Editor’s Note: We take here the unusual step of reproducing parts of a speech made in the Canadian House of Commons. It is the speech of Bob Ray, NDP Finance Critic, which concludes with the motion that was supported by a majority of members of the House of Commons, and therefore brought down the Conservative Government. Bob is a Rhodes Scholar who taught in Oxford. His remarks are always worth reading, but this historic budget sneer should be read by every Cana- ian. Mr. Bob Rae (Broadview-Greenwood): Mr. Speaker, the champagne was flowing freely in the penthouses in Broadview last night at eight o’clock, just as it was in the tenament houses on the Circular Road in St. John’s West. After all, imagine the eager anticipa- tion on the part of the Canadian people at eight o’clock as they turned on their televi- sion sets. They were eagerly awaiting the promises of the Conservative government, the promises they were looking forward to: the $2.5 billion tax cuts, the special incen- tives and tax write-offs for small business- men, intensive capital programs for Atlan- tic Canada. Also, an end to big government was promised by the Prime Minister (Mr. Clark), and an end to high taxes. This is the government that was going to set the little guy free. Imagine how flat that champagne turned at 9:20 o’clock when Newfoundland’s gift to ‘seventeenth century economics completed his discourse. It was not a tax cut, but a whopping tax increase — billions. Over $3.5 billion in personal taxes alone were taken out of the economy and put into the hands of governments and oil companies. There was no action in interest rates. After all, the policies of “Bouey XVI” have been con- firmed for yet another seven years. There were no capital programs. There was nothing for the poor, nothing for the pen- sioners. There was something for the pri- ae investors, and nothing for anybody else. Some have called it a tough budget. Some have said that the budget was actually a courageous one. It was certainly tough on the average Canadian. While the Minister of Finance (Mr. Crosbie) swaggers down Main Street in his mukluks, he is tiptoeing softly through Bay Street and the corridors of power in Calgary and Edmonton. Somehow Clark Kent cannot find a telephone booth when he reaches the Alberta border. This budget is courageous only in the sense that the Charge of the Light Brigade was cour- ageous: “Into the valley of death rode the one hundred and thirty-five.” In my remarks this afternoon I want to talk about the people of Canada, their jobs, and their standard of living. I want to suggest to the Minister of Finance that he start with the people of Canada, with their jobs, and with their standard of living. We ask ourselves: what does this budget mean for the average Canadian?: First, it means punitive taxes. Second, it means prices which continue to climb. It means jobs threatened, that nagging and gnawing insecurity which lies at the heart of every industrial worker not knowing whether he will be able to have his job for the next six months. Down the road it means no change in pension plans, which leaves so many Can- adians uncovered and in poverty as they reach age 65. NDP MOTION D Thanks to these wonderful projections from the Conservative government, we have been told that we will have no social pro- grams because, as it was confirmed again today, there is no money in the bill. Finally the bottom line, Mr. Speaker. Hon. members opposite are so proud of telling members of my party that we have never shaken hands with the bottom line. Well, I should like to introduce them to this particular bottom line. For the average family of four with one working spouse, the tax increases and prices increases which have been imposed mean at least $370, and a tax credit of $110. If both spouses are working, which increasingly is the case, because so many families require both spouses working in order to make ends meet, those families will not get a single penny of the tax credit which is being offered to them by the Conservative govern- ment, not a single penny of it. Single parent families will pay just as much and receive an even smaller break. Such a sizable tax increase would be bad enough when our economy is already slow- ing down, but it is not just any old tax increase that this government has imposed. It is a hidden tax increase, an indirect tax increase, which makes it worse. Let us look at what the government has told us. The govern- ment has told us that we must concentrate on energy conservation. So, we do not have an income tax increase. We have what they call a ‘‘conservation tax.” The rise in unemployment insurance premiums of some $800 million is to make the scheme look.more like insurance. “It is not really a tax. It is in order to get the insurance principles back into the Unemployment Insurance Act.” We were not told what the purpose of the tax on booze and cigarettes was. Presumably it is to pay for our sins, since we know that a deficit is sinful. We have been told that by the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Stevens), so it must be true. I ask Mr. Speaker to think of an average family in my riding. I want to remind the House that my riding is in the downtown area of Toronto. Mr. Jones works in a factory in an industrial park on the out- skirts of Toronto. Mr. Jones drives a 1976 model car. Mrs. Jones works downtown. She takes public transportation to work, and the children go to school by bus as well. They live in a house which is 30 years old. They have an oil furnace. As the hon. member for Mission-Port Moody (Mr. Rose) has said often, ‘“Today there is no fuel like an oil fuel.” Those are the people who are being lec- tured, being hectored, by the Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance as being the profligate energy wasters. These are the new profligates, the new sinners in our society, Mr. and Mrs. Jones. I want to ask the Minister of Finance to answer these questions. Perhaps he can give these answers during the next election campaign when he has an opportunity to meet Mr. and Mrs. Jones if he comes into my riding. Did Mr. and Mrs. Jones build the factory that is on the outskirts of Toronto, requiring Mr. Jones to drive 20 miles to get to work? Did Mr. Jones design the car that gets 16 or 18 miles to the gallon? Did Mr. Jones design an urban transportation system that does not serve industrial parks such as we have in metropolitan Toronto? How can Mr. Jones buy a new, more fuel- efficient car, with consumer loans now running somewhere between 16 per cent and 20 per cent, and higher, if Mr. Jones has had the bad luck to run into credit problems earlier? How can he do this when he is getting constant lectures from governor Bouey and others that he is over-consuming, that he is sinning and that he should be restrained? How can Mr. and Mrs. Jones afford to buy a gas furnace when that involves a capital expenditure of over $1,000 and the interest rates are running at 16 per cent to 20 per cent? How can they do that when the Minister of Finance admitted in this House today that there is nothing in this budget that allows people to write off the cost of changing from oil to gas? I want to ask this government where Mr. and Mrs. Jones will conserve? They will not conserve on energy because the energy costs which they are undergoing are constant. There is no way they can conserve without a dramatic change, but notin their lifestyle as has been suggested.. The Joneses are not suddenly going to be transformed into upper income civil servants running around Ottawa in Volvos, Mr. Speaker. The Joneses are facing the realities of life. Mr. Jones’ factory is not suddenly going to be moved next door to his house. He cannot suddenly demand that the Toronto Transit Commis- sion, which has just had a $61 million deficit, start providing decent 24-hour transit for a 24-hour factory 20 miles from his house outside the city. He must have his car. The hard fact of the matter is that it is lower and middle income Canadians who have the gas guzzling cars because those were the cars they bought years ago and cannot now afford to replace. Where will they conserve? They will conserve on other items. They will not buy a new fridge which might be more fuel effi- cient. They will not be able to afford to buy it. They will not be able to buy furniture.Let me give the minister an elementary lesson in the realities of life. The people who make fridges and furni- ture are laid off when people do not buy their products. Mr. Jones’ neighbour who works at the John Inglis factory making fridges is going to be laid off because the market for consumer durables like fridges is going to go down. That is the meaning of the multiplier effect. It was not invented by the anti-christ Keynes. It was somebody looking at the reality of an industrial situation who said this is what happens. When you put people out of work, that puts more people out of work, and that puts more people out of work. If you take money out of the economy and tax people to death that is exactly what is going to happen. The people will cut down on entertainment. They will not drink so much, they will not smoke so much, and they will not have such a good time. They will cut down on clothing and perhaps they will even cut down on food. I want to compare Mr. and Mrs. Jones to Mr. Lawyer Jones who lives in one of those celebrated tenement houses on Circular Road in St.John’s, Newfoundland. The excise tax is a tax that he can afford. Has Mr. Lawyer Jones been told not to buy a bigger or fancier car? No way; no one has said that. Has there beena tax put on luxury cars which are guzzling gas? The answer is Se a }¢ = ae