are fishing or working on offshore platforms. These are some examples of many of the things that this country needs, the capital investment this country needs, things that we have not been able to accomplish in the last while.
April 20, 1983

I hope that these funds indeed will lead to the employment of young people as well as adult Canadians all across the country.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


FORECAST OF JOBS TO BE CREATED
James Aloysius McGrath: Madam Speaker, God knows we need better Search and Rescue in this country. But we need jobs, and we are not going to get them this year according to the Minister of Finance.
I want to ask a question of the Minister of Employment and Immigration, who has to share the responsibility for this cruel hoax that has been perpetrated on the unemployed. That is what the budget is, a cruel hoax. I want to put a question to that Minister who has to bear responsibility for advice given to the Minister of Finance. Given the fact that at the end of 1985 we will have more people unemployed, three years on into recovery, than at the end of 1982 when there were more people unemployed than at any time since 1933-given that disgraceful fact which I take from the forecast of the Minister of Finance-will he tell the House how many jobs we can expect from the program brought in by his colleague, the Minister of Finance, last night? When can we expect these jobs? There are two million Canadians out there who are waiting.


Hon. Lloyd Axworthy (Minister of Employment and Immigration):: Madam Speaker, before the Hon. Member gets himself worked into a frenzy, it might be useful if he went back and read the budget documents that were tabled last night.


Mr. Jarvis:: Which ones?


Lloyd Axworthy: The Minister of Finance indicated that over the next two years 600,000 jobs will be created in Canada. That will be an average labour growth of between 3 and 5 per cent over the next two years to provide major stimulus in the economy. Those 600,000 jobs will come from a combination of jobs provided in the private sector and direct employment jobs.
The Hon. Member seems to be suffering from a major learning disability in not being able to read properly. I would point out to him that the fact of the matter is that the $1.6 billion that is being put into direct employment jobs will create something like 300,000 jobs directly by the Government, through this Department, over the next two years. Before he goes into his wild, frantic outburst, it would be well for him to go back and read those facts so that he can provide proper, straight information to the Canadian public.
1983 UNEMPLOYMENT FORECAST


Hon. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa):: Madam Speaker, first of all I would say to the Minister who has just spoken that I have read the documents. Now I have a question for the Minister of Finance.
Oral Questions
Given the fact that there are two million Canadian men and women who would like to get a job, how can the Minister of Finance describe his budget as a recovery budget when he notes in his budget documents that there are going to be fewer jobs in the Canadian economy in 1983 than in 1982?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, at the end of 1984 I said there would be 600,000 more Canadians employed than there were at the end of 1982.


Some Hon. Members:: 1983.


Marc Lalonde: At the end of 1983 we will have an improvement in the job situation. We have a very high level of unemployment at the present time. I have never indicated that we would get out of the unemployment level that we are facing at the present time just by the wish of the Leader of the NDP Opposition. I have indicated that the situation would improve gradually. This is what we are working on as fast and as urgently as is possible.
It is true that we have a high level of unemployment at the present time and that it will stay with us for a while. The question is whether we should get together and try to improve the situation, as was proposed in the budget, or just go on raving and ranting like the Leader of the NDP. I do not follow that line.


REASONS FOR UNEMPLOYMENT FORECAST
John Edward Broadbent: Madam Speaker, I want to give the Minister a chance to correct the record before the House. I listened with care, and he just said that there is going to be an improvement in the job situation in 1983. Is he changing the budget once again, or will he admit that what he just said contradicts what appears on page 16 of "The Economic Outlook for Canada" document, which clearly indicates that there are going to be fewer jobs in the Canadian economy on average this year than there were last year? Will the Minister clarify that situation?
If he agrees that what I have said is true, then I come back to my first question. How, in heaven's name, does he have the nerve to call this a recovery budget when he knows that we are going to have about two million unemployed at the end of this year just as we have now?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the record shows that there will be more jobs at the end of this year in the Canadian economy than there were at the beginning of the year. That is what is going to take place. The average for this year is forecast to be about 12.4 per cent. We start from a high level and it will go down gradually. At the end of this year we will be in a better position in terms of numbers of jobs in this country than we are at the present time or than we were in January. That is what is happening. That is what will continue to happen gradually over the next two years.

April 20, 1983
Oral Questions
It seems to me pretty obvious and pretty clear that this is indeed a recovery budget. It is not the kind of magic potion which the New Democratic Party would like to sell the Canadian public. It is a responsible budget which will depend upon the co-operation of all economic agents in the country- trade unions, management, Provinces, and the federal Government. I would love to be able to say that co-operation would also be forthcoming from the Opposition Parties, but I am afraid that would be too naive on my part.


John Edward Broadbent: Madam Speaker, the Minister's crocodile tears are very moving, indeed. I wish he would show the same concern for the unemployed.


REQUEST FOR INDUSTRIAL STRATEGY
John Edward Broadbent: Madam Speaker, considering that the Minister's own documents show that the number of jobs in 1983 on average will be fewer than in 1982, and that the number of unemployed will be 200,000 higher in 1983 on average than in 1982, can the Minister tell us why he did not produce for the long run, having failed for the short run, the kind of strategy which he sometimes talks about, instead of throwing money helter skelter around out there hoping that something might happen in terms of job creation? Why did the Minister not bring before the House of Commons and before the people of Canada a long-range integrated industrial strategy which would give the people in our land some real reason to hope for the future?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the budget we have put forward is indeed a budget which is looking at both the short term and the medium term. It does indeed put forward a number of initiatives which will strengthen the Canadian economy, make it more competitive, and allow Canadian workers and management to beat the competition. That is what we want to ensure. If we can put business back into business, we will be able to put workers back to work and find jobs for Canadians. That is what we want to do.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
[ Translation]


EMPLOYMENT-GOVERNMENT FORECAST FOR 1983
Roch La Salle: Madam Speaker, my question is also directed to the Minister of Finance. Perhaps the Minister could clarify the part about 1983. Not long ago, the Minister of Employment and Immigration announced the creation of 29,000 temporary jobs, but the effect was nil since 47,000 permanent jobs were lost. The Minister of Finance said that he will invest $1.5 billion this year, but it seems quite clear from his budget speech that there will be fewer jobs available in 1983. Will the Minister acknowledge that in 1983, there will still be nearly two million Canadians out of work, notwithstanding this injection of $1.5 billion?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the figures I announced yesterday were very specific. I indicated that for 1983, the unemployment rate would be approximately 12.4 per cent. If my hon. friend would care to check, I think 12.4 per cent equals about one million and a half of people out of work, which is indeed a very large number. I can also inform the Hon. Member, for instance, that thanks to the measures we announced last night, we shall be able to reduce unemployment gradually across Canada in 1983 and 1984. There will be fewer Canadians out of work in December
1983	than there are now or than there were in January 1983 and there will be fewer Canadians out of work by the end of
1984	than was the case at the end of 1983 or at the end of 1982. We shall continue to make progress in our fight against unemployment. However, I think it would be irresponsible to claim that we could rid our country altogether the tragedy of unemployment that is being experienced by both young people and adults. The aim of the budget is to take a comprehensive approach to this problem by trying to encourage the private sector to play its part in economic recovery, and that is what we intend to do. In addition, we have allocated half of the funds provided in this budget to direct aid to the unemployed through direct job creation by government programs. I feel this is a fairly balanced approach, and most of the comments I have heard since last night seem to indicate that the Canadian public is supporting the measures proposed in the budget.


Roch La Salle: Madam Speaker, I have a supplementary. I would like to take the Minister of Finance at his word when he says he is going to reduce unemployment, but the Minister knows perfectly well that we have been hearing this particular refrain for four or five years, and that the same promises have been made by at least three budgets, and we all know with what results. Is the Minister prepared to confirm, for the information of all Canadians, that his budget estimates for 1984-85, in addition to maintaining a high level of unemployment, according to the document just tabled, will oblige taxpayers to pay an additional $2 billion in taxes or income tax, and that corporations will be paying $815 million? In his forecast, does the Minister think it is fair to make the individual Canadian, who already has trouble paying his taxes, pay twice as much as the corporations?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the Government's tax measures were announced last night, and as of October 1984, there will be a one-percent increase in the manufacturers' sales tax, and we shall be maintaining the Canadian Ownership Special Charge which is now in effect. I said, however, that we shall be maintaining it at its current level. It will not be increased, and maintaining this tax will mean nearly one billion dollars of additional revenue for the Goveinment. However, it is not being increased and it is not an additional tax. The main additional tax is the one resulting from the additional one per cent added to the manufacturers' sales tax
April 20, 1983

for six months in 1984-85. The other additional tax reduces exemptions for the wealthiest people in Canada in 1984-85, and that is in line with our objective to ask Canadians who are well off to help those who are in need and people who are less fortunate than they are, and that is what this budget is trying to do.


IMPACT OF BUDGET ON ENERGY PROJECTS
Hon. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of State for Economic Development who is responsible for over-all economic development strategy. The Minister will know that over the past three years several energy oriented projects worth $30 billion to $40 billion were shelved as a result of the Government's destructive economic and energy policy. Would the Minister identify what specific measures are included in the budget which would facilitate the development of these energy projects, even on a smaller scale? For example, could the Minister indicate to the House what there might be in the budget to facilitate the development of a heavy oil upgrader in Lloydminster which would provide some 93,000 man-years of work over the next five years?


Hon. Donald J. Johnston (Minister of State for Economic Development and Minister of State for Science and Technology):: Madam Speaker, first of all I cannot accept at all the premise upon which the question is based. I understand projects of a similar kind have been cancelled in the United States and elsewhere. There are provisions with respect to the PGRT contained in the budget which may indeed have an impact on some of the energy projects.


PETROCHEMICAL PROJECTS
Donald Frank Mazankowski: Madam Speaker, will the Minister not agree that the heavy oil upgrader is currently on the shelf as a result of federal Government policies? It could be spearheaded onward if the Government modified its policies in some respects. The same applies to the petrochemical industry. Some $6 billion to $8 billion worth of petrochemical projects are on hold which, again, would provide some 8,000 to 10,000 jobs. They are on hold because of the heavy up-front taxes arising out of the National Energy Program which makes Canada's feedstock uncompetitive in world markets. I would ask the Minister again to identify what positive action there is in the budget to ensure the facilitation of these petrochemical projects so that we can provide longterm meaningful, productive employment, rather than the kind of fluff which we have been hearing from the Minister of Finance.


Donald James Johnston: Madam Speaker, last night I was delighted to hear in this House, as I am sure all other Hon. Members were, about a $2.4 billion special recovery capital program which, of course, affects 100 projects all over the country, not concentrated
Oral Questions
specifically in one sector. This is going to make an on-going and permanent contribution to productivity through research and development and improved technology affecting all regions. That is what the Hon. Member should be talking about. I hope that in the succeeding weeks we will hear some compliments coming from him and other Hon. Members of the House with respect to the judicious selection of those projects which, as the Minister of Finance indicated during his speech, total over 100.


PROPOSAL TO INCREASE FEDERAL SALES TAX
Mr. Nelson A. Riis (Kamloops-Shuswap):: Madam Speaker, while Canadians are recovering from the Minister's recovery budget, I must say I was a bit surprised that the Minister of Finance, who had been saying for many, many weeks that it was going to be a consumer led recovery, last night announced that perhaps one of the ways to assist this is to slap on an additional federal sales tax in October, 1984. If the Minister is serious about a consumer led recovery, would he explain how adding to the federal sales tax will help that recovery? Why did he not instead reduce the federal sales tax this year if he wanted to encourage Canadians to consume goods and services?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, first of all the Hon. Member has partially given the answer to his own question by pointing out that this increase in sales tax will not take place until October, 1984. By then we hope that the recovery in Canada will not only have taken hold, but that it will be very strong indeed. Secondly, the budget contains measures, such as those with regard to RHOSPs, whereby those who want to buy new homes, furnishings and appliances, will be encouraged to do so and will benefit from significant tax reductions if they make those expenditures by the end of 1984 for houses, and before the end of 1983 for appliances. These are, I believe, significant short-term measures which should help to increase consumption.
I might also mention that the measures I announced yesterday for 1983 are geared to put more money in the hands of low income groups, like low income workers who are going to benefit from the 3 per cent to 20 per cent increase in the $500 allowance for what is known as the employment expense deduction or tool allowance. That is going to mean something like $135 million more in the hands of low income workers that they will spend during the next few months. I think this, plus the $6 billion of tax refunds we are processing at the present time, should be a strong spur to consumption over the next few months.


Nelson Andrew Riis: In other words, Madam Speaker, what the Minister is saying is that if recovery begins this year he will slap an extra sales tax on it to make it more difficult for 1984. A puzzling method of economic stimulus.

April 20, 1983
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FUNDING OF MEASURES TO CREATE JOBS
Nelson Andrew Riis: Along the lines of economic stimulus, Madam Speaker, my question to the Minister is this. Since we are paying out virtually $1 billion a month in UI benefits to Canadians from federal coffers, and since he surprised Canadians last night by saying that the $4.8 billion job-creation program was going to be spread over a four-year period, would it not be a better investment for the federal Government, rather than simply to invest $1.2 billion each year in job creation, to invest more money in job creation, which would result in serious economic development and economic return to Government coffers and thereby begin the process of reducing the deficit and the debt as well?
[Translation\


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, last night I said that 70 per cent of the funds committed for capital projects under the $2.4 billion program I announced will be spent this year and next year. We have done everything possible to accelerate capital investment and to ensure that this money is spent as soon as possible on useful projects throughout Canada. By introducing various tax measures for the corporate sector, and especially for small- and medium-sized businesses in Canada, we have tried to encourage these businesses to start spending on capital projects as soon as possible to upgrade their operations. I believe these measures will have a beneficial effect on Canadian workers in general, and especially on those who are now unemployed, because if we can start business on the road to recovery in Canada, this will create jobs for Canadian workers and that has been our primary concern from the outset in preparing this budget.


GOVERNMENT REVENUE FROM TAXATION
Mr. Don Blenkarn (Mississauga South):: Madam Speaker, the Minister of Finance will know that last night in his financial tables he increased his net take from the economy by $5.72 billion in taxes. Can the Minister explain how this tax grab will encourage job creation and economic recovery?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member might take the trouble of pointing out the number of years he is talking about. For this year and next year, when the economy will need stimulus, the Government is not increasing taxes on a global basis as the Hon. Member has indicated. As a matter of fact this year, 1983-84, we have a quite significant reduction in total taxes, and the Hon. Member should put that on the record. However, as the economy is going to recover and get stronger, obviously, as I indicated yesterday, we would make sure that the fruits of that growth are going to be shared, and the Government is going to get its share in taxes in order to pay for the expenditures we are incurring at the present time to support growth in the economy. So I would invite my friend to show exactly the number of
years he is referring to, and he would have to point out that the taxes he is referring to are not taking place in 1983-84 at all.


FORECAST OF ANNUAL DEFICIT
Donald Alex Blenkarn: Madam Speaker, the Minister knows that even next year there is an increase in taxes of over $800 million. He knows that he is forecasting unemployment in excess of 10 per cent into the indefinite future. He is going to increase taxes and guarantee, almost in perpetuity, that the Canadian Government will have a deficit in excess of $25 billion a year. Therefore, I ask him how, in the name of recovery, that will create confidence, how it will stimulate the economy, create jobs and build this country?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, I would say that probably the best answer to the Hon. Member would be to ask him to take the trouble to read the statements made since last night by dozens and dozens of spokesmen for the private sector who have endorsed this budget. If he does not believe this budget is well received by the people who are going to invest and create jobs, he should explain to me why the Toronto Stock Exchange index went up 28 points since this morning.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Stevens:: So did New York.


REJECTION OF AGRI-BOND CONCEPT
Hon. John Wise (Elgin):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance, who made it very clear last night that this was a budget of recovery. I only wish, speaking for the agricultural industry, that it was a budget of discovery of the fact that we do have an agricultural industry in this country which is suffering very severely. I want to acknowledge, though, four items in that budget relating to the agricultural industry. One is a very small and insignificant measure to farmers in distress, and of course three other measures affecting a very few farmers. However, to take advantage of those three measures they would have to be in a profit position.
I want to ask the Minister of Finance why he ignored a golden opportunity to implement a very significant and meaningful program for farmers at this particular time, and of course he knows, as does the Minister of Agriculture, that I am referring to the implementation of the agri-bond concept. Why did he not utilize the opportunity last night to implement this program?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, I have indeed studied that proposal very, very carefully. I spent a lot of time reviewing it because I was trying to Find out whether it could be implemented in a responsible way. As a matter of fact, as the Hon. Member knows, we asked an outside task force, the Lortie Commission as it was called, composed of experts in the field, to examine this matter. They
April 20, 1983

came up with a recommendation against such a step. I think there are indeed very solid and valid reasons why that proposal has many difficulties. What I have done instead has been to add $100 million to a particular program for the farming community which is going to help farmers in difficulty. This will allow the Farm Credit Corporation under the Farm Financial Assistance Act to provide help and support to the farming community.
I might remind my hon. friend that in addition, as far as the farmers are concerned, the Minister of Agriculture has numerous programs which he has put forward and which he had support for, at least on this side of the Flouse, when they came before the House. As a matter of fact there is one called Canagrex which we would very much like to see the Opposition support very soon. That proposal would be of great benefit to Canadian farmers too. There are plenty of opportunities to help the farmers if the Opposition want to do their share.


INQUIRY RESPECTING PROGRAMS TO ASSIST AGRICULTURE
John Wise: Madam Speaker, the minister talks about the complications and difficulty in implementing the agri-bond concept. Naturally, we cannot accept that.
The other fact that we want to make clear, and I am sure the Minister would agree, is that of the $100 million going to the Farm Credit Corporation there would only be about $8 million in the form of a direct subsidy to farmers in distess. Why did the Minister again ignore three other measures that would be in the interest of agriculture and which would indeed fulfil, or partially fulfil, some longstanding election campaign promises on behalf of his Party? Why did he miss the opportunity to eliminate the federal tax on farm fuels, to make appropriate amendments to Section 31 of the Income Tax Act, and again make some significant and meaningful changes in the capital gains legislative area. Why did he not utilize the opportunity to implement those more simple programs last night in his budget?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, I would like to point out to the Hon. Member that I have received hundreds of recommendations and proposals, and that many of them were very attractive. I certainly was very interested in considering whether they could be implemented. However, we cannot do everything at once. I have tried to propose a set of measures that will be most likely to give the economy a chance to create as many jobs as possible, as quickly as possible. The Hon. Member is referring to suggestions and proposals that I would have liked to implement, and there are hundreds of others, but unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, I have saved a few for the next budget. I hope he will be luckier next time.

Oral Questions


MINES AND MINING
Mr. Thomas Siddon (Richmond-South Delta):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Prime Minister. Last week I asked the Prime Minister in the House if Cabinet would be meeting to discuss the proposal to reactivate the Cyprus Anvil Mine in the Yukon. I now ask the Prime Minister if Cabinet has reached a decision on that proposal which would see at least some proportion of the 30 per cent unemployed workers in the Yukon back to work immediately? Will the Prime Minister confirm that such a decision has been reached and, if so, would he give us the details of that decision?


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Madam Speaker, indeed Cabinet has met repeatedly on this subject. The present situation is that we have authorized the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development to visit the Yukon and presumably try out some propositions. He has the authority to negotiate some possible arrangements. He has the authority of Cabinet to do that, but I am not in a position to make any announcement because I do not know the state of those negotiations between the Minister and the administrators of the Yukon and of the mine itself.


REPORT OF ANNOUNCEMENT BY MINISTER
Thomas Edward Siddon: It is passing strange that the Prime Minister could not be more specific, because I understand from media reports that at this moment the Minister is in Whitehorse announcing a $50 million package for the recovery of the Cyprus Anvil Mine, with 210 workers being recalled, $25 million in a loan fully repayable to the federal Government, and with the Yukon Government helping out. I think it is regrettable that the Prime Minister would not have chosen to have made that announcement in the House when asked the question. I ask the Prime Minister again if he will confirm that such an announcement is being made in Whitehorse at this very moment?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Madam Speaker, it seems to me that the Hon. Member will understand that if we can have an announcement in the House by the Hon. Member, and one up North from the Minister, we get double coverage for it. I am very happy that happened.
I am only sorry that the Member for Yukon has shown such great disinterest in this whole subject, to the point where he is not even in the House of Commons when his colleague is making this announcement.

April 20, 1983
24682____________________________________
Oral Questions


UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE
Mr. Cyril Keeper (Winnipeg-St. James):: Madam Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Finance with regard to his budget. His budget last night acknowledged that there will be a loss of some 60,000 jobs in the Canadian economy this year, that unemployment will remain at 12.4 per cent and all the efforts of the Government with regard to job creation can only affect this by about one-half of a percentage point.
Many of the unemployed today are the heads of households who have children. They must pay for mortgages and grocery bills. Having robbed these people of the dignity of work, will he now seriously consider extending unemployment insurance benefits in order not to force upon them the indignity of having to go on welfare?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, 1 think the best way to restore dignity to those people whom the Member says have lost their dignity is not by extending benefits but by doing everything possible to provide them with work in jobs that they want and need. I think this is what the budget is trying to do.


Cyril Keeper: The Minister clearly indicated in his budget last night that he could not create jobs for Canadians.


REQUEST THAT MINISTER LISTEN TO UNEMPLOYED
Cyril Keeper: Madam Speaker, the Minister must be aware that unemployed Canadians all across the country are organizing. In Winnipeg on Monday night they formed a union of the unemployed. They are angry, frustrated, and fed up with the economic policies of the Government. One of the steps that they have called for is the extension of unemployment insurance benefits. Will the Minister, having listened to business, now listen to the unemployed?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, as I indicated yesterday, the central concern of the budget is indeed about the unemployed. All the steps we have taken in the budget are meant to come to the rescue of the unemployed by creating the environment in which the unemployed of the country will again have good, stable, well paid and satisfying jobs. That is what we want to do.


THE BUDGET
Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Madam Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance who, in answer to a question put by my colleague from Vancouver Centre, stated in terms of his changing arithmetic in the budget that he had filed the necessary corrections and documents with the table last night. Is the Minister of Finance aware that the arithmetic in those documents does not conform to what he said in his
budget speech? For example, on page 16 of the Fiscal Plan, it shows a special recovery capital increase for the year 1984-85 of $40 million, but in his speech he said it was $50 million. One page 41 of the Fiscal Plan we Find that for the fiscal years 1984, 1985, and 1986, the deficits do not add up to the same figures, if you subtract revenues from expenditures. If he is aware of these corrections, how does he explain the discrepancies between his budget and what he filed last night?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, if there is a particular mistake in a particular document that had been filed last night I will be very happy to correct it. I hope that my hon. friend will provide me with a photocopy of that document. I will be happy to make that correction.
Again, what is important is what I said in the House, and the figures I used in the House in my speech.


EXPENDITURE FIGURES
Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Madam Speaker, when the Minister is looking for the many, many discrepancies, would he note on page 41 of the Fiscal Plan the expenditure figures in the aggregate are $200 million higher than on page 45 of the same Fiscal Plan? In the Budget Financial Requirements there is the figure of $26.7 billion for the year 1983-84, yet on page 46 of the Fiscal Plan they are shown at a mere $26.6 billion. If the Minister knew what he was doing, why were there so many errors last night?


Marc Lalonde: Madam Speaker, the Hon. Member shows that he is indeed an excellent bookkeeper and must have been an excellent banker. Again, if there are particular errors in the document I would be very happy to ensure that corrections will be made. I will check with my officials and file the necessary corrections if corrections are required.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. A1 MacBain (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Justice):: Madam Speaker, on behalf of the Minister of Justice, I have the honour of tabling in both official languages the Twelfth Annual Report of the Tax Review Board for 1982. 1 ask that the Report be referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs.
April 20, 1983


PETITION
Mr. Ray Skelly (Comox-Powell River):: Madam Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition of this House in which a group of individuals feel their right of assembly, which is guaranteed under the Constitution, is being denied. It is their concern that individuals involved with the Government of Canada have failed to provide them with a permit to carry through an assembly in which they wish to protest Canada's involvment with the Cruise missile. It would be the wish of the petitioners to have a permit in order that they be allowed to assemble and demonstrate against Government policy concerning the testing of the American cruise missile in Canada.


PRIVILEGE
Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Madam Speaker, I would like to give immediate notice of a question of privilege that I hope to raise later this afternoon.


Madam Speaker:: Order, please. If the Hon. Member wants to raise a question of privilege, notice must not be given in the House but given in writing to the Speaker.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Madam Speaker, the reason I rise now, as I understand the procedure, is that if the question of privilege arises during Question Period it is in order to give you notice from the floor of the House. That is what I was attempting to do.
My question of privilege arises from the answer given by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) which confirms our suspicions that the House is now faced with inconsistent figures with respect to the Minister's expenditures and deficits. Various assumptions are wrongly presented in the documents that have been tabled. In short, I find it very difficult to see how Members of this House can proceed to have a meaningful budget debate when, in fact, we do not know what are the exact figures which the Minister of Finance in due course is going to be putting before us.
What I was suggesting, Madam Speaker-


Madam Speaker:: Very well. That kind of question of privilege does not require any notice. The Hon. Member just rises from his seat and raises the question of privilege by saying that it follows from the deliberations and proceedings of the day. If the Hon. Member has a question of privilege later on, or now, that type of question of privilege will be heard.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: If I may continue, Madam Speaker, my question of privilege, as I said, arises from the response given by the Minister of Finance in that while we felt there were
Privilege-Mr. Stevens
inconsistencies, I put my question to the Minister feeling that he may have some ready explanation. In due course we may be getting an explanation from the Minister of Finance. I felt that in order to preserve the question of privilege, if I gave you notice now I could in turn suggest that we hear the two formal replies to the budget, one from my colleague, the Hon. Member for Vancouver Centre (Miss Carney), and one from the representative of the New Democratic Party. Thus we give the Minister of Finance an opportunity to check where the inconsistencies are and in due course I will proceed formally with my question of privilege.


Mr. Doug Lewis (Simcoe North):: Madam Speaker, under the Standing Orders it would appear to me that my colleague, the Hon. Member for York-Peel (Mr. Stevens), has given you the required notice and is suggesting a course of action which will not interfere with the normal budget debate yet give the Minister of Finance an opportunity to check his Figures. I would suggest the proposal made by my colleague is most sensible, and suits the orderly procession of the business of the House.


Madam Speaker:: Nobody thinks it is not sensible. There was no question of changing the normal course of events. We are all prepared to listen to the Hon. Member for Vancouver Centre (Miss Carney) and those who want to follow in the debate on the budget. At any point at which the Hon. Member for York-Peel feels that he must raise a question of privilege, he can rise and do so. If it is pursuant to the deliberations of the day, he can just rise from his seat and present his question of privilege. It does not require notice. However, I think events will follow their course this afternoon.


Hon. Yvon Pinard (President of the Privy Council):: Madam Speaker, as you have said before, the Standing Orders provide that a question of privilege shall be raised as soon as possible after the incident from which it arose. However, if a question of privilege or an alleged question of privilege arises from oral question period, the first opportunity is not after two speeches or even later in the afternoon, but immediately following oral question period. If the Hon. Member wishes to raise at some other time a question of privilege arising from oral question period, he will have to give proper notice and raise his question after oral question period on the following day, and not after two or three speeches or later today, unless the question of privilege arises from those speeches. However, if he wishes to raise a question of privilege arising from a reply to a question during oral question period, he should not raise it two hours later but right now. Otherwise, he should give proper notice and raise the question tomorrow. I have no objection to the Hon. Member giving the House notice that he will probably be raising a question of privilege later on, but certainly not right in the middle of debate.

April 20, 1983
Order Paper Questions


QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER
[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)
Mr. David Smith (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council):: Madam Speaker, the following question will be answered today: No. 4,491.


Mr. Siddon: 1.	What amount did the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation spend for advertising in the fiscal year (a) 1980-81 (b) 1981-82?
2.	What amount did the CBC budget for advertising in the fiscal year 198283?
3.	What percentage of the CBC's fiscal year 1982-83 advertising will be devoted to (a) newspapers and magazines (b) radio (c) television (d) trade show or convention exhibits (e) any other?
4.	Did the CBC declare a deficit in the fiscal year (a) 1980-81 (b) 1981-82 and, if so, what was the extent of that deficit?
5.	What amount did the CBC budget for the current fiscal year for promotion of (a) the National News (b) The Journal?
6.	What amount did the CBC spend to date in promoting the National News and The Journal (a) in television magazines and newspapers (b) on radio?


Hon. Francis Fox (Minister of Communications):: I am
informed by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as follows:
1.	(a) 1980-81 53,814,400, (b) 1981-82 $4,035,334.
2.	1982-83 $3,716,131.
3.	(a) 66.8 per cent, (b) 1.8 per cent, (c) 0.4 per cent, (d) 6.1 per cent, (e) 24.9 per cent.
4.	(a) No, (b) No.
5.	(a) and (b) For fiscal year 1982-83, the CBC budgeted $92,500 for a newspaper television listings supplement campaign which has jointly promoted The National and The Journal.
6.	(a) Including the figure given in part 5; $393,177, (b) Nil.
 * *


David P. Smith: Madam Speaker, if Question No. 4,620 could be made an order for return, that return could be tabled immediately.


Madam Speaker:: The questions enumerated by the Parliamentary Secretary have been answered. Is it the pleasure of the House that Question No. 4,620 be deemed to have been made an order for return?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Mr. Manly: For each school run by an Indian band over the past ten years, by Province, what was the (a) budget (b) number of pupils and teachers (c) location and was it on or off the reserve?
Return tabled.


David P. Smith: I ask, Madam Speaker, that the remaining questions be allowed to stand.


Madam Speaker:: Shall the remaining questions be allowed to stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: Madam Speaker, I ask for leave to move the adjournment of the House under Standing Order 30 for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter requiring consideration, namely all matters relating to the prior disclosure by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) of detailed information about the contents of the budget delivered last evening, April 19, 1983, the confusion caused by the changes, the breach of the Minister of his oath of office, and the question of the propriety of the Minister continuing to act in his present capacity.
I gave you the required three hours' notice of this motion. We submit this is a serious matter that should be addressed immediately. The capacity of the Minister of Finance to continue to act in the best interests of the country and the breach of his oath of office through premature disclosure of the budget material, in our opinion, requires the immediate attention of the House.


Madam Speaker:: I have received notice from the Hon. Member for Simcoe North (Mr. Lewis) of his intention to move a motion under Standing Order 30. I want to remind Hon. Members that the Standing Order lays down very specific criteria, as they know, governing emergency adjournment motions. Section (5) of Standing Order 30 states:
In determining whether a matter should have urgent consideration, the Speaker shall have regard to the extent to which it concerns the administrative reponsibilities of the government or could come within the scope of ministerial action-
The motion certainly meets this criterion. The matter clearly falls within the responsibility of the Minister of Finance.
April 20, 1983

However, Section (5) of the Standing Order also goes on to state:
-and the Speaker also shall have regard to the probability of the matter being brought before the House within reasonable time by other means.
Thus, the fact that a matter is urgent is not sufficient to qualify it under this particular Standing Order. To be acceptable there must be no probability of an early opportunity occurring for its consideration.
We are about to embark on a six-day debate on the budget, today being the first day of that debate. The terms of the budget motion are very broad and discussion can range widely. It is a matter of parliamentary tradition that the debate on the budget can cover the whole gamut of Government financial policy and administration. There is therefore an immediate opportunity to consider the matters envisioned in the Hon. Member's motion. There could be no earlier opportunity possible.
The notice given to me by the Hon. Member for Simcoe North also implies an accusation against the Minister in that it refers to:
-the possibility that the Minister has breached his oath of office as a Minister and the question of the Minister's ability to function in his present capacity.
I remind Hon. Members again that this is not a matter for an emergency adjournment motion. It is one which calls for a decision of the House, and a motion under Standing Order 30 results in no decision because the decision which the House reaches is that the House must adjourn. Therefore, on the substance of such a motion that problem is not really resolved.
Erskine May is quite clear in stating that such matters may be debated only on substantive motion which admits of a distinct vote of the House. On page 368 of Erskine May's Nineteenth Edition, it is indicated:
These matters cannot, therefore, be questioned by way of amendment, or upon any motion for adjournment or in debate on a Consolidated Fund Bill.
I must therefore refuse to accept this motion as it does not fall within the criteria required by Standing Order 30, and also because its subject matter is better suited to a substantive motion than to an adjournment motion.


David P. Smith: Madam Speaker, notice of motion for the production of papers No. 122, in the name of the Hon. Member for Wetaskiwin (Mr. Schellenberger), is acceptable to the Government.

FINANCIAL FORECAST OF CURRIE, COOPERS & LYBRAND Motion No. 122-Mr. Schellenberger:
The Budget-Miss Carney
That an Order of the House do issue for a copy of the financial forecast study done by Currie, Coopers & Lybrand firm of Management Consultants for the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development estimating past and future costs of the transfer of service delivering responsibility from the Department to the Indian Bands and which includes constructing a comparable financial data base, identifying national and regional cost patterns, and undertaking case study cost analysis.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
David P. Smith: Madam Speaker, I ask that the remaining notices of motions for the production of papers be allowed to stand.


Madam Speaker:: Shall the remaining notices of motions for the production of papers stand?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed from Tuesday, April 19, consideration of the motion of Mr. Lalonde that this House approves in general the budgetary policy of the Government.
Pat Carney: Madam Speaker, yesterday the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) tabled his last chance budget-the last chance this Government has of restoring its fiscal credibility after years of fiscal irresponsibility, economic mismanagement and a string of disastrous budgets which crippled an economy already in recession.
In attempting his last chance he has adopted a basic Conservative principle that our country's best chance of regaining economic growth and creating new jobs is in encouraging the private sector. He has introduced a series of measures which are aimed at encouraging investment opportunities, thus reversing the anti-investment policies of his predecessor.
It should be noted that the Finance Minister started his political career as an aide to Conservative Justice Minister Davie Fulton, and if he had truly returned to the fold, we would commend him. However, a scrutiny of his complex and confusing budget documents shows that he has made no serious attempt to reduce Government expenditures and in fact plans to expand them in order to find the funds to finance his recovery program. He is adding $5 billion to an enormous deficit at a time he claims the economy is in recovery.
Normally Finance Ministers have the wit to spend during recession and save during the recovery phase in order to

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Miss Carney
balance the country's books over the long term. But one dominant theme of his budget is that the country will be permanently in debt for the foreseeable future, a debt which threatens our ability to pay for the social programs we have gained over the years. I will return to that point in a moment.
A further scrutiny of his budget shows that the instigator of the National Energy Program which in effect expanded federal control over the energy sector is at heart still the great inter-venor. He has announced literally hundreds of changes to Government programs, and it will take time to absorb their implications.
He has extended the Canadian Ownership Charge to finance unnamed purchases at a cost to the taxpayer of between $700 million and $1 billion annually. In his "buy now pay later" budget where he expects to raise his revenues through tax increases after he spends them, he has set up the business sector as the fall guys if in fact his policies fail-he can blame them for failing to respond to his incentives. But some businesses will not be able to respond because their markets are depressed. The Minister has done little for consumers whose real incomes are falling and not much at all for the unemployed who need to get back to work to earn pay cheques needed to encourage consumer spending.
In essence, what the Minister has done is attempt to bridge the gap between the present time and 1984-85 when the economy may return to the levels of growth it achieved in the pre-recession economy. That is okay, but he has failed to address the basic structural problems which we face in the country today. That is where he has failed to show the leadership we require at this time.
Surely what must be most striking to Canadians is that the budget promises recovery at the same time as it predicts that unemployment will remain at 10 per cent or higher until 1986. The reality is that Canadians face at least three more years of double-digit unemployment. Even in 1984 there will be 55,000 fewer people with jobs than in 1981. How can those grim projections square with the Minister's promise of recovery? Partly because only part of the special recovery capital projects represents new spending. We are told these projects are funded at a cost of about $2.2 billion, of which $1.5 billion is new spending. Of that $1.5 billion, only $460 million is expected to be spent in the current fiscal year. That does not do much to provide hope to unemployed Canadians today.
Moreover, no project under the program will be physically under way until at least October, 1983 when the recovery is expected to be almost a year old. But these are the projects which are supposed to bring about recovery, providing in the Minister's words "immediate economic and employment opportunities throughout Canada".
Canadians will be excused if they ask whether these projects are intended to provide immediate relief for the unemployed or political relief for the Liberal Party. They might also ask if the projects are simply a way of putting people to work only in order to go back on Unemployment Insurance. The alternative
to that prospect is a rate of growth sufficiently high to reduce unemployment and absorb the increases in the labour force. It is interesting in that regard that a wire story came out today indicating that the economic firm, Chase Econometrics, in running the Minister's figures through its model, forecasts that his proposals would add only one-half of 1 per cent to our economic growth this year. According to the Minister's figures, he will not have that kind of growth under his stewardship as Finance Minister.
The growth we need can come about in the long term through productive investment. In the short term recovery and growth must be encouraged by encouraging consumption. The unemployed are not consuming. The Minister could have extended Unemployment Insurance benefits to ensure that some of those Canadians out of work could continue to support their families and make consumer purchases. At least those benefits could have been extended until the jobs in the recovery program began to come on stream. He chose not to do that. On the contrary, Canadians face an eventual tax burden of $5.7 billion over the next four years. With the twin prospects of few jobs now and higher taxes later, how can consumers be expected to create the demand necessary for real recovery?
The Minister claims that his budget has been motivated by two goals: achievement of fast growth, and guaranteeing a durable recovery. In our view, the budget fails to generate growth in the short term and may in fact threaten recovery in the long term. The reasons are as follows.
The best guarantee of sustained recovery in the years ahead is the steady creation of jobs through the development of the small-business sector, which creates something like 32 per cent of new jobs in the country. By applying the benefits that come from research and development, we could hope for higher productivity, new product development and new markets, resulting in new jobs. One key to long-term recovery is research and development through the small-business sector. We have in the budget only a study of research and development. As for small business, the Minister has seriously misread the needs of many small businesses in the short term.
On the face of it the budget is a pro-business budget, and we support some of the measures that recognize what we have been saying since the Government's first budget in 1981, that investment means growth. But the recession that those earlier budgets aggravated has resulted in many small businesses in Canada being on the verge of financial collapse or, at best, with acute cash flow problems. The investment incentives announced last night do not accomplish the immediate stimulus and inject the activity into the economy that the Minister recognizes we need now. I do not understand, for instance, why he did not adopt the suggestion of a small-business corporation which would help the cash flow problems of small businesses by allowing them to take in partners who could write off any losses against their income. There are other measures like that which he could have proposed at limited cost.
April 20, 1983

I will be pointing out in a few minutes the specific impact of the tax measures on individual Canadians in different economic circumstances. The principle need of small business has been, and will continue to be, increased spending by consumers. Last year the Government removed $2 billion from the economy through an increase in Unemployment Insurance premiums. The partial deindexation of personal income tax removed a further $1 billion, for a total reduction in the pruchasing power of the economy of $3 billion. Nothing in this budget makes up for that and much in the measures of last night add to the reduction in consumer spending. This is important because, I repeat, growing spending by consumers is the most immediate need of the small business sector. We would be supporting measures that served to put dollars in the hands of consumers, especially those out of work or that eased the cash flow problems of small business. Unfortunately, the Minister has given us nothing to support.
I said earlier that the durability of the recovery is in doubt because of the net effect of the budget. We lament the fact that there is no possibility of reducing the deficit below $25 billion anywhere in the foreseeable future on the basis of the budget. I am not raising the question here about how high in the short term the deficit should go or how much stimulus the Minister should have provided. We can deal with that in Question Period and later in the debate. However, I have argued that more of that stimulus should be geared to consumers who are in financial straits and businesses whose financial problems render them incapable of taking advantage of the investment incentives offered. That includes, of course, members of the agricultural community.
My concern is with the fact that with 26.1 per cent of the Gross National Product accounted for by Government expenditures, much of it in the form of permanent national debt, those effects will be felt in the form of choking off the recovery just as soon as it begins to bloom.
Sustained recovery in the long term and a more vigorous growth rate in the short term are both based on perceived and real lower interest rates. That recovery is threatened by a Government reaching deep into the pockets of Canadians through massive tax increases just when the benefits of business investment should begin to be felt.
In short, we face the real possibility of a deficit crowding out the very private sector incentives the budget creates, resulting in higher interest rates and increasing inflation, coming at precisely the time that massive tax increases will either wipe out Canadians' purchasing power further or create new cash flow pressures for business.
The House can only conclude that the Minister of Finance has ignored future consequences of his fiscal plan in the interest of his short term political survival. There is no apparent link between his fiscal policy and a monetary policy that will be of major significance in maintaining confidence throughout the rebuilding phase of the recovery.
We cannot hope to prevent a rise in interest rates and inflation on the basis of last night's deficit projections, and even that deficit is predicated on a real growth rate of 416 per
The Budget-Miss Carney
cent in four consecutive years, which is unbelievably unrealistic given the circumstances he describes in his budget.
There is another casualty of the Government's preoccupation with political survival. The country is beginning to lose count of the number of times the 1981 MacEachen budget has been wheeled to the operating room for surgery. That budget proposed to raise $1.7 billion in revenue through additional taxes from business. This budget is giving back about one-third of that revenue in new tax incentives. In the interim, corporate profits and finances have been in far too many cases wiped out.
We in our Party agree with some of the incentives. We applaud those because we recommended them. However, at best the Minister is only partially restoring the damage of 1981. For example, instead of bringing back the full capital cost allowance and repealing the 12!6 per cent tax on dividends-in effect restoring a known and effective tax system- he adds new, complex tax incentives that will have about one-third the value of those his predecessor did away with. That is the cost of another round of surgery on the universally discredited 1981 budget.
An additional cost of the deficit is the potential and real impact eventually on the social programs that Canadians have built up over the years. We simply may not be able to afford them in years to come or to make the adjustments to them free of cost pressures with this kind of pressure constraining every fiscal decision we make in the years ahead.
That prospect is not just a textbook theory. The very size of a $32 billion deficit is frightening. For instance, a $30 billion deficit is more than the total Government spending on health and education in the last fiscal year by all levels of Government. It is higher than total Government spending as recently as 1974-1975, which is nine years ago. Old age pensioners could be getting four times the monthly payments they are currently receiving. It is $3,120 per taxpayer. That $32 billion is enough to triple unemployment payments for one year. It is equal to the equalization payments to the have-not Provinces for five years.
Instead of real job creation and deficit control, the budget provides for net future tax increases totalling $5.7 billion over the next four years and deficits totalling more than $102 billion between now and 1986-87. That is why we question the Minister's ability to deliver a recovery under those terms. In 1984 alone, taxes which primarily affect individuals will rise by about $380 million. Let me give some examples. These are the kinds of taxes that affect most Canadians in average circumstances.
While the child care deduction has been doubled to $2,000 per child with an $8,000 maximum, the claim from now on will have to be made by the spouse with the lower income. This may then create problems for working wives who have unemployed husbands or husbands who are still in school. That does not seem to us to be fair.
Furthermore, the Child Tax Credit will be maintained at $343 for 1983 instead of decreasing to $326 as would have happened had the six and five restraint program been applied. The cost to the taxpayer comes because there will be no indexing of the threshold amount over which the credit is

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Miss Carney
eroded. This will remain at the 1982 level of $26,330. Therefore, as people's income rises, the Child Tax Credit will decrease.
Even more obvious is the elimination of the SI00 standard deduction. Unfortunately, this has not been replaced by the "give and take" proposals of the voluntary sector and may cost charities a substantial amount in lost donations. Almost certainly it could lead to an increase of the Revenue Canada bureaucracy in order to deal with receipts that Canadians will have to file in order to claim a deduction from a charitable donation. In fact, one budget analyst predicts that the additional manpower cost of this budget change will be approximately equal to the $80 million in revenue the Government expects to gain from it.
In addition, the federal tax cut credit has been restructured. In 1984 it will be reduced by 10 per cent of the amount by which the federal tax payable exceeds $6,000. In 1985 the maximum figure drops to $100 and then to $50 in the following year. In terms of equity, tax credits favour the lower income groups. When a tax credit is reduced, that is who suffers the most. While lower income Canadians are losing under this measure, the Government stands to gain $265 million in 1984 alone.
Similarly, the children's exemption has been frozen. That means that taxpayers with children under the age of 18 will find that the exemption will not rise with inflation. It will not even rise by 6 or 5 per cent. Added to the other tax increases, it means that Canadian families are going to be paying higher taxes in coming years.
Unlike the MacEachen budget, these latest tax measures make no mention of equity. Canadians, particularly those with children and those in the lower income groups, are just told to pay up. There are two other taxes that all Canadians will be paying. I am referring to the continuation of the Canadian ownership charge and the increase in the manufacturers' sales tax.
As you will recall, Mr. Speaker, the Canadian ownership charge was introduced to pay for the Government's takeover of Petrofina. The cost of the takeover has been almost entirely paid off, but we learned last night that this tax is to continue indefinitely. With Petrofina paid off, the Government can use this enormous revenue generator to bail out Dome and the banks. Others grabs by PetroCanada can be financed in this way at a cost to the average energy consumer of about $60 per year.
On top of that, Canadians will be facing a 1 per cent increase in the manufacturers' sales tax next year. Consumers will not begin to feel this until about the time they start their Christmas shopping. All of a sudden they will note increased prices on most of the goods they wish to purchase. The Government is postponing the pain of this tax increase. In the meantime, in all likelihood we will have an election. Our Party will have to implement this tax grab and explain to Canadians why they are feeling the pinch.
The Minister has presented his last chance budget. We will be evaluating his proposals during this budget debate as we pursue the fine print and his background papers to find out how his proposals will be implemented and what their effect will be.
We are very aware in our Party that Canada is on the threshold of our best chance in years to become the kind of country we can become, a country which is productive and competitive and eager for challenge, a country where every Canadian can find useful and interesting work.
We have been through the economic wringer, and in the process we have squeezed out some excesses. Our manufacturing is operating at only 63 per cent of capacity. But some of that capacity is obsolete and must be replaced with new plant and equipment, some of it in new industries. Our hard hit corporations are slowly paying down their strangling debt load. Managers who had become insulated and slow to adapt to change found themselves redundant as their companies struggled to survive. The men and women who replace them will be less complacent.
Some workers who have lost their jobs may never go back to their old tasks. They must face the often painful task of looking for new jobs in different fields and retraining themselves in the process.
As our markets dried up at home, we became more export conscious, aware of the global marketplace where we must be among the best in the world to succeed and where in many fields, such as communications, our success rate shows we are the best in the world.
We have moved into a weak, fragile recovery following the worst recession in 50 years. As our inflation rate has slowed, our wage pressures have moderated. Last year Canada and France shared the reputation for having the worst inflation record of 22 countries.
If we are to sustain that recovery and nurture it into a rolling expansion, we must avoid our past mistakes and change some of our attitudes. For instance, I would like to quote from a survey done by the European Management Forum that ranks 22 countries around the world on such factors as their ability to produce and the way they manage their economic affairs. Canada ranked sixth out of the 22 countries. It is interesting that three of the countries, Japan, Switzerland and The Netherlands, do not have anything like the resource base that we have.
In our ability to compete, we ranked 13 out of 22. That is due to our low productivity where we are in 22nd or last place. In human resources we ranked third due to a well-educated mobile labour force, but that is partly offset by a managerial talent rating of only 10.
In terms of outward orientation or our ability to look to the world for markets, we rank well down the list. One of the problems is the inability or unwillingness of managers to seek overseas postings and to learn another language.
April 20, 1983

One of the most telling observations of this survey was that in innovative orientation, we are 16 out of 22 countries. We have fallen from 13 to 16 in that ranking. Those are some of the measures we have to address and those are some of the attitudes we have to change.
For the reasons I have outlined, Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the Eton. Member for Vegreville (Mr. Mazankow-ski):
That all the words after the word "that" be deleted and the following substituted therefor:
"This House condemns the Government and rejects the budget for its failure
to adequately address the human tragedy of unemployment and increasing an
already unmanageable deficit while, at the same time, imposing an even
greater tax burden on Canadians.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I must say that today Canadians are recovering from the recovery budget. I believe that one thing is perfectly clear. While the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) listened to very many people as he prepared his budget, he heard very, very few people. He heard a very selected few. He certainly heard from the investment community. They had something to tell him and he listened very carefully. We see a budget that reflects that viewpoint. But he also heard from the Progressive Conservatives and accepted many of their recommendations, suggestions and advice.
Mr. Speaker, I suggest that what we have today is a budget brought down by a Liberal Minister of Finance that is essentially a Conservative budget. What is a Conservative budget? It is a budget which means that while two million Canadians are out of work today and two million Canadians will be out of work tomorrow and two million Canadians will be out of work this summer and next winter and two million Canadians will be out of work next year, there will be a handful of Canadians that will be doing very, very well, thanks to this Conservative budget.
This is a budget that Canadians did not want at this particular time. This is not the kind of budget that Canadians were watching their television sets and listening to their radios to see and to hear. They did not want to see and hear a Conservative budget introduced in the House of Commons last night. They wanted a budget that would provide some very clear, strong, bold economic leadership for this country.
The people of Canada were hoping finally to see some direction given to economic development and progress in this country. They were hoping to see a very clear economic statement made that would show the way for Canadians so that Canadians in every region of the country and from every walk of life would have a clear idea of where this country is going.
But the people of Canada got nothing, Mr. Speaker. They got a "do not take action" budget. They got a "do not stimulate the economy in any significant way" budget. They got a "do not provide economic leadership" budget. What the people of Canada received was a Conservative budget. The budget
The Budget-Mr. Riis
simply takes the status quo, makes a few simplistic manipulations, moves it up for the next year or two, and then waits to see.
A number of people in the New Democratic Party have described this budget as a wait and see budget: wait for the economy to turn around in the United States and then see if Canada can move into economic recovery on the coattails of Mr. Reagan's policies.


Mr. Waddell:: Same old story.


Nelson Andrew Riis: That is right. As my colleague for Vancouver-Kingsway (Mr. Waddell) has said, it is the same old story. It is a wait and see budget. We are to stand back and not take any action ourselves. We are to wait for others to solve our problems. We have been doing that for decades. For decades we have been expecting others to solve our economic problems. We have been waiting for the Americans, the Japanese, the Germans and the Swiss to solve our problems.
Canadians want to solve their own problems. They want to take action now. They were expecting a Government that would provide them with that kind of action and leadership.
The Minister of Finance came before us and presented a budget that ignored Canada's number one overwhelming problem, the fact that so many Canadians cannot find work. Too many Canadians are relying on UIC today. Too many Canadians are relying on welfare. Too many young people will be unable to find jobs this summer. That is a tragedy in a country as rich as Canada. Hundreds of thousands of young Canadians have been studying in vocational schools, upgrading their education in colleges, universities and specialty schools. To get to the job market and not be able to take those new skills and knowledge and put them to work for the country is a tragedy. That destroys a young person; dashes morale. They lose heart and become disappointed. It is not the kind of thing on which countries are built.

What is the Government's response to two million people being out of work and 900,000 young Canadians coming on to the job market in the next couple of weeks? It claimed to have a stimulative budget which would provide $4.8 billion for the private and public sector over a four-year period. Why was that not spread over a 20-year period or a seven-year period, Mr. Speaker? It was a sham. To spend $4.8 billion over a four-year period means $1.2 billion per year. That is the amount we spend every single month on UIC. Could we not do a little better than that for a job creation program? It is a pitiful gesture, Mr. Speaker.
Why were UI benefit periods not extended or assistance provided for people who are losing their homes because they have been laid off or are just getting back to work? There was no assistance in the budget for those people. We are told that we have to accept these high levels of unemployment and that we have to accept the fact that we are going to have the number of employed in the country actually decrease this year.

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Riis
If a country as rich as Canada has to accept 12.6 per cent unemployment, Mr. Speaker, that is a tragedy.
Some people have called this a pro-business budget, but if we examine it very closely we see that is only half true. It is a pro-business budget for a very select portion of the business community. If you are a healthy corporation making healthy profits you will be able to use the provisions of the budget; if you are producing to capacity there are provisions you can use. But if you are like most small and medium-sized businesses which are struggling to survive as they wait out the recession or depression, experiencing shortages in cash flow and perhaps laying off staff that have been with them for many, many years, if you are simply hanging in there anticipating that the Minister will bring in a stimulative budget to get the economy moving, can you imagine how such people feel today, Mr. Speaker? They have been sabotaged by the Minister of Finance. He has turned his back on the small and mediumsized businesses that have been pressed to the wall as a result of Government induced recession policies. There is very little for them in the budget.
This morning I was going to an early morning television show and so I took a cab. The driver told me that fourteen years ago he left Europe to come to Canada. This was his dream-a country where the unemployment level was 4.5 per cent; it was a "just society"; the "land was strong"; the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) was saying he was interested in "full employment for Canada"; inflation was 4 per cent; the Gross National Product was increasing 5 per cent per year and 25-year mortgages were available at 6.5 per cent. This man built a small business while his wife worked in a small factory. They raised three children. Then the Government decided that it needed a recession and introduced policies to induce that recession or depression. It tightened the money supply, increased interest rates, reduced the Gross National Product and increased unemployment. These were the conscious policies of this Government, similar to the policies of Mr. Reagan to the south of us.
This man lost his business, he lost his home, he lost his family. He is now driving a cab in Ottawa. He told me that he is going to go back to Europe because his dream of Canada had been dashed, to a large extent because of the policies of the Government.
In the last few hours we have seen the people of Canada rejected. The Government turned its back on the people. But more than that, the people have been used as pawns in this political game of chess between the Liberals and the Conservatives where employees are not viewed as people any longer but as commodities. People are bought, sold, exchanged, exploited, used and thrown on the garbage heap to become the unemployed.
This economic carnage is the result of a Government policy reflected in its Conservative budget where capital takes priority over people, where maximization of profit takes priority over human dignity. In this Party we regard that as an immoral position for a Government, and as reflected in this
Conservative budget it is anything but what is required during these difficult times.
Earlier I said that a select few in Canada will benefit from the tax provisions in the budget. This is a tax increase budget. It is a budget that will increase taxes for most Canadians in the years ahead. As a matter of fact, over the next four-year period the provisions of the budget will increase the personal income tax revenue to the Government by $3.5 billion.
What about the corporate sector, Mr. Speaker? Is it going to increase its contribution? In this Conservative budget its contributions are going to go down by $2.6 billion over the same four-year period.
There will be a 1 per cent increase in federal sales tax and the charges for pay television and cable television will be taxed. This is a desperate tax grab from that group which the Minister claims will be the leader in the recovery program, the consumer. If he is serious about consumers leading or participating in the recovery program, he should have reduced the federal sales tax instead of increasing it.
I believe that the Minister of Finance missed a golden opportunity. Not only did he bungle the process of the budget, he bungled the content. In these difficult times why did the Minister not bring in a full employment option as the goal for the budget? That goal could have put many more Canadians back to work in the short term and in the long term. He should have brought in strategies to accomplish that goal.


Marc Lalonde: You are the one who laughed at short-term jobs.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Canadians were looking for direction, for strong leadership, for strategies to move people off the welfare and UIC rolls.
We needed short-term action to begin to create jobs immediately and to show that we are serious about getting Canadians back to work. We needed short-term strategies to provide money for human capital. We need to invest in our most important resource in the country that, by and large, has been ignored in the budget-the people of the country, our human resource. We should have been providing money for health, education, and developing skills in the workforce, based on the assumption that healthy, well educated, skilled workers would have a high rate of productivity and would therefore contribute to the growth of the country.
There should have been money for reforestation; for affordable, co-operative and non-profit housing; for development of municipal infrastructure; for improved transportation facilities and for environmental protection. In other words, we do not need leaf-raking schemes or people to dig holes and fill them up again. We need short-term jobs that will result in economic development in the country in the years ahead, that will bring revenues into the federal coffers and thus begin to reduce the deficit.
Most important, Mr. Speaker, we needed a long-term job creation strategy as well. The Government should provide an opportunity for Canadians to plan as an economic family, to
April 20, 1983

do what every decent family does-look ahead and identify where they can develop. But we are renters; renters in our own homes with people outside our country making decisions for us.
Our friends in the Conservative Party say leave it to the private sector. That assumes that the private sector is all Canadian. But so many of the critical economic decisions are not even made in Canada, Mr. Speaker; they are made elsewhere.
We in this Party say that it is time to develop a long-term economic recovery program, a long-term strategy in order to develop those sectors of our economy which ought to be developed in the best interests of Canadians. In a country like ours it is a shame that we import manufactured commodities and manufactured equipment for something like our mining sector. We are the third major mining company in the entire world, Mr. Speaker, yet most of our mining equipment is imported. We should be exporting mining equipment. We should be developing a mining equipment manufacturing sector for our domestic needs as well as for international markets. We should do the same in forestry, agriculture, and fishing.
What we need in this country is a strategy so that Canadians can understand what it is we are attempting to accomplish. We do not need a strategy which is dreamed up by mandarins in Ottawa who are protected from the realities of the real world. We should develop a strategy in a proper way with the co-operation of our colleagues across the country as a Canadian economic family. Once we have that strategy in place, then we in the federal House and the provincial Houses across Canada as well as the private sector of this country will know what it is we are attempting to accomplish and can join in a recovery program.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, I would like to propose the following amendment:
That the amendment standing in the name of the Hon. Member for Vancouver Centre (Miss Carney) be further amended by adding after the word "Canadians" the following
"and in particular for its failure to undertake programs to:
(1)	stimulate consumer demand;
(2)	undertake immediate job-creation programs aimed at reducing significantly the levels of unemployment in 1983, and
(3)	produce an economic strategy aimed at integrating private and public sector investment to ensure long-term economic growth".


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: While awaiting the text of the amendment, the Chair would like to inquire as to the name of the seconder of the motion.


Nelson Andrew Riis: The Hon. Member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Deans).


Mr. Fisher:: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. Can you tell us whether questions are permitted of the previous speaker?
The Budget-Mr. Riis


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Yes, brief questions and comments for a period not beyond ten minutes are allowed at this time.


Mr. McRae:: Mr. Speaker, I suppose there is no one on this side who feels more strongly about job creation than do I.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Cross the floor, then, come over, because they don't care.


Paul Edmund McRae: To go over there would make me ineffective. I would have no effect. I would just make noise.
My question has to do with the latter part of the Hon. Member's statement. For years I have heard this word "planning"-we need planning, we need a strategy and so on. It is an incredibly easy thing to say but I would like someone to define the word in terms of how you develop a strategy for one set of industries and leave the regional nature of this country out. It seems to me that we should start to define what this is and stop talking about planning as some kind of an abstract. I do not hear anything but abstractions. There might be one industry you would want to do something about, but I have the feeling that this word has been over-used and not explained. It seems to me that it is a nice, convenient way of criticizing a Government but it does not give us anything positive.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I would like to respond in three ways. I would be pleased to send the Hon. Member some material on the process of economic planning. He makes it seem as though this is some unique phenomenon in which other countries have not been involved. I would like to remind him of two examples of countries which have participated in very serious, comprehensive and sophisticated economic planning with considerable success. Both countries are diverse in regions and have similar topography as Canada, although perhaps are different in size. Those are the countries of Japan and Sweden. As a result of the economic planning which those two countries have successfully attempted, their unemployment level-which they find very difficult to accept today-is less than 3 per cent.
Obviously, the Hon. Member did not listen very carefully to what I said. What I said was that any economic strategy for the future of this country, in recognition of the diverse regional aspects of a country as vast as Canada, needs to be accomplished by a Canadian economic family. The economic strategy for the future would incorporate, as I said, the federal House, the provincial Houses across this country which reflect the regions and the subregions of Canada, as well as the private sector. I cannot imagine what more input would be required from the sectors of the economy, from the regions of the economy, in terms of developing both short and long-term economic strategies than by using that method.


Paul Edmund McRae: I wonder how the Hon. Member can use those two examples of quite homogeneous countries as opposed to a country which is so diverse as this one. It seems to me it is a totally different pattern and we must be realistic about that

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Riis
pattern. Bringing these regions together is a very, very difficult task and it cannot be done by just using the word "planning".


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, if I may respond, I happen to know, as a result of my heritage, Sweden and Scandinavia very well. For the Hon. Member to stand in his place and call Sweden a homogeneous country obviously means that he has never been there. I suggest it would do him well to visit some of these countries which do have progressive economic policies in place and do plan for the future of their country and, more importantly, for their citizens.


Douglas Glenn Fisher: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if we could cut through some of the slogans and get down to some practical details. I would like to know how the Hon. Member intends to accomplish some of these lofty ideas. He said in Question Period, for example, that the Government should have reduced federal sales tax as a key device to create a consumer-led recovery. I believe that is a fair representation of what he said. He obviously cannot square that with his subsequent platitudes about being a nationalist because such a tax reduction, in the opinion of people like John Bulloch of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, would stimulate people to buy foreign watches, foreign cameras, foreign appliances and foreign cars. How does the Hon. Member intend to prevent people from transferring our tax benefits to foreign manufacturers in the name of his beloved consumer-led recovery?


Nelson Andrew Riis: To begin with, Mr. Speaker, if the Hon. Member would listen carefully to what I have to say, I did emphasize that the regions of Canada were very important in any economic recovery program, as are the provincial Governments. If we are going to identify the federal sales tax reduction as a way to put money into the hands of consumers, we would ask our provincial colleagues across the country to participate in this program. We would ask them to identify the appropriate sectors and so on where this would more realistically apply.


Mr. Evans:: Mr. Speaker, I have heard for the last several months now Hon. Members opposite, including the Leader of that Party, indicate what a great system the Swedish have and how the Japanese are making such progress. I have asked him this before and his Party has refused to answer. Are they prepared to follow the Swedish model, that is wage control and included inflation to ensure real wage losses to workers? That is how they keep unemployment down. In Japan workers take a low fixed wage and profit sharing, and when things get bad they are guaranteed a decline in real wages. They do not have large industrial unions in Japan, they have company unions. Now, are the Hon. Member's supporters, financial and otherwise, prepared to go along with that kind of a model of economic development? I doubt very much they are.


Nelson Andrew Riis: Mr. Speaker, I believe the response needs to take two tacks. One, no one would be as simplistic as the Hon. Member has indicated to suggest that whatever occurs in one single country can be applied in another cultural context. However, I say there are many lessons to be learned, and here
is one of them. The Hon. Member talks about wage controls, wage restrictions. One thing that Sweden has and this country has not, and is not likely to have in the immediate future, is a compact between labour, industry and Government where there is fairness in how programs are applied. The fact that virtually the entire Swedish labour force is organized makes it possible for organized labour to sit down with the social democratic Government and industry and together agree on recovery programs. But here this Government attemps to force wage controls and restrictions on a select group. It is that kind of economic arrogance which puts us in the difficult situation we find ourselves in. So when Members opposite stand up and call for co-operation, as the Minister of Finance has done in his budget, it is a hollow cry because they have betrayed not only ordinary Canadians but the trade union movement in this country so very, very often.


Mr. Dionne (Northumberland-Miramichi):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the hon. finance critic for the NDP a question. We heard a lot of pious platitudes from him but no specific concrete proposals.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: You did not listen.


Maurice Adrian Dionne: I wonder if he would accept the method Sweden has used on several occasions now, particularly when there are problems in the forestry industry, of buying up and stockpiling products from the mills and then dumping them below cost, or devaluating their currency which is, in effect, dumping below cost, and disrupting the entire world market for pulp and paper products.


Nelson Andrew Riis: I cannot believe what the Hon. Member is saying. I think what was attempting to levy as a criticism is that it has actually worked relatively successfully in Sweden. If that is the kind of criticism he is able to levy, he obviously does not understand what is going on in that particular country.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to be able to speak on behalf of the Government in presenting to the Canadian public and this House the recovery program presented last night by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde). I am particularly pleased because it gives me the opportunity of listening to the contributions made by our friends in opposition and therefore of being able to digest their suggestions and recommendations and hopefully to incorporate them as part of our over-all assessment of what might be done to aid this economy at a critical time.
At least, Mr. Speaker, that was my intention. But I have to confess, having spent some considerable time listening carefully to the statements made by the leading financial critics and spokespeople for the Opposition, that I come away sadly disappointed at what they have been able thus far to offer. I am afraid that what I heard from the Conservative critic was "Wait until the next election and all will be solved". Those under-aged 14 year-old delegates they are electing will be able to choose an effective economic policy during their leadership convention. Somehow that will provide us with wisdom, direc-
April 20, 1983

tion and force. But when it came to anything that would give us a framework by which the Conservative Party of Canada would offer a recovery program, one ends up chasing after vapours which are whisked away into the atmosphere before anyone can catch hold.
The only thing we heard in Question Period from the Hon. Member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath) was the old hackneyed rabbit out of the hat "give a tax credit to business to employ people". It is unfortunate that the Hon. Member has not gone back to read the evaluations of the program in place when his Government was in power, which indicated that something like 80 per cent of the jobs created were not incremental at all, and that such programs give no control or ability to target where the jobs should be. It is a little bit of a free gift but it does not create any additional jobs. That is the freshness of their thinking. That is the new innovation they are offering the Canadian people, a program devised several years which did not work. We are supposed to accept that as being the gospel of job creation according to the Hon. Member for St. John's East, who is probably as misguided as some of the other sort of preachers of gospel who have come along the way.
In listening to my hon. friend from the NDP, we now finally discover what their secret formula is. I have been sitting in this House for three years, waiting for the moment when they would reveal for the world to see their secret strategy. Now we know what it is. It is a made-in-Stockholm strategy. If we can only sort of adopt full-blown the Swedish way of doing things, then all things in Canada will be well. I have to say, Mr. Speaker, that I do not believe Canadians are prepared to adopt a foreign-made economic policy. They want a policy made by Canadians, one which reflects the desires, outlooks, attitudes and values of our own country.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lloyd Axworthy: I want to say that is the particular and important element presented in the budget last night. Our Minister of Finance has spent the last several months talking to Canadians from all walks of live-labour, business and Government. He has talked to people from one region to the other. That has provided a comprehensive reflection of the basic desires of Canadians and the kind of direction and thrust they want to see in the economic platform and blueprint for this country. The particular genius of this budget is that it really is reflective of the Canadian context. It is a made-in-Canada budget, based on the full scale contributions of Canadians from all walks of life. 1 want to point out that it is not, as the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap (Mr. Riis) was saying, a Conservative budget. Certainly we would not adopt the kind of callous disregard of social programs that the Conservatives have, where they totally and completely disregard any willingness to support job creation programs, where they have adopted Reaganomics which simply cut back various forms of medicare. They only have to follow the leadership of their Conservative brethren in Alberta who are adding on user-fees and additional restraints on medicare budgets. That is not the Liberal way of doing things. But neither, Mr. The Budget-Mr. Axworthy
Speaker, are we prepared to follow what seems to be the made-in-Sweden philosophy supported by the New Democratic Party-


Ian Gardiner Waddell: You are not any different from Reagan.


Lloyd Axworthy: -which seems to have a totally controlled society, organized by big power blocs, where they get together and made those arrangements between themselves.
I think this budget was based upon a very open consultation with Canadians and the answer was very clear. It was given in the very first statement of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde): We want to create jobs. We do not want people living on welfare benefits. We want them to go back to work, and at a time when we are facing a terrible economic period. We have all seen its ravages and we all know the personal tragedy that Canadians have experienced.
We are all aware of how important work has become to Canadians. It is not simply a matter of a means of income; it is a way of establishing one's identity, sense of purpose and position in the family and community. Therefore the job is important both in how it gives a useful and meaningful existence to a person and in what it represents in terms of the use of a person's talents and skills.
That is why I have been disappointed not to have received the co-operation from the Members of the Opposition for the number of initiatives we have taken to try to get people back to work. Those initiatives includes such programs as work sharing, which is now in effect in approximately 13,000 factories and industries across Canada. But all we hear from the NDP and others is that it is taking income away from people. It is true that some incomes are reduced by some 10 per cent, but there are over 100,000 workers who have kept jobs that otherwise would have disappeared had it not been for that program.
I would ask the Hon. Member for Winnipeg-St. James (Mr. Keeper), who is sitting there in his corner and was so critical of the program, to go to Thompson, Manitoba, in our Province and talk to the United Steel Workers local in that City where 2,700 people are back to work at Inco because of the work sharing program.


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lloyd Axworthy: Let him go back there and tell them that they did not benefit from it. I would like to see if he has the courage to tell them that this is a make-nothing program. They are back to work and their families are happy and satisfied because that company is back in business again.
I would like to say at the same time that the thrust of this budget is not to latch on to one single panacea. Canadians have recognized, and it is reflected in the budget, that there is no one magical solution. It is necessary to work on a variety of economic fronts and it is particularly important to be careful to examine the economic reality which exists. There is no point

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Axworthy
trying to paint a fantasy picture. We must face the reality. What the Minister of Finance has proposed is a budget that will provide a major lift to recovery in the private sector. Not only does this budget provide a number of incentives, tax credits and write-offs for industrial investment and provide for an extension of loans for small business, farmers and fishermen; it also addresses what I think is a very clear message to Canadians, which is the necessity to change the mood and atmosphere of the country and begin to say that we can be on the road to recovery. That is why it was so important to inject through the capital budget program a very clear and strong signal that things will happen in this country and there will be economic movement and activity.
Those types of projects have the double purpose of bringing an economic enzyme into the system to begin a resurgence of activity while at the same time providing direct work for professional architects, engineers and construction workers and ultimately to place in the economy a new capital infrastructure. There will be research centres, transportation centres and new facilities and structures in mines and forestry.
Would Hon. Members in the Opposition deny that this is not an investment in the future? Would they deny that we need new bridges and airports and roads? I know the Members in the New Democratic Party deny the necessity for good transportation because they oppose the $16 billion new capital investment in the western railway system and the 300,000 jobs that will go along with it. I realize that they are stuck with the old alliances that they cannot break away from, but that is their political problem and one which we understand and sympathize with.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: That is why your Party did so well in Manitoba.


Lloyd Axworthy: The fact of the matter is that we hope the Conservatives, who have some more sense, will recognize that coupled with that investment is the chance over the next three years to introduce new facilities, factories and an infrastructure in this country which would allow goods to move to the market and allow manufacturers to draw upon new research opportunities. That is the signal that had to be relayed to the private sector, and not only in terms of direct assistance to them since it is the engine that must move the economy.
We cannot socialize everything as the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap would have us do. We cannot nationalize all the economies as he would recommend. We must rely upon the private sector and use it as an engine of recovery. Therefore we recognize the need to work in partnership with the private sector. At the same time we also recognize that it takes time to get the engine moving toward that destination.
Therefore to complement investment in the private sector through both the special recovery programs and the various tax incentives, the Minister has also tried to provide a major investment in directing employment programs. He was quite correct when he said last night that we will be investing more money in direct employment programs than at any time in the history of this country.
Let me cite some figures so that Canadians will recognize their significance. I address this particularly to the Member for St. John's East who is new to his job and will be able to use some of this information to good purpose. In my department alone, aside from what is happening in the housing department and other areas, we will be providing over 300,000 direct employment places for Canadians as a result of this budget. The Minister of Finance has given us the resources to add an additional 126,000 jobs for Canadians.
When the Hon. Member for Kamloops-Shuswap says they are not interested in that, I would ask him why he is not interested in our providing something like an additional 400 or 500 jobs in his riding alone. Is he telling those 400 or 500 workers in his riding who are now working on NEED programs and summer youth programs that he is against them and does not want them working? Is he saying that he does not pay attention to them? Is that what he is telling those 400 or 500 people in his riding who are now working as a result of federal Government job-creation programs?
I would suggest to him that considering the number of letters he has sent me asking for more money under our programs, it would seem that he is talking from both sides of his mouth and not giving us credit for what we are doing. I do not think that this shows honesty. If we are to see an economic recovery we have to be honest with the Canadian people.
Those Members have an easy answer. They say it is to extend Unemployment Insurance benefits. What a wonderful solution! We carefully considered that but what the Hon. Member may not recognize is that the Unemployment Insurance Fund is a contributory fund of workers, business as well as Government. We consulted those other partners to the fund last fall and showed them that if we were to provide an extension of benefits of some 26 weeks it would cost an extra $5 billion to the UI fund. There is the Member, indeed Members from both Parties, saying that we cannot afford to take more money from the consumers' pockets, but he is advocating an extension that would take $5 billion out of their program. It is like dancing on one foot, then the other, and then ending up with both feet in mid-air on no solid ground at all.
Let us get rid of that fallacy and return to what we are doing under the NEED Program where we now have $800 million invested to help people who are exhausting their Unemployment Insurance benefits. Incidentally, I am pleased to report that as a result of those progams the rate of exhaustion is far less than what we initially forecast in our own study. Whereas we forecast a rate of 60,000 or 70,000 over the past several months, it has really been closer to 45,000 or 50,000. While we are putting those people back to work the Hon. Member says that he does not like the make-work projects and does not want people raking grass or painting gravestones. I would point out that in his own Province of British Columbia over 60 per cent of the applications under the NEED Program are from private sector firms. They are modernizing their factories and expanding their facilities.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: That is nonsense.
April 20, 1983


Lloyd Axworthy: As a result, they are not only creating short-term jobs but long-term jobs for the future. I suggest it is the responsibility of Members of Parliament from British Columbia to return there, see what is happening and discover the realities, instead of coming to the House and going through a great deal of puffery without having the facts.
We also felt it was particularly important to address the job needs of young people. Therefore we have introduced in the budget a new youth employment strategy that will combine a number of elements dealing directly with the particular employment requirements of first-time workers coming into the job market who will need assistance to get their first job and establish a track record.
As we have pointed out in the past, in the training program under the National Training Act over 125,000 people under the age of 24 are presently enrolled. The figure is 125,000. I want to repeat that number so we can register the figure in the minds of Members of the Opposition.
In addition to that, we recognize there were special needs in the youth employment market. The most important was to give young people the opportunity to be on the job and get training at the same time. Therefore, we have introduced a new program called the intern program. This will provide a combination of wage subsidies to small business people in particular that will encourage them to hire young people on the job, give them a period of training and allow them to get the combination of work experience and training. This will give them a solid foundation in the job market. We will be introducing this program after consulting with business people and with young people themselves. I am pleased to say that we will be holding a major national conference on employment for young people, inviting young people from across the country this summer to discuss the matter with them. If this program is successful, we will be able to utilize it in a much broader variety of ways. It will provide in its initial phase over 35,000 jobs for young people on the job with on-the-job training.
In addition to that, we have provided major inserts for the Department of National Defence to enable it to bring people into that department's bases and give them training and also to provide opportunities in Katimavik in those areas.
We now have in place the ability to combine training, jobs and job core experience that will bring together counselling and guidance in a residential framework. We think we can honestly go forward to Canadian young people and say to them that we have put in place a strategy. If they would work with us we will be able to tackle not just the immediate crisis, not just the problem of the here and now, but the long-term problem facing young people. We recognize it is not simply a product of the recession; it is something that is endemic in the way the labour market works. What we are doing now is working with the Provinces and other partners in the economy to try to provide a much broader based youth program across Canada to give young people that kind of assistance.
The Budget-Mr. Axworthy
In light of those new reforms we also felt it would be very helpful to consolidate many of the existing job programs which my department runs into three or four basic programs and to provide new funding for them. This will give us one program that will direct itself at counter-cyclical programs to provide for a response to areas of the country where there is high unemployment when there is a sudden recession, and so provide some backstop to that.
Second, it will enable us to invest in the longer term in regions where there is chronic unemployment. This is a country of great diversity. We must, in particular, help small communities in rural areas that face difficulties and do not have the same opportunities for new technology, new expansion and new business. I am speaking of areas like my friend's region of New Brunswick about which he has talked so much, parts of Quebec, northern Ontario and the northern parts of western Canada. We will provide long-term development employment funds in those areas to give people and communities a chance to plan proper employment programs. That is another part of the employment strategy.
Finally, I want to say that in addressing those issues we are tabling for the interest and response for Members of Parliament and the public a major document which is a perspective on employment for the 1980s. It will outline the framework of an employment strategy that we think will meet both the immediate problems of employment as well as the long-term structural employment problems. It will be our hope that this particular document will provide the basis for an honest debate in the country. We set out job figures where we see the job market going. We put forward how we see the Government, the private sector and labour working in partnership to solve these problems.
Therefore I request the unanimous consent of the House to table a document entitled "Perspective on Employment: A Labour Market Policy Framework for the 1980s". I also request unanimous consent that this document be referred to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration without debate. If the House agrees, I will be prepared at an opportunity next week to start debating this important document with my colleagues so that we continue to create jobs for Canadians in the time ahead.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order, please. The House has heard a request from the Minister of Employment and Immigration to table a document and for its reference to the Standing Committee on Labour, Manpower and Immigration.
Is there unanimous consent for the Minister's proposal?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Agreed and so ordered. Questions?


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, according to the projections of the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) last night, the level of employment in Canada will drop from 10,574,000 jobs in 1982

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Axworthy
to 10,511,000 in 1983, for a loss of 63,000 jobs. Yet the level of unemployment will rise from 1,305,000 in 1982 to 1,487,000 in 1983, for an increase of 182,000. The Minister failed to address this question today.
Given the fact-and the Minister talked about this in his speech-that the budget calls for an expenditure of $1,484 billion in terms of direct job creation, surely the Minister must be able to tell the House how many jobs we can expect these new job creation funds will create this year. I tell him not to talk about the 600,000 projection over two years, which is really talking about restoring jobs in the economy. We are talking here about direct job creation.


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I will be very pleased to answer that question. It is a very straightforward one and deserves a straightforward answer. The actual expenditures of our Department as a result of the budget last night which added an additional $375 million in expenditures will take the total employment development expenditures to approximately $1.6 billion and will provide employment opportunities for over
300.000	Canadians. That is the simple result of the kind of expenditure pattern that we are now offering through the auspices of my Department.
I would caution the Hon. Member to recognize that that is not the exclusive initiative being taken by the Government. In the budget itself there are a number of initiatives in the housing area that will provide immediate stimulus. There is the commitment to provide a number of new jobs through the capital recovery program. There are also a number of new jobs being provided by the private sector itself and the improved environment that we will be able to provide to bring those jobs on stream.
It is our commitment to provide over 300,000 employment opportunities and places through the expenditures of the Department of Manpower and Immigration. I suggest this has provided a major source of stability, a major source of help and a major source of bridging for people in this country this year and next.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, could the Minister be more specific? For example, let us take the NEED Program. According to the budget, we are talking about $180 million in new money going into the NEED Program on top of the $500 million allocated last year. The Minister himself will tell us that the NEED Program, with a target of 50,000 jobs for half a billion dollars, has thus far created, according to the latest figures, and I stand to be corrected, only 27,000 jobs. We have
27.000	jobs in the NEED Program, notwithstanding the fact that this is a half billion dollar program. This program started last November and it was targeted to those in dire straits. In other words, it was supposed to help those Unemployment Insurance exhaustees right away, yet it has taken this while to create 27,000 jobs.
Where are the 300,000 jobs the Minister is talking about? Are these 300,000 jobs to be created this year as a result of the direct job creation expenditures for which the Minister is responsible?


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I will be very pleased to try to clarify the situation for the Hon. Member.
First, let us examine the NEED Program itself. When the Minister of Finance announced the $500 million expenditure last October, he expressed the hope that we would be able to take those sums and multiply them by having matching funds from the Province, municipalities and other sponsors. I was engaged to go forward and develop that program. As a result of negotiations we were able to sign agreements with the Provinces which have added an additional $200 million to the program. Further to that, we have also discovered that under the NEED Program additional funds are coming in from individual sponsors. The municipalities, on average, are adding another 25 per cent. The private sector, and this is perhaps the most exciting part, is matching the funds by almost 50 per cent.
This is why we are putting a particular emphasis on accepting proposals by smaller firms, because where we are spending $1 they will spend $1. Thus we are getting money back into the economy again.
The Hon. Member has an example in his own riding with the Erco Industries which I believe is spending something like $6 million. We are putting in $.5 million, and the result is that we will create over 100 additional jobs. Not only that, but that company will have a basic modernization of its facilities. There is a living example in his own riding which he could utilize. That has been the whole purpose of the NEED Program. It is our estimate that under NEED we will create closer to 80,000 jobs.
Also the Hon. Member has to recognize that there are other job programs as well. The Canada Community Development Program created 50,000 employment places this year. Summer Youth Employment will create over 75,000 jobs. The Program for the Employment-Disadvantaged has 20,000 enrolled in it. The list goes on. There are a number of those kinds of programs. By the way, that is one of the reasons I will be consolidating those programs over the next couple of months so that perhaps we will not have quite the same confusion the next time the Hon. Member and I have this kind of exchange.


Douglas Grinslade Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister. In the budget the Government has allowed for $100 million so that laid-off workers will continue to receive Unemployment Insurance benefits while doing voluntary work on community projects. I can see the reason behind that, and personally I support it.
There is a situation occurring in ridings all across the country where Canadians are laid off and they apply at the Manpower office. The Manpower office does not have jobs for them, so in turn they enrol in a course of their own choice and pay tuition at community colleges to be either retrained or receive additional training. When they do that, they find that the same office which cannot find them jobs cuts them off benefits because they are not available for work.
April 20, 1983

Is this not the same type of example? We have Canadians who want to be retrained or want to learn something, yet they need their Unemployment Insurance benefits while they are going to school. Is there really a difference between going to school and learning something and working on a community project?


Lloyd Axworthy: Mr. Speaker, I think that is an important question. Let me first clarify one statement made by the Hon. Member for Simcoe North (Mr. Lewis). Section 38 of the Unemployment Insurance Act has proven to be a very helpful support for many workers. It is not putting people back on voluntary work. In fact, if the Hon. Member looks at the program, he will find there are some 15,000 people over the past year who have been employed under Section 38. Most of that employment has been in resource-based industries such as mining, forestry and fishing. In Ontario the program has been largely taken up. There are people in Ontario, British Columbia and in other areas who are investing their labour and efforts in developing new productive uses of facilities. They are doing a lot of seed work, environmental clean-ups and so on. The work is not purely voluntary. It is designed for resource-based industries.
On the question of training, the fact is that a large number of people enrolled in training programs indeed receive Unemployment Insurance benefits. I forget the exact figures. I do not have them here, but I believe that some 25,000 people have received about $200 million of Unemployment Insurance benefits as income when enrolled in programs. The difference between them and the person in the circumstances the Hon. Member described is that the courses are assigned through the employment centre. The reason for doing that is that we have to maintain some control. Under the Act we have to confirm that a person is eligible for work or is enrolled in a legitimate training program. If someone simply on his or her own cognizance signs up for a training program and does not let us know or does not do it through our system, we do not know whether or not they are eligible for work. There really has to be a control mechanism to ensure that the Unemployment Insurance Program is not abused. That is the reason for doing it. I undertake to provide a more detailed answer to the Hon. Member. I will send him a letter as soon as I can to explain the procedure.


Ian Gardiner Waddell: Mr. Speaker, the Minister singled out the NEED Program as an example of job creation. I just returned from a visit to southwestern Ontario, the industrial heartland of Canada. I met with local councils, officials and businessmen. I was told that the NEED Program was totally inadequate and bureaucratic. I was told that they were short-term jobs and were limited to people who were exhaustees of Unemployment Insurance-about 27,000 or 28,000 jobs and about 600,000 exhaustees, and they were low paid to boot. Does the Minister agree with some of the jobs under the NEED Program, such as the counting of dogs in Windsor? Does he think that that is a good short-term job? What about university graduates who have been retrained, incidentally,
The Budget-Mr. Stevens
and are gathering brush in St. Catharines? Is that the kind of job in which he believes?
The Minister mentioned the private sector as being the engine of economic growth. I was told in southwestern Ontario that the private sector is mainly controlled by American businesses and that they were sucking out all the jobs from southwestern Ontario. If the Minister really believes in full employment, does he not agree that we must make some fundamental changes to the Canadian economy to bring it about?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: The Minister has 30 seconds in which to answer.


Lloyd Axworthy: I would just say that, unlike the comments of the Hon. Member for Vancouver-Kingsway (Mr. Waddell), we have a number of Members of Parliament from southwestern Ontario with whom I spoke who are coming in with proposals for new community centres, new industrial parks and new water and sewage systems for their communities. They are producing good, solid projects, not the fuzzy-wuzzy ones he mentioned. I do not think he has been travelling in southwestern Ontario. He is off on another trip somewhere.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, I am sorry our time ran out so quickly as far as questions for the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Axworthy) are concerned. I certainly had a few questions I wanted to put to him. I noticed that in his speech he said it was time to be honest with the Canadian public. I would have liked to ask him whether he really feels his colleague, the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), was honest last night when he stated in his budget speech:
Over 600,000 more Canadians are expected to be working at the end of 1984 than at the end of 1982.
He did not make clear to the public that, as is reflected in The Economic Outlook for Canada tabled last night at page 16, in 1983 the amount of employment will actually fall over half of 1 per cent. In short, what they have disguised in the budget is that this year, on average there will be fewer people working than were working even last year, and last year the number of employed fell 3.5 per cent.
I would have simply asked the Minister whether he felt it was being honest with the Canadian public to gloss over the fact that the Government is not increasing employment this year as the budget would imply with the word "recovery". They anticipate that employment will fall this year, not go up. I notice the Minister is walking out of the House. I only hope that he is unemployed in the not too distant future as so many other Canadians are at present.
Perhaps we lose sight sometimes in these debates of how grossly inaccurate the Government has been with respect to what future it holds out to the Canadian public. It was not that long ago, in November 1981, that we in the House heard the budget of the then Minister of Finance, commonly referred to as the November 18, 1981 budget of the Minister of Finance. It may be wise for the record to remember what we were told

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Stevens
at that time about the current period. The 1974 to 1980 figures, averages and those types of things, were revealed. Incidentally, in last night's overview, The Economic Outlook for Canada, they have carefully set the past aside. We do not have those figures. All they are doing is playing with certain projections for the future.
What I would point out is that in November, 1981, we were told that in 1982 employment in this country would grow 1.8 per cent. In reality, it fell 3.2 per cent. We were told that in 1983 employment would grow 1.7 per cent. In reality, if we believe the statement of the Minister of Finance last night, it is going to fall 0.6 per cent, over one half of 1 per cent.
There is something I would have loved to have been able to ask the Minister of Employment and Immigration. I see the Minister of Finance is in the Chamber. Perhaps he could ask for unanimous consent to answer my second question. It is simply this: Why were we told in November, 1981 that the labour force would grow 2.8 per cent last year when in reality it fell 0.5 per cent? Why is there that 3 point discrepancy? Did those people simply get lost? Did they all suddenly die? Did they disappear? Did they emmigrate? What happened?
We know what happened. There were no jobs for them. We anticipated the labour force was going to grow 2.5 per cent. It was no surprise for the Government of the day. The fact is it failed the people of Canada. They failed those who ended up on the unemployment list or, worse still, gave up looking for a job.
Most important, why were we told in 1981 that this year the labour force would grow 2.2 per cent when last night we were told it will actually fall by 1 per cent? What happened to those people? We are talking about hundreds of thousands of Canadians who, it was anticipated in November, 1981, would be joining the labour force. Now we are being told that they have suddeny disappeared.
What I am suspicious of, having lived so long with this Government and knowing its deceptions, sophistry and lack of honesty, and what is happening is it is massaging the figures, as economists like to say. It is assuming that the labour force growth will be smaller and, of course, arithmetically that means unemployment may look better.
If you want to go on to this question of unemployment, we were told in November of 1981 that unemployment in the country in 1982 would be 7.8 per cent of the work force. In fact, it turned out to be 11.1 per cent. In 1981 we were told that this year we would see 8.3 per cent of the work force unemployed, roughly what the United States is experiencing. In fact, we find it is an astounding 12.4 per cent due to the gross incompetence of this Government.
If we believe the Minister, and I do not recommend that Canadians believe him, but if they choose to believe what the Minister said last night, the unemployment rate will be 11.4 per cent next year. In November, 1981, the Minister's predecessor told us it would only be 8.3 per cent. Who can you believe? I believe that the figures presented last night were deceptive. They are not an accurate reflection of what the
Government honestly believes. Likely, some Members of this House will rise on another day simply to ask questions such as I am asking this afternoon. One is: why can a Government with all the mandarins it has around, the thousands and thousands of calculator pushers, not get more accurate information as to where we are heading?
I could give many more examples of what appears to have been the most unbelievable, almost optimistic projections in earlier budgets that in reality have gone to ashes because, as time has demonstrated, this Government does not know what it is doing.
Let me touch on one other matter, that is, productivity. I was rather surprised to find that that is not even commented on as far as estimates of increases in productivity are concerned. The Government has just buried them. In earlier budgets at least it took a guess at what productivity would do in the sense of going up or down. This time it makes no comment.
I found something most startling in reviewing the budgetary papers yesterday. We in this country have lived with the difficulties of Crown corporations, including the $125 million write-off with respect to Consolidated Computer Corporation. Not only have we sustained that write-off, but we have never had an explanation given to the House as to what went wrong. The internal investigation that took place has never been openly tabled or revealed in this House. Notwithstanding the growing scandalous nature of what is happening in Canadair, this House has never had a meaningful debate on Canadair.
Other than $1 items, letters of comfort, one thing and another, we have never been consulted with regard to whether the public would like us to support that company. We now find that our exposure may reach somewhere between $1.8 billion and $2.3 billion. Notwithstanding all the other fundings that the Government may be anticipating in the current year and subsequent years with respect to de Havilland, CDC, Canadian National Railways, Air Canada and all these other entities, there is not one word mentioned in the budget brought in last night by the Minister of Finance as to what in fact will be the financial requirements for all of those companies.
As the Auditor General has pointed out, those companies collectively employ hundreds of thousands of people. They are virtually like a Government underneath the Government. Can you believe this? The Government that has the nerve through the Minister of Employment and Immigration to suggest that it is time to be honest with the Canadian people is the same Government that brought in a budget without giving any information concerning the estimated financial needs of hundreds and hundreds of Crown corporations that we now live with.
Since I have been in the House of Commons, I have found it interesting to see how that has evolved. I remember the good old days-it looks that way now-in the early seventies when it was taken for granted that whatever a Crown corporation had to raise was part of the financial requirements of the budget and was reflected as such in the budgetary papers. I
April 20, 1983

remember a budget in which, much to my surprise, it was not reflected in the normal line; it became a footnote. The Government said the financial requirements would be, let us say, $10 billion, and there was a little footnote which said that in addition there would be another $2 billion for various Crown corporations.
Last night they went all the way. They just forgot it. It is no place to be seen. When the Minister indicates that the deficit is going to be $31.2 billion, as he did in his budget, he is omitting to take into account how that might be increased by deficits of various Crown corporations. Some Members may feel I made a mistake when 1 said $31.2 billion because, as we know, there was an addendum last night. There was an addendum. Quite negligently, if you like, the Minister of Finance waved his budget around prior to its being delivered yesterday evening. He waved it around in the midst of many press people, including those with TV cameras. As a result, there was a very substantial leak with respect to the budget to be delivered yesterday.
What was the response of this Minister of Finance? Mr. Speaker, I could cite precedents on this type of thing. As an example, a comparable Minister of Finance simply walked into the lobby at Westminster, mentioned to a press man that he should buy a package of cigarettes, and then delivered a budget in which he increased the tax on those cigarettes. A news story ran indicating that there was to be a tax on cigarettes. The following day that Minister felt sufficiently embarrassed to resign, and his Prime Minister accepted that resignation.
Mr. Speaker, that occurred at a time when honour meant something, at a time when a Minister would feel that there are traditions and conventions that a parliamentary democracy must abide by and that must be observed. But what happened last evening? I will ask all Members to note that the Minister, in his budget speech, admitted that he leaked information. It is true that he said in an offhand way that the press should not have done it. But he admits that several pages of his budget speech were filmed.
The Minister's reply is not, "I have made a mistake and must resign". His reply is, "I am going to fudge it. I will within a 24-hour period, pretend that I had always thought that there was another $100 million and maybe another $50 million and then another $50 million that I should be spending, and I am just going to change everything to ensure that that happens." This is where he got caught out, though. He was caught out because he felt that the inclusion of his little addendum was presumably all he had to do.
I can see somebody in the Department of Finance saying, "Yes, but what about all the budgetary papers that you have to table?" So they got some fellow who apparently had a pen to try desperately to make all ink changes in the various tables and pages that had to be filed in order to back up the Minister's cover-up of his leak of the budget to the press.
The Budget-Mr. Stevens
For those who have not taken the trouble to go to the Table and look at those papers, let me tell you about them. For example, this is page six of the fiscal plan. Look at those ink changes. Does it look as if it came from a Government that has matters under control? Does it look as if it came from a Government which, through its Minister of Finance, can say, "We know exactly what this economy needs. These are the measures I am putting in place. Have confidence in me and my Prime Minister and the Government. I know where I am going"? That looks more as if one of the chickens of my farm had walked all over it. You can hardly read the inked-in portions that are found written over the typed portion, the same portion, incidentally, that the press had an opportunity to see. It has been inked over in order to make it appear as though what the press thought was the budget and what in reality was the budget was in fact not the budget.
That is not where it stops. We find that there are gross errors in what that poor person who was asked to ink in the changes ended up doing. I ask you to look at page 16 of the fiscal plan. You will find there that while the Minister said with a straight face, "Under a thing called the special recovery capital project, I am going to add $100 million this year, $50 million next year and $50 million the year after", in table 2.3 something went wrong, only $40 million was added for next year. Who is right? Was the Minister simply caught off guard? Is the error going to be rectified?
In response to a question put by myself to the Minister today, the Minister said, "If there are corrections to be made, I would be pleased if the Member would send me over a photostat of his changes, and if things are wrong, I will surely correct them".
Mr. Speaker, I do not mind helping this Minister out. God knows he needs the help. Would it not be much better, though, if the whole bunch of them were swept out of power and somebody took over who knows how to run the financial affairs of Canada?


Some Hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: The Minister negligently leaked a substantial part of his budget, in fact, as far as bond markets are concerned, almost a crucial part of his budget. That was the question of how big the deficit is going to be. A Minister who has erred so grossly that he must now be corrected almost page by page because of his errors in tabling a document in the House is surely not someone on whom Canada's world confidence will be built upon.
Just let me take you a little further, Mr. Speaker. Leaf over to page 41. You will find that the deficit is recorded at $28.2 billion for fiscal 1984, $24.7 billion in 1985, and $20.6 billion in 1986. Every one of those figures is wrong. If they are not right, then I must say that the budget is also wrong.
In short, the Minister, between his left-handed budget and his right-handed delivery of these documents to the Table, does not know what each hand has done.

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Maltais
As an example, I direct you to page 42. There are more errors-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: I regret to interrupt the Hon. Member but I must inform him that the time provided for his speech has expired.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: May I just take one minute to sum up?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Blaker):: Is there unanimous consent to allow the Hon. Member to continue?


Some Hon. Members:: Agreed.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Thank you, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the Hon. Members for giving me a little more time. Hopefully it is the truth that they like to hear, and they would like to hear a little more of it.
I would refer Hon. Members to page 45 of the same fiscal plan. There it is said that the total expenditures contemplated for this year are $100,100,000,000. Can you believe it? That is almost $2 billion a week that the Minister has us spending. When he took over, the expenditures were $10 billion for a full year. Now they are up to ten times that amount in fiscal 1984. But he says that the amount of total expenditures in 1984 will be $100,100,000,000. Next year they will be $105,900,000,000, and the next year he says they will be $112,700,000,000. Oddly enough, if we are to believe the Minister's budget speech, every one of those figures is wrong. Who is right?
Finally, Mr. Speaker, if you wish more knowledge of the errors made by this Minister, I would recommend that you read page 46. It contains quite a few errors. In short, we have found dozens of errors in the statistical information that has been offered as backup to this budget.
It is not only that the Minister does not know what he is doing, it is not only that $200 million has been added, but he does not know where he will spend it. The hard fact is on that side of the House no one knows where they are going in an economic sense. Unfortunately it is the Canadian public, through the loss of jobs, the high taxation, the almost unbearable interest rates we have had to live with since they took over, who has to pay the sad penalty.


Mr. Andre Maltais (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce and Minister of Regional Economic Expansion):: Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise today in order to comment on the Budget speech that was given yesterday. Indeed, I believe Canadians have been waiting for a long time for a budget that would be really structured and which would focus on job creation. Moreover, I come from an area which is severely distressed today, namely the North Shore, where we have to deal daily not with statistics but with people. A minute ago, I was listening to the Hon. Member for York-Peel (Mr. Stevens) who pointed out so-called statistical errors in some of the papers that have been introduced. It is all
very well to engage in rhetoric or academic work, but it is much more important to work directly with people in order to ascertain whether action taken actually brings about a solution to a given problem, that is, unemployment.
I especially want to congratulate the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde), Mr. Speaker, for acting on what people have been telling him for the past six or seven months. The Minister met and consulted with every group in our society, with the organized and non-organized, to ensure that the budget would truly respond to the expectations of Canadians. Of course it was impossible to respond to everyone's expectations to the same extent, but if we listen to what people are saying in Canada today, it seems the Minister has put his finger on the problem and taken the right approach to solving it.
What did the Minister of Finance actually propose, Mr. Speaker? He proposed, first of all, a series of measures that will provide $2.4 billion for direct job creation, and he also provided for $2.4 billion for the private sector, to stimulate the economy. That is what the Minister of Finance did last night. Of course people can talk about the deficit and say they would have acted differently, but when the Minister of Finance identified the two main aspects of his budget, he said with respect to direct job creation and public spending that the purpose was to create infrastructures and public facilities that would be used by future generations. That is what I call productive investment, and the Opposition should understand this. It is easy to say: they are going to spend for the sake of spending, but the Minister of Finance clearly said, and it is there in his budget, that these were projects planned for the next ten, fifteen or twenty years, and instead, they will be started this year in order to provide jobs.


An Hon. Member:: And the debt!


André Maltais: I heard the Member opposite tell the House: And the debt! Remember the New Deal in the United States! What did they do after the Great Depression in the United States? They introduced a very similar policy, that is, they spend public funds on public facilities that would be used for many years. That is a very important point.
I feel I am on very familiar ground here, Mr. Speaker, because as I said before, I live in an area that has been severely affected by the economic situation, not because of the President of the Iron Ore Company, not because of the present Government, but because of the depressed state of the world market for iron ore. However, we are eagerly awaiting a capital project that will help develop and diversify industry in the region, and I am referring to a National Harbours Board project. I hope it is included in the 100 projects the Minister is expected to announce within the next few weeks. However, without the clear thinking of the Government and the Minister of Finance and without the Government's help, would our people be prepared to accept proposals from an Opposition that is saying that this is not the right approach? During the
April 20, 1983

past year I have been travelling throughout my riding since the various lay-offs have taken place, to find out what people want. That was drawn repeatedly to the attention of the Minister of Finance. Last night, I must say that I recognized myself in the budget speech. Today, I received numerous phone calls in my constituency office as well as in my office in Ottawa from people in my region saying: "For some time, we have had unemployment problems and no hope. Last night, the Minister of Finance not only gave us hope, but he said that he would take action. Right now, the top priority is to take action, not to keep talking and repeating that one is going to try."
The Minister was quite specific when he said that more than 100 projects had been selected and were ready to be implemented. What does that mean, 100 projects selected and ready to be implemented? We have to translate that statement into real terms. Surely, from a theoretical point of view, this does not mean much. But if we decide in my region to build airports, harbours, shipways, it makes a lot of sense in fishing areas. It means orders for concrete, nails, wood and stone. It means new found pride for the workers, hope for their families and first and foremost, security. That is what it means in real terms. If such projects are implemented all over the country, it will mean in Toronto, Vancouver, Winnipeg, Quebec City, Sherbrooke, everywhere, in the Lac-Saint-Jean area new initiatives taking shape, which will in turn allow those communities to organize in order to improve public infrastructures that the Minister has set himself to priorize in his budget. That is what it means in actual terms. It means that businessmen and contractors can already hope to see their machinery in operation and that workers will be rehired. That is what it means. It also means that young Canadians will be able to carry on their studies, knowing that their parents will work and be able to pay part of the expenses. It means creating a psychological environment favourable to work and security. That is what the country needed and what Canadians were asking the Minister of Finance to do in a budget. Those are not expenditures selected at random in the country. Those expenditures were planned. It is important to point out that those were planned expenditures, either by federal ministers or by various Crown corporations. Therefore, no improvisation there. Moreover, the Minister was perfectly clear about these projects last night, when he stated, as reported on page 3:
More than a hundred subjects have been selected. They are in the advanced planning stage.
So, Hon. Members opposite are wrong when they suggest that these projects were hastily put together. As a matter of fact, they had been submitted to Treasury Board a year or a year and a half ago, and if they had not been approved, it is not because they were not good enough, but merely because of lack of funds.
This means that in my own area of Sept-Iles-Port-Cartier, the local Chamber of Commerce, town councils and industrial planners will be able to suggest ways for private industries to set up shop on these public structures. In this context, it was
The Budget-Mr. Maltais
wonderful of the Minister of Finance to announce that he was offering up to $2.4 billion in tax credit to small and medium size corporations to help them expand, streamline their operation or recoup their losses of the past two years due to recession. That is what these corporations in our area had been asking for. Having run too many bills and with the high level of interest rates they lacked the necessary cash flow to grow and to keep up with their daily operations. Thanks to the measures which the Minister of Finance has just announced, business people are getting exactly what they wanted. This was evidenced in the comments made by business people to the news media; they all said this budget is one of the finest of the past decade as far as the private sector and the business community are concerned. Members opposite have constantly asked the Government to take steps which would not only help the private sector but would also stimulate the economy. We find that more specifically in the budget which is aimed at young people. It is meant for young people who assuredly could not be ignored. Whenever we talk with parents, we realize what it means to young people. Not more than 15 minutes ago, I was talking with the Mayor of Gagnon, Mr. Coicou. He was quite pleased to hear that the projects announced in the budget could also be implemented in this area and you cannot imagine what he asked me. How strange that real life should be so different from what goes on in this House of Commons. He asked me whether it would be possible to add a small amount of $15,000 to $21,000 to create jobs for students because the Sidbec-Normines company is not hiring anyone this year in Gagnon and he explained how this would relieve his municipal council and heads of families to know that their young people could have summer jobs that would allow them to go out at Gagnon to attend the community college in Sept-Iles or various Canadian universities. That is what he asked me and this is no begging. He was asking that on behalf of his community. This is something positive and this is what people want, they want to work. We have to give them the means to do so. The budget contains novel proposals for putting people to work and that is no improvisation nor wasting of public funds. It is an investment in the future, in public infrastructures and in young people who will be allowed to find some work there.
We should consider the various measures, Mr. Speaker, and referring to the Katimavik program I remember quite well when the Government formed by the party opposite wanted to scrap that program. I would have liked to refer to the testimonies of young people who are enjoying a special experience thanks to the Katimavik program and the Minister of Finance has earmarked $40 million for that program. In the first place it is a personality development program for Canadians and I think that Members from all sides of the House do agree with such a principle. Second, this program will enable our young

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Maltais
people to know their country and to find out about its opportunities. The main asset of a country is to make sure that the young are aware of the environment in which they will have to work, because Canada is not only the province of Quebec, the North coast, or Vancouver, it is the sum of all these regions, and the Katimavik program makes it possible.
On the subject of the Armed Forces, Mr. Speaker, how many young people or their parents have contacted their members as well as whether in the opposition or on the government side to find out what are their chances to get in the Armed Forces? For many of them, it is not only a last resort decision, but a choice, be they boys or girls. There are 17,000 of them who have already passed all the tests required by the Armed Forces and who are on a waiting list. The budget speech provides for 5,000 young people to be enrolled in the Armed Forces at a cost of $75 million. I think it can be said that this is a budget for the young. In addition, more than $300 million have been added to a training program for them. A team of experts is working together with the industry in order to help ease the difficult transition from school to the work place. It is a very interesting strategy which involves unions, business and non-organized labour. Young people must often be given at least an opportunity to enter the labour market. However when applying for a job with a company, and even a Crown Corporation, Mr. Speaker they are told that experience is a requirement, but they are never given the opportunity to acquire it.
The program introduced by the Minister of Finance will help ease this transition and will provide young people with job experience, the lack of which is often an impediment. This budget, I suggest, under the present circumstances is not only practical but down-to-earth and that is what was needed. Of course, it could have been based on all kinds of theories. This budget could be drafted in a completely different way, but would the results be any better? This is what I would like to hear from the other side. How could we put people back to work tomorrow morning? It would be interesting to hear something about this later on. For my part, I remember very well what happened when the Iron Ore company announced its lay-offs, Mr. Speaker. The First thing that the man who was then president of the company asked me . . . He came to Ottawa to meet the ministers concerned-and this shows, in my opinion, the gentlemanly attitude of Mr. Mulroney-and asked: What could the government do to help those who are laid off? He did not say that the company would pay. He came to ask for government assistance. In this regard, the budget provides assistance for the communities affected by all types of lay-offs.
Instead of taking a partisan attitude, Mr. Speaker, it would be interesting if the Hon. Members suggested additional solutions or better ones than those offered in the budget rather than being negative about every aspect of our proposals. It is obvious, Mr. Speaker, that more could have been done, and I would have been tempted myself to draw a caricature of
several reporters or cameramen taking pictures of the budget because one picture is worth $200 million, and this means more jobs. If we need such photos to create more jobs, let us take some, by all means, let us make a feature film! What people want is work. We should therefore be thankful to the cameraman who did what has been called an addition to the budget. I find it marvelous.
However, I do not want to belabour the point and I shall simply say that the budget truly reflects the needs of the people. It is what we need at this time. It is exactly the levelheaded formula that Canadian expected. I am convinced that within two months, there will be an extraordinary change of attitude in this country. Already today, we had phone calls from people who wanted to know if they were entitled to the homeownership grants. It is wonderful that the Minister of Finance thought of including this proposal because a home is often the most important security factor of a family, and most important, it represents equity for one's old age and the largest investment in the lifetime of an individual. And the Minister of Finance thought of it. He was sensitive to that need. In fact, the major characteristic of this budget is perhaps that it is sensitive to the needs of people. If we had to give a name to the budget, we would call it the action budget. That is what it is.
I am really looking forward to hearing the various Ministers begin to announce the programs which were proposed in the budget, Mr. Speaker. People will then be able to judge the budget by its results. They will realize that the budget offers something concrete. In this House, we often seem to be simply stating facts and developing frameworks, but for the people, it means hearing the noise of plants and seeing their smoke. In the past, there were many ecological complaints about the smell of manufactures. Nowadays, the smoke from a manufacture is like perfume, it is what people want to see, and the noise which bothered us in the past will now become a pleasant music to our ears. I believe that this is what people expect as a concrete result of this budget.
There would be a lot more to say, Mr. Speaker, because all kinds of measures could be set forth. But what I wanted to stress on this first day following the budget presentation is the expectations of people in my area. I wish Hon. Members could have a look at what is going on in my area, the change in attitudes between yesterday and today. People are beaming with hope, and a breeze of optimism is blowing over my constituency because the Minister has been so very sensitive to our people's expectations. Had the budget been of a different nature, I would not have hesitated to voice my feelings, and these would have been quite different had the budget not really reflected my constituents' expectations. And because I find in that budget almost exactly what my colleagues and I have been telling the Minister, we do commend him for his proposals. All I ask, because I see my time is up is that from the other side of the House co-operation be forthcoming for the adoption of ways that are of a creative and durable nature.
April 20, 1983


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, I followed the speech of the Hon. Member with great interest. Undoubtedly he has been following the financial affairs of his Government. I wonder if I could perhaps refer him to page 4. Perhaps he can explain to the constituencies to whom he is speaking why the employment growth in Canada was the worst of that in seven major industrial countries in 1982. In Canada it actually fell 3.3 per cent compared to a seven country average of less than 1 per cent. For example, Italy had no employment fall-off; the United Kingdom was the next worst at 3 per cent; France fell off less than 1 per cent; Germany, 1.8 per cent. Japan actually went up, and the U.S. went down slightly.
If we should be enthusiastic about our economy, and we all want to be enthusiastic, can he explain why this Government let us down so badly in 1982?


André Maltais: Mr. Speaker, the answer to that question is very simple. It is a matter of changing the economy. If on the North Shore, companies operating there had initially started the processing of raw materials, I think structurally our economy would be much stronger and would provide much better-paid and more durable employment. We would have a much stronger economy, an economy that would allow us much more easily to find solutions to those recession problems we have been facing. If industrialized nations like the United States and others have been able to get out of this more easily, Mr. Speaker, it was for reasons of structure and nothing else. In other terms, what this country still needs is further processing of raw materials. As I have often said to the presidents of Iron Ore and other companies, if our economic structures were more involved in processing operations we would have had still stronger results. This is an invitation to the Minister of Finance to add incentives for companies to process more raw materials in Canada, rather than having it done abroad.


Mr. Huntington:: Mr. Speaker, the Parliamentary Secretary mentioned that he had just had a conversation with, I believe, the mayor of his town, or at least a town in a district in his riding. Can he tell us if he is experiencing the same trouble we are having with the NEED Program out on the west coast where the unions serving the municipalities are not allowing the unemployed to be hired under that Program at less than union wages? This means that municipalities have to match dollar for dollar the NEED grants, which is an impossible thing for them to do under the present expenditure restraint programs in place. Are they experiencing the same thing in his part of the country?
[ Translation]


André Maltais: I welcome this question, Mr. Speaker, because currently on the North Shore there is a tremendous amount of co-operation between management, labour and governments. As I said earlier about my meeting or discussions with the
The Budget-Mr. Maltais
Mayor of Gagnon, Mr. Coicou, concerning the Summer Canada Program, and already the Minister of Finance has announced $70 million for that program, that part concerns students. As regards the other part which concerns laid-off employees, people that are out of work, what we are seeing now in Schefferville, where Iron Ore employees are currently being laid-off, and have been since the fall of 1982, is that the federal Government is keeping in operation Schefferville's recreation centre and ski centre. The people working on those projects are laid-off employees and they are paid by the Government. They preferred that to drawing unemployment insurance benefits and doing nothing. The union managers agreed with that formula, and I thank them for their cooperation. But I must point out, Mr. Speaker, that I went to Schefferville first to reach an agreement with them, to ensure that everything would be done according to standards, and actually, were it not for the federal presence in those areas, people would be facing real tragedy. In conclusion, I would stress that the Canadian government also will pay $4,500 to each family moving anywhere in Canada.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, my second question of course is prompted by the answer given by the Parliamentary Secretary to my first question as to why we have the worst employment growth or creation record of any of seven major countries. He said it was something to do with the North shore not processing enough material. Now, that may be so, I am not well acquainted with what happens on the North shore, but I was wondering if the Parliamentary Secretary, who has been a very supportive force behind this Government, could tell us why in November, 1981 his Government told the people of Canada that there would be an actual growth in employment in 1982 of 1.8 per cent. If all those factors he referred to were true, did they not foresee it? In short, why did we have a 5 per cent turnaround from a 1.8 per cent growth rate to a fall-off of 3.3 per cent?


André Maltais: Mr. Speaker, the question has something to do with the answer I gave earlier. The North shore is not the only issue here. When industrialization is highly advanced and the leading sectors very active, it is easier to create a lot more direct jobs than when the Canadian industry is based mostly on exports with very little processing of raw materials. That goes for regions other than the North shore. Let us take fisheries on the Pacific or the Atlantic. We would stand to benefit if we were to do more product processing, which in turn would boost the labour force growth rate, but we have a structural problem in this country. Our preference seems to be to export unprocessed raw materials so that our labour force is not highly skilled. As a result, countries such as the United States, France and even Japan process the products which create skilled jobs and enable them to have a higher growth rate than Canada can achieve. It is as simple as that.

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Maltais


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, in view of the sharp criticism the Parliamentary Secretary is making, is it not fair for this House and the Canadian public generally to take it as being critical of his Government, because after all it has been in power for 15 years and if we are not processing materials as much as we should be, surely the Government has to accept the responsibility for this sad performance? Is it fair to interpret his remarks as being most critical of his Government?
[ Translation]


André Maltais: Without seeking to be formally critical, Mr. Speaker, I fully endorse what has been done by the Liberal Party for many years. There is much to do to change all that.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, I was just wondering, though, in saying "there is much to do to change all that", could the Hon. Member indicate whether he has any slight reservation concerning his Government when we find that not only did employment fall but Canada had the worst growth of any of the 24 member states of OECD last year? Does he not feel that is a pretty bad reflection on the Government he has chosen to support?


André Maltais: Mr. Speaker, may I say simply that the Government is doing an outstanding job and will have to keep up its good work. I am thinking about Canadair which will need our assistance very soon if we are to make sure that we keep those highly skilled jobs in high technology. Our Government has done a lot for Bombardier to help that company find new markets in New York, and yet the Opposition spoke up against that formula. But we went ahead anyway, de Havil-land on the outskirts of Toronto has been a leader in the field of aviation. What I am trying to say, Mr. Speaker, is that there are lots of things to do. What has been accomplished in the past was done in the context of those years, and I think that the private sector also has an important role to play. It will have to take the lead in certain sectors rather than forever expecting Government support.


John Leslie Evans: Mr. Speaker, the Hon. Member for York-Peel (Mr. Stevens) referred to how bad the job creation rate was in 1980. Would the Parliamentary Secretary not agree that, if you look at the entire decade of the 1970s, Canada created jobs at twice the rate of any of the nations described by the Hon. Member for York-Peel? He has pointed out one year as being such a disaster when for the decade prior Canada had created jobs at twice the rate of any of those countries he has described. Would the Parliamentary Secretary not agree with that point?


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I am pleased to give the Hon. Member the figures. For 1980 our
employment record was up by 2.8 per cent. In 1979 it went up by 4 per cent.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: That is hardly a point of order.

The question was put to the Parliamentary Secretary, but I must inform Hon. Members that the time allocated for the question period has ended.


Mr. Howard Crosby (Halifax West):: Mr. Speaker, let me begin my remarks on the budget presented to the House of Commons by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) on April 19, 1983, by reviewing a very basic economic principle. The purpose of a budget is to relate expenditures to revenue, but the object of the exercise is to bring the estimate of expenditures and the estimate of revenue into balance.
Due to the financial policies of the federal Government over the past decade or more, we have virtually abandoned the concept of a balanced budget and substituted instead the notion that a manageable deficit is acceptable. For this reason, the first question that we should ask in any examination of a national budget must be: do the proposed expenditures exceed the anticipated revenue beyond the level that can be described as a manageable deficit?
The Minister of Finance, like his predecessor, has clearly endorsed the abandonment of any attempt to balance the budget because he has projected a deficit of $31.3 billion with expenditures of approximately $90 billion and revenues just under $60 billion. We must ask this question: is $31.3 billion a manageable deficit? Can such an enormous amount be justified in terms of the current and future economic trends?
Let me try to explain what this means. In terms of the immediate cost to working Canadians, if they are required to meet that budgetary deficit in this fiscal year, it would be $3,100. If you ask, can the taxpayers of Canada individually afford to spend and contribute $3,100 or more in addition to the money they are already paying in taxes of all kinds, I am sure the answer would be, very quickly, no.
We are placing a burden on the taxpayers that they cannot live with on a current basis. We must also consider that the deficit we will incur must be added to the accumulated national debt, which will now rise to approximately $168 billion. If that debt load is spread among working Canadians, those who pay taxes, it burdens them as individuals with a debt of approximately $16,000. That would be in addition to all their other debts which include that part of the provincial debt load that they share in respect of the Province in which they reside. In the case of Nova Scotia, it is approximately $5,000 per person.
We have these enormous figures. The result is that over one out of every four revenue dollars received by the Government of Canada is immediately expended on interest charges with respect to the accumulated debt. It is becoming virtually impossible to break out of this cycle of enormous expenditures
April 20, 1983

and limited revenues leading to an immense budgetary deficit that is increasing the accumulated national debt to gigantic proportions. The only other alternative, if one is to attempt to establish the principle of a balanced budget in our economy, would be to raise taxes. The Government has raised taxes in this new budget, and I will talk about that in my subsequent remarks.
I want to remind Members of Parliament and all Canadians that the ability of Canadians to pay taxes has reached the limit. The tables that I have before me, which relate to past years but I think are valid, indicate that Canadians pay an average of 43 per cent of their income in taxes, that is, taxes of all kinds. An average Canadian family with an income of $24,000 would pay approximately $10,000 in taxes. The exact percentage would be 45.8 per cent. So the Canadian family is paying almost 50 per cent of its cash income in taxes. I recognize that this is taxes of all kinds, including provincial and municipal taxes. We realize that taxation has reached the limit, yet taxes go up and up. The unfortunate result is that we have to live with this concept of a budget deficit whether it is manageable or not.
There is not much that the Government can or is able to do about that fact. Unfortunately, it must bear the responsibility for the existing situation because it is the fiscal policies of the Government over the past decade or more that have led to this situation. It is in the context of this horrendous financial burden on the Government and taxpayers of Canada, and indeed all Canadians, that we have to review the budget.
Let me say immediately that if, as some Members have suggested, there is a broad feeling of optimism among Canadians that the budget in itself contributes to the economy in a real way, to the extent there are provisions in it that encourage the private sector and would prompt business persons and those in industry to invest and increase activity that would create jobs in business and stimulate industrial activity, I would applaud such a measure in the budget. I want to add very quickly that those measures which would lead to increased confidence in the business and industrial community, and indeed across the private sector in Canada, are of a very sophisticated nature. They are complicated and technical. Only time will tell if they will have the effect that the Minister of Finance has claimed in the course of his budget speech. Only time will tell whether business and industrial activity will increase across the country and produce the jobs that everyone recognizes are required in every Province and territory of Canada.
The Minister of Finance indicated that that was his priority in his budget-to deal with the massive unemployment problem in Canada and take cognizance of the fact that 1.5 million people are out on the streets looking for work. He did not mention the million who have given up looking for work or the million Canadians who are working at jobs which are below their qualifications or working part time. However, he does finally admit that that is the major problem in Canada, and he says that job creation was a major concern in the formulation of his budget.
The Budget-Mr. Crosby
I want to examine some of the measures that the Minister claims will increase jobs in Canada and some of the programs for which provisions were allegedly made in the budget. First, I want to recognize the contribution made by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business and other representatives of small and medium businesses across Canada. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has recognized the role played by small and medium businesses in job creation in Canada. In fact, they point to the loss of 700,000 jobs in Canada between January of 1982 and January of 1983 in that sector of the economy. We can only have real job creation if we restore those 700,000 jobs that are lost.
On a positive note, the Minister of Finance mentioned the creation of 600,000 jobs through the measures that are included in the budget. But I can give the Minister a simple way to create that number of jobs in Canada. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business pointed out that in 1982, a bad economic year, there were 150,000 start-ups of small business enterprises across Canada. These are known as formulations. There were 150,000 people in Canada who started some form of business enterprise in 1982. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business says that with a little encouragement those formulations might increase to 200,000 in 1983, that is to say, entrepreneurs who are willing to start some sort of business on their own, possibly with some financial assistance or encouragement. If each one of those small business formulations which the Canadian Federation of Independent Business indicates could be started were, in fact, started with the encouragement of the Government and each one of those enterprises created just three jobs, which they could easily do with financial assistance from the Government, you would have right there in that one concept 600,00 jobs.
That is not an impossible goal. But what does the Government do? It spreads its job creation through a very complex and complicated mechanism which I can guarantee you, Mr. Speaker, will have every bit of red tape we have seen in every program introduced by the Government of Canada over the last ten years. I will give you one example, Mr. Speaker.
In March, 1983, the Minister of Employment and Immigration (Mr. Axworthy) announced an allocation through the New Employment Expansion and Development Program, the so-called NEED Program, of some $25 million through the Department of National Defence through the creation of jobs. He said that this allocation of funds would create 3,000 jobs. But what he did not say was that the Department of National Defence would immediately embark upon the process of terminating the employment of 1,027 workers, some of whom had been employed by the Department for three years or more. This was in order to provide spaces for the new employees. That is the kind of hokum which the Government serves up in terms of job creation programs. That is fact. I can take you to the Canadian Forces Base in Halifax, Mr. Speaker, and show you exactly where the Department of National Defence has terminated the employment of one person who was a term employee and hired others in place of that person. That is the
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April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Crosby
kind of job creation for which the Government takes credit. I think that is a travesty. I think it is the worst kind of deception and fraud to claim that 3,000 jobs are being created when, in fact, term employees, persons who have worked for the Government in the Department of National Defence for long periods of time, lose their employment in the name of job creation. The purpose of the Government is clear. It is to get as many people employed for as little dollar cost as possible whatever the expense to the human beings involved. That kind of injustice cannot go unpunished in our society.
Let me comment on some other measures in the budget, bearing in mind and underlining the fact that job creation and relief of unemployment is the major task of the Government of Canada today. The Government has talked about a Special Recovery Program. I cannot deal with that part of the program which involves special recovery incentives to business. Those are the sophisticated tax measures I was talking about and only time will tell whether or not they are worthwhile.
Let us look at the other aspects of the Special Recovery Program. I am speaking of the capital projects which were mysteriously increased from $2.2 billion from $2.4 billion. I have the page from the budget that was amended, brought in at the last minute, with the $200 million increase. I look down the list of special projects and I see for one the item "vessel procurement." The amount opposite is $630 million, which is almost one-third, we will say one-quarter, of the total allocation. I wonder what vessel procurement is. We are going to create jobs in vessel procurement? Is that the $200 million ferry that is going to be built in the Province of Quebec in order to aid the bail-out of Dome Petroleum? Is that the Gulf span ferry boat the construction of which the Government turned down and said it would be ridiculous to construct this vessel, and about which, very dramatically a few months later, it changed its mind because Davie Shipbuilding Limited in the Province of Quebec was in financial difficulty and that, in turn, created the problem for Dome Petroleum? Is that the same vessel? I suspect it is, Mr. Speaker. We will find out in due course.
On the same page, under special recovery capital projects, we have an item of $650 million for transportation facilities. Is that the famous double-tracking in western Canada? The Minister talked about $2.4 billion in projects that were to get under way immediately with employment to start as early as May. Yet the Minister cannot name the projects, or will not name the projects, because if he names the projects we will find out they are the same old projects that have been placed on the table many times in the past, for instance, doubletracking, the bail-out of Dome and help to the Davie Shipbuilding Company. It goes on and on. But what can we do about it, Mr. Speaker? Only time will tell. But it will be on the record here for anybody to read.


Mr. McCain:: Regan likes all that.


Howard Edward Crosby: We know what the Liberals are up to, Mr. Speaker. They are not fooling us.
Let us look at the budgetary measures with respect to housing. Anything that helps the housing industry in Canada will meet with my approval. I do not want to put that too broadly, but I want to say that I am not going to deal specifically with the housing measures except to say that I agree the housing industry is one of the most important industries in Canada and provides a basic necessity for Canadians, one of the real needs of life. But I have a question for the Minister responsible for housing. Not many months ago in this House we were faced with the problem of a gigantic rise in interest costs on mortgages for home owners. We talked about all kinds of programs we would use and implement to bring interest rates on mortgages down. Now interest rates are down. Now is the time to act. Now is the time for the Minister of Finance to say, "Here is a program to keep mortgage interest rates where they are now. Here is a program that will guarantee to Canadians that if they buy a home now they will have some guarantee that current interest rates will stay at those levels." Now is the time to do that. If you do that, Mr. Speaker, Canadians will build and buy homes. Canadians will look after themselves. But what Canadians need is some assurance that there will be some stability in the system on which they can rely. They do not want to buy a home now at 12 per cent or 13 per cent and face a 19 per cent or 20 per cent mortgage in two, three or five years. But what does the Minister do? He just goes back to the same old rehabilitation programs, the things we have heard, the old chestnuts. Although they have value, they will not solve the problem of Canadians owning their homes. They will not solve the continuing problem of having in Canada a viable housing industry. Now is the time to look at interest rates for mortgages, and the Minister has failed to do that.
I have already talked about the book juggling that is done with respect to the employment program in the Department of National Defence. But what about the book juggling with respect to other programs? We want to keep a close eye on that because this is not the first time this Government and this Minister of Finance have described the same program with different words, but the same dollars were involved. I do not need to tell anybody from western Canada, about the Western Development Fund. Whatever happened to that and the billions of dollars in that? Whatever happened to the gas pipeline that we were supposed to have? That has gone.
I want to point out and record very clearly in the presence of the Minister of Finance that it is fine for him to come in with pieces of paper, but development programs are pipelines, are railway tracks and are highways. Dollar bills have pictures of the Queen on them. They are not what is written in the budget speech. I suspect that many of the dollar bills in this budget for employment programs, for development programs, will disappear in the same way that they have disappeared in the past with respect to the Western Development Fund, the gas pipeline and a whole variety of other projects.


Mr. Munro (Esquimalt-Saanich):: It is phony money.


Howard Edward Crosby: As my colleague says, phony money.
April 20, 1983

There is one thing I would like to ask the Minister, I was not here when he spoke. I am not a very sophisticated person and I do not know that much about the economy, but I do not quite understand how raising the exemption on goods brought into Canada from $100 to $300 will help Canadians and Canadian businesses. That is interesting. I know Canadians will need a truck to bring their goods back from the United States and from other parts when they return to this country.


Donald W. Munro: They will use Maislin.


Howard Edward Crosby: Maybe that is it, Mr. Speaker. Maislin Transport will drive them back from the United States to Montreal. It will carry the goods and earn the money involved.
In the short time I have left I want to mention one thing that is very dear to everybody from Atlantic Canada, and that is the problem of regional disparity. In April of last year we passed the Constitution. It provided that the Government would work toward reducing regional disparity and creating equalization across Canada. In the budget there is absolutely no reference to the problem of regional disparity or to regional economic development.
In the Atlantic Provinces today everyone knows that the problem is in the fishing industry. There is a report before the Government which recommends a program for the fishing industry, a program which is absolutely essential to save that industry. It involves the infusion of funds in the area of $280 million. There is no mention of that in the budget. That is a blow to Atlantic Canada and a blow to the people involved in the fishing industry. It means that that recovery will be delayed for another year.
For those of us who observed the Government, we knew it was in trouble in June 1982 when it brought in its budget. The inflation, unemployment and interest rates were up, but the Government said that the problem was inflation and interest rates and that we had to get them down. The Government introduced the six and five program. It knew that inflation and interest rates would come down because there was no business activity in Canada. It knew that the problem could be cured.
It brought in the six and five program which had nothing to do with inflation or interest rates. It just robbed a few public servants of some dollar bills. The interest rate and the inflation rate went down. Now the Government is claiming victory and indicating how it will expand the economy. It will put on taxes in October 1984. I can tell the House what Government Members will do. They will call an election in September 1984 and claim that they solved all the problems of Canada. I am saying that today because they are not solving any problems. They failed to do that in the last three years, and they will fail to do that in the next year or year and a half because they are totally incapable of dealing with the realities of economic life. They hide behind rhetoric and empty budgets.


John Leslie Evans: Mr. Speaker, it was enlightening to listen to the Hon. Member's speech. The proof of the pudding is always in the eating. The fact that he could find nothing of substance to
The Budget-Mr. Crosby
criticize in the budget indicated, as has been indicated all afternoon by the Opposition, that they are having a difficult time sustaining criticism on their side. The Hon. Member spent most of his time dealing with small business and the need for small business assistance. Could he tell us what was the reaction to the budget of Mr. John Bulloch, head of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, and of Mr. Geoffrey Hale, head of the Canadian Organization of Small Business this morning after the budget was tabled last night?


Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, I cannot tell the Hon. Member in specific terms the exact reaction, but I can tell him about the attitude of Mr. Bulloch and other business people across Canada. For the last three years they have felt that in the last numerous budgets and financial statements the Government was suppressing their activities and providing no incentive or encouragement to them to get out and work, expand and contribute to the economy. This weighed heavily on them as they have indicated in innumerable reports, some of which I have before me.
In the case of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, it brought forward all kinds of suggestions. As I indicated in my speech, they want Government to assist them in their need and desire to expand their enterprises and to create new enterprises. With that attitude they look fondly on any change of heart on the part of the Government. I think they see this as a change of heart, not a National Energy Program which virtually destroyed the Canadian petroleum industry, nor the promises of gigantic projects such as the ones which the Minister of Finance when he was Minister of Energy told the House in 1980 he would have constructed across Canada-on the East Coast, in Alberta and so on. It is not the pie in the sky we have heard before. It is a recognition that the economy has to recover through the private sector. That, for the Minister of Finance and his colleagues in the Liberal Government, is a real admission.
We have been telling the Minister and the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) for years now that they have to look to the private sector for real economic growth and recovery. Finally, after trying everything else and failing, the Minister of Finance has seen the light. I think Mr. Bulloch and his associates in business and industry across Canada now see it on a piece of paper and applaud it, naturally so.
What I want to say to Mr. Bulloch is, "Do not trust pieces of paper. Dollar bills have pictures of the Queen. Get the dollar bills". Let us see the dollar bills.
I have been waiting for a gas pipeline from the Minister of Finance for three years now. I cannot get gas in my furnace at home. I still pay for imported oil, even though that Minister promised in his National Energy Program, which was part of the budget, that we would have a gas pipeline.
Mr. Bulloch wants to ensure that that same person, now the Minister of Finance, is not trying to fool him with respect to these business incentives like he fooled me when he said that I would have a gas pipeline. My answer to the question is, sure

April 20, 1983
The Budget-Mr. Crosby
they are pleased because they believe it. I ask my hon. friend to bear with me. We both know that only time will tell, but we must remember the gas pipeline.


Mr. Blaikie:: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Hon. Member for Halifax West (Mr. Crosby). Would the Hon. Member not agree, having said that he was fooled by the Minister of Finance (Mr. Lalonde) when he was Minister of Energy with regard to the gas pipeline, that perhaps he is easily fooled? He was not only fooled on the gas pipeline to the Maritimes; he was fooled on the prebuild of the southern portion of the Alaska gas pipeline. He was fooled when the Conservatives voted with the Liberals. He was fooled on the six and five program when the Conservatives voted with the Liberals. He was fooled on the Bank Act when they voted with the Liberals on a number of amendments. We then found a year later Conservatives screaming, "Why are we not able to do those kinds of things, after having voted against NDP amendments which would have made those kinds of things possible?"
Could the Hon. Member enlighten us as to why he and his colleagues continue to fall for the promises of the Liberal Party when it comes to these kinds of issues? When will they smarten up and either stop falling for the promises or admit that when it comes to these issues they are one and the same and that is why the Hon. Member could not find anything to criticize in the budget?


Howard Edward Crosby: Mr. Speaker, if you will give me another 20 minutes and there is any mistake about my attitude on features of the budget, I could mention some points which I did not make as yet. One relates to the $100 charitable donation
which is a tax measure that raises $80 million. They put it in because they said that voluntary organizations and charities in Canada wanted them to do it. But they put it in to get $80 million. That is the kind of fraud to which I am referring.
The Hon. Member for Winnipeg-Birds Hill (Mr. Blaikie) asked a difficult question. I can only answer it for myself. I come to the Parliament of Canada loaded with good faith. I like to believe that the officers or the people who form the Government of Canada, when they rise in the House and present documents and papers, are entitled to some credibility or they would not be the Government of Canada. We have to face the fact that the people of Canada elected the Government of Canada. However unwisely, that was the result of the democratic process. I for one have to respect that democratic process. I realize that does not come easy to some Members of Parliament. There are those who want to throw out the democratic process and deny the majority the right to govern. I embrace the democratic process. I come here with good faith. I am prepared to listen to Government proposals and I am prepared to accord a measure of credibility. But as they say, once bitten twice shy. We have been bitten 16, 18 or maybe 116 times.
I just want to make one point. I was not fooled by the six and five. They did not fool me on the six and five. I knew what they were up to, and I have already covered that in my speech.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Corbin):: Order, please. It being six o'clock, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at eleven o'clock a.m., pursuant to Standing Order 2(1).
At 6 p.m. the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.

Thursday, April 21, 1983