Shaughnessy Cohen

[Employment Equity Act, October 3rd, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, over the summer I spent my time in my riding of Windsor-St. Clair which is the centre of my universe.

I returned to this session of Parliament with a renewed commitment to employment equity. I am convinced more than ever that Bill C-64 is the right thing for Canada right now. I am concerned though, after meeting with my constituents over the summer recess, that there is a great deal of misunderstanding about both the intent and the implications of our improved employment equity legislation.

Distortions have resulted from a misinterpretation and frankly, a misrepresentation of the facts by a few. I have discovered that once these misconceptions are straightened out and the legislation fully understood, it gains widespread support. It seems to be essential that these misconceptions be corrected on the floor of the House.

I specifically want to address several of the arguments raised in the Reform Party's minority report. I am particularly concerned about the attitude that report reflects, the "I'm all right, I have got mine, Jack" attitude. I have mine so everyone else can go to hell. That is the tone of the Reform Party's minority report. The idea in it is that I got ahead and so everyone else should just try to get there on their own. I do not owe it to anybody to help them or to assist them or to do anything.

It is disingenuous for a woman to suggest that because she is successful, got there on her own, she owes nothing to her sisters who came before her. It is disingenuous for any of us to suggest that anyone can get to this job, can become an accountant, can become a banker or can become a painter. It is disingenuous, false and deludes the Canadian public.

The idea that as Canadians we should not acknowledge and address systemic inequities and that in promoting that view it is okay to promulgate misinformation and to promote misconceptions is anathema to the government.

The first assumption I would like to address is the assumption that women, persons with disabilities, members of visible minorities and aboriginal people are somehow enjoying special privileges that compensate for their disadvantage and that are way ahead of the general population. Informed individuals know that nothing could be further from the truth.

The 1995 United Nations human development report concluded that it is still an unequal world. Canada in practice is still in many respects an unequal country. Canadian employers agree with this.

A witness representing the Manitoba telephone system told members of the Standing Committee on Human Rights and the Status of Disabled Persons the following:

There is very little evidence in the workforce to suggest that in the absence of affirmative measures or some intervention equality will indeed occur. We live in a society that prefers some values, some characteristics over others. The kind of legislation that employment equity represents is an appropriate intervention in the flow of business decision making.

That was stated by the private sector.

There was also the suggestion that the current Employment Equity Act has been so effective that it has eliminated employment problems for members of the designated groups. The facts speak for themselves.

The 1984 annual report on the Employment Equity Act, a copy of which all members of Parliament received, concluded that a number of Canadian companies covered by the legislation have yet to completely satisfy its intent. Of the 343 employers in the report, four employers had no female employees; 74 did not employ a single aboriginal person; 65 did not have persons with disabilities on staff; 28 employed no members of visible minority groups. This was the situation nearly eight years after the current act was proclaimed into force in August 1986.

Like other government members here today, I certainly applaud the progress that has been made over the years, but I think all members will agree that we have some distance to go.

Let us look at the suggestion that the market automatically solves inequities without government intervention, a suggestion that was heard from the last speaker. That theory was clearly addressed in the recently released United Nations report, the most exhaustive examination of the issue of inequality for women in our time. It was prepared by an international team of eminent consultants and stated:

The free workings of economic and political processes are unlikely to deliver equality of opportunity because of the prevailing inequities in power structures. When such structural barriers exist, government intervention is necessary, both through comprehensive policy reforms and through a series of affirmative actions.

I remind the House that Canada is the number one nation in the world in its human development index ranking according to the UN. However, when we look at it closer and consider women's economic positions in our society, our country drops from number one to number nine.

To add insult to injury, there are some who use women, members of visible minority groups, aboriginals and persons with disabilities as scapegoats as if we were somehow to blame for the stresses resulting from our rapidly changing economy.

We are in the midst of one of the most momentous transitions in human history. In the span of this century we have shifted through the agricultural and industrial eras and are hurtling fast forward to the information age and the knowledge economy. If the general population finds itself a victim in this vortex, imagine how much greater the impact is on Canadians who are members of minority groups, on women, on persons with disabilities.

It is not fair to suggest, as the Reform minority report does, that statistical data are skewed to make the case for employment equity. Canada's statistics and its statistical analyses are the best in world, so much so that our data is sought after by governments and by academics everywhere. It is true that no statistics are perfect, including those for gross domestic product, unemployment, or demographics. But does the Reform Party seriously suggest that we should abandon the pursuit of social justice and abandon the pursuit of economic growth just because there are numerous ways to read the numbers?

Incredibly, the Reform Party report also asserts that employment equity somehow hurts designated groups. It suggests that designation "carries with it a presumption of racial and gender inferiority". I would like to hear the Reform Party stand before Women in Trades and Technology, who organized a letter writing campaign in support of Bill C-64, and say that. Letters to the human resources minister urged the government to go further. Many letters stated that much work needs to be done to urge, coerce, educate, and assist employers and unions to increase and enhance women's opportunities to train and work in their industries.

These women are asking the government to modify policy and program interventions to support and encourage true equality in the workplace. They are not alone. In case somebody thinks they are alone, let me remind the Reform Party and this House that women are 52 per cent of the population.

The vast majority of witnesses before the Standing Committee on Human Rights and the Status of Disabled Persons fully endorsed the direction of our new legislation. They recognize that treating people differently in order to achieve equality has nothing to do

with inferiority. It has everything to do with ensuring each and every job applicant has an equal chance to prove his or her abilities.

Recently I saw a cartoon that showed a monkey, a seal, an elephant and a dog being told by a circus job interviewer: "For a just selection, everyone has to take the same examination. Now please, I would like each of you to climb that tree". The idea that there is some ideal to which we all must conform is ridiculous. It is also discriminatory, and Canadians will not put up with it. If this legislation does nothing else, it will finally put some of these outdated and damaging beliefs to rest. It will ensure that yet another generation does not adopt the hardened attitudes held by their elders and perpetuate systemic and overt discrimination.

Employment equity is a guarantee that every little girl and every little boy will grow up in this country secure in the knowledge that each can pursue his or her dreams, that they will some day work in a world that is fair, that is equal, that is free of racial slurs and unwanted pats on the backside, where doors are always open instead of being inaccessible. They will be assured of being citizens of a Canada where they can have a fighting chance of achieving their personal career goals.

Is that intrusive? Is it really so much to ask? Today's working Canadians and tomorrow's future parents, taxpayers, and employees expect no less. The hon. members of this House must not let them down.

I am convinced that Bill C-64 is the next logical step in our nation's progress. I am anxious to get on with the job.

[Cultural Property Export And Import Act, September 28th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, if in two years or so some Liberals, perhaps under the leadership of the Prime Minister, were to travel to Wild Rose country, where there have been some sightings of dinosaurs, and

sneak up behind a couple of them and knock them off and then try to donate them to a museum, how would this act work to allow us to have a tax credit for knocking off dinosaurs in Wild Rose country?

[Cultural Property Export And Import Act, September 25th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, from the level of the debate particularly from the opposition benches this afternoon, I can see that the dinosaurs from the west are not only in Drumheller. Some of them appear to be alive and kicking and present in the Chamber today.

It is important to understand that cultural property is not just paintings and fine art. It extends also to natural history, paleontology and mineralogy, all aspects of human history, archaeology, military history, antique furniture, antique firearms, which I am sure my friends like very much, scientific and technological objects and a full range of archival and library materials. There have been some significant examples recently of donations which help to illustrate the diversity of cultural property that is included in the legislation.

Last summer several pieces of a meteorite fell near St-Robert, Quebec. These have been donated to institutions in Quebec and to the Geological Survey of Canada to enable scientists to enhance their knowledge of space and the history of the universe.

The Hudson's Bay Company donated its extensive archival collection of business records dating from the 17th century to the present to the archives of the province of Manitoba. This collection includes information rich documentation that is being consulted and analyzed for such diverse information as arctic exploration, Canada's economic development and even climatic changes and weather patterns.

Native run museums in British Columbia have been able to retain important and in some cases sacred objects in their communities through donations facilitated by the act.

Some people like to characterize these tax credits for donations of cultural property as loopholes for the wealthy.

I am thinking today of some constituents of mine. They are not people who drive $70,000 Cadillacs to Parliament Hill. For instance there is a research scientist for the federal government who has a group of seven painting which he inherited from his grandmother. He has loaned it to the art gallery of Windsor. A grade school teacher who is a friend of mine has collected primitive Inuit pieces over many years which I am sure she will ultimately donate. There is an anthropologist retired from the University of Windsor who has a collection of native relics. On Pelee Island in southwestern Ontario there are retired farmers who have exquisite collections of fossils and native relics. These are not wealthy people. These are not people for whom these so-called loopholes are gaining extraordinary advantage. These are people who would like to be able to make a donation of their precious collections.

Even if somebody is wealthy, and some donations are made by wealthy Canadians, this is consistent with their support of performing arts, of the arts community and of collecting institutions. Without their support Canada's museums, archives and libraries would not have the quality collections they now possess. Nor would we be able to actively participate in the international exchange of exhibitions and scholarships. Without strong collections in our custodial institutions we would have a reduced sense of our own identity and a diminished role internationally in the cultural domain.

Many individuals who have donated important objects of Canadiana have donated those objects from collections which have been with their families for generations. They have contributed to the preservation of Canada's history. These individuals have chosen to enrich the collection of a local or national institution rather than exporting the object for sale with the result that it would be lost to Canada forever. While they may receive a tax credit for their donation, it is nevertheless a philanthropic act on their part because the money they receive is equivalent to about 50 per cent of the fair market value of the object.

Donations ensure that we are able to maintain a record of artistic development in Canada and that artists receive the recognition and exposure in Canada they so richly deserve.

In today's economic climate few collecting institutions have funds to purchase objects and we must therefore rely on donations. By offering incentives for donations to custodial institutions that have demonstrated they meet professional standards, the Government of Canada is able to provide assistance to ensure that their collections continue to reflect our country's heritage. This is something that is certainly valued by the government if not by the Reform Party.

Responsibility for determining fair market value of cultural property has been transferred from Revenue Canada to the Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board. This happened in 1991. However this arm's length board was making decisions which could not at that time be appealed. The establishment of an appeal process of the determinations of the Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board proposed in this bill will permit any donor of cultural property who disagrees with its decision the opportunity to pursue this ultimately with the Tax Court of Canada. What could be fairer?

The amendments in this bill should be reviewed as a guarantee of the donor's right to natural justice through an appeal to the judicial system if that is warranted. These amendments should also be viewed as the reinstatement of the right of appeal that was lost in

1991 when the responsibility for determining fair market value was transferred to the review board.

The announcement of these proposed amendments was applauded by members of the public who enjoy and who value our cultural history, by collectors, by custodial institutions and by members of the review board itself. We believe that the establishment of this appeal process will strengthen the incentive for individuals to collect and ultimately to donate cultural property to designated institutions or public authorities rather than to sell it on the international market.

In recent months articles have appeared and comments have been made even in this House suggesting that tax avoidance schemes have extended to donations of cultural property.

[Brian Ducharme, June 14th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, today the Minister of Health presented Canada volunteer awards to several outstanding Canadians. Among them was Brian Ducharme of Tecumseh, Ontario in the riding of Windsor-St. Clair.

Brian Ducharme has served as a volunteer board member with Hiatus House in Windsor since 1981. Hiatus House is a shelter for battered women and their children. Because of the contributions of Brian Ducharme and others like him, it is a shelter with a difference. Indeed, it is the premier facility of its kind in Canada.

I am proud to be able to acknowledge Mr. Ducharme and his contributions in this House.

[Firearms Act, June 13th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, in response I would say that I did answer the hon. member's two questions before, but apparently he did not like the answers.

We have never sold this as a bill to reduce crime by reason of its existence in Canada, although it is being used as such on a faulty basis for argument by the opposition. This bill will provide the tools to law enforcement agencies and the cultural

basis that will enable us to have less crime in the future. There is a substantial difference.

Also, with respect to the issue of delay, the hon. member should give his head a shake and realize that the people of Canada want us to get on with the business of governing. The people of Canada are not obsessed by guns. The people of Canada are worried about jobs and unemployment. Equating money for gun control with money for crisis centres is unfair, particularly coming from a party whose members tried to turn down summer grants for those very services in their ridings.

[Firearms Act, June 13th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I think there were basically two questions asked. The first was the question of whether I would agree with my hon. friend that there should be an audit of the situation in a few years.

I think the hon. member is confused about the nature of the bill. This bill is about cultural values, crime, and a variety of issues, none of which are capable of being dealt with in a financial audit. It is not an economic bill.

With respect to the second question, about postponing the legislation, the people of my riding do not want the legislation postponed. They want us to get on with it and get on with our agenda.

I would suggest to my hon. friend this his constituents probably have concerns other than guns as well.

[Firearms Act, June 13th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to rise on third reading of Bill C-68 on the final day of debate on this fine bill.

I am very proud to rise as a member of this caucus because I am proud not just of our position on this bill but also of the strength of our caucus in standing up to criticism which, although many times unfair and certainly very emotional, has been strong and relentless. I am also proud of the Prime Minister and particularly of the justice minister who has seen this legislation through from beginning to end.

I am proud also because I know I am representing the views of my constituents in Windsor-St. Clair. We have heard a lot of the importance of representing the views of our constituents today. We heard a lot from the third party about that. There are some very specific reasons the people of Windsor-St. Clair want me to vote for the bill.

In Windsor we enjoy a great deal of American tourism. We are less than a mile from the United States. When thinking where to go for lunch one can actually factor in restaurants in Detroit. One can go there and get back on one's lunch hour. That is how close it is. We have clean, safe streets. We have tremendous cross-border shopping in reverse and we have a casino which attracts 17,000 visitors a day, 90 per cent of whom are American.

People who are active in the tourist industry in Windsor, hoteliers, people at the casino and others, tell us one of the great reasons for the attraction of our community is that it is in Canada and people feel safe there. They tell us clearly and unequivocally that when they canvas their customers, when they talk to the patrons at the Windsor casino, gun control is a factor.

This bill in a very specific economic sense is good for my riding. The people of my riding appreciate it, understand it and want it. That is not my only reason for supporting it and certainly is not the only reason my constituents have for supporting it.

It is my view and the view of the majority of my constituents that the bill is not just about crime control. The people of Windsor-St. Clair and I as their representative suggest the bill is about the kind of Canada we want for the future, in our retirement for our children, for our grandchildren. It is about the values we share as a country.

There is no constitutional right to bear arms in Canada. There is no right to pack a pistol on one's hip or to hide one in one's car; nor should there ever be. On the other hand as a society we value hunting, sport shooting and aboriginal rights and we struggle to find the balance between those seemingly competing interests. In Windsor we know this very well. We also know what happens when firearms as a commodity go out of control.

As I said, we live less than a mile from a country with a very different view of this commodity, a country where firearms are indeed out of control. We watch the Detroit news in Windsor, and every night purposeful criminal shootings and accidental shootings are displayed on the air as though they were car accidents or as though they were just another fact of life. In those American cities they are.

I worked in Windsor in the criminal courts as both a defence lawyer and a prosecuting lawyer. Every Monday morning in bail court-court room number three, for those of you who are listening in Windsor-there would be a parade of American visitors to Canada who came into the country, passed that great big sign that says that firearms are prohibited in Canada, came across the border and had their firearms seized. Why? They would tell us they had forgotten they were in the car. They would be under the front seat, loaded, or in the glove box loaded or in the trunk loose and loaded, sometimes carelessly stored, sometimes kept loaded and right on hand.

Very often these same people would be offended by our laws and highly indignant, all of them feeling that they have a God-given right to carry a gun, and in spite of the warning at the border they were going to continue to carry it. Why do they feel that way? They feel that way because their culture is different from ours, but also because many of them feel a need to carry that gun. They feel they need protection. This is not the society or the culture the vast majority of Canadians want to live in.

I enjoy Americans very much. I like going to the United States. There is much to admire about their culture, their industry, their enthusiasm, their protection of individual rights. There is much to recommend in their democratic system. Yet last February the President of the United States came to this House and spoke to a joint sitting of the House and the Senate, and what did he talk about? He talked about our efforts to control firearms in our society. What did he talk about when he was introduced to our justice minister that evening? Both he and Mrs. Clinton wished him well in his struggle to control this commodity.

My friends opposite like to talk about democracy and about the need for us to represent our constituents. They like to talk about the importance of representing the folks back home in this House. I believe that is what I am doing. I believe that the constituents of Windsor-St. Clair support me, support this government, support the Prime Minister and the justice minister in this effort to control this commodity. I believe as well that the vast majority of the constituents of the members of the third party feel the same way.

[Reform Party, June 13th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, today is the final vote in the House on Bill C-68.

Just as we faced some tough questions on the bill, it is time for the other side to answer one or two. We know who they are, the new politicians, the great populists, the members who came here to represent the folks back home; the wundekinders who will ignore special interests and stay true to their constituents.

I think their whip said it best when he said a few minutes ago to vote the will of your constituents even if it bucks the party line. The member from Simcoe-Centre was telling us the same thing. In the face of a clear consensus, in the face of the clear wishes of the constituents in Calgary, their leader is kowtowing to the gun lobby, turning his back on his constituents and bowing to the will of his caucus-some populist.

[Ontario Election, June 7th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, Reformers, Tories, same old stories in Ontario.

Tomorrow is E-day and in Windsor and Essex county, the centre of the universe, we are ready. We live on the U.S. border and we can see the effect of Mike Harris style politics every day. We do not want Ontario governed by the republicans of the north.

We want universal access to health care. We want our brand new casino industry to thrive. We want good, competent, compassionate government: McNamara, Duncan, Pupattello, Crozier, Hoy.

Republican, Tory, same old story. That is not what Windsor wants.

[Criminal Code, June 6th, 1995]

Madam Speaker, I commend the hon. member on her initiative in bringing forward the motion today. This is an issue like many horrors that is easily ignored, an issue we must face and about which I feel very strongly.

This is not an issue, however, that the government has ignored. The hon. Minister of Justice assured me in discussions we have had that it has been on the agenda for approximately one year, that he has taken the time to meet with members of cultural groups and to meet with women in Canada concerned about the particular issue, and that he has studied it carefully. He also indicated to me and to members of my caucus that he will

continue to listen on the subject. That is obviously witnessed by the fact that he is present for the debate today.

In 1991 by a unique set of circumstances I made the acquaintance of a young professional couple who was fleeing an extremely oppressive situation in a north African country. I will talk a bit about them and about my indirect personal experience with this terrible subject matter.

These people were secular Muslims. They were persecuted by a fundamentalist regime for expressing their more moderate views and for associating with persons who shared those moderate views. I am straining here not to invade their privacy and I am of necessity therefore being vague about details of their professions, nationalities and other identifying features.

In any event, I am happy to say the Canadian immigration system worked. It delivered for this couple. They became refugees and then immigrants. Now they are citizens living and working in the freedom of our great country. They became friends of our family and particular friends of my daughter who is the same age as the young woman.

Shortly after achieving refugee status they came to see me. The woman needed to consult a doctor because she wanted to have children and she needed advice. She had been the victim at the age of 12 of female genital mutilation. Her clitoris had been crudely removed, her labia minora excised and her labia majora incised to create raw surfaces so they could be stitched together forming a cover of skin and scar over the vagina. There is in this type of mutilation a small opening left to allow for urination, for menstruation and for the pleasure of the man who would ultimately become her husband.

Like most Canadians I had never been confronted with it before although I knew about it. We were able to find a surgeon who was of assistance and who performed a procedure that gave some relief and ultimately allowed my friend to more comfortably perform bodily functions and happily to bear two gorgeous children who are Canadian citizens. One of them was a Canadian before her parents were.

I was struck then and I remain struck now by the image of this beautiful young woman, the same age as my daughter, intelligent, alive, youthful and because of our system politically free.

Even with what we have done for her we can never put things back the way they should be. She can never, ever enjoy sexual relations with her husband. She bears scars and will suffer physical side effects for the rest of her life. She will have pain both physical and spiritual that we can only imagine. She will bear this pain stoically, with dignity, and thankfully with the support of her husband. She bears the terrible memory of the mutilation act, of the midwife with a razor, of no anesthesia, of her mother and others holding her down, of the blood, the pain, the fear, the convalescence, and to what end? The end to be served was that of her own oppression.

They mutilate women, damage them. In this rite women are treated like chattel, like livestock. They exist to be used for labour, to bear sons and for sexual gratification that they cannot share. They mutilate them so they will be faithful, so they will not enjoy sex, so they will not run away, so someone else will not take them. It is done in the name of manhood, in the name of God or religion, in the name of the preservation of a way of life and in the name of a culture; but nothing comparable is done in these cultures to men.

I believe passionately in the diversity of this country; in the right of Canadians and of people who come here to display their religions, their cultures and their ethnic origins; in the equality of the sexes; and in respect for religious and cultural practices of others.

I believe religious headgear like the keppah, the turban and the Muslim veil should be accepted by Canadians in our everyday life. I believe we should be colour blind in our policies. I believe in employment equity.

As much as I believe in all these things, I also believe that practices like female genital mutilation cannot and must not be tolerated in Canada. Throughout the world between 85 million and 115 million girls and women have suffered this tragedy. Its defenders say, quite incredibly to me, that it is a right of passage like ear piercing or the male right of circumcision. The mutilation of female genitalia cannot be compared to these other minor procedures. It has no purpose but to suppress.

I do not want to impose my views unilaterally on foreign lands or cultures, but I believe that we can and must come to grips with this practice within our own borders.

I know and I accept the assurances of legal experts that female genital mutilation is covered by the more general sections of the Criminal Code concerning assault. However, as a woman, as a mother, as a sister, as a daughter and as a citizen of the global village, I do not think that is good enough.

I urge the government and all members of the House to take the extra step to help to educate others, to help to educate across the world and to educate within our borders so that people understand that if they participate in the act of female genital mutilation we believe it is wrong. If it takes an amendment to the Criminal Code in the final analysis after we have studied it, after it has perhaps gone to committee and after we have looked at all factors, I will rise in the House and support it.