Carolyn Parrish

[Privilege, December 11th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I rise primarily because I moved the motion at procedures yesterday. I want to make sure, procedurally, that it is very clear why I did so.

I have been--

[Privilege, December 11th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, not only am I the member for Mississauga Centre, but I am the former queen of democracy as of three weeks ago. It was a short crown.

[Supply, October 31st, 2002]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I am sorry. I do not speak in the House very often so I have to be brought to task once in a while.

Listening to the debate makes me nervous because I hear people referring to the former finance minister and his concepts. I hear them sinking down into this partisanship that seems to be something we are trying to work our way through. The people on the government side who choose to vote for the motion are giving up a lot more than the opposition. There is no question. It is harder for them and when everything is reinterpreted as a potential leadership race it hardens attitudes on this side.

I would caution people on the opposite side to keep the discussion on the positive merits of selecting chairs based on merit and service on a committee rather than degenerate into one of putting up or shutting up, or is it a leadership race or whatever. Heaven forbid that the opposition would lose my vote on this on Monday but I do not enjoy listening to this.

I would encourage everyone to demonstrate that this will be a wonderful experiment. It will be non-partisan because the opposition is not going to continue taking shots at this side of the House.

[Supply, October 31st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to comment on what I heard from both of the last two speakers.

First, there are members on this side of the House that are willing to vote for the motion on Monday, but I caution you that the rhetoric that I am hearing this afternoon--

[Supply, October 31st, 2002]

Madam Speaker, I would like to make one comment and then hopefully inspire a bit of dialogue.

First, I would like to put on the record, given that I can challenge the patience of most whips and House leaders, that I have never been intimidated by the current whip or the current House leader, when he was in that role of whip. This is a much exaggerated theory. On our side of the House we are often put in a position where we have things explained to us, and to please and to continue a good rapport we sometimes change our minds. I cannot speak for others but I have never been intimated by a whip of our party. Members can probably guess from today that I challenge the patience of a lot of people a lot of the time.

My second comment to the official opposition House leader is that we were involved at procedure and House affairs, which I considered to be the most non-partisan committee in the House. This motion has come forward before at that committee. During that time it never really came to the House because it did not get agreement in that committee.

One thing that the mover of the original motion did before it was amended, was to change the second vice-chair from a member of the official opposition to just a member of the opposition. I partially think that was to make the whole opposition feel that it had an opportunity to become vice-chair of some committees. Was it an oversight or was it an intentional modification to be more democratic?

The other thing I would like to ask the House leader of the opposition is this. Is it a big stretch to agree that the chair should be a member of the government, particularly for this round?

This is the last thing I would like to ask him. I have been accused of being rather naive in trusting the opposition to make this work, if in fact it passes on Monday, because this is an adversarial place. I can remember when I was a high school teacher, we would get an OSR on the kids and would find one who had been jail and who was a big problem. The first time that kid stepped out of line, he or she was nailed and then the kid became a problem in class.

We are at the point in that committee where I trust that members really wants this to work for the next year or the next round. It would be very good if the member could assure the House that I am not naive, that the member has every intention of selecting the best chairs possible and not disrupting, not being adversarial and not purposely choosing chairs who will not work.

[Committees of the House, October 31st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I have a couple of comments to make, hoping that I will get a few responses from the previous speaker.

First, I find it a very unusual argument from the parliamentary secretary for public works when he talks about giving out jobs based on sex and based on ethnicity when we currently have two parliamentary secretaries for public works who are male and white and in the city of Mississauga, so I do not think that is working too well.

I think he talked about the majority of the committee selecting the chair because in fact the Liberals are the majority, but that is the sort of argument that causes the us and them argument in the House. Committees are not supposed to be like that and I would like him to comment on that. He actually suggested that the opposition should not be involved and I find that quite unusual.

He talked about the way things are done. I cannot resist commenting on the way this argument has gone today. Procedure has been used to defer a vote into oblivion, so I would like his comment on the way things are being done here right now.

[Women's History Month, October 29th, 2002]

Madam Speaker, October is Women's History Month. This year's theme is Women and Sport--Champions Forever. I would like to take this opportunity to celebrate the achievements of Nancy Greene Raine, declared Canada's female athlete of the 20th century.

Nancy Greene participated in three winter Olympics in Alpine skiing's slolam and giant slolam events and won gold and silver medals in 1968 in Grenoble, France. Her success continued as she won the World Cup title two years consecutively in 1967 and 1968. In fact, Nancy Greene was the inspiration for one personally disastrous attempt at downhill skiing, which I shall never forget.

Not only a great athlete, Nancy helped to develop the Nancy Greene ski league and entry level racing program for young children and has made significant contributions to the development of amateur sport in Canada.

Nancy and her husband, Al, have been instrumental in the development of the Whistler Blackcomb ski resort and are currently helping to develop the Sun Peaks ski resort in British Columbia.

I would like to congratulate Nancy Greene on her great accomplishments as an athlete, coach, businesswoman and mother.

[Health, June 12th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to acknowledge a true Canadian success story of which we can all be very proud.

On Monday Health Partners International of Canada inaugurated a new distribution centre in Mississauga, Ontario. From this new centre Health Partners International co-ordinates the shipment of donated medicines, vaccines and health care products to needy patients in developing countries. The centre also delivers aid in response to natural disasters around the world.

Over the past decade Canadian research-based pharmaceutical companies have donated almost $100 million dollars worth of products for this effort. This includes more than $15 million dollars that will be donated this year alone.

I wish to congratulate Canada's research-based pharmaceutical companies and Health Partners International for this program, a program that exemplifies the universal desire of Canadians to help the less fortunate around the world.

[Interparliamentary Delegations, April 23rd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 34 I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the 13th report of the Canadian NATO Parliamentary Association, which represented Canada at the meeting of the subcommittee on future security and defence capabilities of the NATO parliamentary assembly held in Slovenia and Slovakia from March 5 to March 8, 2002.

[Interparliamentary Delegations, March 21st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 34(1) I have the honour to present to the House, in both official languages, the 12th report of the Canadian NATO Parliamentary Association which represented Canada at the joint meeting for the defence and security, economics and security, and political committees of the NATO parliamentary assembly held in Brussels, Belgium and France from February 17 to 20, 2002.