Bill C-15 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Lobbyists Registration Act

Committee Business and Reinstatement of Government Bills

[Robert Lanctôt, Bloc, Châteauguay, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today in the House to share with it the Bloc Quebecois position on the amendment proposed by my colleague from the Canadian Alliance concerning exclusion of Bill C-15B from the first session of the 37th Parliament.

I must begin by making it clear that the Bloc Quebecois is in favour of concrete and appropriate measures against the scourge of animal cruelty. This is a serious problem and one that merits our full attention and consideration.

This is a problem that has been with us far too long and one we have a duty as parliamentarians within a democratic system to address and to come up with the appropriate remedial measures for.

I stress the term “appropriate”, because this is the basis of our opposition to this animal cruelty bill. I must point out that the Bloc Quebecois also agrees with the amendment proposed by the Alliance, since its effect would be to set aside this bill, with its serious problems relating to gun control.

With respect to cruelty to animals, I want to say again: this refers to acts of extreme violence deliberately committed against creatures unable to defend themselves and win recognition of their rights.

Although the intention of Bill C-15B is good on the face of it, the Bloc Quebecois opposes it for two main reasons. First, because of the lack of protection for legitimate activities involving animals, and second, because important powers are being taken away from the chief firearms officer, who currently reports to the Quebec government.

In the last Parliament, an amendment to the bill was put forward requiring that the bill be referred back to committee for detailed consideration of clause 8. Therein lies the crux of our opposition. Clause 8 sets out how the bill will be applied, and its flaws are too big to be ignored.

One of our main objections to Bill C-15B is the disgraceful lack of explicit defences—I stress the word explicit—for legitimate activities relating to animal husbandry.

We want to stress that the clause in Bill C-15B concerning firearms would benefit from a thorough review as well. As far as the Bloc Quebecois is concerned, that part of the bill is actually a camouflaged decrease of the powers of the chief firearms officer, who currently reports to the Quebec government.

The Bloc Quebecois is in favour of the creation of a new section in the Criminal Code, which would institute an innovative concept, the object of which would be to completely change the concept of what an animal is. This way, an animal would no longer be considered as property, but rather as an entity specifically mentioned in the Criminal Code.

However, the Bloc Quebecois is opposed to any change to the Criminal Code that would have a significant negative impact on all those who are involved in a totally legitimate way in animal husbandry, hunting or scientific and medical research.

Such an amendment is very important, because the application of the Criminal Code will be forever altered. It goes without saying that such a change in perception must not be detrimental to what is already in place. And this what we fear will happen if Bill C-15B is reintroduced without a thorough and in-depth analysis. All this because of the current wording of the bill. It is obvious that we will no longer look at animals in the same way as before and that we will no longer treat them like before.

We support the amendment to the extent that it will have the effect of revisiting Bill C-15B and amending it thoroughly when it is before the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights, while seriously taking into account all aspects of the proposed changes.

So, the proposed changes must not have the effect of radically and forever changing the lives of those who have been involved for many years in animal husbandry or scientific research, among other activities.

We are asking the government to recognize that an in-depth review of clause 8 of the bill is essential in terms of its form, but particularly its substance. We are asking for the explicit addition, in the new part V.1 of the Criminal Code, of the defences provided under section 429 of the Criminal Code.

Section 429 includes the defences called “colour of right” or legal justification or excuse. These defences are specifically mentioned in that section, but they are not included in the new part V.1.

The Bloc Quebecois recognizes the urgency of the tragic situation that keeps recurring daily. In proposing this amendment, parliamentarians are asking for an in-depth review of the bill by the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights.

The Bloc Quebecois believes that it is essential to closely review clause 8 of the bill, because that provision is considered to be the cornerstone of the criteria for protecting legitimate activities involving animals, including animal husbandry, hunting and scientific and medical research.

Bill C-15B caused quite a controversy from the outset. We all received correspondence from constituents asking us to support the bill. I had the opportunity to present the Bloc Quebecois' position and people said they supported it. Basically, the Bloc Quebecois believes that animals must be protected, while acknowledging the legitimate activities related to the animal industry.

We repeat that we stand for increased protection for animals. However, we also support specific protections for those who work in the animal industry. Under its present form, Bill C-15B displays a flagrant lack of respect, when it comes to the legitimate practises of the animal industry as a whole.

We cannot support the bill with its current wording, because of this unacceptable and unfortunate flaw. For this reason, we believe it is preferable to review and amend Bill C-15B.

We base this on the fact that there are currently explicit means of defence for activities related to the animal industry. These means are found in section 429 of the Criminal Code.

Section 429 of the Criminal Code protects those who raise livestock, hunters, the animal industry and researchers. Our problem with it is that these protections are not included in the new part V.1 of the Criminal Code.

The primary purpose of this bill should have been to increase penalties for any reprehensible and violent activity involving animals. In the case of a cruel offence, the penalty should be serious enough for those who committed it, and serious enough to deter anyone contemplating such vile behaviour. But this is not the case with Bill C-15B, because it lumps all violent actions together, whether or not cruelty is involved.

Officials from the Department of Justice told us in committee that the government's intent was not to deprive those who take part in legitimate breeding, hunting or research activities of the protection to which they are entitled. How can this be the case when the current protection that is specifically laid out in section 429 of the Criminal Code is not included in clause 8 of the bill?

We have some serious questions about what the officials from the Department of Justice have to say. Their information is so ambiguous as to end up being contradictory, which is the main reason for our disagreement.

It is all very well to tell us that the legal experts have covered all the bases, but we have serious doubts about that. If indeed everything were covered, why not include the protection currently given to legitimate activities in the new bill? In other words, why refuse to include explicitly the rights set out in section 429 of the Criminal Code in the new section V.1 of the code? No one can give any coherent answer to this, not even in committee, because the very structure of the bill is totally at odds with the government's intention to protect legitimate activities.

This makes no sense. Once again, I ask why the specific and explicit defences set out in Criminal Code section 429 are not being repeated here? Once again, it is important to state that these are not reproduced in the new part V.1 of the Criminal Code, not even implicitly, regardless of what the justice department may think.

Section 429 applies only to sections 430 through 446 of the Criminal Code. The government claims we can quite simply apply the general defences of section 8 of the Criminal Code, in other words common law defences. If this were the case, why would the legislator have specified, “legal justification, excuse or colour of right” in subsection 429? Why would the legislator have specifically and explicitly set these defences out in section 429 if common law defences were implicit for such offences? Let us get serious here. The Minister of Justice tells us he considers that section 8 of the criminal code, that is common law defences, could apply to all legal, legitimate activities involving animals. Why then is he refusing to include them explicitly, if they are already there in section 429?

Why not include what has been there for a very long time? One of the first principles one learns in law is that the legislator is not deemed to speak in vain. Everyone in the legal profession knows that. If the legislator has made provision to apply section 429 to certain sections, that means it does not apply to the entire Criminal Code. Thus, if the legislator has deliberately specified that these protections will apply only to certain specific sections, and not to the code as whole, it is because that is what was intended.

The Bloc Quebecois moved amendments to correct this situation, but they were all rejected in committee during the last session. What an unfortunate thing.

The Bloc Quebecois repeatedly tried to reconcile stakeholders' demands, but a majority of committee members rejected the idea. I should point out that this was rejected by the majority only when the time came to vote.

When stakeholders from the animal industry appeared before the committee, those who support protection for animals against cruelty showed respect. All the stakeholders from the animal industry want protection against cruelty to animals. However, they want to keep their defence rights, which are truly specific and which were included in section 429.

Again, these rights are the colour of right, the legal excuse and the legal justification. These rights are explicitly provided under that section. Why not take them and include them in the new part V.1? This is where we have a problem. This is why not just the Bloc Quebecois but the whole animal industry fears that frivolous suits could be launched, even in the case of sporting activities.

I can think of activities such as hunting with hounds and the roue du roi. The hunting season is on, right now. These are activities in which hunters have engaged for a long time. However, there will no longer be any specific defences, if this bill is passed. We will have to rely on implicit defences that are based strictly on common law defences.

Therefore, let us be serious. If the government really means it when it says that the purpose of Bill C-15B is to not adversely affect the animal industry, then it must review clause 8 again and take into account the amendments moved by the Bloc Quebecois during the proceedings of the Standing Committee on Justice.

The Minister of Justice must realize this, because during the last session, I asked him questions on this issue and he was never able to explain why he did not want to include explicit defences. He would only say, “We rely on the implicit nature of clause 8 for common law defences”. But I will explain something truly ridiculous that happened during the meetings of that committee.

Amendment No. 1 was adopted and it was even proposed by the government, following my representations. Clause 8, dealing with common law defences, was explicitly included. The government felt that it would appropriate to explicitly include clause 8, which deals with general means of defence for the entire Criminal Code. This is done explicitly for clause 8 of the Criminal Code, but not for the means of defence provided in section 429. We definitely have doubts about how serious the government is and about the motives behind Bill C-15B.

This is why, unfortunately, the Bloc Quebecois has no choice by to vote against this bill, whose ultimate purpose should be to protect animals against cruelty, not to adversely affect the animal industry. We tabled amendments to correct this situation, but they were all rejected in committee.

As we have been saying since the beginning, the Bloc Quebecois supports the creation of a new part in the Criminal Code to include a new definition of what an animal is. The idea is to give animals a new definition and new legal protection.

However, it is unacceptable that this should be done without respecting the defences that are currently available to the whole animal industry. The decision not to include the existing defences is very worrisome, particularly for that industry.

It is important to point out that we currently have the necessary tools such that offenders could be punished, while breeders, hunters and researchers could be protected. But this is obviously not a priority for the government.

The amendments proposed by the Bloc Quebecois should be accepted. I agree with the amendment proposed by the Canadian Alliance to the effect that Bill C-15B should not be reinstated at the stage at which it was during the last session. This bill must be reviewed. We must take a serious look at all its implications for the animal industry.

I am not saying that we should not add new clauses or that we should not protect animals against cruelty. The Bloc Quebecois wants to preserve the provisions dealing with animal cruelty, but this must not be done at the expense of the whole animal industry.

The Bloc Quebecois therefore supports the amendment, because it would send a clear message to the government that it is imperative to review the contents of Bill C-15B. We are of the view that not including the defences found in subsection 429(2) of the Criminal Code in the new part V.1 will have the effect of depriving those who legally kill or cause pain to animals of the protection they are currently afforded.

Section 429 of the Criminal Code is clear. It says that legal justification or excuse and colour of right constitute specific protection for whoever takes part in a legitimate and legal activity. It is therefore essential to include these specific safeguards in the provisions of new part V.1 of the Criminal Code.

According to the evidence given by Department of Justice officials in committee, subsection 8(3) of the Criminal Code should apply.

They said that defences of legal justification or excuse or colour of right are implicit in section 8. Why not include them explicitly in the bill as the entire animal industry is requesting?

These protections are not implicit, because they must be made explicit. We insist on this request. The means of defence currently laid out in section 429 of the Criminal Code must be specified in the new part V.1.

So, if I may conclude--

[Werner Schmidt, Canadian Alliance, Kelowna, BC]

Maybe the hon. member did not do it but I know there are some over there who did. Maybe he did not but that does not make it right.

The issue has to be addressed and it has to be addressed just as soon as we possibly can. We should eliminate and take away from this particular motion Bill C-5 and Bill C-15 and then democracy at least would have the potential of being served.

[Werner Schmidt, Canadian Alliance, Kelowna, BC]

Yes, it is many more than Mulroney. In fact, I dare say that it is about 50% more than Mulroney did in total.

I am wondering what it is that the government is trying to do with this. Is it really trying to defy or deny the democratic process? The hon. member for Medicine Hat suggested that we have a democratic deficit. Well, we have a democratic deficit, a financial deficit and a deficit of new ideas.

There was an excellent opportunity to rectify some of the errors and shortcomings in both Bill C-5 and Bill C-15 but nothing happened. The government will bring them forward just as they were before.

I cannot help but draw attention to a particular issue that really bothered me with regard to Bill C-15, which is the cruelty to animals bill. I met with some dairy people this summer. When we first entered the debate some time ago I read into the record at that time about a group by the name of PETA and what they were doing. This summer I had the occasion to meet with the people at PETA and to ask them whether this was really true, whether this had really happened. Let me tell the House exactly what it was that had happened at that time.

There was a group known as PETA, People For the Ethical Treatment of Animals. Guess what this group did? When I read what they did I could not believe it had happened. I thought it was some kind of misinterpretation or mis-statement. However I found out this summer that it was absolutely correct. PETA launched an anti-dairy campaign targeting school children. It essentially told them that if children drank milk they would be responsible for the torture of cows. Why would anyone do that?

My colleagues and I in the Canadian Alliance, including my party's agriculture critic, are concerned that groups such as PETA are about to be armed with a powerful new weapon against farmers. I hope you, Mr. Speaker, and all the other members opposite recognize the door that has been opened for groups like this. We have to say to ourselves that it will never happen again, but it did just happen.

We had another indication earlier that told us that very clearly. On Bill C-5 a group told us that if the legislation was not tested in the courts it would have no value. We hear all this talk about there not being any frivolous litigation launched on the basis of cruelty of animals. Liz White, I believe it was, said clearly that not only would there be contests, but it was essential that litigation like that take place to prove in fact that this legislation was real.

Can anyone imagine a government putting legislation on the table that has already indicated that it will be tested in the courts? To prove what? To prove that it can be read in a variety of different ways? We do not have to go to the courts for that. We already know that.

No less a person than the attorney general for the Province of British Columbia wrote a book. His name is Alex Macdonald. You probably know him, Mr. Speaker. This gentleman said that in Canada we do not have a system of justice, we have a legal system. He goes through the book to illustrate case after case where the principle was one of legality, where the principle was one of how much money do the litigants have and then proceeded to carry on until the resources were exhausted. That is not justice. That means that the justice system is being abused, and much more than being abused, it is being misused when that happens. I know that is not true in all cases but why would the government introduce legislation that permits this kind of thing to happen?

We are now at the point where some people have said that what we have in Canada today is judicial imperialism. What does that really mean? It means rule by judges. How do they do this? They do something they call “write in”. They write into legislation what they think that legislation should be saying if it is not saying exactly what it is they want it to say. The legislation is written in such an ambiguous fashion that indeed they can do this and they do it with impunity. However, that is not all. It then has the force of law.

Members here are the lawmakers, not the judges. It should be incumbent upon us, the Prime Minister and every member here to make sure that the intention of the legislation on the books is portrayed clearly and unequivocally. When it becomes so ambiguous that a judge can write into it whatever he wishes, that is an abuse and a misuse of the parliamentary system.

I think it goes even further than that. I am looking over at some of the backbenchers over there and I know some of them very well. I know that when they voted in favour of Bill C-15 they were voting against the wishes of their constituents. Why did they do that? They did it because they were clipped into shape? No. It was because they were whipped into voting against their conscience, against their better knowledge and against the wishes of their constituents. That is a complete abuse of the democratic system and it should never happen again.

[Werner Schmidt, Canadian Alliance, Kelowna, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Saskatchewan who speaks from the heart. He is a true blue kind of Saskatchewan person. We have a whole bunch of them here. We have one fellow here from Grande Prairie and another one from Medicine Hat. These are gentlemen of the soil. These are men who know what it is like to win. These are people who understand.

The hon. member should have said that out loud but he did not. For those who are listening, I will not repeat what he said because I do not think people really want to know.

The big issue here this afternoon is the whole matter of closure. I do not know how many people have raised the issue but over the weekend I saw that this was going to be another closure motion. In fact, last fall we had an indication that Bill C-15 probably would be subject to closure and indeed here it is. It came under the rubric of bringing together all the legislation that was on the table before the House was prorogued and now it will be brought back holus-bolus at the stage that it left the House.

The government knows full well that it is in difficulty with both of those pieces of legislation. On this side of the House we have a lot of really sober, well-thinking, well-meaning, honest people who understand what people in Canada are thinking. We would have supported bringing forward the motion of reinstating bills and motions but what did the government do? It included, as it usually does, in this omnibus bill, two pieces of legislation that it knows full well do not have the support of many of their backbench members and do not have the support of many of the people who voted Liberal in the last election. Hopefully in the next election Canadians will know better and they will vote for the Canadian Alliance. We have to look very carefully at these.

Mr. Speaker, I guess you and the House should be reminded that this is now the 78th motion of closure. That is too long and too many.

[Gerry Ritz, Canadian Alliance, Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise again. This is the first chance we have had to speak in the House since the government prorogued. We are speaking about a motion to reinstate a lot of what it left behind when it decided to shut down the House for two weeks and not address the very serious and important issues that we felt should have been brought to bear here almost immediately. I am talking about the agricultural crisis in Western Canada.

We see nothing like that in a reinstatement bill here in this motion because the government has totally ignored that crisis. It has tossed some money here and there and an ad hoc program here and there. It is kind of like putting one's finger in a dike which is leaking all the way across. It is just playing fast and loose with agricultural members out there who are taxpayers. They tend to pay their bills and would love to do that, if the government would allow them to and if it would come up with some programs and long term vision that would see some strength put back into fundamental agriculture. It is basic: the guys own the land.

I will be splitting my time, Mr. Speaker, with the member for Kelowna.

Getting back to agriculture, we see two issues in this motion, and it is an omnibus motion. We see the Liberals again envelope in one little motion a huge cross-section of what they have on their wish list that certainly does not resonate with most Canadians out there.

Agriculture, as I said is in crisis in Saskatchewan and Alberta in the north halves of the provinces where huge amount of agriculture goes on. The Liberals have dedicated $600 million across the country. They did not even prioritize. They did not even send it where it needed to go. The only action we saw that prioritized the need in those two areas was the Hay West campaign, generated by some terrific citizens in Ontario, moving east from Quebec into the Maritimes. They did a great job.

However, unfortunately the amount of hay that can get through the bureaucratic eye of the needle is maybe 30,000 tonnes. That is not even an appetizer for the cattle herds that we have out west. One RM where my hay land is requires at least 50,000 tonnes all by itself. That is one RM out of 200, 300 or 400 that requires that kind of volume. What goes out from Hay West is equivalent to half of what that RM needs, and there are 300 or 400 more requiring that same sort of commitment.

Did the government do the right thing? No, it did not. Its own Liberal senator said that it was a joke, an absolute travesty, what the government did not do or recognize.

The agriculture minister did show up in Saskatchewan but did he get his boots dusty? No. He landed on both ends of where the problem lies, close to an airport, but he did not get out and see the real world. He did not come out through my riding. Politics aside, I offered to take him through to have a look. He just, I guess, did not figure it was worth his time so he did not come.

We have two other parts of this omnibus motion that deal with agriculture in a huge, negative way. I am talking about Bill C-5, the species at risk legislation. No one with clear common sense thinking in Canada wants to see a species disappear from this country. However, when we look at legislation like this that is so encompassing and is such a horrendous load on primary producers and others folks who work the land, we have to have some sound science.

I watched a documentary the other night on the spotted owl in British Columbia. There is concern that because some of the lobbying has moved them from an area and so on, they could become an endangered species in Canada. The problem is the vast majority of their nesting grounds is across the line. These owls do not care where the 49th parallel is. We are going to list them as endangered but in some parts across the line they may be a nuisance. That is the problem with legislation like this that is not built or even founded on sound science.

I hear the peanut gallery chipping over there. It is the only time the backbenchers get.

Let us get back to Bill C-5 for just one second. The huge stumbling block for those of us in the Alliance is the lack of the wording in the bill, where we want to see compensation based on fair market value. That is just bedrock. No one would see that as the wrong way to go. If people lose access to land, working it, going across it or whatever, they have to have some compensation. They cannot keep on paying taxes on land of which they no longer have any use.

Fair market value compensation is all we are asking. It is a very simple thing to put in.

A lot of the rural Ontario caucus fell for the line that the government would let the Liberals in the Senate make those changes. It did not happen. It will be now reintroduced, go back over there and it still will not happen because the Liberals do not see that private property rights have to be paramount in any legislation like this. Fair market compensation are three little words that are just a huge stumbling block on that piece of legislation.

Then we get into Bill C-15B which talks about cruelty to animals. Again, no one out there in rural Canada or in the cities for that matter want to see animals treated cruelly. It is just not done. People of good conscience would never accept that.

All we are looking for is a couple of little words in the legislation so that proper, acceptable husbandry rules and regulations, which we already have, will be maintained. We cannot get that. Dehorning a cow, or castrating a bull or snipping the tail on a hog has been accepted for years. However the Liberals cannot understand that we have to entrench the basic premise that accepted husbandry practices will continue. It leads to all sorts of nuisance liability suits and everything.

There are good, free thinking members on the other side. However they are falling for the line that they can support this and some amendments will go through at the Senate. That will not happen because the Senate is not accountable to anybody. Senators are not accountable to the people who never have a chance to elect them. They are accountable to the Prime Minister, just like the ethics counsellor. That leads us into another part.

Where is the ethics package? Where are the priorities of the government? Rather than reintroducing the flawed, failed legislation of the last session, where is the new stuff? Where is the fresh thinking. Where is the outline, the impact assessment on Kyoto? Where the heck is that? The Liberals have not even thought about that, yet they will ratify it by the end of this year. That is another huge hit to my particular area where any farm that is still open and viable is because of an off farm job relating to the oil patch.

The Liberals will be hammering these poor folks again just because they will not start to address the bedrock principles of free market. What will the impact be? How many jobs will we lose? How high will the cost of home heating, power and gasoline at the pump go? The Liberals say that we all have to do that for future generations. Certainly, we have to slow down the train when it is running away, but that is being done now. We have already got environmental assessments on every drill site in western Canada and they are doing a great job.

When we look at everything that is not in the bill, it just screams out to the electorate there that we need a change of government. There are absolutely no fresh ideas in the throne speech. It is a rehash, a mishmash, a reintroduction of a lot of failed initiatives from the last nine years. The Liberals are trying to build a legacy for a Prime Minister whom nobody wants or likes any more. It cannot be done. He is tired out and there is nothing left. There is no direction there

Last week there was another huge example of a tremendous lack of ethical conduct by a minister of the Crown. Will he be sanctioned? No, he will be covered. He will be covered by the blanket of the ethics counsellor, who reports to the Prime Minister whom the minister supports, one of the last few on the front bench. Will he be given blanket amnesty? Certainly, for hiding behind the fact that it was a company, not the individual. The individual signed it and a partnership says that money that comes into the partnership in which he takes part.

I have not had time to concentrate on a lot of the things that are mentioned in there. The member who spoke before me from Etobicoke has talked about the drug committee and the wonderful work it is doing. Certainly it is doing wonderful work. Then we have the Senate coming through saying to legalize marijuana. That will not go to the committee.

He talked about the member for Esquimalt--Juan de Fuca who had his private member's bill hoisted, hijacked in this very House. Private members' business has been hijacked by the government and sent to a committee where it will not be votable. As a private member's bill it was to be votable. It would have come before all of us so that we could represent our constituents. It is gone, hoisted, hijacked and sent to a committee that is still stacked with a number of Liberal members. It is a totally democratic deficit. That is what is wrong in the House, and we will continue to raise those issues.

[Rick Casson, Canadian Alliance, Lethbridge, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thought the member just split his time with another member of the government, but I guess he has not.

It was interesting to hear some of the comments from the previous speaker about the bills coming back, that the ministers have some prerogative as to at what stage, that they could take them right back to the beginning, that the evidence that was heard would have to be recollected and reheard and that possibly there will be some changes made in some of these bills.

We have tried for the last couple of years to make some changes. Of course we were able to have Bill C-15 split into parts A and B in order to pass the parts we supported. After a lot of negotiation and a lot of work on our behalf that happened. With Bill C-15B there are issues there that we still have problems with, such as the cruelty to animals section and how that would affect animal husbandry practices in the country. We still need to bring those issues to light.

Also, because Bill C-5 does not have a full compensation aspect in it for affected landowners, we cannot accept it. We thought we had some support from the government side of the House on that particular issue, but when it came time for the vote the members on that side of the House who were against it lined up and voted for it so it went forward.

I think the member who spoke before me made a good point about the fact that if we start a bill at the beginning we have to rehear the evidence. That being so, I do not think there is anything wrong with that. In most instances at committee, time is short and witness lists have to be pared back because all who want to appear cannot, and there are all the requests that go forward for people to appear at committee stage who cannot get here to do that. There is the also aspect that some of these bills are so wide-ranging and cumbersome in the legislation they put onto the citizens of Canada that opening them up for debate again is not a concern of mine. The more debate that goes on, the better. It is an opportunity to bring forward witnesses who were not able to appear last time. They could now be heard.

Bill C-5 is one of the two bills that we have some problems with. We opposed it vigorously all through the last stages and actually through the last number of years. I remember when campaigning in 1997 that it was an issue then. It continued to be an issue for the next two Parliaments and finally in this Parliament it was brought forward.

To prorogue the House is to allow the government to start with a throne speech to give a new focus and a new direction for government. Unfortunately that did not happen. As we saw, most of what was in the throne speech had been presented before, and now the government is saying except for what it wants to bring back as it was. If the government is going to have a new direction and a new focus for Canadians, why would it go back to the same old, tired past throne speeches and legislation? Let us do what the throne speech is really intended to do and start afresh.

As for some of the issues in Bill C-5, the species at risk act, certainly there is the compensation issue for affected landowners. It is absolutely critical. For us to accept this legislation in any form, it has to be in there. If it is not, we will continue to fight the battles and try to stop it. We feel this is just going to create such havoc in the environmental field that it will actually be a detriment to saving endangered species instead of helping them, particularly the aspect whereby a person could be charged under the act for unknowingly disturbing the habitat of an endangered species. That is not right. People are going to be very cautious about how they approach this. If they do have endangered species on their property, are not aware of it, disturb the habitat and are somehow reported, the fines and penalties are absolutely huge and will be very hard for people to deal with. We feel that this is another aspect of the compensation issue, the fact that someone can be charged unknowingly. The mens rea aspect needs to be in there. Surely criminal intent should have to be established before the book, or this law, can be thrown at anyone.

There is also the fact that this bill deals with other than crown lands. Most of the provinces have endangered species legislation. They do a good job of policing. I know that particularly in our part of world in southern Alberta there are very many mitigation projects in place through a very wide aspect of industry. The farm industries, the irrigation districts and the resource sectors all make special efforts to leave habitat for species at risk and to leave habitat for all species. It is really good to see that this can happen without legislation and that it happens because these industries and people realize and support that things have to be done to protect endangered species.

We still have some problems with these two bills, Bill C-5 and Bill C-15B. Hopefully, as the member from the government side previously indicated, perhaps something could be done with the Minister of Justice to change that bill so that it would be more acceptable to people who deal with animals in their day-to-day lives, in research, in agriculture, and to those who deal with animals in general. Certainly we do not in any way condone cruelty to animals. It is terrible thing when people go out of their way to purposefully abuse an animal. We do need legislation to protect animals, but we have to make sure that it does not intrude on the animal husbandry practices in existence today.

I will be splitting my time with the member for Yellowhead, and I have a motion I would like to move as I conclude. I move that the amendment be amended by adding the following words: and the 66th Report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs that called for all private members' business to be votable, tabled in the previous session, be deemed presented and adopted in the second session.

Mr. Speaker, before you rule on the admissibility of the subamendment, I point out that the main motion reads:

That, in order to provide for the resumption and continuation of the business of the House begun in the previous Session of Parliament it is ordered--

The issue of private members' business has been mentioned here by many people and its votable status was an important issue in the last session, in the last Parliament and in the Parliament before that. In fact, it has been the subject matter of numerous points of order and questions of privilege. In the last session, the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs finally agreed to make all private members' business votable. Just before the House had a chance to adopt the report, the House adjourned and then the government prorogued. It is essential that this report be brought back and adopted. We can consider it as one of the positive issues Motion No. 2A can bring back from the previous session instead of having to focus on all the negative issues the government was in during the middle of the last session, like Bill C-5 and Bill C-15B.

I present this motion.

[John Bryden, Liberal, Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we are debating today a motion that would bring back to the House the legislation that was before the House before the time of prorogation, that is legislation that was before the House in June, and also bring back to the House the evidence that was before the committee at that time.

People should understand that when the House prorogues all these bills and evidence basically collapse and are lost unless Parliament moves a motion that allows them to be brought back. This motion would allow all these bills to be brought back at the same standing as they were in the process they were last June, at the discretion of the minister.

I am in sort of a funny situation. There is an amendment to the motion that was moved by the member for Macleod. He suggested in his amendment that the former bills, Bill C-5 and Bill C-15B, should be exempted from the motion. In other words, the motion could go forward but the two particular bills, one the cruelty to animal bill and the other the species at risk bill, would not be allowed to go forward where they are right now, which is in the Senate. They would have to begin the process all over again.

I find myself in a quandary. Had the member for Macleod simply said that Bill C-15B should be excluded from this motion, I think he would have received a chorus of support on this side of the House. I myself would have supported that motion. That bill, which is now in the Senate and almost ready to be passed into law, is a terrible bill.

There is no doubt on this side of the House and many of the MPs, particularly from rural Canada, are very much against this piece of legislation. There has been a long battle both in the House and behind the scenes to halt that piece of legislation.

Even though cruelty to animals is a dreadful thing, and we all want to prevent cruelty to animals, that piece of legislation is incredibly and horribly flawed in its definition of animal. Basically that definition says that any creature that has the capacity to feel pain is covered by the legislation. Amoebas, worms, lobsters and so on, all these creatures have a capacity to feel pain because we can see their reaction when they are subject to any sort of physical violence.

Therefore, we have a piece of legislation that is so broad in its reach that we expect that special interest, animal rights lobbies will use this legislation to bring all kinds of cases before the courts which will enable them to do all kinds of fundraising and will create great anguish and unhappiness in the farming community because the farming community and its farming practices will be unfairly the target of this type of litigation as a result of this over broad definition.

If ever there was a bill that is now in the Senate or ever has been in the Senate that I would wish, as one MP, should be restarted or perhaps forgotten altogether, it is the former Bill C-15B.

Unfortunately the amendment includes the former Bill C-5, species at risk and I have a completely opposite attitude to that. The species at risk bill was enormously contentious but which spent years being wrangled upon in committee, negotiated and talked about in the House, behind the scenes, between House leaders and so on. I remember no other bill in my nines years in this Parliament where there has been so much toing and froing, so much struggle to come up with the final version, and I suppose all legislation is a compromise, a version that I think is reasonably acceptable to all Canadians.

It is a very important bill, but unfortunately we are dealing with legislation that has the possibility of interfering with the rights of property owners, which is one of the things about the species at risk bill. It requires the protection of habitat, mostly on public lands indeed, and sets up a regime for the protection of habitat and the protection of endangered species. That was the subject of a lot of controversy. However finally compromise was reached and I believe the species of risk legislation in the Senate now should be passed and it should not be restarted.

I have this dilemma. I find myself with an amendment to the original motion which I would love to support, but cannot because I really do believe that the species at risk bill must go forward as it has taken literally years to get where it is.

I would point out, however, that the cruelty to animals legislation has no such history. It was, shall we say, sprung on Parliament and on the Liberal caucus out of the blue. It was the result of behind the scenes lobbying from various animal rights organizations which had a better line into policy-makers than perhaps most members of Parliament sometimes have. It is very unfortunate.

The story goes with the rest of the bills that are being brought back.

For the most part, I have to support the main motion because the other bills that are being brought back are non-controversial and need to go forward quickly, in the public interest. By that I mean the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, which is another very important piece of legislation; the Copyright Act, which is in the Senate, and that has been contentious as well, and it is very important that it go forward so that we have security in the whole regime of copyright because there are a lot of problems in copyright legislation right now; the Pest Control Products Act which is in the Senate; and the specific claims resolution act which is in committee. We do not really need to go back to the process with those.

However there are other bills that would be reintroduced at the same level as they were last June that I have reservations about and I would prefer that they be started at the very beginning. One is the assisted human reproduction act, which is in committee. We cannot have too much debate on the subject. This is the whole question of whether embryonic material can be used for research purposes to look for cures for various disease. This is the stem cell debate.

I took part in that debate before second reading. It was one of the most elevated debates I have ever seen in the House of Commons. Both sides were trying to find a way around, a problem that touches the very core of our human values. On the one hand, there are the people who are very afraid that the use of embryonic stem cells will open the door to a disrespect for human life. Then there are the people on the other side of the equation who feel that any type of research or any means that can save lives and who feel that the use of discarded, and I stress discarded, embryonic cells could speed up research that would lead to cures of Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis, ALS and all these other diseases is a worthy aim. However that debate is not over.

I would not be opposed to seeing that piece of legislation start again through the process so that we could have a similar debate again because I think it is Parliament at its best, first and foremost, and it is an issue that, because it touches the core values of individual Canadians, really needs to be debated at great depth in the House. I would actually hope that the minister does not reinstate it at the committee stage and that he actually brings it back as a new bill.

The other bill that I would like to see started at the very beginning is the first nations governance act. Again this is very important legislation. If it is reinstated, it will be in committee. We did not have enough debate on that. The message is not going out clearly enough, particularly to the aboriginal community, that this legislation, of all the bills before the House, is tremendously good for Canada's native people. It would require aboriginal organizations to have democratic elections and to open their financial books to scrutiny.

Right now we know, and nobody likes to hear it, that all kinds of money goes to aboriginal communities and never reaches the people. This is federal money that just never gets to the people who need it. Therefore, we have this peculiar situation where the federal government is putting out many billions of dollars to assist Canada's aboriginals and that money is just not getting there. The reason the money is not getting there is that the aboriginal people themselves cannot see how that money is being managed.

I think all Canadians should support transparency and accountability. It is a given. Unfortunately, that bill, particularly because of its timing in the life of the House this past year, did not get the debate it deserves. Therefore, I would like to see it actually restarted.

Again, I am in this quandary. I have to support the main motion because, quite apart from the bills I think need to go forward immediately, what is even more crucial to me and what is key, and I am directing this right at the opposition members who are giving me very good attention and I thank them, is the motion would reinstate evidence before committees.

That has two consequences. It means that the evidence the committee on public accounts, of which I was a member, heard pertaining to the sponsorship files, all this notorious stuff about organizations, businesses in Quebec receiving government money to provide advice to the government on sponsorship, the advertising of or putting forward of the government logo, would be reinstated. There was I think quite a justifiable concern when the Auditor General and others reported that there appeared to be no records kept of these transactions, many hundreds of thousands of dollars, and little evidence that any work was actually done. Public accounts heard evidence on this.

Public accounts tends to work in a very non-partisan way. I think all members of public accounts felt that we had done a good job in hearing evidence. We felt that we had a report that was of great value to the House. However, unless this motion goes forward in allowing the reinstatement of evidence before committees, the House will never hear its report. I think it is so important that the committee hear what we have to say on an issue that caused great discomfort to members on the government side, in the front benches.

The other committee that had evidence before it that we need to see reinstated is the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, which heard a lot of evidence about the need to reform private members' business. It heard from MPs on all sides of the House. This is a terribly important issue to private members. As the situation stands now the whole business of bringing forward private members' legislation is totally flawed. If a member tries to bring forward a bill of value, it may be defeated for partisan and political reasons. That is not acceptable. It is not acceptable that private members' business can be interfered with by the leadership of any party, for example. That is the situation right now.

After much debate, the procedures and House affairs committee recommended that all private members' bills be votable, at least one member per session. What it means basically is that each MP will be entitled to put forward, per parliamentary session, one bill and that bill, no matter what it contains, would be votable. It would go before the House to be debated. The system now is a blind lottery. It is a flawed committee process that sees very good initiatives from both opposition and government MPs fail.

What has happened is the Stanting Committee on Procedures and House Affairs has tabled the report on that debate, has made that recommendation, and all that needs to happen is for the government to adopt that report and then there will be a change in the Standing Orders that will permit private members' bills to be votable. With prorogation that is lost unless the evidence of committees is reinstated as proposed in this motion. Then of course we would expect the government would reissue the same report that it tabled last June. I can say that if it did not, there would certainly be trouble on this side, not to mention, I am sure, the other side.

There it is. It is a dilemma. The motion is to reinstate bills and evidence before committees to the same status that these bills and evidence were before prorogation last June.

Mr. Speaker, no matter what side of the House, one always finds oneself in the position where one is forced to support a flawed motion or a flawed piece of legislation. I would certainly support this motion, but I can tell you one thing, Mr. Speaker: If this motion goes forward I can assure you that on this side of the House there will be pressure put on the individual ministers to make changes to one or two of those bills, because the thing about the motion is that these bills can only come back at the status they left the House last June if the minister reintroduces them without changes.

I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that perhaps the Minister of Justice make a little change to the cruelty to animals legislation, forcing it to go back to the beginning. Perhaps the Indian Affairs minister could make a little change to the Indian accountability act that would force it to go back to the beginning. Maybe the health minister could do the same thing with the assisted reproduction act.

So even though I would have supported the amendment proposed originally, I cannot support it now because I want to see the species at risk bill go forward, but I do hope that the Minister of Justice will have second thoughts about the cruelty to animals bill because we do not like it over here. A lot of us have a lot of reservations about it. I would love to see it go back to the beginning again because I doubt if it would survive the process a second time.

Having said all of that, let me say that even if this motion goes forward--and the motion will go forward, I am sure it will pass the House--there will be those of us on this side and those on that side, Mr. Speaker, who will be working on the ministers to try to persuade them that certain of those bills should be started at the very beginning and perhaps some of them will come out of the process much better than they certainly are in their current state.

[Inky Mark, Canadian Alliance, Dauphin—Swan River, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part in the debate on the government's amendment to shut down debate in the House, which is called closure. Should I be surprised? Not really. Nothing has really changed in the House since the Liberal government came to power in 1993. In fact, we heard this morning from other members of the opposition that the Liberals have already established a record of closing debate in this democratic House. I believe it has been over 70 times

I would like to talk about the democratic deficit of the government and the whole issue of prorogation as well as some of the bills that the government wants to bring back to the House.

It is rather ironic that throughout the summer we read newspaper articles on comments made by Liberal members about the democratic deficit in Parliament. Here again we have, in the second week of Parliament, another example of why this place is in deficit when it comes to practising democratic values.

It is also unfortunate that the government House leader could not come to an agreement with the opposition House parties that would have avoided the situation that obviously led the government side to bring in a motion to shut down debate again.

The first thing on which members of the Liberal Party need to be reminded is that they rarely listen to Canadians. They do a lot of talking about consulting and listening but when it comes to putting their beliefs into practice usually it does not work out very well.

On the whole issue of proroguing the House and returning two weeks later, I had no complaints because I am always busy at home doing constituency work. However, in terms of delaying the House business for two weeks and then coming back here today with the government asking to almost reverse the process of prorogation, in other words, bringing the legislation that died on the order paper back into the House at this point in time, is rather a mockery.

It tells me that the throne speech, this whole business of going through the motions at the beginning of last week, was really all for show and for nothing else. I have been told that when we have a throne speech the government is supposed to put in place a new agenda, a new set of legislation that it wants to put through the House. Obviously, there is nothing new. We see the request of the government to bring back into the House old pieces of legislation which leads me to believe that we really did not need to prorogue the House in the first place.

I would like to comment on some of the bills that the government wants to bring back which are very contentious. It seems to be in the order of the day for the government to divide Canadians along the lines of urban and rural. We know for a fact that 80% of Canadians live in urban centres. That is probably the reason they would rather support the urban type legislation and many times forget about the effect they have in the rural communities.

Bill C-5 is a good example, the cruelty to animals legislation. My riding of Dauphin—Swan River is a very agricultural based riding. It is truly the backbone of our economy, the way our economic health is determined by the health of the agriculture industry. This bill really could be called a pet bill if someone did not know what it was. It is about the protection of pets. I do not think there is a Canadian who would disagree with the principal premise of this bill, of cruelty to animals, not only pets but also animals that we raise for food.

I believe farmers throughout the country agree that we need to treat all animals in the right manner. We live in the 21st century. We do not believe in beating animals, beating our children or beating our pets. The problem is that the way the legislation is written it could have a huge impact on people raising animals for the purpose of producing food for Canadians.

That leads me to make another statement which is that the government really does not value the whole food production industry. With that kind of bill it certainly does not respect or have any value for the people putting food on the table with reference to the raising of animals.

Another very contentious bill and one that was mentioned this morning is Bill C-15B, the species at risk bill. It would have a huge impact. Canadians have a great interest in our environment. In our nature as Canadians, we are environmentalists. The problem is we need to also look at the pitfalls of bills such as Bill C-15B and the impact they would have on people who live in the rural parts of the country. Farmers already are very aware of species that are at risk and do their utmost. They leave land untilled and leave an environment that is conducive to helping the species survive. We see that throughout this country. However, if it is legislated into law the demands on lands, and with absolutely no reasonable approach to compensation, it would create a conflict between rural Canadians and urban Canadians.

Unfortunately the government has a track record of dividing Canadians along urban-rural lines. I do not need to remind Canadians and certainly the Liberal government how the gun control bill, Bill C-68 has done exactly that. In fact, Bill C-68 is still paramount in the minds of most Canadians. It has absolutely nothing to do with the intent of the bill, which is to reduce violence in our society with which we all agree as Canadians. The problem is that the Liberals do not understand that the use of firearms as a tool is a way of life in rural Canada. Every time we look at a firearm, it is not a dangerous piece of material by itself. It is the person behind it and the person using it. In fact it has created a mess. The firearm registration system for long guns is a disaster. As Canadians know, we have had handgun registration in the country for over 60 years. Unfortunately, with the mixing of the two, even that registration system will be a mess.

On top of that, we talk about the financial deficit of the military. We are wasting over $1 billion on the long gun registration which easily could have been put into health care or put toward the needs of the military.

Another contentious bill in the eyes of aboriginal Canadians is Bill C-61, the first nations governance bill. The biggest criticism of the bill was that it lacked consultation with the first nations communities. Let me say that not all first nations agree with that comment. The minister has said that he himself consulted with many first nations communities.

I will close by saying that the Liberals as usual do not walk the talk. They tend to do a lot of talking. They have a history of that. Most Canadians agree that the whole political system needs an overhaul. Certainly we should begin in the House. It is really called democracy. If we are really to practise democracy then let us begin in the House.

[Rob Merrifield, Canadian Alliance, Yellowhead, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the House leader on the opposite side has tried to avoid answering the questions on Bill C-15B and Bill C-5 that my colleague addressed to him, which are very straightforward. It goes to the root problem of why we are sitting in this place. It is because we are here to make good legislation that applies appropriately across the board to all citizens.

The problem that we have right now and that we have been discussing for half an hour is a democratic problem. When I go into my riding people tell me all the time that this place is dysfunctional and that they feel they have no voice here. That is why 40% of them checked out of the last election. The government is going for a legacy, a legacy of invoking closure or time allocation 78 times. The last government did it 72 times.

Why would the government want to continue that legacy?

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, both those bills have been voted on by the House. Some amendments were proposed at various stages in committee and elsewhere. Members on all sides of the House considered those amendments. The minister considered those amendments in the case of both bills. Accommodations were made on a whole number of amendments to Bill C-5. Everyone recognizes that. As a matter of fact, the hon. member's colleague a few moments ago talked about the fact that we studied the bill for too long. I think he said something like nine years. Obviously, many points of view were considered at that time.

As to why the House voted a particular way or a committee voted a particular way on a particular amendment, obviously that is not for me to say as government House leader.

On the issue of Bill C-15B, I said before that the government very much wants the procedures to occur in a way that do not adversely affect the agricultural community. That has been said. The minister has said it in speeches in the House and elsewhere. Everyone knows that is the case. Of course, the bill will go before the Senate and the Senate can propose at that point amendments that it deems necessary, if it deems any amendments to be necessary.

[Grant Hill, Canadian Alliance, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, in a constructive vein in terms of these questions, I would like the Canadian public to know just exactly what the Alliance's disquiet is with Bill C-5 and Bill C-15. I would like the House leader to explain why these two simple things could not be done.

Bill C-5 talks about reasonable compensation. That is subject to a very broad discretion. The Alliance would be very pleased with this bill if fair market value compensation was in the bill. My question to the House leader on that bill is this. Why would the government not put in fair market value compensation for landowners whose land is withdrawn because of society's broad goal?

On Bill C-15 our concern is that farmers and ranchers will have their operations impacted by frivolous animal rights activists. My question to the House leader is this. Why would the government not exclude in the bill normal agricultural practices?

These are two straightforward questions.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I believe I represent my agricultural constituents as well as the hon. member for Wild Rose, who I believe is doing a good job representing his constituents.

Bill C-15B is a good bill. The minister has been quite clear in saying how he would not object to further clarification. Obviously we have the Senate and whatever the Senate feels is appropriate will be done. However the minister has been quite clear.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, in terms of the use of time allocation, in the U.K. house actually every bill is allocated to the same date it is read. In other words, at the end of every day, whatever is being debated, there is a vote.

The hon. member is complaining about free votes. I know that there is a problem in his party in that regard. I wish he and his caucus the best of luck to sort those things out. We do not have that problem on our side of the House, but if he does, I have some sympathy for his problem.

On the issue of Bill C-15B, and this is a more serious part of what the member says, I represent a very large agricultural constituency, as does the hon. member--

[Roy H. Bailey, Canadian Alliance, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Mr. Speaker, it seems that the government is probably headed toward establishing a centenary record. The government is at 78 closures and, who knows, it may get the 100. I do not think that is very complimentary to any government. I know when it was in the opposition, it certainly criticized the government in power at the time.

I sat for many hours in the environment committee on Bill C-5. However my concern is that for Bill C-15B a promise was made to the backbench agricultural people in the your own caucus that the Senate would guarantee that all the things for which we were asking would be put in the bill. We learned in December that the Senate said that nobody would tell it anything. Those promises, which were made, will not be kept. Now the bill will come back to the House and we will have no assurance that you will not shut down an entire industry and leave it up to those outside the House to decide what cruelty is. We are in a drastic situation.

I think that bill--

[Charlie Penson, Canadian Alliance, Peace River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting to hear the government House leader talk about the need to bring back all this legislation. Really, the question that is raised as a result of this is, why did the government prorogue to begin with? If all the same legislation is coming back, what was the reason to prorogue the House?

We know that there are two pieces of legislation that have been of considerable controversy, not just last summer, but for years prior to that. In fact, the Liberals have tried several times to bring forward the endangered species legislation, the species at risk bill, Bill C-15. I know from travelling my constituency all summer that there is still a tremendous amount of debate about this issue. Most of the people I have talked to are very much against it and would like to see this issue debated further in the House before it passes. Why prorogue the House if the government is going to bring back the same kind of legislation?

I would like to ask the House leader of the government if he will at least take Bills C-15B and C-5, the two controversial bills, out of this omnibus legislation he is trying to bring back, separate them and let us move on with the other issues that the government wants to proceed with?