It's a great day for me. They've agreed with me on something over there.

I'm not sure if that spirit of agreement is going to continue as I make my remarks today on the budget bill, because while the parliamentary assistant to the finance minister may paint a rosy picture, what we on the opposite side and certainly workers and taxpayers in this province see are two different things. It's not quite as rosy.

In fact, Ontario is now straddling the line of being a have-not province. Our fiscal capacity has decreased dramatically in Ontario, meaning we're close to being an equalization province. I grew up in Nova Scotia, a have-not province. I came to this province, Ontario, 10 years ago with $200 in my pocket and a lot of hope-not a job. I got dropped off by a friend of my parents who was up visiting his daughter. I worked really hard, but I always remember, growing up, what Ontario meant to the rest of Canada. It was the economic engine of this country. People were proud that they could send their kids from where we were from, where I grew up, out west, which meant Ontario, not Alberta.

But the economic status in this province is worsening to the extent that we have gone from first to worst in economic growth. We're now on the verge of have-not status. After five years and five budgets, the Liberals have driven down Ontario's per capita fiscal capacity from roughly $400 above the equalization line just four years ago to barely over $84 today.

1620

Over 194,000 manufacturing jobs have left Ontario since 2004. Long gone are the days when kids like me, who graduated from university, left for the prosperous province. Today, because of the mismanagement of the crowd opposite, kids like me, when they're graduating from university, aren't coming here; they're leaving here. That's a sad state of affairs. A lot of times we'll stand over here and my colleague's husband will be criticized, or the former Premier of Ontario will be criticized, but I'll tell you something: When Mike Harris was the Premier of this province, Ontario was the beacon of hope for every other Canadian who wanted a job and who wanted a chance. I can speak from experience on that.

But again, I digress-194,000 Ontarians, people we represent in this chamber, have lost their jobs in the manufacturing sector alone since 2004. That's 64,000 since 2007 alone. That's a lot of people. That's more than anybody who votes for any of us in this place. Our unemployment rate-can you believe this? You can laugh about this, but the unemployment rate in the province of Ontario is higher now than it ever has been. It's higher than the national average for the first time in 30 years.

What they provided us with in this House two weeks ago was nothing more than trinkets, baubles and recycled federal investments. I'll tell you something: They're on the wrong track. They could have reduced our corporate taxes. They could have reduced regulatory burdens. They could have provided tax relief for low-income families and middle-income families, but none of that was in the budget. It shocks me, because all I ever hear is this rhetoric from the crowd opposite that all it is is "mean Conservatives, mean Conservatives." Oh, my gosh, we'r e all mean Conservatives because we're the ones who cut taxes. Not so, because guess what? It's the Conservatives, it's the Liberals, it's the New Democrats, it's the Saskatchewan Party that are cutting taxes and reducing the regulatory burden on small businesses right across this country from sea to sea to shining sea. They've all got it except for one guy: Mr. McGuinty. Do you know what he tells people this week, Mr. Speaker? "Don't panic. Steel yourself." Steel yourselves. How do you do that? How do you look at a man who is middle aged, middle income, who's trying to send his kids to university, and you've got no plan for him. All you've got is about 30 billion bucks more in spending, but they're not seeing it at the supper table, I can tell you that. They're not seeing it when they sit down at the evening news. Do you know what? They're worried. I don't know if anyone else has ever been in this situation before. I don't know.

Interjections.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: I've got a member here heckling me, and I'm not sure if he has ever had to see his father go on unemployment. I don't know if he has ever seen a child come home from school wondering if they're going to be able to go to university. I don't know, because quite honestly they don't seem to care over there.

But I'm going to tell you something. When you're looking at the provinces now that are the beacon of hope in this country because of Mr. McGuinty's inaction, they chose to cut some taxes. It's not a right-wing policy. Even their rudderless federal leader, Stéphane Dion, will acknowledge that. Instead, these guys chose big government, big spending and higher taxes, all this as we look at the indicators in the budget projections for 2008-09, which say there is going to be a slower economic period, that employment growth in Ontario is going to stall.

The province is projecting a surplus of $600 million for 2007-08. They enjoyed a revenue windfall of $5.1 billion in 2007-08, and relative to their budget plan, they spent 95% of that surplus. I ask you, if you have a surplus of $5.1 billion, first of all wouldn't you just put it toward your debt, so that kids like my daughter and the daughter of my colleague Sylvia Jones from Dufferin-Caledon won't have to pay because Mr. McGuinty decided to throw money away? Wouldn't you think it would be a great idea to give it back to those hardworking families I talked about one minute ago, who are contemplating how they're going to put bread on the table, how they're going to send their kids to school? It's something that didn't even cross the minds of the crowd opposite.

I just want to go back to my community, the city of Ottawa.

Mr. Jeff Leal: How's that Senate appointment going?

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: I wish I could get a Senate appointment, but I'm still two years too early; I'm still under-age.

Mr. Jeff Leal: You'd be Canada's youngest senator.

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: Yeah, Canada's youngest senator. Well, thank you so much.

But in all seriousness, I have a lot of work to do here and so do the members of the official opposition-and apparently the third party too-because we seem to be the only ones that are the voice of reason in this province. Whether we agree or not, at least the New Democrats will stand up and fight for their people. At least we'll stand up and we'll fight for their people.

But you know what? They just want to buy people off. They just want to spend on these big luxury government buyouts and things like that; billion-dollar boondoggles and slush funds for the rich and famous. But we're talking about real things and real needs for real people. I know they don't like to hear that over there.

According to Statistics Canada-I go back to 194,000 people losing high-paying jobs in this province. Couple that loss of jobs that are high-paying and what that's done to our economy, and the fact that these guys are raising our taxes because they haven't met a tax they didn't like to hike and they haven't met a fee that they wouldn't like to pass over to us, whether it is a tire tax or a recycling fee or whatever they want to raise, how do working families pay for those losses in income? I' m completely shocked by what they've done.

Now look at my federal colleagues. I had the privilege of working very briefly in Canada's new government. What I like about their philosophy-and it's not a right-wing philosophy-is that to them Big Brother doesn't know best. In fact, what they do is go over the heads of the type of people opposite. They just decide to give tax credits or tax breaks to regular working families. Most Canadians are aware that they receive $100 a month per child under the age of six to help with child care costs and raising a child.

They're still balancing their books and they're doing great things. Of course, the great things that we can expect right now from the federal government are some of the great things that we were privileged to have here in Ontario under Jim Flaherty, when he was our finance minister. I think he's doing a wonderful job.

The one thing though-I want to go back to the credibility, if you like, of this budget. We talked about the economy, the warning signs, where we're at. And still they put forward this budget. My favourite part of the budget is not one that benefits my riding. In fact, this budget doesn't benefit my riding at all if you look at it. Any Ontarian that says, "It's great that this guy McGuinty has taken my economy and put it in the gutter"-there's not one person in Nepean-Carleton that thinks that and there's not one person in Ontario that does. That's just news for them.

But my favourite part of their budget is this: $500 million, the centrepiece of their budget-the centrepiece. They were so proud of their skills training. They were going to give people second-career skills training. You should listen this because this is fun. It was federal money all along, federal money that-you've got to get this part too-they didn't even sign on the dotted line for.

First of all, Prime Minister Harper announced $500 million in an Ontario trust for second-career training for Ontarians. Well, Dalton McGuinty didn't like that. He was actually quoted as saying something like, "That's not enough. I don't really like it." And then he doesn't only criticize it; he takes another month, puts it in his budget and gives it another name. Then we find out that this is federal money. We should all be applauding Stephen Harper and Jim Flaherty, but we're supposed to be applauding, for some reason, Dwight Duncan. But I didn't; I applauded Jim Flaherty and I applauded Stephen Harper.

1630

Then we find out the next day that they put this $500 million in there for second-skills training, and they never even called the Prime Minister's office to say thanks for the money. They didn't even sign on the dotted line until the day after the budget was tabled. Talk about asleep at the switch or not caring or whatever it is, but Ontarians deserve better. They deserve better. They deserve a government that's going to take into account every single penny and spend it appropriately.

Instead, what we got was a budget that was based on, "Maybe I'll get my allowance next week if I'm a good boy, but I'm going to spend it anyway." No Ontarian does their budgeting that way. How dare the finance minister of Ontario do his budgeting that way, in addition to all of the excess spending-the $30 billion, or $41% more of revenues that they've taken in; and $28.2 billion, or 48% more in expenditures since 2003? You'd think at this point they'd at least cut back the hated health tax that's not going to health care in this province, that's going into potholes and general revenues.

They've created the greatest myth ever over there. They could be doing something for the low-income and middle-class residents of this province by giving them a break, giving them that health tax back. You didn't increase health care spending. In fact, I got another little ditty for you. Your health care spending on this budget is basically the exact same amount of money that was increased in federal transfers. No new money. You've got a centrepiece budget that's $500 million from Stephen Harper that you repackaged. Then you've got your health care money, which is roughly equivalent to the health care transfers from Stephen Harper, and then you've got nothing else, really.

My favourite part of the budget, other than the $500 million, is the no-strings-attached cheques that you're giving out to municipalities. In my municipality-even Mr. McNeely over here can attest to this-you shoved almost $16 million to the municipality, and instead of using it for roads and bridges, they actually used it to shovel snow. It was a snow job; it was given to the snow.

They're giving conditions now, but they didn't. The figure was $14.9 million. Everyone here knows I have been lobbying for a bridge, the Strandherd-Armstrong bridge, which was named as a priority for the city of Ottawa-a $35-million bridge. The member opposite used to actually represent the riding there and didn't get the bridge. So I've been fighting for it, and he's telling me now I'm not going to get it, I guess because I've been effective at exposing their budget for what it really is today. But in any event, it's a $35-million bridge. This crowd opposite-$14 million; that's all they've given the city of Ottawa. The second-largest city in the province of Ontario, and we rate second-class status.

I can give you a little bit more: The $14.9 million was used for snow shovelling, not for infrastructure. If that's not the worst thing possible, here is a comparative. I don't know how any member from the city of Ottawa who sits in the government could be proud of this budget when we found out that between 2004 and 2006 three vital local services-h ere is a comparative. For transit, the Liberals gave the city of Toronto $246.06 per household, while Ottawa-don't be shocked-only received $54.44. For general government services, Toronto cashed in with $191.97 per household from the province, from Mr. McGuinty's Liberals. Do you want to know what Ottawa got? Ottawa got $4.44. For public health and ambulance services, Toronto got $511.86 per household, compared to $370 for Ottawa. This is per household.

Our taxes in the city of Ottawa are 7.5% higher than they are in Toronto because this Liberal government, its Premier, its two cabinet ministers and two other silent backbenchers have not stood up for this city. I'll tell you something: That's $519.75 less for Ottawa households than the city of Toronto. That's what we like to call "the McGuinty gap." We call it the McGuinty gap in Ottawa.

Mr. Bill Murdoch: Did London get any money?

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: I don't know about London, because we've got a couple of members over there who I think are still talking about some of the mismanagement there. I see that we'v e gotten under their skin.

I just have one final topic to talk about while we're here and I still have time on the clock. It's about agriculture in rural Ontario. I'm very proud to be a representative from the city of Ottawa, Canada's largest agricultural city and probably one of the largest agricultural cities in all of the world. My riding is a suburban-rural split. While farmers are struggling to make ends meet, the Liberals didn't put anything in here for them; nothing to help them in 2008-09. In fact, most of the investments for our farmers and for our agricultural sector are in this fiscal year.

I'll share with you the minor initiatives: $56 million over four years for Pick Ontario Freshness and the Ontario farmers' market initiative; $7.5 million this year and next for agricultural chemical fuels research at the University of Western Ontario; $56 million in 2007-08 for the Ontario Veterinary College; and $12.5 million in 2007-08 for the Vineland Research and Innovation Centre. The proposal to expand the land transfer exemption for transfers of the family farm to include transfers from family farm corporations amounts to a paltry $1 million across the province.

The Liberals have neglected rural Ontario since 2003, but they did a spectacular job on it in 2008. It has not changed anything. Their plan to help our struggling rural communities is nothing more than a series of band-aid initiatives: $30 million over the next four years for broadband in southern Ontario; a $30-million increase in funding over the next four years for RED programs; and work towards the promised eastern Ontario development fund is long delayed. I can tell you something: There is a lot of dismay on this side with respect to the lack of commitment to the Eastern Ontario Development Corp.

I know I've got them all excited over there and I'm very happy about that, and I look forward to their questions and comments. But I remind them to put their partisan rhetoric aside for one moment, think about what's best for this province and think about the province we can be, not what they have made it

Ms. Lisa MacLeod: To the Liberals, I want to congratulate you. It was under your watch that we went from first in economic growth to worst, that we went from over $400 above the equalization line to just $84 above the equalization line. You guys can claim credit for being the government whose unemployment rate, for the first time in 30 years, is higher than the national average. If you're proud of that, folks, give yourselves a pat on the back, because I'll tell you something: It is you people, not us, who have driven away 194,000 manufacturing jobs from this province, 64,000 of them last year alone.

I don't know how they can look at themselves in the mirror after what they have done to the economy of this province and then stand there behind their Premier as he says, "Steel yourselves, people. Don't panic. It's going to be okay." You're not going to have a job, but we're going to grow bureaucracy in the province.

But I'll tell you something: They could have done something. They could have reduced corporate taxes, reduced the regulatory burdens on small businesses-like those I met with in my riding all day last Friday and all day last Monday-provided tax relief for the middle class. Wouldn't that be an option? I still get the rhetoric that tax cuts are right-wing policies, and I am going to tell you something. They're doing it elsewhere. Conservatives, Liberals, New Democrats-right across this province, right across this country-believe that you have to help small independent businesses; you've got to help the middle