Grant Hill

[Health, March 21st, 1994]

I have a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker.

Blood samples kept by the Red Cross are identifiable as to donors and recipients. Why else would they be kept? This may be a difficult problem but lives are at stake. Will the minister commit today to seek out the recipients of this tainted blood?

[Health, March 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Health.

Thousands of Canadians worry about their chances of contracting AIDS from transfusions received prior to 1985. What progress can the minister report in identifying those at risk?

[Supply, March 17th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, to talk specifically about the gun control comment, I am not for one second saying that gun control should not exist. What I am saying and will say very strongly is that more stringent gun control measures are not the answer.

As the member speaks of Lépine's gun, he should realize that Lépine's gun would not be removed from Canadian society under our current gun control legislation.

[Supply, March 17th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I might comment on the idea of legislating moral values.

I am sure the issue of code of conduct is one the member opposite would not care to disagree with. This issue has been blown all out of proportion, as a code of ethics is simply a statement that as public persons a very important part of our lives is now public. I am sure the member opposite will be most interested in seeing what our code of conduct looks like when it comes out.

[Supply, March 17th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I feel this is probably one of the easiest topics to speak on in the House. Surely we have a very common desire on this topic, to see justice and fairness in our justice system enacted.

I would like to start off by saying that in my view Canada does have a justice problem. It is a problem that is typified by the fact that homicides are climbing, our schools are unsafe and smuggling is rampant. We have recently had House business that dealt with smuggling. Fraud in our country is commonplace.

I would like to put criminal justice on a priority list for members who are close to me on this side of the House. We have gone through social programs and priorized them. We put health care at the top of our priorities along with education, pensions for the needy and environmental issues. We put justice as the one area in our social program system that we would spend more money on. This is the one area, in spite of our deficit and debt problems, we would spend extra money on. We put a high priority on this specific issue.

This discourse is not in any sense meant to be confrontational. This discourse is meant to be informational. I hope it will be taken in that context.

Some statistics in our country trouble me: 3 per cent of the population are natives and 11.3 per cent of our penitentiary inmates are natives. I have talked to the native elders and have tried to ascertain what they thought the answer to that problem was. They think the old values of the native community need to be better taught. They talk of sweetgrass ceremonies, sweat lodges, and improving the status of the individual by their old cultural methods. I say we need a return of dignity and self-sufficiency for natives. People can only be proud of their culture when they are proud of themselves.

Another thing I would pause to reflect on is something I call a prison revolt. This revolt comes from the sociologists and criminologists in our society. They approach crime with the viewpoint that crime is not the fault of the criminal in many instances. It is simply the fault of upbringing, of poverty and of abuse. I recognize there are major problems in our society that contribute to crime. I recognize that education, prevention of poverty and prevention of child abuse are extremely important. They say the answer to the problem is compassionate, caring

therapy in a nice warm jail, with retraining opportunities and better recreation and library facilities than people on assistance have. I frankly disagree. That is not the answer to that problem.

We allow prisoners to vote. We release dangerous offenders on unsupervised leave. We sentence them to life but that means little. In my view in some ways we as Canadians have lost our marbles.

Turning to some other backward moves in our criminal justice system, we take our law enforcement officers, our RCMP trainees, and do not pay them very well. As trainees we give them a relatively low wage scale. As they go through their training process they reach a point at which they are ready to take on the more major responsibilities and with our frozen civil servant wages we leave them at the training wage scale. What talented young men would want to serve in the law enforcement agency realizing that they would be penalized? This is one area in which the civil service wage freeze is absolutely unfair.

When gun control measures were started, they were started to curtail violence with guns, a proposition that no one could argue with. Homicides with guns have not improved over the lifetime of gun control. Stricter gun control has no correlation whatever to better results on homicides with guns. I hear now that one of the reasons for stricter gun control is that guns are inherently dangerous. I also hear that we are going to prevent accidents and suicides by having stricter gun control. It just is not the reason to have gun control. On the other end of the scale we have a free vote coming up that is going to allow doctors to assist in suicides. These are the two ends of the scale that I think are completely wrong.

Honest gun users are also having weapons declared restricted and then confiscated without pay, a provision that is entirely unfair.

Another issue that I found fascinating about gun control is that when RCMP officers take their weapons off their hips, either in the detachment or in their homes, they must place bore locks in their weapons. Their weapons are then locked so that they cannot be used.

I spoke with RCMP officers at home and asked: "What advantage is there to you in doing that?" They said: "There is no advantage to us at all. We have always been extremely careful with our weapons, extremely careful because our own children could get the loaded weapons. The only advantage in that is to the criminal". In fact a criminal could wander into the detachment and spray the RCMP officers with rifle fire while they scramble to unlock their weapons. Again in my view in Canada on some issues we have lost our marbles.

It is not good enough to stand in the House and just complain, mutter and say that everything is wrong. It is only useful if we have some constructive comments to make. I would like to turn to that portion of my address now.

In our society family values have become less important. This has a major part to play in our problems with our criminal justice system. Single parent families today are 13 per cent of the families in society. Many reasons are given for this but a few stand out to me. More teens today are choosing to keep and raise their babies. There are fewer forced weddings and there is much more divorce in society today. I have tried to look very critically at why families are breaking down. I am partial to the one that says that families are spending too much time trying to raise their sights financially rather than raise their sights on their children.

When I was a young man of about 13 years of age and in grade seven my parents got their first home. It was a 1,300 square foot home; not very big, not very expensive. If they had paid for that mortgage over the span of their lives, they would have paid for it by the time that they were in their early sixties.

I look with interest as young families today set out very early in their lives to get big homes. Homes much bigger than 1,300 square feet would be the average. They borrow earlier. They take on more onerous financial duties. This forces both parents to get out into the workforce to try to pay that debt. This conscious decision does not allow as much direct parental contact with the children. I believe that contributes to some of the problems in our justice system.

Day care is not the same as parent care. Television care is not the same as parent care. A new BMW in the garage is not the same as close, loving parental care of a loved child.

The solution in part would be to change the tax rules so that there is encouragement for one parent to stay home. That need not be the woman; it could well be the man. Another change that could take place would be to allow our workforce to adjust hours so that there could at least be one parent at home.

The other specific area I wanted to address does not have very much to do with jails and what not. There is a very expensive area in our justice system. I want to refer to an article in the Medical Post from December that talked about obstetricians recommending defensive medicine to prevent lawsuits. The obstetrician in this article said that every single baby, just after it is born, should have a brain scan and the brain scan should be done to prevent a lawsuit ensuing in the future if things showed up in that baby's development. If cerebral palsy ensued the obstetrician could be blamed for problems at birth. Every single baby that had potential problems should have a brain scan, according to that obstetrician.

The lawsuits that this obstetrician is trying to prevent are lawsuits that involve huge amounts of money in our court system and huge amounts of money in terms of the actual awards that are given, settlements of up to $7 million.

In my view the confrontational legal system we are developing in our country mimicking the U.S. system when it comes to medical legal issues is costing untold amounts of money. The end result of the meeting-and this was a meeting that had a number of solicitors in it-was to suggest that no fault medical insurance would go a long way toward preventing the gladiatorial events of doctors against lawyers in our court system. I propose that as one specific item that we should be looking at. It involves the health ministry. It involves the justice ministry as well.

The justice issue transcends every political party. This issue transcends every personal philosophy, every level of income, and every age group. I want to co-operate in the House to make sure our criminal justice system is improved.

[The Budget, March 10th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I want to give the members two specific examples of how municipalities are in fact handling the infrastructure program. When I was in one community in my riding not so long ago, I was told: "Well, we are going to look after our sewers on the main street". The councillor admitted to me that this work would be done next year but they were pushing it ahead one year because the infrastructure program was there.

A second community in my riding, and these are communities that have no reason to tell me other than the truth, said they were going to modify their beautiful ice arena equipment so that it would be upgraded, work they would do simply two years down the road.

My comment is that I do not believe that many of the things that are being done with the infrastructure program should be done with borrowed money. I would be more than willing to have the member's comment on that.

[Vietnam War Memorial, March 9th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, between 1958 and 1975 an estimated 40,000 Canadians joined the American armed forces, many of whom served in southeast Asia and the war in Vietnam.

In Washington, D.C. today the names of over 100 Canadians who were killed or missing in action are listed on the Vietnam war memorial. One of those listed is a close family member of mine, Paul Stuart Laverock.

On July 9, 1994 a Canadian coalition will be unveiling the Canadian Vietnam veterans national memorial dedicated to those Canadians who gave their lives and to those who are still missing in southeast Asia.

The plan is for this memorial to be located in Ottawa. However, to date no crown land has been volunteered for this small yet highly symbolic memorial.

On behalf of those Canadians killed and missing in Vietnam and thousands of Canadians who lost loved ones to the war in Vietnam, I call upon the government today to provide a suitable plot of crown land for this memorial.

[Supply, March 8th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, never-married men and never-married women statistically have exactly the same earnings Canada-wide. The member is correct and that is what I said.

[Supply, March 8th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I would prefer, rather than recognize the woman in the home or even in fact the man in the home by paying or doing something of that nature, making sure that the income tax system did not downplay the contribution of the spouse in the home.

The Income Tax Act is discriminatory for those who have a spouse at home. My preference would be to do this the least legislative way as possible. In my mind the use of the Income Tax Act in that way would be more appropriate. I thank the member for the question.

[Supply, March 8th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the motion in front of the House today is one that someone may wonder about, specifically why a male would stand on this issue at all, thinking that it might be an issue only for women. I would like to state initially that as a Reformer I believe in equality of opportunity for every single Canadian but not equality of outcome.

I would like to comment on what qualifies me to speak on this issue. First, I was raised by a wonderful mother. Second, I have a sister whose love and affection I value. Third, I am a husband of 28 years, very happily married. Fourth, I am a father of seven children, only one a daughter. I have six sons, an imbalance

maybe in my life. Finally I have professional qualifications which have allowed me to be close to women and their problems for all my adult working life.

I would like to make some observations. One observation is that women live seven years longer on average than men. I have wondered in one sense why women would want to be equal to men in that regard. We have a shorter lifespan than women.

The second thing I would like to comment on is an observation that I have made from my time as a student in university. In my initial class there were 106 of us, but 14 of my classmates were women. I graduated back in 1968. I have watched the enrolment in university in my faculty very carefully. Today I find that the enrolment in the faculty is virtually equal.

I have asked myself what the change has been since 1964 when I entered college and today. Has it been a legislative change? Has there been a change in legislation that would require the university to have men and women treated as equal? There has not been such a legislative change at all. There has been what I call an educative change, a change that has allowed us to recognize that women's qualifications in the faculty that I graduated from are absolutely equal.

Another observation I would like to make is in a sense a bit of a myth exploder. I have heard figures bandied about that women are paid much lower than men on average and that for equivalent work they do not do as well as men. One thing that is missing from this equation, however, is if we compare men who were never married with women who were never married, the results are virtually equal for pay and have been in that regard equal for a long time. Those observations I would like to leave with the House at the start of my comments today.

I would like to address what marriage does to the equation. I look back to the days when my grandparents were raising their family. It was a traditional, old time Canadian family. My grandfather worked on a dairy farm, outside. My grandmother was the housekeeper and worked inside. She did the gardening, the housework, the cooking, the sewing, the yard chores, the house renovations, gave piano lessons, prepared for church. There are some who say that those duties were not at all equal. There are some who say there was an equality there. I asked my grandmother whether she felt there was any inequality there. She said there was an inequality, my poor grandad had all the hard work and she had all the enjoyable work.

In the modern family today things have changed dramatically. There are often two working parents who have to leave the home, go outside the household, and it is very difficult for a mother to nurture the children and do that only. With those working parents when they get married the most natural thing that happens is that they decide to have children. When the children come along there are certain negatives that relate to the mother as far as the job situation is concerned. When she is pregnant often morning sickness comes along and she has difficulty even getting to work during that period of time. She goes through childbirth and there is a period of time, some six weeks plus, in which she is incapable of working. In many cases there are mothers who decide that they will stay home and nurture the baby, breast feed, care for in a way that only a mother can care for the newborn baby.

There are cases in which there are medical problems that crop up. High blood pressure can be a problem with the post-partum period. There are other issues, problems with the placenta, problems that require the mother to be out of the workforce for a fairly long period of time.

When these issues ensue the mother automatically takes a drop in income. The father generally goes out and may even find extra work. The statistics I hear which say that men and women are not equally treated in our society in some cases are aberrations. I would rather have the statistics of never married men and women compared to see if we have equality.

I hear from both the Liberals and the Bloc members a desire to engineer socially, to move toward what I think are very well meaning principles. I do not agree with the final result but I know that the motives are good.

I want to bring up an example of a type of social engineering that I came across which I think is wrong headed social engineering.

With regard to social engineering, in the early 1900s there was a small community in Alberta called Brule. This community was based on coal mining and coal mining alone. It was a thriving community. In fact when the first world war came along the community boomed. People moved in, built homes, and had a real solid community. They had enough access to humanity. There was a theatre and a bowling alley.

The future of Brule looked very bright. However the coal reserve ran out. The very fine seam of coal they had literally ran out. It took six months until the community of Brule was non-existent. Everyone had moved away. They sought employment where employment was.

I wonder what would happen to Brule today if exactly the same thing occurred. I imagine that Brule would have had an influx of social workers who would come in to take care of the problems of alcoholism that would ensue from unemployed miners who wanted to stay exactly where they were because they had nice homes and all the amenities. I am quite convinced we would have a department of all kinds of things looking after the social needs and concerns and worries of the people of Brule. We would need somebody there for economic displacement, somebody to make sure the post office was looked after and some-

body to make sure that the school had all the advantages of the schools in the larger communities.

The social engineering that would keep Brule there today did not keep Brule there when it died. The community of Brule today is non-existent. Even the homes were taken down, disassembled, and taken to a community fairly close by. Brule was literally gone.

I think in our haste and great desire to do well that we sometimes socially engineer ourselves into the corner.

I would conclude my comments by saying as I said at the start, that I heartily support the equality of opportunity for everyone in Canada. I do not support the equality of outcome. My desire is to make sure that we do everything we can to prevent the impediments that will prevent the equality of opportunity. That goes for every single Canadian, man or woman.