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Crucial Fact

  • His favourite word was petition.

Last in Parliament April 1997, as Liberal MP for Leeds—Grenville (Ontario)

Won his last election, in 1993, with 52% of the vote.

Statements in the House

Housing April 19th, 1994

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the minister responsible for housing.

The budget announcement that $100 million over the next two years will be available to improve the housing of low income Canadians is being well received, particularly in rural Canada. Reinstating RRAP will create jobs and improve living conditions for low income Canadians.

Could the minister advise the House when the funds will be made available? What interest has there been from the provinces and territories to become partners in this program?

Petitions April 18th, 1994

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition which I am pleased to present and support.

It has to do with calling for a ban on the sale of killer cards, as they are referred to, collector cards in Canada. The cards, as most people know by now because there have been several other petitions presented, feature the killer and a description of the acts of the killer. I find it very repulsive but I think it is an attempt to glamorize this repulsiveness and idealize it in the minds of young people.

I am sure the killers, if they are in prison, must be flattered to think that somebody was interested in their endeavours. I do not know how in a civilized nation we can have this. It is an attempt to desensitize this thing. I am very much against it and I am pleading with the government to put in place legislation that would prevent the display, the sale or the exchange of killer cards in this country.

Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Suspension Act March 21st, 1994

Mr. Speaker, the member made some reference to what the Prime Minister said in the context of the poorest NHL hockey players in reference to what MPs should be making. I am not talking about the pension. That is something that most MPs here think should be addressed, particularly when there is no age factor to qualify. I leave that out of it.

Would the member just throw out a figure? What would he think? He has been here now for four or five months. He knows some of the costs associated with the job. I do not think he would want it to be said that in order to be a member of Parliament one had to have an outside source of money. That would put it on a totally different plane. It would eliminate a lot of people from ever aspiring to become a member of Parliament if they had to be wealthy to start with. I do not think that is what the member was suggesting.

What would be a fair reimbursement for the kind of demand that is put on a member of Parliament, on his time and his resources and energy and the costs that he has? Perhaps some Canadians are not fully aware that there are costs associated with being a member of Parliament, particularly like the member who has just spoken whose riding is a considerable distance from here. Would he give me a figure? What would be an appropriate salary?

Ethanol March 21st, 1994

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

Canada's farmers and others appreciate the minister's decision to leave the excise tax off ethanol. This method of encouraging the use of ethanol blended fuel is good for the environment, for agriculture and for the ethanol industry.

I noted in the budget documents that the minister did not put any time limit on this tax break. Could the minister speculate a bit on the permanence of this waiver of the excise tax on ethanol?

National Transportation Agency March 11th, 1994

Mr. Speaker, recently the National Transportation Agency of Canada announced new regulations requiring that rail, marine and air carriers train their employees and contractors to provide suitable transportation services to persons with disabilities.

In addition, as of January 1 of this year air carriers operating domestic services with aircraft of 30 passenger seats or more are required to provide certain services if requested in advance.

I mention these improvements as the former associate critic for the disabled in the last Parliament. Physically handicapped people often have trouble finding employment and coping with situations which most of us take for granted. It is encouraging to see some of the shortcomings in our society pertaining to the handicapped being addressed.

It has been a long, difficult struggle for those affected by physical disabilities and those speaking for them. I congratulate those responsible for these new regulations.

Petitions March 7th, 1994

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition addressed to the minister responsible for post offices. This subject perhaps has taken a new slant with the new minister but I do have an obligation to present these petitions anyway. I have been sitting on them here for a week or so.

The petitioners are from little places in rural eastern Ontario, for example Lansdowne, Elgin, Westport, Gananoque, and so forth. They express real concerns about the previous government's position in reference to rural post offices.

Rural residents think they deserve the same postal services as urban residents of Canada enjoy. The previous government pillaged small towns in rural Canada.

They ask that the new minister responsible for post offices take a new look at this and he already has. The petitioners are asking the new minister to restore complete postal services to rural communities. They have grown accustomed to this service through the years and would like to see it restored.

I support these petitioners as do many of our rural caucus.

The Budget February 24th, 1994

Madam Speaker, I think anyone who campaigned in the last election found out that very high on the priority list of Canadians was the need to address the national debt and the national accumulating deficits. I notice my good friend from Kamloops did not allude to that.

Today I think we know where the Reform would stand. They would say: "Correct that by deeper cuts". I think I know where the BQ stands, if I understood their leader this morning. We did not get a chance to dialogue with him because of the new rule. I think he was saying: "We would be in favour of deeper cuts, that way of getting at the national debt".

I wonder if the hon. member for Kamloops would tell me where the NDP stands in relation to national debt. Were the cuts deep enough, too deep or just right?

The Budget February 24th, 1994

Madam Speaker, I just want to congratulate the minister on his fine speech. I am very sorry that we did not have the opportunity to question the Leader of the Opposition. I think that is a mistake because unless we have that exchange and dialogue we are not quite sure where the opposition stands in reference to the budget.

If I understood correctly it was saying that the cuts did not go deep enough. I will never know for sure. I do know for sure that the Reform Party is saying that the cuts did not go nearly deep enough. It would have cut further and I guess would have been prepared to substantiate and defend the fallout.

I want to ask the hon. minister if he saw any further area of substantial cuts that this budget could have imposed on the Canadian people, forgetting that there is a fallout; that innocent, hardworking, perhaps unemployed Canadian people will bear the negative effect of any further cuts we would have imposed on the Canadian people. That would have to be realized.

I wonder where the Reform Party and the Bloc will be a year from today when we come in with a new budget. They will say further cuts, further cuts.

I just wonder if the minister would care to pass judgment on that. If we consider that people are still the bottom line, will there still be that position a year from today when they think we should have made deeper cuts than we did?

Supply February 21st, 1994

Mr. Speaker, I do not think anyone is questioning the merit of this idea of exhausting whatever is on the minds of Canadians at every opportunity.

I have trouble with the mechanics of it. I wonder if we would be raising expectations if we would announce that there was a possibility that petitions might be open for further discussion and debate at some point, once each session as the motion reads.

I do not know how we would handle that. I have carried a lot of petitions into the House of Commons. I carried in one last year with between 4,000 and 5,000 names on it. I am always a little disappointed in knowing what happens to them afterward. Somebody signs them and one cannot make out the signature and then what?

I have not let go of that petition. There is a very strong feeling in my riding about this issue. I intend to pursue that. As a matter of fact, it is almost all consuming with me right now. On the fact that it is sort of passed by and filed, the member of Parliament would have to be sensitive whether he thought that had enough merit. A member may have a petition with 25 names on it. We know that if we want to initiate a petition in our ridings,we

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could get one with thousands of names with the opposite viewpoint.

I wonder that when somebody's petition gets here if we might not be getting their expectations up, thinking that they had a real hot issue and it was going to be debated further and then the mechanics of the way we operate just would not allow it.

As the hon. member was saying, there are many more ways a motion can be brought forward based on a petition. One could use it as an opposition day, as is being done today. One could continue having the issue for an opposition day based on a petition one received and thought had a lot of concurrence across Canada.

I am puzzled with the mechanics of how this thing would work. I do not understand it.

Petitions February 11th, 1994

Mr. Speaker, I have a petition, duly certified as to form and content, from citizens across my riding asking the federal government to seek approval from the Canadian people for Canada's policy with reference to official languages.