Pierre Brien

[Fisheries, March 21st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the debate for several hours now, and initially I did not intend to participate but at this time of day, it will not make that much difference whether I do or not. I wanted to offer a certain perspective on the issue.

I remember—unfortunately it is becoming a habit here—about six years ago, Brian Tobin, the then fisheries minister, the ambitious former industry minister who has since quit, had engineered quite a coup. He had done so in the hope that one day the problem of overfishing, especially in Canadian waters by foreign fishermen, would be solved. He boarded a foreign trawler, and a media show ensued. Six years later, the problem is still here, it has not been solved.

Today, as we speak, negotiations on softwood lumber are underway in Washington; five years later, we are still faced with the same old problem. It is a trend that is becoming more pronounced, especially with regard to natural resources. These issues are extremely important for communities. People in large urban areas may be less sensitive to this reality, but for communities that rely on such important economic activities what is happening is really terrible.

It is not because we are here in Ottawa, far from this everyday reality, sheltered from it, that we should not move more quickly. I understand their cry from the heart. I must admit that earlier in the day, when an emergency debate was requested on this issue, I thought it was not necessarily a top priority for the constituents of Témiscamingue.

At the same time, one must appreciate that for some of our fellow citizens, this is a major issue, just as the ongoing negotiations between Canada and the United States on softwood lumber are for us, an issue the government dragged its feet on. Expectations were created by the promise to return to free trade, but it did not happen. People are waiting. Tomorrow morning, they will wake up wondering what happened.

In other communities of the Atlantic region, there are serious problems with fisheries. Let us look at the background of this matter. There have been some difficulties with stock management. There was a problem with foreigners fishing in our waters. That problem still exists and is not new. Why is it that six, seven years later--and I would guess more than that because the problem probably existed before we went there--nothing has been done and we are still at square one, we are once again discussing the issue just before we leave for the Easter holiday?

I understand the members representing those communities who say “Wake up; this is an emergency for us”. That is the message they want to convey this evening. I know some people are annoyed at having to debate this question tonight. Maybe there are other priorities just now. Some people might have preferred to go to bed earlier, but others are asking what will happen tomorrow with regard to this very important matter.

At first, I did not want to talk to this issue, but as it seems to be annoying the Liberals, the more they are annoyed, the more I will talk and use up all the time that is alloted to me.

[Privilege, March 21st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to support the hon. member for Acadie--Bathurst, who has raised the question of privilege. I too sit on the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

This morning, I was dismayed to find newspaper reports quoting excerpts from a confidential report. The article is unequivocal. The reporter states clearly that he has a draft report in his possession, whereas this document had been in the hands of committee members only a few hours. They were provided with it yesterday and it was discussed privately this morning, in camera.

We are now faced with an extremely difficult situation for you, Mr. Speaker, and for all members of this House. Normally, the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs is where we can all, yourself included, go to shed light on problematical occurrences here.

Now we find ourselves in a situation where the people on the committee are the ones responsible for the leak. Of course, all manner of hypotheses are possible, but regardless of whether an MP or an assistant was involved, the responsibility ultimately lies with the MP, despite the arguments we heard on this in committee this morning.

This is a very problematic situation. For several years now—and I have been a member since 1993—the number of reports that have been leaked to the media has increased dramatically. It is a major problem and it is growing. Similar cases have already been referred to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs. However, in this case, there is almost nowhere to turn.

In light of this, the member for Acadie--Bathurst suggested that you strike a special committee or some other body. We are in a situation where we have to ask ourselves who can shed light on this, and it is very worrisome.

I could make lengthy comments on my hypotheses and on whom I think leaked the report to the media, but that is not the point of today's discussion. All we can do is look at who stood to gain from the crime to know who committed it. People can judge for themselves. All they need do is read the article in question to come to their own conclusions.

However, you are faced with a situation that is very disturbing and I do not know how you will be able to resolve it. Clearly there is a problem. The committee's credibility has been greatly affected. I find this unfortunate, because I sit on this committee. I do not like wasting my time and I do not want to be a part of a committee that will be discredited in the future.

So there is a credibility problem that concerns the committee, the House and the Speaker, who relies on this committee to investigate contentious issues.

I look to you to provide an indication as to how we can solve a problem that persists and that has gotten worse in recent years, with many reports finding their way to the media.

Many members here learned about this from the media, before having had the chance to discuss it. Some members of the committee learned about the report last night, others did so this morning after seeing it in the papers. That much is clear.

The report was most definitely leaked. If we thought that the passages that were quoted were not accurate, we would not be raising the issue today.

Mr. Speaker, I look to you to give us some direction, some solutions and ways to rectify this problem in the future.

[Supply, March 19th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, Bloc Quebecois members will vote in favour of this motion.

[Supply, March 18th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I believe that you would find unanimous consent of the House for the following motion:

That at the conclusion of today's debate on the Bloc Quebecois' motion, if a recorded division is requested on that motion, that it be deferred to Tuesday, March 19, 2002, at the end of government orders.

[Airport Security, March 15th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, in areas such as Abitibi-Témiscamingue, the new air security charge is going to have a major negative impact. The Minister of Finance is claiming that the security measures will be based on the user pay principle. The airport at Rouyn Noranda will be spending $50,000 a year on security. Yet, the costs to passengers are estimated at over $550,000.

Is this what the Liberal government means by the user pay principle?

[Canada Elections Act, March 13th, 2002]

Madam Speaker, we are debating tonight Motion M-122, which says, and I quote:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should consider amending the Canada Elections Act in order to grant the right to vote to those residing in Canada with landed immigrant status.

I have listened carefully to the speech of the member for Prince George--Peace River, who introduced the motion, in order to understand. At first glance, I asked myself what could motivate him today to introduce a motion which would give landed immigrants the right to vote in the future. I will come back to that issue because one of the arguments formulated has not convinced me.

It is a given—and I believe that everyone has said it, even though it is not the subject of this debate—that we all recognize the importance of the contribution of immigrants to an open and democratic society. Any society which wants to expand and progress should show some openness. This was the case of Quebec and Canada who have successively considerably expanded and which will continue to do so thanks to what immigration has helped us to become. But this is not the issue. I believe there is some kind of consensus in society about that.

However, I have not felt that the right to vote for immigrants was an important demand in Quebec these past few years. I did not feel that many people were asking for that because everyone agrees quite clearly that the right to vote comes as a result of citizenship. Citizenship entails a certain number of privileges and responsibilities, but also a certain number of other things. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms says clearly, under section 3 if I am not mistaken, that every citizen of Canada has the right to vote in an election of members of the House of Commons or of a legislative assembly.

From the moment someone chooses to become citizen of a country, in this case Canada, from the moment they get their citizenship, they have that privilege.

I was not convinced by the argument according to which people should have the right to vote from the moment they become residents, pay taxes and contribute to our society. That reasoning could actually apply to 16 or 17 year old citizens who work and pay taxes. Based on that argument, those people should also have the right to vote.

I do not think therefore that this is an argument which necessarily leads to the conclusion that, just because an individual has come here and is in the process of integrating with society, he or she is automatically entitled to vote. A period of acclimatization, transition, adaptation to a society is defined as the time between arrival and obtaining Canadian citizenship, before one is able to participate in the choices made by the community to which one has decided to belong in future. This strikes me as fairly reasonable, and is the way things are at present. It seems to me that there is a pretty strong consensus within society on this. This criterion is not being challenged by anyone, and is reasonably well accepted by all.

The other argument I heard at the beginning of the speech was the point made, and rightly so, about the disconcertingly low turnout rate, particularly in the last federal election. Barely 60% of eligible voters exercised their right to vote. This is extremely worrisome.

It leads us to wonder about the nature of what we do, the distance that is developing between politicians and ordinary citizens, and the way issues are being defended. People's degree of involvement depends on the issues, and on how they identify with those issues.

I am more familiar with the situation in Quebec. For example, I know that the participation rate in provincial elections in Quebec is always around 80 or 85%. The reason for that is that people feel close to the issues. They vote and they get involved in the campaigns. We had referendums, including the last one, in 1995, where 97% of Quebecers chose to exercise their right to vote.

So I think that, when important issues that people can identify with are at stake, people do participate.

As for the fact that 39% of people did not vote in the last election, it sends us various signals, but we have to try to decipher them. Saying that we will automatically give landed immigrants the right to vote to solve the problem of low participation rates seems to me like a shortcut. I am not saying that the member suggested that it was the only way. I understand that he said that it could be part of the solution.

I think there are other elements that explain the increasingly low participation rates in federal elections. That argument did not convince me any more than the tax argument.

What we have in place now seems normal to me: when a person is granted citizenship, he or she acquires the right to vote and the right to run for office in a federal election. After listening to the debate so far, I believe that the majority of members still agree on that.

But I certainly do not want to criticize the member for raising this issue. In a democratic society, issues are debated. The member who brought forward this motion has a different point of view. I respect his point of view, but I do not share it. Nevertheless, this motion allowed us to reflect on our democratic practices and to initiate all kinds of interesting debates.

I hope that we will also reflect on other variables of our democratic system. While we are talking about the importance of the right to vote in our society, I have serious concerns about the fact that there often is very little control regarding the way voting is conducted.

In the last election, and in the past—this is nothing new—people have used other people's identities. I would like to see more care taken in federal elections to check the identity of voters who come to cast their ballot. This does not strike me as unreasonable either. It would also be very much in our interest to ensure that a citizen's right to vote, which is extremely precious and powerful as well, is exercised by the right person. Much work remains to be done on this score.

Other aspects of this issue are worth looking at in order to ensure that people identify more with the issues. There are all sorts of debates. Should we have elections with a certain degree of proportionality? This would allow particular groups to be heard, to get their point across, and citizens who identify less with the mainstream to vote for parties which defend more specific causes. This also deserves some thought.

Unfortunately, there is no forum as such to frame this debate, and the government has no desire to open up the debate on this for now. However, people are talking about these issues. I know that very shortly, in Quebec, a parliamentary committee will be studying the future of the democratic system because many people are saying that we need to improve our voting system, and perhaps consider proportional elections, for example, as is done elsewhere in the world.

So there is a whole series of questions that are being raised. Regardless of whether someone is for or against the idea, the debate will take place. But at the federal level, no one is receptive right now to this, or no one is sending this message to the government, telling it that we do need to ask these questions. We need to ask ourselves why so few people go out to vote.

There is the process as such, and then there is what is at stake. This does not seem to be a problem that the government wants to acknowledge right now. This is understandable, they are in office and, therefore, they are benefiting from the current system. Yet this is cause for concern, and the government should be worried about this variable that the member was justified in raising at the beginning of his comments, that of the poor turnout.

In concluding, I would say that, in my opinion, the motion before us today is not going to solve the problem. The issue is much more about what citizenship brings or not. I believe, as many if not all of my colleagues do, that there is a consensus that citizenship and the right to vote go hand in hand. This is the normal and reasonable direction to go in a democratic society. This standard is being applied in Quebec, in Canada and in several other societies.

It has been said that some countries allow permanent residents to vote, depending on the country they come from. This worries me somewhat. How do we define discrimination? If they come from a specific country, they would be allowed to vote when they become permanent residents and, if they are from another country, they would not be allowed to vote. This seems like a troubling discrimination, and I am not sure that it is in keeping with the values held by our society.

There is a consensus about the status quo. I hope that some points of the debate will be discussed further, including the low turnout at federal elections and the weakening of democracy that may result. This is a great concern to me. I think this is a debate that should be pursued.

In closing, I am clearly not in favour of the motion as such, and even if it is not votable, it has still allowed us to address the issue of the principles and values that we want in our democracy.

[Privilege, February 28th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I would simply like to bring to your attention the fact that, without taking a position on the merit of the question that was raised, I find it quite strange that a member of parliament who is also a member of the committee studying the matter would rise a question of privilege in the House at the very moment where this committee is meeting. I am also a member of this committee. To have an informed debate on the question of privilege that was raised, it would have been normal and more courteous to do so when the people involved would have had the opportunity of making themselves heard on this question of privilege in this place before you made a decision.

Therefore, I am extremely disappointed with the behaviour of a member questioning the good faith of other members with regard to their speaking order, when he himself is rising at the very moment when the committee is taking some important decisions concerning the work that lays ahead.

I am not saying this question has no merit. It is up to you to decide. I am simply wondering about this, and I find the member's intentions dubious, because he is rising at a time when all the other colleagues involved are working on the matter.

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, February 4th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the members of the Bloc Quebecois will vote against the motion.

[Intergovernmental Affairs, February 4th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the Quebec Liberal Party critic for intergovernmental affairs has joined the government of Quebec and the Bloc Quebecois in saying that there is a major fiscal imbalance between Ottawa and Quebec.

Does the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs, who is preparing to help Jean Charest fight it out at the polls, still maintain that there is no fiscal imbalance in Quebec or has the Liberal Party of Quebec helped him to see the light, and does he finally admit that this is a serious problem that must be resolved?

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, February 4th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, before putting my question, I want to make sure the minister is aware that an amendment to an amendment with a special provision for Quebec has been tabled and will be voted on.

I have a very simple question and I will let people judge the answer for themselves. The minister alluded to the number of witnesses. How many witnesses appeared before the parliamentary committees to support his bill? How many witnesses from Quebec supported his bill?