Wayne Easter

[Willard MacPhail, November 5th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to say a few words in tribute to Willard MacPhail, a well-respected farmer and community leader who recently passed away.

Willard's accomplishments are many. He served as a municipal councillor for 21 years and became the first mayor of Cornwall after the amalgamation of North River, Cornwall and Elliot River. He was a founding member of the North River fire department and remained active for 37 years.

Willard organized the P.E.I. Quality Swine Units, served as a director of the Canadian Swine Breeders Association and was chair of the Canadian Centre for Swine Improvements. As well, he served as a member of the Chicken Farmers of Canada.

However, first and foremost, Willard was a family man, devoted to his wife Kathy and their three children. While he would not want to be singled out as a role model, he certainly was that and more.

Willard's commitment and dedication is appreciated and will be greatly missed.

[Petitions, October 31st, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36 I would like to present a petition on behalf of a number of signators who are concerned about foods that are genetically modified or contain genetically modified material.

[Committees of the House, October 31st, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present, in both official languages, the fourth report of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans.

Pursuant to section 52 of the Oceans Act the committee has completed its review of the Oceans Act and we ask the government to respond within the prescribed timeframe.

[Peacekeeping, October 19th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to acknowledge in parliament two residents of Prince Edward Island who have been honoured as recipients of Canada's prestigious peacekeeping award.

They are Mr. Blair Darrach of New Haven, who served with the special forces units in the 1960s and 1970s, including two missions to Cyprus, and Mr. Thomas Albrecht of Albany, who served with the Canadian forces from 1963 to 1979, participating in missions to Cyprus, Egypt and the Golan Heights.

Blair, Tom and their families exemplify the best of our service men and women. They have shown a willingness to serve in some of the world's most troubled places and enhanced our nation's efforts to make this a more peaceful world.

I congratulate and thank them for a job well done and for the inspiration they provided to others.

[Foreign Missions and International Organizations Act, October 18th, 2001]

Madam Speaker, there was not a lot in the member's remarks that related to this bill, although he did get to it in the end. The hon. member left the impression that there were no charges laid against the individual who pied the Prime Minister. In fact the individual was charged and he is paying a penalty as a result. Unlawful acts of that type are not allowed.

I am concerned with the hon. member's comments regarding the right to demonstration. I am a strong believer in that right. I agree that there should not be violence, but if there is then people should be handled in full accordance with the law.

I was not in favour of the APEC inquiry that took place. In a former life with the National Farmers Union I have probably been in more demonstrations in every province in the country than most people in the House.

If demonstrators stretch the law and get hit with water or clubbed with a billy, they should not be crying about it. They know beforehand that by stretching the law there are consequences to be accepted. Some demonstrators at APEC did not accept those consequences. I strongly believe in the right to demonstration. We would not have supply management in the country, which is a great system of marketing for the farm industry, if there had not been demonstrations.

We must have freedom of expression and freedom of demonstration. If too many rights are taken away then bin Laden and the likes of him have won the fight. Canada must be careful to retain the rights and freedoms for which we are respected. How far would the hon. member go in terms of taking those rights away? Where does he draw the line?

[Foreign Missions and International Organizations Act, October 18th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I certainly disagree with the member's last remarks that the bill does nothing. When I look at his examples, they are typical from members of the official opposition. They seem to look back rather than look ahead. Many of the examples the member talked about are the very reason for the bill. The bill does go some distance to dealing with those problems.

The other point I want to pick up on and one that is absolutely wrong is the point that this country is a soft touch for terrorists. That is far from the truth. The bill makes it clear that people in the diplomatic service are not above the law. It moves some distance to deal with that question.

There is an old saying “what is good for the goose is good for the gander”. We have to be careful in terms of how far we go in the bill when we have our own diplomatic people abroad. If we take away all the rights and privileges from people from other countries and treat them the same as they would be treated on their own sovereign soil, we would be doing a disservice internationally. We could not have confidence in the security of our own people in embassies abroad that they would be treated fairly under international standards. We need to find a balance, which is what the government is trying to do through the bill.

The member seems to believe that we are not taking any steps forward with the bill. I find that amazing. Could the member not admit that this does move us ahead some distance to deal with the problems we have faced in the past?

[Foreign Missions and International Organizations Act, October 18th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I am really concerned by the remarks the member made which make serious implications toward the RCMP. As the member for Portage--Lisgar has said, the RCMP is one of the most respected forces around the world.

To suggest that there was political influence in British Columbia at that time is not what the APEC inquiry found. I am concerned that the member is speaking in a way to not let the facts get in the way of a good story. I am not surprised about that from the official opposition.

Could the member lay out the specific sections of the APEC inquiry that substantiate the claims he is making in the House?

[Sir John A. Macdonald and the Sir Wilfrid Laurier Day Act, September 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure for me to speak to Bill S-14. The bill would recognize Sir John A. Macdonald, who was born on January 11, 1815, and Sir Wilfrid Laurier, who was born on November 20, 1841. They should be recognized; one English, our first prime minister, and one French, our first French prime minister.

These leaders built far better than they knew. They took a country of regions where there was a natural north-south pole and forged it together into a very strong east-west unity. That was felt impossible at the time. There are many today who still think it is very difficult to do. However they forged together what has been recognized many times as the best country in the world and the best place in which to live.

They built the railways against great financial odds and tremendous geographic natural difficulties. Last spring I had the opportunity to travel by rail through the mountains from Vancouver to Edmonton along with many of my colleagues who were on the Canada-U.S. parliamentary association. My American and Canadian colleagues talked a lot about the history of the railroad. We could see by looking at the rails that were placed through the mountains some hundred years ago the tremendous amount of difficulty that must have been faced by the people to link the country from coast to coast.

As leaders of the country they rose above the financial and geographic obstacles which must have been both challenging and risky. These leaders had a lot of inspiration and dedication to stick with it to get the job done. These two prime ministers were very instrumental in the expansion of the west as a result of the building of the railroad and much more .

I was not surprised that the hon. member from the Canadian Alliance who spoke earlier was trying to be a naysayer. We have an opportunity to take a look at our history and build on it. This is not the time to bring in current events.

One of our failings as Canadians is that we often look at the negative. We are very fortunate to live in Canada. It has been recognized as the best country in the world in which to live, but it is much more than that. We live in a very tolerant multicultural society where we have brought two great languages and many other cultures together to build this great country. We have such a great foundation as a result of these leaders.

We should be using the debate today when talking about Macdonald and Laurier to build on our past and to talk about how wonderful it was. The hon. member for Sackville--Musquodoboit Valley--Eastern Shore talked about there not being enough history taught in our schools. That is absolutely true. There is not enough history taught in our schools. If we do not know our history, we will not know where we come from and we will not know where we should be going.

I also comment on the points raised by the Bloc that we were naming two but that the rest of the heroes were not being mentioned.

There were many heroes in the country. It is important to recognize these two men because they consolidated the inspiration to put the country together, to tie it from coast to coast to coast, and to build on that foundation, giving the opportunity to past leaders and current leaders to build the kind of country that we have today.

I understand the Bloc's point of view in terms of the tactics it uses of confusing history because it makes the cause for separatism that much easier. However it is important to name these two leaders because it allows us to build on our history, to recognize the great leaders of our past, and to give high school and university students the opportunity to use these days when they are named to further study these and other leaders from our past and what they did to build the country.

People often look at the calendar, including myself and I expect others in the House as well, and ask why that day is there. A study was done to determine why the day should be recognized. As a result we have a better knowledge and understanding of our history and of these two leaders in Canada's past.

It is very important for all members of the House to support Bill S-14. As Canadians we have not given enough recognition to the leaders of our past and we have not studied enough of our history. We have not recognized the difficulty of building a nation, the inspiration of these two leaders and the difficulties they experienced in forging the ties to build the kind of country we have today.

With the passage of Bill S-14 these two days would be catalysts that Canadians could use to study our history, learn more and as a result become better Canadians because of it.

[Criminal Law Amendment Act, 2001, September 20th, 2001]

Madam Speaker, I do not mind admitting in the House that I too am quite concerned about all aspects of the omnibus bill.

I would like to ask a question of the member on the specifics of the legislation in the area he is concerned about. He said that the bill would allow some crackpot to decide what is cruelty, and I wonder if he would expand on that.

Being a farmer I have worked on cattle farms out west. What might be his interpretation of the branding of cattle as worded in the bill? Might that be a problem as well?

[Attack on the United States, September 17th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, that is not what I said. I talked about the security--