Debates of Dec. 16th, 1999

Government Grants

[The Speaker]

I remind hon. members not to use the names of members who are sitting in the House.

[Grant Hill, Reform, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, as all these people are referred to, I wonder if they knew what was going on behind closed doors. Did those people who accepted this proposition know what was happening? How can the government stand to try to defend the indefensible?

[Jane Stewart, Liberal, Minister of Human Resources Development]

Mr. Speaker, let me remind the hon. member again about the people in the community that supported these programs, such as the mayor of Shawinigan; the provincial member, as I pointed out; members of la Société québécoise de développement de la main-d'oeuvre; and members of the caisses populaires. Yes, they know their region. Yes, they know what undertakings will create jobs in their region. Yes, they wrote to our department and confirmed that this was an appropriate investment.

Bill C-20

[Louis Plamondon, Bloc, Richelieu, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs.

He can say that his Bill C-20 is a bill on clarity, but the fact is that the provisions on evaluation of the results thrust us into vagueness and obscurity, and lay open to question the universally accepted principle that all votes are equal.

Does the minister not understand that 93.52% of registered voters who cast ballots in the last referendum in Quebec did so specifically because they were convinced that all votes were equal?

[Stéphane Dion, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, all votes are of course equal, and after that the outcome is evaluated.

Is the hon. member by any chance suggesting that every referendum in Quebec in which there is a result of 50% plus one ought to be acted on? If so, he ought to get on the phone right away to the Quebec Minister of Municipal Affairs.

[Louis Plamondon, Bloc, Richelieu, QC]

Mr. Speaker, there is just one thing that is unclear for Quebec: the convoluted arguments of the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs.

I will ask him only one question through you, Mr. Speaker: is my vote equal to his vote?

[Stéphane Dion, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, our votes are equal of course, which is what yielded the 49.4% yes vote last time. As far as I know, the PQ government was quick to say “until next time”. If it lost the next time there was a referendum, would it say the same again? It will start all over again.

The crux of the problem, however, is that if ever, after a yes vote, separation were to occur, unfortunately, the people who had voted no would not be able to say “until next time”. The act would be irreversible, and would commit our children, our children's children, and the generations after that.

[Some hon. members]

Hear, hear.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[The Speaker]

Order, please. I do not know where it came from, but I heard the word liar.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[The Speaker]

Order, please. The other day the hon. member for Roberval was among those who told us that the right to free speech here in this House had to be protected. It must be protected for all members.

I therefore ask all members never to use these words during oral question period or during debate.

Government Grants

[Grant McNally, Reform, Dewdney—Alouette, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the government is attempting to throw up a smokescreen when answering questions about shady deals in Shawinigan by pointing to a handful of individuals who support the deal. There are millions of Canadians who do not support it.

Let us review the facts. The Prime Minister promised a convicted criminal and a confessed embezzler hundreds of thousands of dollars in government grants. The deal was helped along by René Fugère who is under RCMP investigation for illegal lobbying. Not coincidentally the Prime Minister owned a large share of the golf course which neighbours the Grand-Mère inn.

Is it not true that the Prime Minister's interest in these dealings goes beyond simply creating jobs in his riding?

[Herb Gray, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister]

No, Mr. Speaker, it is not true.

[Grant McNally, Reform, Dewdney—Alouette, BC]

Mr. Speaker, once again, the Prime Minister intervened to give a convicted criminal access to hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money. He discussed the deal with two shady characters, and one of the criminals owns the hotel next to the Prime Minister's old golf course.

Why does the Prime Minister insist that he was just being a good MP when it is obvious to everyone that his dealings benefited him politically?

[Herb Gray, Liberal, Deputy Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is a captive of the clouds in his own mind because it is obvious only to him that there was wrongdoing by the Prime Minister. This is not true. This is not true.

Bill C-20

[Paul Mercier, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as Mr. Trudeau pointed out in 1958:

In national politics, English Canadians have long behaved as if they believed that democracy was not made for French Canadians.

Will the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs admit that his clarity bill perpetuates the same bias regarding the ability of Quebecers to democratically decide their future?

[Stéphane Dion, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, we Quebecers are lucky enough to have two governments and two parliaments that have constitutional powers, one in Quebec City and one in Ottawa. These two parliaments have a responsibility to never let us lose Canada in confusion.

As long as we want to stay in Canada we will stay, because we built this country, and the national assembly will fulfil that responsibility in its own fashion and so will the Parliament of Canada.

[Paul Mercier, Bloc, Terrebonne—Blainville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we are on the eve of the Christmas holiday. Quebec families will be discussing the minister's bill when they get together.

Should that bill not be clear and should the minister not give a nice present by clearly stating that in a future referendum no vote will have more weight than another one and, therefore, recognize the legitimacy of the 50% plus one rule?

[Stéphane Dion, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada and Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, that rule does not exist. It is not written anywhere in the Quebec Referendum Act. In fact, the white paper that underlies this act clearly states that the reason it is not necessary to set a majority threshold is that the political authorities will be able to evaluate the result on the basis of what is at stake and of the clarity of the process.

Above all, we Quebecers like clarity. We are clearly saying that we no longer want confusing questions like the one asked in 1995.

Government Grants

[Gary Lunn, Reform, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, how things change. When Brian Mulroney found himself in a scandal Liberal rat packers were all over him. Today they applaud and cheer a Prime Minister who negotiated taxpayer funded grants for criminals and allowed a minister of the crown to break the government's own rules by becoming associated with suspected criminals who got secret commissions from these grants.

Will the government House leader or the minister of heritage stand today to explain how this is any different from what they used to raise hell about in the House?

[The Speaker]

I wish we would stay away from words like hell and damn. We do not need them. We have other words we can use.

[Jane Stewart, Liberal, Minister of Human Resources Development]

Mr. Speaker, let us look at this another way. In terms of these projects only 10% of the funding came from transitional jobs funds. The rest came from private sector investors, from private and public financial institutions, from local communities and even from a union investment fund.

Is the hon. member suggesting that these people did not know what they were doing or who they were partnering with? Is he suggesting that they did not believe these projects were the right thing to do in this region? They agreed that investments by the federal government along with their investments was the right thing to do to help create jobs in this area of very high unemployment.

[Gary Lunn, Reform, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is amazing that the Minister of Canadian Heritage is remaining quiet in this but let us look at some of the facts.

The ministry of human resources staffer Thériault made it very clear to departmental personnel what they were up against. He said the proposed grants broke the rules, needed to be artificially inflated to meet the dollar amounts promised by the Prime Minister and had to proceed no matter what.

Let me rephrase my question. Can the Minister of Canadian Heritage or the House leader explain how this is any different from what Brian Mulroney did which drove the Tories to two seats in the House? How is what the Prime Minister is doing any different from what Brian Mulroney did?

[Sheila Copps, Liberal, Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I am absolutely amazed that the member would be complaining about members doing work to help constituents in their ridings. Every single day this week the member has privately crossed the floor to talk to me about a particular project in his riding. It involves considerable expenditure of the taxpayers' money but of course I want to consider it because I respect the integrity of the member.