John M. Cummins

[Canada National Marine Conservation Areas Act, November 8th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I do not see this as an environmental bill. The push behind it or the driving force may be to protect the marine environment, but it is a bill essentially to create conservation areas.

The federal government is clearly responsible for the ocean below the low water mark. That is the minister's constitutional responsibility. The member is quite correct in that in this day and age we cannot simply march in and have our will prevail. The provinces certainly want a say, and have a right to a say, regarding the waters off their shores and how they want them developed.

My point is that ultimately somebody has to be responsible. The wisdom of the constitution was that it made somebody responsible. That somebody was the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. There was someone we could point the finger at when things went wrong. This bill is going to muddy that. No one is going to be responsible. I think it bodes ill for the fisheries and the fisheries resource.

[Canada National Marine Conservation Areas Act, November 8th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak on the bill today. I have a number of concerns about it. It is interesting that in question period today we were talking about the possibility of a recession and a need for spending scarce government funds on a variety of issues.

When money is scarce and the government still has to spend money, we have to look at where we will find it. One area is to try to do something about controlling government spending. The bill, as far as I can see, flies right in the face of that objective of streamlining government and making government accountable.

Currently the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has a constitutional responsibility to protect the fisheries resource. Section 91(12) of the Constitution Act, 1867 states that the federal government has jurisdiction over “sea coast and inland fisheries”. This constitutional jurisdiction is exercised by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, which manages and controls fisheries through the provisions of the Fisheries Act.

In a nutshell, the responsibility of the federal government has been addressed many times in court. In the Agawa decision, in the Ontario courts, it stated quite clearly that:

The purpose of the Fisheries Act and Regulations made thereunder, although binding upon all persons, is not to abolish the rights to fish of all persons, but to monitor and regulate, so that the fisheries resource will provide an adequate supply of fish now, and in the future.

In this constitutional obligation to manage the fishery, it is implicit upon the minister that he manage the fisheries resource and fish habitat so as to provide an adequate supply of fish now and in the future.

That comment in the Agawa decision is one which has been reflected in other decisions, not only of the Ontario court, but also the Supreme Court of Canada.

In that regard, back in 1995 John Fraser, a former speaker of the House, a former ambassador to the environment and a former minister of fisheries, made the statement in a report on the Fraser River sockeye. He said:

We recommend that DFO retain and exercise its constitutional conservation responsibilities and not in any way abrogate its stewardship of resources under federal jurisdiction. Conservation (of salmon stocks) must be the primary objective...

Mr. Fraser was saying that the federal minister had this constitutional obligation to protect the fisheries resource.

In this bill I see a wearing away of that particular responsibility. Not only that, it adds costs. What the constitution envisioned was that the minister of fisheries would be completely responsible for fish and fish habitat. That responsibility was his and his alone. There is a direct line drawn between the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and his responsibilities; fish and fish habitat.

What is happening now is a wearing away or an erosion of that responsibility. We see it with the Oceans Act. The Oceans Act puts on an equal footing with fish and fish habitat things like the exploration and drilling for oil and gas on the seabed. It puts aquaculture at the same level as fish and fish habitat. It equalizes and it makes for competing interests for the ocean resources.

I have a serious problem with that because the constitution intended that the minister would be responsible for fish and fish habitat and that responsibility gave fish and fish habitat a priority over all other ocean activities. The Oceans Act detracts from that responsibility.

In detracting from it with the Oceans Act, Bill C-10 and the Minister of the Environment, and I will get to that in a minute, we are putting another level of government into play here. In essence, who is responsible and why are we paying for another level of government when it comes to the management of the fisheries resource?

The Department of Canadian Heritage does not have the capability now to manage in the ocean environment. It will have to develop it. It will have to put in place the people and acquire the expertise to do its job of managing these ocean parks.

By the same token with the Fisheries Act, those responsibilities will have to be paid for. As I will demonstrate a little more clearly in a minute, under the environment ministry, it too will have to develop the expertise, expertise which the minister should have at his hand in the department now.

The question that comes to mind then is what really is the purpose of the bill? We should be asking that of any piece of legislation that comes before the House. What is its purpose? Is the purpose of the bill to protect fish and fish habitat?

The member for Lac-Saint-Louis spoke a little while ago about the cod prices on the east coast. He suggested that somehow by the creation of these marine parks we would prevent that sort of tragedy from happening again. However, that is not the fact. Fish are mobile creatures. They are not sedentary; they move. Simply establishing these marine parks as no catch zones will not protect the fisheries resource.

Is the purpose of these parks to protect the ocean environment from oil exploration and that sort of thing? I think not. It will protect a particular section of the ocean resource. However, earlier I heard a member on this side of the House talk about the fact that certain activities were taking place within 5 or 25 kilometres of the gully off Nova Scotia. That is true. If we establish a marine park and allow the drilling of oil five kilometres off the edge of that park and there is an accident, park or no park, there will be a problem. The bill will not protect the ocean environment from that sort of activity.

Is it then just to establish marine sanctuaries because someone else has done that? I heard that from the member for Lac-Saint-Louis. He suggested that others were doing it and that we were the last boys on the block to establish these kinds of sanctuaries. If that is the case, it is a poor reason to do it. If the purpose is to protect marine resources from a total collapse, I suggest that will simply not happen.

I mentioned earlier about the erosion on the authority of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to manage ocean resources and to manage fish and fisheries. I raised the issue about the Department of the Environment and the responsibilities that it seems to have.

In July 2001 there was an environment document entitled “Habitat Protection and Pollution Prevention Provisions—of the Fisheries Act”. This document claims that the Department of the Environment has a responsibility for habitat under the Fisheries Act, not the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. The document states:

The Department of the Environment has been assigned responsibility for administration and enforcement of Fisheries Act provisions dealing with the deposit of deleterious substances into the water frequented by fish through a 1978 Prime Ministerial decision.

We tried to find this prime ministerial decision. What we found was a letter which was written November 9, 1978, from Prime Minister Trudeau to then fisheries minister Leblanc. That apparently is where this authority comes from. It does not come from an order in council or what in normal language we would call a cabinet decision. It comes from a decision made by a government nearing the end of its mandate and which, for all intents and purposes, I think may well have been simply a political decision, or an election ploy or whatever.

The Department of the Environment has taken this to the extreme. I draw the House's attention to an Environment Canada document, which is a compliance and enforcement policy for habitat protection and pollution prevention provisions of the Fisheries Act. This document lays out the notion that the Department of the Environment is already accepting responsibility for the ocean environment. I will quote from the document:

Any interested person--whether an individual, private company, federal department or agency, provincial, territorial or aboriginal government, environmental, health or labour group, aboriginal group or municipality--may comment. Environment Canada invites all interested persons to provide their comments, observations, recommendations or criticisms to the individual whose name and address appear below.

What this document does contain is an actual application form. The application form refers to types of activity and lists aquaculture.

The other place down the hall from here has just completed a study on aquaculture. The auditor general did a study on aquaculture and the government's response to it within the past year. The House of Commons Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans has been looking at the issue also. The House committee has not yet published its report but certainly the auditor general and the folks down the way at the other place have made it very clear that the federal minister of fisheries is not fulfilling his mandate to protect fish and fish habitat in this critical area.

The bill is not going to accomplish what many people hope it will do. It is not going to protect fish or fish habitat. It is not going to protect the oceans from over exploitation. The only thing it is going to accomplish is to muddy the waters and eliminate direct responsibility of the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans for fish and fish habitat and make it much more difficult for legitimate concerns like fishing companies and fishermen to do their business. It will not prevent serious harm happening to our resources. The only way we accomplish that is to provide the minister with encouragement to do the job that he is constitutionally required to do.

In conclusion, I would like to thank my friend down the way who allowed me to speak in her place.

[Softwood Lumber, November 6th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that we are having this debate this evening. It is unfortunate that our American neighbours are treating us so shabbily again. We recall that they have unjustifiably interfered with the free flow of trade in hothouse tomatoes in British Columbia, with mussels and potatoes in P.E.I., and again for the last few months with softwood lumber.

Many in the House have worn a pin with both the Canadian and American flags on it to show our solidarity with our American cousins over the events of the last few months. It is upsetting, to say the least, that in return for our generosity and support we would be treated by the American government in this way.

Having said that, it is unfortunate that the government has ignored this critical trade issue until it has become a crisis.

Recently, Gordon Gibson, a noted British Columbian, wrote an article. I will quote his comments because they are worth repeating. He said:

If scientists detected a small asteroid headed toward us with a high probability of taking out a continent-sized chunk of Planet Earth five years hence, chances are something would be done about it. No matter how hopeless the case, rockets would be launched and so on. It might or might not work, but by God, the world would try.

Unless of course the space rock was pointed only at Canada, in which case nothing would be done, if the current lumber export crisis is any example.

Our governments have seen the softwood lumber attack launched by the U.S. forest industry and its senatorial supporters coming at us for five years, and hey -- surprise -- here it is! Communities and companies are already forecast to lose 14,000 jobs in British Columbia alone. Double that for Canada, escalate for the longer term. If there is no solution, expect a further decline in the Canadian dollar, important loss of government revenue and an eventual humiliating capitulation to the Americans.

There are, in fact, no surprises here. All of the actors are playing their assigned roles as predicted. The trade asteroid that might have been diverted five years out is here now, and the only option is damage control. The politicians we pay to look after these things should be tarred and feathered sometime in the future, but for now we all have a problem.

Mr. Gibson notes a further decline in the Canadian dollar. It is interesting to speculate on why that is.

The B.C. Lumber Trade Council points out the significance of forestry to the British Columbia economy. It claims that it represents 17% of all output and about 14% of all direct and indirect jobs in the province. Tax revenues from B.C. forestry help fund vital services that B.C. and Canadian residents value, such as education and health care.

B.C. exports roughly half of all the country's softwood lumber to the United States, almost $4 billion Canadian in 1999. Used mainly in home building and renovation, softwood lumber products, spruce, pine and fir, represent Canada's single largest export to the United States. That is why this issue is so important not only to British Columbia, but to Canada.

Last March when the expiry deadline of the previous agreement was forthcoming, Diane Francis notes in a column that Jimmy Carter, the former U.S. president, had written an article on it, an op-ed piece, which she claims, and I think quite rightly so, is totally off base and smears Canada as an unfair trader. She notes that the comments of former President Carter are a combination of propaganda and mistruths. She suggests that the anti-Canadian campaign which has been waged for years is simply a thinly disguised attempt by American forest industry interests to subsidize their lumber business.

She points out the real facts of the matter, that Canadian lumber exports are not subsidized in the way that Mr. Carter suggests. She notes that the trees which are harvested are publicly owned trees, but that they must be replaced by law.

She notes that log prices, for example, and the taxes on them are on landed costs. The taxes may be lower in British Columbia due to the long distance the logs have to be taken to get them to market. They have to be hauled across and through challenging terrain.

She also notes that if taxes are taken into consideration, Canada is hardly a low tax regime. Corporate taxes and income, sales, royalty and other government compliance taxes or costs are routinely higher in Canada.

In closing, she notes that U.S. lumber interests, not Canadian ones, are often directly subsidized by their governments. It is not unusual for local or state governments to offer tax breaks to forest industries and she says that in the U.S. the companies ship on roads which are owned and built by the government, not privately.

How did we end up in this mess? I think the facts are quite clear. There is no free trade in lumber such as some would suggest. When the North American Free Trade Agreement was signed, lumber was not included, as we know. What we are facing is really just a clever form of anti-competition practice.

If we look at the history of the issue we notice that since 1982 Canada and the U.S. have been involved in three lumber countervailing duty cases. The softwood lumber agreement avoided a fourth one.

However, those agreements were not wins for British Columbia or for Canada. In fact they were not victories at all. The B.C. Lumber Trade Council makes that point very clearly and I would like to quote from a document it has printed because I think the comments are valid and worth noting. It stated: “Some have also argued that since Canada has previously won softwood lumber disputes with the U.S. at international trade tribunals we should pursue that strategy again. That reasoning demonstrates a fundamental lack of understanding of the dispute which has hit industry with the highest duties in history and has already resulted in the loss of 16,000 mill and logging jobs across B.C.”.

The council continued, stating that: “The previous wins were hardly victories for Canada and, in particular, for British Columbia. The cost of successfully defending against three earlier trade cases came after some two decades of constant litigation and restrictions on the free trade of B.C. lumber across the border. It cost industry over $100 million in legal, research and other costs. Finally, those so-called wins have handed us the largest duty in history at a whopping 32%. If that is victory one shudders at the notion of defeat”.

In conclusion, the council stated that: “Further, at the urging of the U.S. industry lobby, the United States has changed its trade laws this time around. They are more complicated and onerous than ever and the U.S. lumber industry has stated outright that if it loses this round at the World Trade Organization it will lobby again to have the U.S. rewrite its trade legislation to suit its own purposes. The U.S. industry believes it is not bound by international trade law but by domestic law. Its actions to date bear this out”.

The lumber trade council goes on to say that it is why it believes the only responsible approach for Canada is to negotiate a constructive long term resolution that will provide us with stable, free and unfettered access to the U.S. market, or in short, free trade.

It is interesting to look at some of the comments made in the United States on this issue. What are Americans saying about this dispute?

Federal reserve chairman Alan Greenspan suggests that anti-dumping suits and countervailing duties have often been imposed under the label of promoting free trade but oftentimes are just simply guises for inhibiting competition. Protectionist trade barriers could become “a great tragedy” for the country.

Other concerns are expressed by Americans as well which suggest that all is not well in the states, that not all Americans support this action by their government. The problem is that there is a powerful lobby in the United States and the issue was ignored by our government for the previous five years. It has done nothing to solve the dispute in time.

[Search and Rescue, October 29th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the fact of the matter is that the Labrador was called at 25 minutes past midnight but refused due to darkness and severe weather. It was called a second time at six in the morning and did not leave until eight.

As the minister suggests, there was a helicopter available but it was not deployed because it was being held in Victoria so that the minister could have a photo op. A photo op for the minister is more important than saving lives.

Does the minister not agree that if the government had acted responsibly and provided proper search and rescue helicopters, these deaths may well not have happened?

[Search and Rescue, October 29th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, on Friday two men died and two were rescued in horrific sea conditions off the north coast of Vancouver Island. Before I continue I would like to express my appreciation for the heroic efforts of the crew of the coast guard vessel John P. Tully in this rescue and the crews of the fishing vessels Frosty and Hope Bay who assisted the rescue efforts.

Does the minister not agree that the rescue of these men was delayed because search and rescue did not have a suitable helicopter to deploy?

[International Actions Against Terrorism, October 15th, 2001]

Mr. Chairman, it is with great sadness and deep concern that I participate in the debate this evening. Our country, along with our great neighbour to the south, our friend, the United States of America, along with our ally, Great Britain, our mother country which provided the model for this parliament and other institutions of governance in this land, and indeed all of the western world are threatened by the perpetrators of the events of September 11.

Together we face an enemy like no other in the past, an enemy who has as his goal the destruction of our society, an enemy unencumbered by the constraints of nationhood and human dignity, an enemy who cares nothing for his own life let alone the thousands who died on September 11.

I support Canada's commitment to send the Canadian armed forces to serve in the coalition currently engaged in operations in Afghanistan directed at eliminating this hideous threat. It is never an easy decision to commit a nation to war, but commit we must to ensure the safety of our neighbourhoods and the continuance of our way of life. There has never been such a threat on our own shores.

The words of Chesterton never rang more true than now: “The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him”. On behalf of my constituents and all Canadians, let me wish our troops Godspeed and a safe return to those they now leave behind.

The evil of September 11 was not an abstract ethereal cloud that somehow overcame people like a fog. It was an evil conceived in the minds of those who choose to see the lives of fellow human beings as nothing more than a means to an end. Bin Laden has willingly embraced murder in an effort to achieve his perverted vision of a society dedicated to God.

Time and time again the world has seen despots who justified their horrific action as God's work. We know the type and will not judge as guilty those who have a real understanding of the faith desecrated by the actions of a few evil men.

Leaders of all religions, Christian, Hindu, Sikh, Jew, Muslim and others, have condemned the acts of September 11 and we share their horror. In short, this is not a war against Islam. It is a war against a terrorist who has caused innocent people to be killed before and attempts to justify his unholy actions as God's work.

The Prime Minister's shoulder to shoulder pledge to support the Americans in the war against terrorism is, as respected columnist and commentator on military matters Peter Worthington noted “mostly rhetoric with some tokenism”.

Major General Lewis MacKenzie, who commanded UN soldiers during the siege of Sarajevo, said the federal government has failed to fund its military as required under the 1994 white paper on defence and that has left the country unable to contribute to an international effort against terrorism with anything less than a token force. He said “We are not capable of carrying out the very instructions that the Government of Canada has given the military”.

MacKenzie pointed out that even if Canada was asked to contribute a battle group of 1,200 or 1,400 soldiers “we would be unable to deliver it to any theatre of operations without American military support, making Canada a potential liability rather than an asset”. He said further “We would need a taxi to get us there. We don't have the strategic lift capability we would need to get anywhere and we don't have the infrastructure”.

As well, MacKenzie suggests that even if we could provide a couple of squadrons of CF-18s for “attacks on terrorist camps or the states that give them shelter...we would need the Americans to provide their in-flight refuelling capability to get them overseas”.

Another example of the shabby treatment our military has received from the government was raised by my colleague, the member for Edmonton Centre-East, who released a DND document last week which shows that the Sea King helicopters are probably no more than ballast on this trip because at temperatures of 35° Celsius and above the Sea King cannot fly and the temperatures at this time of the year in the Persian Gulf are often over 35° Celsius. Naval helicopters are the eyes and ears of their ships. Without them the lives of the personnel aboard the frigates are needlessly put at risk.

Our military has been sadly underfunded for years. In 1998 the auditor general advised parliament that while DND required almost $11 billion for equipment over the next five years the government had budgeted for little more than half that amount.

In a recent article, Scott Taylor of Esprit de Corps magazine wrote that since 1993 defence spending has been slashed by 23% to $9 billion. This represents only 1.1% of GDP and Canada ranks barely ahead of Luxembourg for the lowest expenditure among NATO's 19 nations.

Mr. Taylor notes that a year ago Lord Robertson, NATO secretary-general, warned that additional military spending was required Canada. He stated that “If our armed forces are to do the complex, difficult and dangerous jobs we assign them--and if they are to succeed in these jobs--it is the duty of each NATO ally to make needed improvements”.

Lord Robertson is not alone in his criticism. In 1997, British Falklands war hero Lieutenant-General Sir Hew Pike created a controversy when he claimed politically correct policies, none aimed at enhancing operational effectiveness, had badly eroded our forces' combat capability. He said “The Canadians have surrendered any claim to be a war fighting force”.

Scott Taylor says that in their efforts to recruit a 25% target of women into combat trades, the forces have been funding the feminization of standard army webbing and rucksacks and the design of a special combat bra. Meanwhile, essential supplies have become so short that during three years of peacekeeping in Bosnia new arrivals had to exchange kit with homeward bound soldiers.

Rather than acknowledge Sir Hew Pike's concerns, defence minister Art Eggleton rose in the House of Commons and arrogantly dismissed the valiant soldier with “Take a hike, Pike”.

Sergeant Tom Hoppe, a highly decorated Canadian soldier, took exception to this. “Pike is right”, Hoppe said. “When you've got the Defence Department more concerned with paying for sex-change operations than taking care of combat-stressed soldiers, and policy makers more concerned about regulating body piercing and hair tinting than about new armored vehicles, we've got a serious problem”.

In 1993, the Prime Minister said we could not afford what he called the Cadillac helicopter selected by the previous government for use aboard our naval frigates. He spent $500 million to cancel the contract and never did bother replacing the aging helicopters.

Somehow at this moment, with our navy going into a war zone, I would feel a lot easier if the navy had a Cadillac helicopter or two on those ships, and I bet our sailors would too.

When the Minister of Foreign Affairs said Canada faces a glaring inadequacy in its intelligence gathering, defence and foreign aid capabilities that is compromising the country's ability to meet overseas commitments or to live up to its international reputation and when he said that "You can't just sit at the G-8 table and then, when the bill comes, go to the washroom", he was really admitting what we all knew, that our military did not have the resources to do the job and Canada was getting by on a reputation earned decades ago, a refreshing admission. Finally, someone was being honest with Canadians and telling us the truth even when it made the government look as if it had not done its job. Leadership is not simply protecting one's behind: it is being honest with the people one is responsible for, the people one represents. At times like these, Canadians want to believe in their government.

That being said, it is easy to feel revulsion toward our leaders. Immediately after September 11, they told us there was not a problem. They were prepared to label as undemocratic anyone who questioned them. Now they have changed their position. They are going to protect us, perhaps, but it is they who dumbed down our military, RCMP, CSIS and the immigration and refugee determination board system.

The Prime Minister, defence minister, immigration minister, justice minister and solicitor general have a responsibility to us as Canadians. They have a responsibility to keep Canadians safe and to respond on our behalf against those who would endanger us. They have not done so. They have failed us.

Successive Liberal governments, from that of Lester Pearson to that of Pierre Trudeau, who failed to show up when our freedoms were being tested in World War II, have allowed this country's defence forces to deteriorate from their place of prominence in the great wars and Korean conflict to the point where we need to take a taxi to get to battle stations and our brave soldiers, sailors and air crew are put at risk by just showing up with obsolete equipment.

I said at the outset that we face an enemy like no other in our past, an enemy who places no value on human life, his or ours. Distant though the battles to which our troops are travelling may be, our safety here is dependent on their success. They are our heroes. We will keep them foremost in our thoughts and prayers.

[Fisheries, October 2nd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, for 21 days ending this past Sunday the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans allowed an unsupervised commercial aboriginal beach seine fishery on the Fraser River that has wreaked havoc. Ken Kristian, a recreational fisherman, wrote:

The stretches located directly below each beach seine site are literally stacked with hundreds upon hundreds of pre-spawn male pink salmon bodies. Only the male pink salmon and of course the odd so-called endangered coho or steel head were being culled and grabbed roughly by their heads, gills or tails and thrown from the bunt of the net, some 10 to 15 feet in the air, back into the very shallow water. The pink female salmon were being harvested simply for their payload of valuable roe.

I witnessed this appalling spectacle as did hundreds of others. Missing from this picture was any sign of DFO enforcement. This fishery combined with a lack of enforcement suggests another species of salmon may soon be on the endangered or extinct list.

[Canadian Airline Industry, October 1st, 2001]

Madam Chairman, the world airline industry is in turmoil as a result of events of September 11. The repercussions of plummeting passenger loads are widespread. Travel agents, hotels, restaurants and taxis have all been impacted by cancelled reservations and the decreased numbers of people willing to travel by air.

Unless the decline in passenger travel is reversed, manufacturers of aircraft and their components will also soon be impacted. It is a huge blow to our economy given present circumstances. The slowdown is affecting carriers worldwide.

American Airlines, the world's largest carrier with over 110,000 employees, is contemplating layoffs of 20,000 people. Last month American Airlines went through $1 billion in cash and is now working aggressively to arrange additional financing so it can keep its doors open, according to its chief executive officer, Donald Carty. He also stated that the primary challenge is survival, not profitability. He noted that as of last week the scaled back system of American Airlines had a load factor of about 50%, the equivalent of operating the pre-September 11 schedule with a 40% load factor.

The Swissair group could also go out of business within the next few days if a last minute rescue initiative fails to materialize. The chairman and chief executive officer, Mario Corti, said on Swiss television that the company will be threatened with bankruptcy without the recapitalization it expects in the next few days. Its problems, like Air Canada's, predated the September 11 tragedy but the outlook is not much different without some sort of assistance.

Air Canada is in trouble and that is the reason for this debate. The job of the government is to fix the problem. Air Canada must be kept afloat because we need a safe and dependable national carrier to do business. If Air Canada flounders, given the state of the world's airlines,no one is likely to come in to fill the gap. There will be a huge disruption which will be very costly to business.

What we should do? Some have urged the government to take an equity position in Air Canada. I reject that position on the premise that government's role is to regulate. The job of private enterprise is to maintain the successful operation of a business. All too often the success of private enterprise is dependent on good regulations. That is the case now. Turning the clock back and making Air Canada a crown corporation will not help.

In their comments on the Air Canada crisis, fundamentalists if I may use that term, the free market, no rules and no regulations theorists, would allow the hangar to burn along with all the planes. They would have us believe that some free market good fairy would put it all together again at a lower cost, with increased levels of safety, and so on. It does not quite work that way in the real world.

Air Canada's problem prior to September 11 centred on the failure of the government to provide leadership for the airline sector. Its problems after September 11 were no different. Bolstering consumer confidence in the safety of our skies is the surest way to help Air Canada recover from this difficult time. The government must take action on this front now.

Since the tragic events of September 11 airline bookings in the country have plummeted, resulting in huge shortfalls not only for the airlines but also for others. Despite repeated requests for increased and improved airport security, the use of sky marshals and additional security procedures aboard Canadian commercial aircraft, the government has refused to take action.

Let us compare this inaction with the resolve of the Americans. President Bush is expanding the use of armed and plainclothes officers aboard commercial airlines, restricting access to the cockpit, developing aircraft tracking equipment that cannot be turned off, and putting the federal government in charge of all airport security and screening, including the purchase and maintenance of all equipment. In addition the U.S. government is committed to stabilizing its industry with $22 billion Canadian.

Given the direct losses and increased costs related to the events of September 11, given the dislocation to the Canadian economy and the job losses, both direct and indirect, the government must commit to ensuring the stability of the Canadian airline industry with prudent cash support, appropriate security regulations and a reasonable regulatory system.

If the government took this common sense approach to restoring public confidence in air travel, it would go a long way toward saving jobs threatened by the current situation. A healthy airline industry would have a positive influence in these troubled times.

What we need from the government is a commitment to the success of a national carrier, commitment to the success of regional carriers and commitment to the success of the independent carriers. Commitment to success in the airline industry has long been lacking in Canada. It is time for a change.

[Questions No. 61, September 21st, 2001]

With regard to the fishing industry and infrastructure necessary to support it on a riding basis for the fiscal years 1997-98 to 2000-01 inclusive: ( a ) what was the funding for fishing harbours under the Small Craft Harbours Program; and ( b ) what was the value of fish landings?

Return tabled.

[Ovarian Cancer, September 18th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, while the House was quite rightly considering the course of the nation in the wake of the terrorist attack in the United States, I attended the launching of a bike tour from Ottawa to Toronto called Miles for Megan. The tour is to help raise awareness and funds for the fight against ovarian cancer.

Megan Rodger was 18 when she passed away last November because of this disease.

The fundraising tour, organized by Megan's Mom and Dad, will, over eight days, pass through Cornwall, Brockville, Kingston, Trenton, Belleville, Peterborough, Oshawa and Markham, finishing at Nathan Phillips Square in Toronto on September 25.

Ovarian cancer is a family disease that attacks our wives, daughters, mothers and sisters, but it can be beaten, as evidenced by my colleague from Saskatoon--Rosetown--Biggar, herself a survivor of ovarian cancer.

I ask my colleagues and the residents of these fine Ontario communities to support the Miles for Megan ride and the 2,500 Canadian women this disease will strike this year.