This bill is from the 39th Parliament, 1st session, which ended in October 2007.
Maxime Bernier Conservative
This bill has received Royal Assent and is now law.
This is from the published bill. The Library of Parliament has also written a full legislative summary of the bill.
This enactment provides for the protection of Olympic and Paralympic marks and protection against certain misleading business associations between a business and the Olympic Games, the Paralympic Games or certain committees associated with those Games.
This enactment also makes a related amendment to the Trade-marks Act to preclude the registration of a trade-mark whose adoption is prohibited by this enactment.
All sorts of information on this bill is available at LEGISinfo, an excellent resource from Parliament. You can also read the full text of the bill.
Bill numbers are reused for different bills each new session. Perhaps you were looking for one of these other C-47s:
Olympic and Paralympic Marks ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker Andrew Scheer
The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Veterans Affairs is rising on a point of order.
Betty Hinton Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Mr. Speaker, although I am very interested in the subject matter the member opposite is discussing, and although I share his concern about childhood obesity, his discussion and his questions have absolutely no relevance to what we are discussing at this time. I would ask that the Speaker rule on whether or not he can continue down this road.
Olympic and Paralympic Marks ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker Andrew Scheer
I will ask the hon. member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca to try to keep his questions or comments regarding the speech of the hon. member for Verchères—Les Patriotes as close as possible to the subject matter of the bill. He has a very short period of time to continue his question. Could he wrap it up very briefly and try to keep it to the actual subject matter of the bill?
Keith Martin Liberal Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I hope that my hon. colleague will give me enough time, more than 15 seconds, to ask my question and make it relevant to the issue at hand.
As I was saying, it is unfortunate that we have a society in which children are spending so much time in front of screens, computers, hand-held devices and television sets. They need to spend a lot more time outside in a physically active environment, particularly with their parents or with an adult caregiver on an ongoing basis and, better yet, with children simply acting in play.
Does my hon. colleague not think this would be a great opportunity for the federal government, as we are talking about the Olympics today, to engage with its provincial counterparts in health and education to have a full-court press for making sure that children spend a lot of time being more active and less time in front of a screen?
Olympic and Paralympic Marks ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker Andrew Scheer
The member for Verchères—Les-Patriotes has only 30 seconds to respond.
Luc Malo Bloc Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC
Mr. Speaker, I can give essentially the same answer that I gave to the member for Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca in response to his previous question—it is Quebec and the provinces that are responsible.
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to speak to Bill C-47, which has been introduced by the government to deal with trademark protection for the 2010 Vancouver Olympic and Paralympic Games. I have been working very closely with my colleagues from British Columbia, because this will be a unique moment in the history not just of our country but in particular of the people of the west coast, and I would like to speak to that.
I feel that it is always incumbent upon politicians to address their biases up front so that the people back home know where they are coming from. There is certainly a tendency for politicians to identify themselves with sports and to be seen with regard to sports, partly because people like sports a lot more than they like politicians, which is I think a good example of how the average person's wisdom tends to be fairly sharp.
When I was a boy in Timmins, we seemed to not exist anywhere on the planet. Culturally we never heard our voices mentioned on national television. We never heard ourselves on radio. The only time we ever saw a reflection of who we were was on Saturday night with the Montreal Canadiens and Frank Mahovlich playing. Frank Mahovlich was from Shumacher. We felt we were someplace on the world map because of Frank Mahovlich or Bill Barilko or the Kreiner sisters, who were such fantastic Olympians.
I cannot claim any share of that great sporting heritage from northern Ontario. I would not claim to be the worst hockey player ever put out in northern Ontario in the city of Timmins, but if we classified the 10 worst athletes ever put out in northern Ontario, I might be one of them. In fact, I remember as a little boy coming home to my father saying that I could not catch a baseball. I could not score a goal. I was pretty good at dirty cheap shots, but I have certainly grown out of that, and I think most of my colleagues will agree.
I remember asking my father why it was that in an area that produced so many great athletes the Angus family was so bereft of the most basic skills of eye-hand coordination. My father said, “Son, it's been like this for generations. When God was giving out eye-hand coordination, the Anguses were in another room getting a drink”.
I feel it is incumbent upon me to at least be honest with the people here and back home. I would never, ever claim any ability to win anything in the world of sports, but that does not mean I do not appreciate it.
When we are talking about the Olympics, we are talking about an event that brings us the best of our young athletes and the best of that spirit from around the world. However, we are also talking about what it does to a city. A city is forever changed by the Olympics. It is changed in the minds of the international community.
Let us think of the experiences in Calgary and Montreal. It will be the same for Vancouver. I think so much about the city of Sarajevo, which was such a symbol of international goodwill and of a cosmopolitan coming together. The tragedy of Sarajevo afterwards was very much marked because of our impression of it through the Olympics and the lost promise there.
The impact that the 2010 Olympics will have on Vancouver and the Whistler area will be phenomenal for the region of British Columbia. It certainly will be an event that will propel Vancouver's place in the 21st century. As government and parliamentarians, we certainly have a serious role to play in ensuring that these games are the most successful possible.
We have only to look back to the experience of the Montreal Olympics. Certainly from Expo but then from the Olympics, Montreal really was identified forever as an international city because of those events. However, Montreal also was remembered, at least in Canada, for Mayor Drapeau's famous baby that he delivered in the form of the massive debt he ended up with.
After that, cities and governments always had to contend with how to ensure that they promote a successful Olympics. How do they compete with every other Olympics? Every Olympics has to be the best there ever was. There is incredible pressure on a country, a region and a city to deliver something that the previous Olympics did not, to deliver so that in this age of 24-7 television and international attention, Vancouver, the Vancouver area and by extension all of Canada will shine.
There is an issue in terms of the financial costs. The costs are enormous. As parliamentarians we have to ensure that we are doing our utmost to make it possible for VANOC to work with the International Olympic Committee and Paralympic Committee to deal with sponsorship issues.
I am going to be speaking to Bill C-47 today because I think it is an important bill. We have to deal with the issues of bootleg products and ambush marketing to ensure that there is a good business climate so that people who do invest in the games will not be unfairly undermined.
However, at the same time, as with anything in terms of trademark or copyright law, we have to look at balancing the issues. Legislation is a blunt instrument. When we bring legislation forward, especially legislation that tries to cover off the minutia and the details that this legislation does, we are creating a very large and cumbersome body, and it can have unintended consequences. We see that with any bill that comes forward.
We have to reflect and make sure that we provide the tools to prevent the unfair ambush marketing that will undermine the value of the sponsorships. We are looking at a massive amount of money having to be brought forward by the private sector. The corporations that invest certainly have a right to be protected from the unfair bootlegging of Olympic logos by people who do not want to pay.
At the same time, as I say, in any trademark or copyright issue it is a balancing act. We have to ensure that the legislation we bring forward here will not have unfair and unintended consequences for small organizations and for small mom-and-pop operations. We have to ensure that the legislation we bring forward will not prevent citizens within Vancouver, Whistler or anywhere in Canada from partaking in a debate or discussion without facing unfair litigation or going to court to prove they really were not infringing on trademarks.
We have to look at how we can balance these two issues, because we see an extremely wide array of trademark issues and words put forward as being under protection. There are something like 75 being proposed for the Whistler games while there were only three for Montreal. That is a major change.
Words such as “tenth”, “winter” and “Vancouver” will be subject to a form of trademark protection. How will we ensure they are used fairly? We would understand if the five Olympic rings were being used by some burger chain in competition with a much bigger burger chain that actually paid to use them.
There is certainly an argument to be made that using the five rings and saying, “Come and get our Olympic fries”, would be an infringement. However, what about using specific words like “twenty-first” and “Vancouver”? How do we ensure average and fair use? Fair use is a legal term in any copyright issue. How does this legislation not impede the fair use of words like “twenty-first” and “Vancouver”?.
I am particularly concerned about the logo that was chosen, the inukshuk, which I think is an amazing symbol. It has become a symbol of Canada, but it is primarily a first nation symbol. It comes from our far north. It has become a symbol of the Olympics. Suddenly this symbol from our first nation people has been appropriated, in a sense, as being under trademark protection.
People see this symbol if they travel anywhere in northern Canada, not just in Inuit lands or in the far Arctic. It has become a common symbol. It is a symbol that everyone uses. I am very concerned that it is suddenly being given patent protection as an Olympic symbol when in fact it has been a symbol within the communities of the first nation peoples for I would not even venture to guess how long. I definitely have a concern about that and it has been raised within the NDP caucus.
We have a concern about the overall intent in terms of trying to be so specific. I appreciate the comments made by the Conservative member who spoke earlier and said that this will be applied only for commercial abuse. Public satire, public discourse, blogging, et cetera will not be impeded. This again shows the intent of a balance, but we have to see it in the legislation in order to feel comfortable that we are going after the unfair bootlegging use of symbols that are quite rightly trademarked.
One of the concerns I have is that law is based on precedent and we are setting up a massive tent for a short period of time with a sunset on how long we will not be allowed to use the word “Vancouver”, “tent”, “winter” or “gold”. However, under that tent, we are moving all the yardsticks fairly dramatically on Canadian trademark law and policy. It also affects copyright issues because this would be the single largest change in trademark law in the last 50 years. Essentially what it says is that if there is a perceived abuse of the trademark by someone then that person must stop using it immediately. The onus would then be on that person to prove that he or she was not abusing the trademark.
We saw similar attempts brought forward under the famous Bulte report on heritage in terms of copyright legislation where a suggestion was brought forward that if one felt that a website unfairly infringed on one's copyright material, that website would need to be shut down immediately. The reverse onus on someone to prove that he or she has not done something wrong is troubling. The person could say that he or she was just doing it for the duration of the Vancouver Games and then he or she will fold up the tent and everything will go back to normal, but we have set precedents at that point on how we establish trademark law in this country.
There have been some public critics of Bill C-47 who have said that we are looking at creating special interest law for a short period of time and then they will move that tent to another area.
On the larger issue of trademark law and copyright law, I know there has been much debate over the last number of years on where Canada needs to go and whether or not we are some kind of outrageous pirate haven for bootleg copies, as certain lobbyists have attempted to say, or whether we need to start building a 21st century legislative framework to deal with trademark and copyright issues in a digital age. Those are certainly issues that we need to discuss.
I am looking at Bill C-47 in terms of the larger issue of how we establish and protect the rights of businesses to invest in something as important as the Vancouver Games and how we also assess the potential impact on a mom and pop operation that wants to have gold and silver coffee at their little coffee shop in northern B.C. and whether or not their rights will be unfairly infringed upon.
We have been promised these rights by the VANOC committee and, I would like to believe, that it will be very judicious in their use, which is certainly comforting. However, it is a question that we would need to ask.
If we provide a large and wide interpretation of anything that could possibly be seen as potential abuse and then expect that it will only be used in certain circumstances, once we have given those rights to go after potential infringers, my sense is that people will go after potential infringers. We need to ensure that what we do with the legislation has a balancing act.
I want to reiterate that it is important to have a framework in place to ensure that the VANOC Games succeed in the way they need to succeed and in the way they are able to generate the revenue necessary. The only way they can do that is to ensure there are certain trademark protections brought into law and that we are very serious about going after bootlegging. That needs to be understood.
The question here is how we balance the rights, not whether or not we support the legislation. The committee will need to do some work to ensure these rights are balanced off and that we are not using a massive hammer to hit the little ants, the very small operations that will, quite rightly, have the ability and the right to partake in the celebration of something as important as the Vancouver Games.
We had the example of the Olympia restaurant in Vancouver and the fact that it already had been for some time using this term. We have had a number of similar trademark law cases in recent years. The famous Barbie's Restaurant was sued by Mattel for an apparent trademark infringement when there had been an established use of Barbie's Restaurant for some time. I believe Barbie was the name of the owner of the restaurant.
Therefore, we have had cases and we have seen how they have played out in the courts. They definitely will help guide us as parliamentarians to ensure that the legislation we bring forth will be balanced to protect the notion of trademarks but also not excessive to unfairly infringe and shut down the fair use of terms like “tents”, “winter”, “Vancouver”, “gold” , “sponsor” or “Whistler”. Those are public terms used in a wide variety of applications.
Whether it is a small mom and pop operation that wants to celebrate the fact that a young woman or man from their community is going to Whistler to celebrate a golden event, and they want to invite people to partake, we certainly do not want to see this law misused in that sense.
I am not suggesting for a minute that is the intention of the VANOC committee. It has done an excellent job so far of promoting the games but with trademark law and copyright law we must be very clear that we are not simply moving the yardsticks one day, popping the tent up and saying that there will no longer be any implications from dramatically changing how we see trademark and copyright , particularly on the issue of reverse onus because it sets a precedent and we will start seeing it in other areas.
As I have said, we have already seen it in some of the suggestions on digital copyright and the attempt to bring in the reverse onus on the use of website materials. This is not related at all to the Olympics but it does concern the issue of creating a precedent. What we are looking at in Bill C-47 is the single largest change in trademark law in Canada in 50 years.
Every effort needs to be made at all levels of government to ensure that 2010 is as successful as it possibly can be. One of the lessons we have learned from the Olympic experience is that we need to ensure that at the end of the day the residents of the city of Vancouver and British Columbia are not left bearing the financial costs of staging such a massive event, which is why we work with private sponsorship. Private sponsorship is essential for the success of the Olympics, and so it should be.
However, we need to ensure the balancing act between providing businesses, which want to invest, security in that investment, but we must also ensure that the legislation we bring forth does not unfairly change the basic ground rules for average citizens who want to partake.
As I said earlier, we have been reassured that this strictly looks at commercial interests and commercial use of trademark logos, which is very reassuring to New Democrats because we believe that out of the 2010 games there will be all kinds of public comment. People will participate on their own blog cites. Some people will be against the Olympics, for whatever reason, and they will want to say things. We certainly do not want to have a law in place that shuts down the open and fair discussion and the fair use of phrases.
We are looking forward to seeing where we can go with this bill by working with other parties. I think this is one area where all parties believe that this will be an amazing event for the 21st century and for setting Vancouver on the road to being a world-class city.
We are all coming together at this time but it is very clear that we need to put aside our partisans hats and try to do the best we can so that after the games there are no sour feelings at any level in society that we, as parliamentarians, somehow dropped the ball. At the end of this, it must be fully understood that we brought forward bills that did everything possible to ensure the Paralympic and Olympic Games were the best ever.
Olympic and Paralympic Marks ActGovernment Orders
Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo B.C.
Conservative
Betty Hinton ConservativeParliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Veterans Affairs
Mr. Speaker, I would like to assure my hon. colleague from the NDP that Vancouver is a world-class city. If he has not had the opportunity to visit, I would invite him to do so. As a very proud third generation British Columbian, Vancouver can hold its head high internationally. It is a beautiful city. I am certain that the games will be absolutely wonderful.
I share one of the concerns expressed by the hon. member and I would like to give him the assurance that I have had from the organizers of the Olympics. They will not go after small companies that have the name “Olympic” or something that relates to the Olympics in their name. They will be grandfathered. The organizers' concern is to maintain and hold onto the rings, which are symbolic internationally for the Olympics. They want to make certain that the symbol is used in the proper way.
Although many of the concerns I have heard him express today have been expressed to me earlier, I want to reassure him that the government took all those things into consideration. We will be supportive of small business but we must also protect the logo rights of the Olympics.
I again would invite the member to come to Vancouver. It is a fabulous city. It is known internationally as a hospitality centre and a wonderful place to visit. He should come to B.C. because we would love to have him there.
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Mr. Speaker, although I am glad she took the time to invite me to her city, I have been there many times. I have played at the Vancouver folk festival so I am well aware of the city. However, I do believe there are many people in the world who have not been to Vancouver and I am hoping they will visit in 2010 so that it is fully recognized as a city of the world.
I am pleased that she is saying that they are very clear in terms of their interpretation of what they need to protect. She speaks of the Olympic rings. I have always been under the impression that the Olympic rings are already carefully protected under trademark and copyright because of the international symbolism that they have.
I would think that Bill C-47 is looking at other areas that have not been covered off, in particular, the VANOC games, which brings me back to my point about the Inukshuk and how that would be protected as it is a symbol that has been within the first nations communities for however long, we could not even begin to guess. I would be more concerned about that symbol suddenly being brought under trademark law than about somebody getting away with abusing the Olympic rings because that is already covered under international trademark law.
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
Mr. Speaker, I know the member has some concerns but I can tell him that I was a Calgarian when we had the Olympics in 1988 and I was very proud to be an Albertan at the time. However, now I am a British Columbian and I am very proud to have British Columbia hosting the 2010 Olympic Games.
I had the opportunity to have some issues resolved by meeting with the CEO of the 2010 Olympics, Mr. Furlong, and the committee members. I wonder if the hon. member and his caucus have made any efforts to meet the CEO and the Olympic committee to get those questions answered.
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased the member had the privilege to be a Calgarian and now a Vancouverite, or within the jurisdiction of Vancouver.
I guess I am not really sure of the point of his question. Members of our caucus meet with key stakeholders on these issues all the time. However, being reassured in a meeting has very little to do with legislation. We are talking about bringing forward legislation here and legislation here is done publicly. It is done at committee and we do it clause by clause.
We have raised the questions because the law must be done very carefully and very clearly, which is something that is done at committee level. The CEO of the Olympics can speak at committee level, and we will hear that, but we can also hear from other groups that have concerns. We then resolve it. That is how we do legislation.
I would be more than willing to meet with anybody but I do not feel that will alleviate the fundamental issue, which is that legislation must be put to the test of a committee and of the witnesses and then it must be brought back to the House.
As I said, I am certain that in an instant like this we can all put our partisan hats aside because what we all want at the end of the day is legislation that will be the best to support the 2010 games.
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Mr. Speaker, while my hon. colleague may lack sporting acuity, he is most definitely an advocate of the first class for artists and communicators in Canada.
I have wondered about this issue in regard to artists. The experience in other countries suggests that legislation can very often impair artists and their ability to do what they do best, and that is create art. Could he comment on that?
Is this the corporatization of the Olympic legacy? Could it indeed restrict artists? Does this preoccupation with trademarks further the ideals of the Olympic or Paralympic Games?
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Mr. Speaker, the question from my colleague is an interesting one. The Olympics are symbols of something much larger than just sporting events among amateur athletes. They symbolize so much of our sense of an international coming together, and artists comment on that. The issue of trademarks is a concern.
I will give an example. I was talking with some documentary filmmakers about how many problems they had now making documentary films. So much of what we view is already under copyright or trademark without realizing it. They gave me an example that I found so shocking. They could not make a film near Niagara Falls because apparently the image of Niagara Falls, the light show, is under a trademark patent by a very large corporation, which I do not need to mention here. It is not all that relevant. Even a symbol such as Niagara Falls could not appear in a documentary film because it was under trademark.
When we talk about changing the rules on trademark and copyright and expanding that, we have to ensure that the balance is there between legitimate business rights and the ability of artists and community members to partake.
That has nothing to do with the five rings because they are like the golden arches. They are a specific symbol. There are other elements out there, certainly under the wide range of 70 terms that have been put under the tent of this trademark, which will cover off a much wider area than we have previously would have considered under an Olympic logo.
Sukh Dhaliwal Liberal Newton—North Delta, BC
Mr. Speaker, I welcome you back into the chair. I am a new member in the House, even though it is over a year, but there are always certain things that when I speak, I go off line, and I thank you for your input. You always give it to me after my speech, the things that I should have done differently. Therefore, I commend you for not only helping the people from Ottawa—Orléans, but for helping new members like myself as well.
I am very pleased and happy to be standing here today as a proud British Columbian and to speak to this bill. I feel the Olympic Games in British Columbia are more than just a sporting and cultural event. It is tremendously important to the economic future of the greater Vancouver area, which includes my riding of Newton—North Delta.
Recently the Vancouver 2010 committee introduced its business plan. I am very proud to say, as should all British Columbians and Canadians, that this presents a balanced budget and a solid contingency plan for cost overruns. It is an amazing achievement when we consider that we are talking about almost $2 billion in expenditures.
I do not think I need to tell anyone in the House that $2 billion spent on a project of this kind requires a great deal of fiscal management. For those on the Olympic committee, this means they have to be as careful as possible about the Olympic and Paralympics brands. It is simply a global reality. There is no better branding than the Olympic brand.
People from Montreal can witness their legacy from 1976. I went to Calgary in 1988. I have seen how important the branding is. People in 1976 and 1988 showed to the world that they were ready. Vancouver and an area like mine, Newton—North Delta, and the greater Vancouver area are more than ready to showcase all we have to offer to the world.
The Economist magazine now rates us as the number one place to live by all measures of quality of life. It is a legacy of the Liberal government. I say legacy of the Liberal government because I came to this country in 1984. I saw where the Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney took this country and what he did to the country. We took it back in 1993 and put it on a sound financial footing.
When it comes to the Olympics, the Liberals were there on day one, we are there today and we will be there until the last minute.
However, in a global marketplace, with more players than ever, more people are looking to make a profit in every way they can. Solid brand identity is crucial. It is a competitive advantage we must take very seriously and protect at all costs.
That is why I support, in principle, all aspects of the bill. The Olympic effort has been years in the making. The Liberal government of the Right Hon. Jean Chrétien was there at the very beginning and we championed the bid from its earliest stages.
Prime Minister Chrétien was out there speaking up for Vancouver and British Columbia, doing all he could do to make this happen. This is not a commitment that we would ever turn our backs on. As the CEO of the 2010 Olympics, John Furlong, recently mentioned, an effort like this requires real leadership at the federal level.
As I said earlier, our federal government should be up front, taking the lead on branding. The pins I am wearing today every MP will be wearing one day and very proudly.
I want to repeat that brand protection is revenue protection. There are high risks involved when we are looking at securing over $700 million in corporate sponsors and funding. That is all the money coming from private corporate sponsors.
I believe federal leadership should have happened faster in getting this bill to the draft stage. Last week my caucus met with members of the Olympic committee. There was a sense of urgency in getting this done. In finally providing real brand protection, an international showcase for Canada like this should not have to do all the groundwork.
In caucus we made it quite clear to the committee that we were there in the beginning for it we are there to give them all the support we can today. We will not turn our backs on it at any time, the way the government turned its back on Kyoto, Kelowna, child care and income trusts. It is a never-ending list of betrayals. In fact, we have made overtures to the government time and time again to move the Olympic agenda forward, as fast and as forcefully as possible.
The response has been, to say the least, disappointing. The government has been in no great hurry to cooperate. Perhaps it has other priorities for Vancouver and British Columbians, priorities that include shortchanging Pacific gateway funding and moving forward on infrastructure development in my area to jeopardize the quality of life, the property values and most important, the environment like Burns Bog in my riding.
Even the Conservatives' own member of Parliament, who I am proud and happy to have as my constituent, does not support that. Priorities that include delivering two budgets have been bad for British Columbia. They have dismantled the support for child care. They have dragged their feet on funding for more police officers, so much so that the mayor of Vancouver has spent more money on new officers to date than the government across the country.
As I said, even faced with this irresponsible mismanagement of British Columbia priorities, we have tried to work with the government to get a bill like this done fast. The Olympic and Paralympic games are too important to waste time on partisan bickering.
As a person with a small business, one of the first lessons one learns is that time is money. Maybe this is a lesson lost on the Prime Minister, who has never had to worry about a bottom line in the same way. The point of the matter is that when we are talking about protecting a brand, the longer we wait, the worse it gets in an international market.
There are some minor points in the bill, as the hon. member from the NDP mentioned, that should still be worked out, points that will require some discussion and debate in the committee. We want to ensure that we are not too heavy-handed, that our decisions will not affect the local small businesses, which are the lifeblood of Vancouver's communities. They are the lifeblood of my community of Newton North Delta. This fine tuning can be done if there is a real will to move this forward.
We have to make sure in our clause by clause approach to everything in this bill that we are as thorough, thoughtful and careful in our consideration of the business opportunities an event like this presents.
Mr. Furlong and the great people on his committee have already proven themselves to be careful and well planned. Vancouver knows, from its experience with Expo 86, that there are many who have said this is going to cost the taxpayers more than they get out of it. However, an event like this will easily prove them wrong with real leadership and protection of the marketing opportunities we have in British Columbia.
Money from brand protection will make it easier for us to make sure that the effort will not have to cut corners and look for profits without careful consideration. Brand protection is like an insurance policy. It means we can really learn from past Olympic success stories that include Montreal in 1976 and Calgary in 1988. We can develop the right model for the taxpayers and the citizens of Vancouver and British Columbia.
We do not have to worry about the mistakes made on housing. I do not think I need to remind this House about what happened in Expo 86, when the new housing that was created raised real estate prices downtown and caused the lower income families to have to move out of the downtown core.
Branding protection is revenue protection. It makes it easier for us to be innovative and proactive. Perhaps we can ensure that the new housing for athletes will actually benefit low income families in the Vancouver area.
The federal government could have that dialogue if of course it displayed the leadership. I am sure there would be the will and the way from the provincial and municipal orders of government if they heard more from this government, if real direction was there from the top.
When we look at the actual percentage of government money committed to this effort, I believe it is a little over 25% and the whole of the money is going into infrastructure projects.
I am not advocating irresponsible spending because we are talking about tax revenues here. I am talking about real leadership for the real investment we are putting in place. I am talking about protecting that investment in the most proactive ways we can.
From my perspective I see no reason why we would want to delay the process in committee. The way the government has blocked and delayed the passage of its own justice bills for partisan gains, and the way it has filibustered in committee on questions of access to information, the Vancouver Olympics and Paralympic Games are simply too important to be sacrificed to such small-minded, partisan interests.
The way I see it, the government has a clear choice: it can finally stand up for British Columbia, and champion and support the tremendous efforts of the Vancouver Olympic Committee to get this bill passed. It can protect the Olympic and Paralympic brands for Vancouver and the revenues that will benefit all hard-working British Columbian families.
The fact is when we have expenditures of $1.6 billion and, as I mentioned, when over $700 million of that must be raised from corporate interests, we cannot jeopardize, in any way, the trust and the commitment that private sponsors will put in this Olympic effort.
This bill is in the greater public interest because of this. The people of Newton—North Delta, the people of Vancouver, and British Columbians and Canadians from coast to coast will watch us showcase what we have to offer to the world. This is why Liberals like myself and Liberals in the British Columbia caucus here in the House have supported this effort from the very beginning.
It is why we are proud to stand as partners and supporters, and why we want to see this bill get through the committee process as soon as possible. We want to ensure that the young people in British Columbia can see how proud we are as members of Parliament by providing Canadians with opportunities for a better future.
Paule Brunelle Bloc Trois-Rivières, QC
Mr. Speaker, after listening to my colleague's speech, I understand that the Liberals will be in favour of Bill C-47, because they have a good understanding of how important it is to provide adequate funding for these Olympic Games, even more so because my colleague is a member from Vancouver.
We can see how quickly the government wants to adopt Bill C-47. But it seems to me that the government is much slower to react to the phenomena of counterfeiting and intellectual property crime, which have increased considerably in Canada.
What does my colleague think about the Conservative government's slow reaction when it comes to intellectual property, whether in connection with films, the manufacturing sector or whatever?