Bill C-38 (Historical)

Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act

An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 29, 2012 and other measures

Part 1 of this enactment implements certain income tax measures and related measures proposed in the March 29, 2012 budget. Most notably, it
(a) expands the list of eligible expenses under the Medical Expense Tax Credit to include blood coagulation monitors and their disposable peripherals;
(b) introduces a temporary measure to allow certain family members to open a Registered Disability Savings Plan for an adult individual who might not be able to enter into a contract;
(c) extends, for one year, the temporary Mineral Exploration Tax Credit for flow-through share investors;
(d) allows corporations to make split and late eligible dividend designations;
(e) makes the salary of the Governor General taxable and adjusts that salary;
(f) allows a designated partner of a partnership to provide a waiver on behalf of all partners to extend the time limit for issuing a determination in respect of the partnership;
(g) amends the penalty applicable to promoters of charitable donation tax shelters who file false registration information or who fail to register a tax shelter prior to selling interests in the tax shelter;
(h) introduces a new penalty applicable to tax shelter promoters who fail to respond to a demand to file an information return or who file an information return that contains false or misleading sales information;
(i) limits the period for which a tax shelter identification number is valid to one calendar year;
(j) modifies the rules for registering certain foreign charitable organizations as qualified donees;
(k) amends the rules for determining the extent to which a charity has engaged in political activities; and
(l) provides the Minister of National Revenue with the authority to suspend the privileges, with respect to issuing tax receipts, of a registered charity or a registered Canadian amateur athletic association if the charity or association fails to report information that is required to be filed annually in an information return or devotes resources to political activities in excess of the limits set out in the Income Tax Act.
Part 1 also implements other selected income tax measures and related measures. Most notably, it
(a) amends the Income Tax Act consequential on the implementation of the Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act, including the extension of the tax deferral allowed to farmers in a designated area who produce listed grains and receive deferred cash purchase tickets to all Canadian farmers who produce listed grains and receive deferred cash purchase tickets;
(b) provides authority for the Canada Revenue Agency to issue via online notice or regular mail demands to file a return; and
(c) introduces a requirement for commercial tax preparers to file income tax returns electronically.
Part 2 amends the Excise Tax Act to implement certain excise tax and goods and services tax/harmonized sales tax (GST/HST) measures proposed in the March 29, 2012 Budget. It expands the list of GST/HST zero-rated medical and assistive devices as well as the list of GST/HST zero-rated non-prescription drugs that are used to treat life-threatening diseases. It also exempts certain pharmacists’ professional services from the GST/HST, other than prescription drug dispensing services that are already zero-rated. It further allows certain literacy organizations to claim a rebate of the GST and the federal component of the HST paid on the acquisition of books to be given away for free by those organizations. It also implements legislative requirements relating to the Government of British Columbia’s decision to exit the harmonized sales tax framework. Additional amendments to that Act and related regulations in respect of foreign-based rental vehicles temporarily imported by Canadian residents provide, in certain circumstances, relief from the GST/HST, the Green Levy on fuel-inefficient vehicles and the automobile air conditioner tax. This Part further amends that Act to ensure that changes to the standardized fuel consumption test method used for the EnerGuide, as announced on February 17, 2012 by the Minister of Natural Resources, do not affect the application of the Green Levy.
Finally, Part 2 amends the Air Travellers Security Charge Act, the Excise Act, 2001 and the Excise Tax Act to provide authority for the Canada Revenue Agency to issue via online notice or regular mail demands to file a return.
Part 3 contains certain measures related to responsible resource development.
Division 1 of Part 3 enacts the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, 2012, which establishes a new federal environmental assessment regime. Assessments are conducted in relation to projects, designated by regulations or by the Minister of the Environment, to determine whether they are likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects that fall within the legislative authority of Parliament, or that are directly linked or necessarily incidental to a federal authority’s exercise of a power or performance of a duty or function that is required for the carrying out of the project.
The Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, the National Energy Board or a review panel established by the Minister are to conduct assessments within applicable time limits. At the end of an assessment, a decision statement is to be issued to the project proponent who is required to comply with the conditions set out in it.
The enactment provides for cooperation between the federal government and other jurisdictions by enabling the delegation of an environmental assessment, the substitution of the process of another jurisdiction for an environmental assessment under the Act and the exclusion of a project from the application of the Act when there is an equivalent assessment by another jurisdiction. The enactment requires that there be opportunities for public participation during an environmental assessment, that participant funding programs and a public registry be established, and that there be follow-up programs in relation to all environmental assessments. It also provides for powers of inspection and fines.
Finally, the enactment specifies that federal authorities are not to take certain measures regarding the carrying out of projects on federal lands or outside Canada unless they determine that those projects are not likely to cause significant adverse environmental effects.
This Division also makes related amendments to the Environmental Violations Administrative Monetary Penalties Act and consequential amendments to other Acts, and repeals the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act.
Division 2 of Part 3 amends the National Energy Board Act to allow the Governor in Council to make the decision about the issuance of certificates for major pipelines. It amends the Act to establish time limits for regulatory reviews under the Act and to enhance the powers of the National Energy Board Chairperson and the Minister responsible for the Act to ensure that those reviews are conducted in a timely manner. It also amends the Act to permit the National Energy Board to exercise federal jurisdiction over navigation in respect of pipelines and power lines that cross navigable waters and it establishes an administrative monetary penalty system.
Division 3 of Part 3 amends the Canada Oil and Gas Operations Act to authorize the National Energy Board to exercise federal jurisdiction over navigation in respect of pipelines and power lines that cross navigable waters.
Division 4 of Part 3 amends the Nuclear Safety and Control Act to extend the maximum allowable term of temporary members of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission from six months to three years. It is also amended to allow for a licence to be transferred with the consent of that Commission and it puts in place an administrative monetary penalty system.
Division 5 of Part 3 amends the Fisheries Act to focus that Act on the protection of fish that support commercial, recreational or Aboriginal fisheries and to more effectively manage those activities that pose the greatest threats to these fisheries. The amendments provide additional clarity for the authorization of serious harm to fish and of deposits of deleterious substances. The amendments allow the Minister to enter into agreements with provinces and with other bodies, provide for the control and management of aquatic invasive species, clarify and expand the powers of inspectors, and permit the Governor in Council to designate another Minister as the Minister responsible for the administration and enforcement of subsections 36(3) to (6) of the Fisheries Act for the purposes of, and in relation to, subject matters set out by order.
Division 6 of Part 3 amends the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999 to provide the Minister of the Environment with the authority to renew disposal at sea permits in prescribed circumstances. It is also amended to change the publication requirements for disposal at sea permits and to provide authority to make regulations respecting time limits for their issuance and renewal.
Division 7 of Part 3 amends the Species at Risk Act to allow for the issuance of authorizations with a longer term, to clarify the authority to renew the authorizations and to make compliance with conditions of permits enforceable. The Act is also amended to provide authority to make regulations respecting time limits for the issuance and renewal of permits under the Act. Furthermore, section 77 is amended to ensure that the National Energy Board will be able to issue a certificate when required to do so by the Governor in Council under subsection 54(1) of the National Energy Board Act.
Part 4 enacts and amends several Acts in order to implement various measures.
Division 1 of Part 4 amends a number of Acts to eliminate the requirement for the Auditor General of Canada to undertake annual financial audits of certain entities and to assess the performance reports of two agencies. This Division also eliminates other related obligations.
Division 2 of Part 4 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act, the Bank Act and the Cooperative Credit Associations Act to prohibit the issuance of life annuity-like products.
Division 3 of Part 4 provides that PPP Canada Inc. is an agent of Her Majesty for purposes limited to its mandated activities at the federal level, including the provision of advice to federal departments and Crown corporations on public-private partnership projects.
Division 4 of Part 4 amends the Northwest Territories Act, the Nunavut Act and the Yukon Act to provide the authority for the Governor in Council to set, on the recommendation of the Minister of Finance, the maximum amount of territorial borrowings and to make regulations in relation to those maximum amounts, including what constitutes borrowing, the relevant entities and the valuation of the borrowings.
Division 5 of Part 4 amends the Financial Administration Act to modify, for parent Crown corporations, the period to which their quarterly financial reports relate, so that it is aligned with their financial year, and to include in the place of certain annual tabling requirements related to the business and activities of parent Crown corporations a requirement to make public consolidated quarterly reports on their business and activities. It also amends the Alternative Fuels Act and the Public Service Employment Act to eliminate certain reporting requirements.
Division 6 of Part 4 amends the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development Act to establish the Social Security Tribunal and to add provisions authorizing the electronic administration or enforcement of programs, legislation, activities or policies. It also amends the Canada Pension Plan, the Old Age Security Act and the Employment Insurance Act so that appeals from decisions made under those Acts will be heard by the Social Security Tribunal. Finally, it provides for transitional provisions and makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Division 7 of Part 4 amends the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development Act to add provisions relating to the protection of personal information obtained in the course of administering or enforcing the Canada Pension Plan and the Old Age Security Act and repeals provisions in the Canada Pension Plan and the Old Age Security Act that are substantially the same as those that are added to the Human Resources and Skills Development Act.
Division 8 of Part 4 amends the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development Act to add provisions relating to the social insurance registers and Social Insurance Numbers. It also amends the Canada Pension Plan in relation to Social Insurance Numbers and the Employment Insurance Act to repeal certain provisions relating to the social insurance registers and Social Insurance Numbers and to maintain the power to charge the costs of those registers to the Employment Insurance Operating Account.
Division 9 of Part 4 amends the Parks Canada Agency Act to provide that the Agency may enter into agreements with other ministers or bodies to assist in the administration and enforcement of legislation in places outside national parks, national historic sites, national marine conservation areas and other protected heritage areas if considerations of geography make it impractical for the other minister or body to administer and enforce that legislation in those places. It also amends that Act to provide that the Chief Executive Officer is to report to the Minister of the Environment under section 31 of that Act every five years. It amends that Act to remove the requirements for annual corporate plans, annual reports and annual audits, and amends that Act, the Canada National Parks Act and the Canada National Marine Conservation Areas Act to provide that that Minister is to review management plans for national parks, national historic sites, national marine conservation areas and other protected heritage areas at least every 10 years and is to have any amendments to a plan tabled in Parliament.
Division 10 of Part 4 amends the Trust and Loan Companies Act, the Bank Act and the Insurance Companies Act in order to allow public sector investment pools that satisfy certain criteria, including pursuing commercial objectives, to directly invest in a Canadian financial institution, subject to approval by the Minister of Finance.
Division 11 of Part 4 amends the National Housing Act, the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation Act and the Supporting Vulnerable Seniors and Strengthening Canada’s Economy Act to enhance the governance and oversight framework of the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.
This Division also amends the National Housing Act to establish a registry for institutions that issue covered bonds and for covered bond programs and to provide for the protection of covered bond contracts and covered bond collateral in the event of an issuer’s bankruptcy or insolvency. It also makes amendments to the Trust and Loan Companies Act, the Bank Act, the Insurance Companies Act and the Cooperative Credit Associations Act to prohibit institutions from issuing covered bonds except within the framework established under the National Housing Act. Finally, it includes a coordinating amendment to the Supporting Vulnerable Seniors and Strengthening Canada’s Economy Act.
Division 12 of Part 4 implements the Framework Agreement on Integrated Cross-Border Maritime Law Enforcement Operations between the Government of Canada and the Government of the United States of America signed on May 26, 2009.
Division 13 of Part 4 amends the Bretton Woods and Related Agreements Act to reflect an increase in Canada’s quota subscription, as related to the ratification of the 2010 Quota and Governance reform resolution of the Board of Governors of the International Monetary Fund, and to align the timing of the annual report under that Act to correspond to that of the annual report under the Official Development Assistance Accountability Act.
Division 14 of Part 4 amends the Canada Health Act so that members of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police are included in the definition of “insured person”.
Division 15 of Part 4 amends the Canadian Security Intelligence Service Act to
(a) remove the office of the Inspector General;
(b) require the Security Intelligence Review Committee to submit to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness a certificate on the Director of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service’s annual report; and
(c) increase the information on the Service’s activities to be provided by that Committee to that Minister.
Division 16 of Part 4 amends the Currency Act to clarify certain provisions that relate to the calling in and the redemption of coins.
Division 17 of Part 4 amends the Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act in order to implement the total transfer protection for the 2012-2013 fiscal year and to give effect to certain elements of major transfer renewal that were announced by the Minister of Finance on December 19, 2011. It also makes certain administrative amendments to that Act and to the Canada Health Act.
Division 18 of Part 4 amends the Fisheries Act to authorize the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans to allocate fish for the purpose of financing scientific and fisheries management activities in the context of joint project agreements.
Division 19 of Part 4 amends the Food and Drugs Act to give the Minister of Health the power to establish a list that sets out prescription drugs or classes of prescription drugs and to provide that the list may be incorporated by reference. It also gives the Minister the power to issue marketing authorizations that exempt a food, or an advertisement with respect to a food, from certain provisions of the Act. The division also provides that a regulation with respect to a food and a marketing authorization may incorporate by reference any document. It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Division 20 of Part 4 amends the Government Employees Compensation Act to allow prescribed entities to be subrogated to the rights of employees to make claims against third parties.
Division 21 of Part 4 amends the International Development Research Centre Act to reduce the maximum number of governors of the Centre to 14, and to consequently change other rules about the number of governors.
Division 22 of Part 4 amends Part I of the Canada Labour Code to require the parties to a collective agreement to file a copy of it with the Minister of Labour, subject to the regulations, as a condition for it to come into force. It amends Part III of that Act to require employers that provide benefits to their employees under long-term disability plans to insure those plans, subject to certain exceptions. The Division also amends that Part to create an offence and to increase maximum fines for offences under that Part.
Division 23 of Part 4 repeals the Fair Wages and Hours of Labour Act.
Division 24 of Part 4 amends the Old Age Security Act to provide the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development with the authority to waive the requirement for an application for Old Age Security benefits for many eligible seniors, to gradually increase the age of eligibility for the Old Age Security Pension, the Guaranteed Income Supplement, the Allowance and the Allowance for the Survivor and to allow individuals to voluntarily defer their Old Age Security Pension up to five years past the age of eligibility, in exchange for a higher, actuarially adjusted, pension.
Division 25 of Part 4 dissolves the Public Appointments Commission and its secretariat.
Division 26 of Part 4 amends the Seeds Act to give the President of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency the power to issue licences to persons authorizing them to perform activities related to controlling or assuring the quality of seeds or seed crops.
Division 27 of Part 4 amends the Statutory Instruments Act to remove the distribution requirements for the Canada Gazette.
Division 28 of Part 4 amends the Investment Canada Act in order to authorize the Minister of Industry to communicate or disclose certain information relating to investments and to accept security in order to promote compliance with undertakings.
Division 29 of Part 4 amends the Customs Act to allow the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness to designate a portion of a roadway or other access way that leads to a customs office and that is used by persons arriving in Canada and by persons travelling within Canada as a mixed-traffic corridor. All persons who are travelling in a mixed-traffic corridor must present themselves to a border services officer and state whether they are arriving from a location outside or within Canada.
Division 30 of Part 4 gives retroactive effect to subsections 39(2) and (3) of the Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985.
Division 31 of Part 4 amends the Railway Safety Act to limit the apportionment of costs to a road authority when a grant has been made under section 12 of that Act.
Division 32 of Part 4 amends the Canadian International Trade Tribunal Act to replace the two Vice-chairperson positions with two permanent member positions.
Division 33 of Part 4 repeals the International Centre for Human Rights and Democratic Development Act and authorizes the closing out of the affairs of the Centre established by that Act.
Division 34 of Part 4 amends the Health of Animals Act to allow the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food to declare certain areas to be control zones in respect of a disease or toxic substance. The enactment also grants the Minister certain powers, including the power to make regulations prohibiting the movement of persons, animals or things in the control zones for the purpose of eliminating a disease or toxic substance or controlling its spread and the power to impose conditions on the movement of animals or things in those zones.
Division 35 of Part 4 amends the Canada School of Public Service Act to abolish the Board of Governors of the Canada School of Public Service and to place certain responsibilities on the Minister designated for the purposes of the Act and on the President of the School.
Division 36 of Part 4 amends the Bank Act by adding a preamble to it.
Division 37 of Part 4 amends the Corrections and Conditional Release Act to eliminate the requirement of a hearing for certain reviews.
Division 38 of Part 4 amends the Coasting Trade Act to add seismic activities to the list of exceptions to the prohibition against foreign ships and non-duty paid ships engaging in the coasting trade.
Division 39 of Part 4 amends the Status of the Artist Act to dissolve the Canadian Artists and Producers Professional Relations Tribunal and transfer its powers and duties to the Canada Industrial Relations Board.
Division 40 of Part 4 amends the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy Act to give the Round Table the power to sell or otherwise dispose of its assets and satisfy its debts and liabilities and to give the Minister of the Environment the power to direct the Round Table in respect of the exercise of some of its powers. The Division provides for the repeal of the Act and makes consequential amendments to other acts.
Division 41 of Part 4 amends the Telecommunications Act to change the rules relating to foreign ownership of Canadian carriers eligible to operate as telecommunications common carriers and to permit the recovery of costs associated with the administration and enforcement of the national do not call list.
Division 42 of Part 4 amends the Employment Equity Act to remove the requirements that are specific to the Federal Contractors Program for Employment Equity.
Division 43 of Part 4 amends the Employment Insurance Act to permit a person’s benefits to be determined by reference to their highest earnings in a given number of weeks, to permit regulations to be made respecting what constitutes suitable employment, to remove the requirement that a consent to deduction be in writing, to provide a limitation period within which certain repayments of overpayments need to be deducted and paid and to clarify the provisions respecting the refund of premiums to self-employed persons. It also amends that Act to modify the Employment Insurance premium rate-setting mechanism, including requiring that the rate be set on a seven-year break-even basis once the Employment Insurance Operating Account returns to balance. The Division makes consequential amendments to the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board Act.
Division 44 of Part 4 amends the Customs Tariff to make certain imported fuels duty-free and to increase the travellers’ exemption thresholds.
Division 45 of Part 4 amends the Canada Marine Act to require provisions of a port authority’s letters patent relating to limits on the authority’s power to borrow money to be recommended by the Minister of Transport and the Minister of Finance before they are approved by the Governor in Council.
Division 46 of Part 4 amends the First Nations Land Management Act to implement changes made to the Framework Agreement on First Nation Land Management, including changes relating to the description of land that is to be subject to a land code, and to provide for the coming into force of land codes and the development by First Nations of environmental protection regimes.
Division 47 of Part 4 amends the Canada Travelling Exhibitions Indemnification Act to increase the maximum indemnity in respect of individual travelling exhibitions, as well as the maximum indemnity in respect of all travelling exhibitions.
Division 48 of Part 4 amends the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority Act to provide that the chief executive officer of the Authority is appointed by the Governor in Council and that an employee may not replace the chief executive officer for more than 90 days without the Governor in Council’s approval.
Division 49 of Part 4 amends the First Nations Fiscal and Statistical Management Act to repeal provisions related to the First Nations Statistical Institute and amends that Act and other Acts to remove any reference to that Institute. It authorizes the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development to close out the Institute’s affairs.
Division 50 of Part 4 amends the Canadian Forces Members and Veterans Re-establishment and Compensation Act to provide for the payment or reimbursement of fees for career transition services for veterans or their survivors.
Division 51 of Part 4 amends the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development Act to add powers, duties and functions that are substantially the same as those conferred by the Department of Social Development Act. It repeals the Department of Social Development Act and, in doing so, eliminates the National Council of Welfare.
Division 52 of Part 4 amends the Wage Earner Protection Program Act in order to correct the English version of the definition “eligible wages”.
Division 53 of Part 4 repeals the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act.
Division 54 of Part 4 amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Budget Implementation Act, 2008 to provide for the termination of certain applications for permanent residence that were made before February 27, 2008. This Division also amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to, among other things, authorize the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to give instructions establishing and governing classes of permanent residents as part of the economic class and to provide that the User Fees Act does not apply in respect of fees set by those instructions. Furthermore, this Division amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to allow for the retrospective application of certain regulations and certain instructions given by the Minister, if those regulations and instructions so provide, and to authorize regulations to be made respecting requirements imposed on employers in relation to authorizations to work in Canada.
Division 55 of Part 4 enacts the Shared Services Canada Act to establish Shared Services Canada to provide certain administrative services specified by the Governor in Council. The Act provides for the Governor in Council to designate a minister to preside over Shared Services Canada.
Division 56 of Part 4 amends the Assisted Human Reproduction Act to respond to the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Reference re Assisted Human Reproduction Act that was rendered in 2010, including by repealing the provisions that were found to be unconstitutional and abolishing the Assisted Human Reproduction Agency of Canada.

Opposition Motion--Omnibus Legislation

[Alexandrine Latendresse, NDP, Louis-Saint-Laurent, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Hamilton-Centre.

We are here to debate the democratic validity of so-called omnibus bills. The term is already an old one. Many important omnibus bills have been introduced in the House over the years, as a quick search of Hansard will show. There are numerous precedents. What that search also shows is that, on every occasion, the opposition reacted as though it had been programmed in 1867 to repeat the same thing every time: omnibus bills are undemocratic.

They all claim their rights are being violated. All of them have said it over and over and over again. All of them. The Reform Party said it through the current Prime Minister, the former Progressive Conservative Party said it as well, and, it goes without saying, the Liberals have sung it in every possible octave many, many times.

In 150 years of parliamentary activity, people have expressed indignation, but no one has ever made a genuine attempt to block omnibus bills. That is why we still have them. Omnibus bills are designed, drafted, tabled and passed, and they become law.

As I noted in passing, everyone has expressed indignation. Everyone has accused the government of behaving unethically. They have also announced the death of democracy and appealed to parliamentarianism on moral grounds. Great!

The result is that life goes on; the country votes, voters punish or reward, and a new omnibus bill is ultimately introduced. And the whole rigmarole starts again.

Let us call that the march of history, or legislative bad habits, as you will, except that sometimes surprising and unpredictable consequences arise even here, in Ottawa, on what is generally rather quiet Anishnabe land.

True to their beloved excess, inspired by the tyrants of the Old Testament, the Conservatives have not skimped on the omnes reibus sub sole, orbi et urbi, all things under the sun, in the earthly city and the heavenly city.

Bill C-38, the budget implementation act, which was tabled in the spring and which I have previously discussed in the House, ran to 421 pages, contained 753 provisions and amended a series of more or less related acts.

I compared reading Bill C-38 to reading War and Peace. I apologize because I strongly recommend War and Peace to everyone. However, neo-conservative-style omnibus bills inspired solely by a raging desire to shift everything to the right without listening to or understanding anything do not make for good reading. I want to warn my colleagues because a second budget bill will of course be tabled shortly.

This time, however, we can see the theatrics coming. This document will have no fewer than 800 pages. It will be heavier than the Code of Hammurabi itself and no doubt just as modern. And why not? From now on, there will be an upward spiral. The next one may have 1,000 pages, the following 2,000 pages, and we will no doubt wind up with omnibus bills of 5,000 pages written in Sumerian cuneiform hieroglyphics on granite tablets. Dead languages are all the rage, so why not?

Of course, no consideration is given to the Canadian people in those 800 pages. They may wonder what motivates the Conservatives to act like this. It is very simple. As in everything they undertake, they are deeply convinced that they are taking action to restore Canadian society, which was languishing in perdition.

Have they asked any questions to challenge their ideas? Of course not. When you believe you have a mission, you only talk to people who tell you what you want to hear.

Knowing that they have only one majority mandate and that their days as a government are numbered, they are rushing to change things they do not like. And by “things”, I mean “everything”.

After all, the world could end next week. How will we look to St. Peter if the country is too concerned about people who do not deserve that concern? Success at any price: that is the measure of salvation.

This could be characterized as an typically medieval attitude, but that would be to overlook the fact that Europe's cathedrals were built during the Middle Ages. Apart from vandalizing and renaming museums built by others, however, the Conservatives are not doing much.

What am I getting at with all these comparisons? I am simply saying that what took 150 years to build cannot be changed in four years.

Whoever thinks that is simply a despot. However, 800-page omnibus bills are outward signs of that kind of folly.

The citizens of this country feel there is a problem with changing 1,000 acts in one fell swoop.

When we ask why, we are told that we should ask no questions and that if we object, that means we want to condemn Canada to misery.

When we resist, someone on the other side rises and unleashes a whole string of epithets: communist, separatist, terrorist or Esperantist.

Once they have calmed down, the Conservatives tell us they are doing this out of diligence. However, that is false, and everyone knows it. They are not really acting this way for my good or that of Canadians.

No, they are doing it first and foremost for their friends, the big corporations, for the cash, and to transform Canada's economy into a profit-making machine, without any scruples or long-term vision.

If you are too big a slouch to get close to the sources of prosperity, the government can do nothing for you. You can eat your shirt. But let us take a look at what we can do today to try to solve this problem.

First, I would like to put things in perspective. The gigantic omnibus bills rushed through the Standing Committee on Finance appear to be a Conservative affectation that will surely not survive them. Consequently, I will not be one of those people announcing the death of democracy. The Westminster system is built too solidly for a single government to do enough to cause it irreparable damage.

It is also obvious that no one will ever question whether the NDP, when it comes to power, will at any time act as the Conservatives are doing. We do not feel we have a mission inspired by apocalyptic revelations, and Canadians know that. We also believe in dialogue and in compromise and fairness, but we especially trust in the intelligence of Canadians. To the NDP, the Conservatives’ at-any-cost attitude is above all an obvious sign of weakness.

The Conservatives are going to keep introducing 30-pound paving stones in this House and saying, “Out of the way, coming through.” If the block falls on somebody’s head, they will not even slow down. Certainly, I will keep objecting to these kinds of crude political manoeuvres, but I can also wait them out. I will be watching and waiting, because I know this is a dangerous game. I know Canadians see what is going on and will not put up with being toyed with for very long. The public knows very well that these omnibus bills conceal low blows and schemes. There is a very real risk that the Conservatives' world will end in 2015. I will not have made them get out their Latin textbooks for nothing. Oro pro vobis—I am praying for you.

The Liberals’ solution is to use the opportunity they have today to give the impression they are doing something. They really have no other choice, stuck away as they are at the back of the House by the broom closet and the fuse box. I will give them the benefit of the doubt. They are also shocked by the legislative gall of the government, and they too want to cool its autocratic jets.

The NDP therefore has no problem supporting the motion by the member for Westmount—Ville-Marie. It will be beneficial to the conduct of parliamentary proceedings to find a way to stave off any future paving stones. And what a good opportunity, when the NDP is the official opposition and can make sure the review process is carried out with the public interest in mind.

I have no illusions, however. The Liberals are so full of a sense of self-entitlement that they are only angry because they have been outwitted by people who are stronger and bolder than them. Their indignation today is out of self-interest only. They will be happy to cite the legal precedent of the Conservatives’ 800-page omnibus bills, but as soon as they get a bit of power, it will be their great pleasure to mimic their old enemy. This motion, which seems to reflect a new-found awareness, is of course no more than the never-ending squabbling between the Liberals and the Conservatives. The sole purpose of this schoolyard quarrel is to select and crown the one that excels at enraging the other in the most underhanded way, at the expense, and to the tacit exclusion, of the Canadian public, of course.

The purpose of a Parliament is for us to talk, not just among ourselves, and not just so we can dig in our heels. It is, first and foremost, a place for dialogue with the experts who are invited to testify in committee, so that by hearing opposing opinions, parliamentarians can make informed decisions. Committees exist for that reason. A bill that amends all sorts of laws covering all different areas should not exist. Subjects and bills should be dealt with individually, so they can be examined in the proper committees. That is why we are here. We must not go on blind belief; we must understand and decide. If they do not agree with that really very simple premise, I can show them the way to North Korea.

It is crucially important that elected representatives have access to the most accurate information in order to legislate, but they must also have a minimum of intellectual curiosity, and that is unfortunately not always the case. That does not concern me excessively either, since the system is sufficiently well designed that even the biggest idiot could not do too much harm.

There is a big difference between an occasional idiot who does a bad job—and of course I am speaking hypothetically—and a party that decides in advance what is true and what is false. An 800-page omnibus bill is a case in point. It is a decree. It is a [member spoke in a foreign language], as I said last time. The czar decides and the subjects obey. All discussion is derided as a waste of time and a misplaced tendency to play the bleeding heart.

Today, we have a chance to send a message to the people who aspire to authoritarianism above all. It is plain to Canadians that decimating the machinery of government will not save them any money and will condemn them to living in a country where the guardrails have collapsed under the pressure, and Canadians will not forgive them for that.

[Stéphane Dion, Liberal, Saint-Laurent—Cartierville, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Liberal opposition motion urges us to put an end to the abusive and unprecedented use of omnibus legislation. It is a fact that bills to implement certain provisions of the budget have ballooned in size. They have grown at a spectacular rate since the Conservative government came to power.

A Maclean's analysis on budget implementation bills found that between 1994 and 2005, these bills averaged the length of just under 75 pages. However, from 2006 to today, they have averaged well over 300 pages.

And, as we know, this year, Bill C-38 was 452 pages long. However, it is not just the length of the bills that is in question; it is also the number of unrelated topics that are being crammed into one bill. Back in budget 2010, the government used the same scheme to amend no fewer than 24 laws, but this time, the government is smashing its own record. Bill C-38 amended no fewer than 72 laws. In almost every case, these amendments had little to do with the budget or any financial issues in general.

The government defends itself by saying that it has to act quickly because of the worrisome economic conditions. This argument would be more credible if the 452 pages of Bill C-38 actually had anything to do with fiscal measures. Such is not the case. Only 30 pages had anything to do with fiscal measures. In fact, no fewer than 151 pages amended laws concerning the protection of the environment.

The Standing Committee on Finance had to review a mishmash of issues as crucial as the weakening of many environmental laws and regulations, the end of protecting fish habit, the power given to the government to reverse decisions by the National Energy Board, the weakening of the Food and Drugs Act, the gradual change in the age of eligibility for old age security benefits to 67, the cancellation of thousands of immigration applications, the weakening of the Governor General's mandate, and so on.

Now the government plans to restart this fall with a new omnibus bill that would go in all directions. Some likely topics would be pension changes for public servants, pension changes for parliamentarians, a new mandate for the National Research Council and new oil tanker regulations. The Minister of Natural Resources repeatedly said that these changes were somewhere in Bill C-38, but no one was able to find them. It would also likely include the Rouge Valley national urban park and the renewal of the hiring credit for small business and so forth.

This is how the Conservative government transformed budget implementation bills into a steamroller that allows it to push through important measures that deserve a thorough review, without any serious, careful examination. Today's motion urges us to put an end to this suspect way of doing things, which is dangerous to the health and safety of Canadians.

Is it not as though there is no solution to this problem. In a recent communication, professor Louis Massicotte looked more closely at the practice in the United States.

He found a list of 42 U.S. states that have provisions that prohibit omnibus bills. For example, the Arkansas constitution states:

The general appropriation bill shall embrace nothing but appropriations for the ordinary expense of the executive, legislative and judicial departments of the State; all other appropriations shall be made by separate bills, each embracing but one subject.

I am not sure we need to go as far as that. I am just saying that it is possible, if we have goodwill, to find solutions to the problem we are facing today.

Professor Massicotte notes that on January 23, 2012, representative Tom Marino, a Republican from Pennsylvania, introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, the One Subject at a Time Act that goes to “end the practice of including more than one subject in a single bill”.

I repeat that, with good will, we could put an end to this contempt for parliamentary democracy, which is being criticized by Canadians everywhere.

For example, Professor Ned Frank said:

These omnibus budget implementation bills subvert and evade the normal principles of parliamentary review of legislation.

However, the most sincere criticism comes from one of our colleagues opposite, who was at the time, and remains to this day, the member for Calgary Southwest, the current Prime Minister. On March 25, 1994—as we have heard repeatedly here today—regarding a budget bill that was only 21 pages long and included only measures that were clearly budget related, that member said the following in this House:

...I would argue that the subject matter of the bill is so diverse that a single vote on the content would put members in conflict with their own principles.

So why is the Prime Minister now putting us in a clear conflict with our own principles? Again quoting the Prime Minister:

...In the interest of democracy, I ask: How can members represent their constituents...when they are forced to vote in a block...? ...Dividing the bill into several components would allow members to represent views of their constituents on each of the different components in the bill.

So, in the interest of democracy, why will the Prime Minister not divide his gigantic bill? He went on to say:

...only one committee...will inevitably lack the breadth of expertise required for consideration of a bill of this scope.

Why does the Prime Minister no longer feel the need to call on several committees instead of just one? If he will not listen to anyone else, the Prime Minister should at least take his own advice in the interest of democracy and simple common sense, so that we as legislators can do our job in service to Canadians.

I urge all of my colleagues to support this Liberal motion.

Opposition Motion—Omnibus Legislation

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, some of the contributions today from the opposite side have brought to mind a comment that at the time shocked me. Back in May when the Jobs, Growth and Long-term Prosperity Act, omnibus Bill C-38, was being debated, the Conservative member for Vegreville—Wainwright said:

Mr. Speaker, the member must really have very little to complain about when it comes to this legislation, because he focuses on the process, as do so many others opposite.

Quite frankly, Canadians do not care about process; what they care about is what the end result will be. What they care about is having ample time for debate, and there has been a record amount of time for debate on a budget bill.

Does my colleague think this might be indicative of a broader attitude that underlies how the Conservative government thinks of democracy in the House? I wonder if the hon. member for Mount Royal might comment on whether this reveals an underlying problem with how the government thinks about the House.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Mount Royal, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today in this debate on omnibus legislation. Like my colleagues, and particularly now my colleague from Etobicoke North, I agree with what the current Prime Minister stated in this place in 1994 when, as an opposition member, he criticized the use of omnibus legislation asking:

How can members represent their constituents on these various areas when they are forced to vote in a block on such legislation and on such concerns?

He continued:

We can agree with some of the measures but oppose others. How do we express our views and the views of our constituents when the matters are so diverse?

The complaint of the Prime Minister, then speaking as an opposition member in 1994, about the use of omnibus bills ought now to underpin his work as Prime Minister. Rather, he is forcing legislation through this place as he himself regaled against. Indeed, it is time that the House took action to study and restrict the use of sweeping omnibus legislation that, among other things, deprives MPs of the opportunity to undertake the requisite detailed and differentiated analysis of the diverse constituent elements in a given omnibus bill, deprives the members of the House of the necessary public oversight with respect to these bills and undermines public participation in the political process as well as the public right to know.

I am not suggesting that the government somehow does not have a right to pursue its policy objectives. What must be debated, however, is the integrity of the process used and the merits of the means chosen. The purpose of Parliament is not to serve as a rubber stamp of the government, to be disconnected from the people and our constituents, even in a majority Parliament. Indeed, the government has yet to explain how Canadians are worse off when this body does take the necessary time to study subject matter items in detail, to separate out disparate legislative proposals and thereby, as a result, to produce the appropriate high-quality legislation deserving of our Parliament and our people. Indeed, it would seem by his own acknowledgement in this place that the member for Calgary Southwest at the time acknowledged these same views in 1994.

Accordingly, my brief remarks will be organized around the discussion of two particular pieces of legislation, the recent federal budget implementation bill, and Bill C-10, the omnibus crime bill. While those are the two latest and most blatant examples of the use and abuse of the omnibus process, the government has a pattern of bundling perfectly acceptable items with utterly untenable legislation, and does so not only to its peril but to the peril of its own case and cause.

The recent federal budget legislation, Bill C-38, is what I have referred to elsewhere as the hydra-headed Trojan Horse omnibus budget implementation bill, for it was as stealth-like in its scope as it will be and has been prejudicial in its impact, the whole constituting an assault on the integrity of Parliament and its members, as well as on the democratic process. That is putting it modestly and mildly.

Simply put, while this 400-plus page piece of legislation was supposed to be anchored in the budget, in reality it had very little to do with the budget. Rather, in its sweeping scope it introduced, amended or repealed more than 70 federal statutes with the omnibus Trojan Horse providing political cover for pervasive and prejudicial impacts on everything from Canadian retirement plans to environmental protection, from immigration to food safety. All of this was accomplished through sleight-of-hand omnibus legislation where, for example, one provision undermined the whole of our environmental protection safeguards.

This enormous hodgepodge, this disconnected bundling together of variegated legislative proposals, did not and does not allow for the requisite differentiated discussion and debate, let alone the necessary oversight of the legislation. It imbued the executive with arbitrary authority to the exclusion of Parliament thereby serving as a standing abuse to the canons of good governance, transparency, accountability, public oversight, cost disclosure and the like. Indeed, this alone should have been cause for its defeat.

As Andrew Coyne put it at the time, “The scale and scope is on a level not previously seen, or tolerated”. He noted that the bill made “a mockery of the confidence convention” and that there was no “common thread” or “overarching principle” between the legislative items therein, let alone its standing contempt for Parliament in matters of process and procedure.

Moreover, and again on the crucial issues of parliamentary process and procedure, this bill was sent to the finance committee. Accordingly, the review of the environmental regulations therein, which overhauled, weakened and undermined the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act and environmental protection as a whole, were thus not reviewed by the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development where it belonged.

Similarly, the provisions that changed the First Nations Land Management Act were not the subject of examination and study by the Standing Committee on Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development, as my colleague from Etobicoke North identified, where they ought to have been deliberated. I could go on with numerous examples in this regard.

Moreover, if circumventing proper and thorough parliamentary review were not enough, the government invoked time allocation to limit discussion on the bill at every stage of the legislative process.

I am not suggesting that invoking time allocation, as the government has done again and again, violates the rules of this place. What I am suggesting, as many commentators have said, is that this use of it, particularly in the context of omnibus legislation, is unnecessary, prejudicial, surprisingly undemocratic, in effect, unparliamentary, and otherwise unsubstantiated, unwarranted and, frankly, is a contempt of Parliament and the people.

Surely if Parliament had to debate something like going to war, it would be easy to see why we might have time allocation to ensure that we get to the most pressing debate first. Or, if there were court decisions that affected many statutes, we might easily welcome an omnibus bill that could make the same change to many statutes at once, and that has been done by this House.

What is so disconcerting with the budget implementation bill is that the government need not have been in such a rush. There was no coherent or compelling theme, as commentators and experts have pointed out, to the omnibus proposals contained in the bill. Frankly, it could have used more study and, as we see with the current tainted beef scandal, the provisions on food inspectors perhaps warranted a more thorough review.

There are many issues that remain with the budget implement bill, not the least of which is the question of cost disclosure and the remaining possibility of a lawsuit from the PBO over the government's failure to be open and transparent about the extent of the budget cuts proposed and its cost impact.

In the matter of the omnibus crime legislation, Bill C-10, the problem with omnibus legislation is illustrated no less compellingly. While the same generic omnibus critiques operate in this context, namely, what Richard Poplak in a Globe and Mail piece termed “Chinese disease...hollowing out democracy”, for which Canadians are increasingly bearing the burden of this onslaught, I would refer to one case study of the government's omnibus failure: the amendments to the Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act, JVTA.

The JVTA was one of nine constituent bills of Bill C-10, one which received little attention. This landmark legislation, however, allowed, for the first time, Canadian victims of terror to sue their terrorist perpetrators in Canadian courts.

I supported the principles of the JVTA and had even introduced similar legislation in a previous session for that purpose. However, the government's version of this bill warranted improvement, which it did not allow for. Accordingly, I proposed a series of amendments at the legislative committee, explaining that I sought only to strengthen the government's bill. All of my amendments were summarily rejected by the Conservatives, as were all opposition amendments. Indeed, all 50 of my proposed amendments to Bill C-10 were summarily rejected. There was no debate or consideration given. In fact, I was accused of obstruction and delay for merely suggesting these changes. At the next meeting, the government moved to shut down debate entirely, a flagrant abuse of the parliamentary and legislative process.

Certainly a majority government has the procedural right to use its majority as it pleases. However, it ignores the opposition at its peril. Indeed, the government eventually realized the merit of my amendments and proposed them later as its own. Therefore, these amendments became part of the legislation in a dilatory fashion, prejudicing the outcome and even the improvement that could have been warranted in that legislation.

Simply put, legislation has to be examined on the merits and, when so examined, the Conservatives' omnibus crime bill revealed that it would result in more crime, less justice, at greater cost, with fewer rehabilitation opportunities for offenders, less protection and voice for the victims, and less protection for society. We are now slowly seeing the consequences of the legislation being that which we predicted at the time. In fact, we have situations and problems with regard with prison overcrowding, mandatory minimum penalties and the like, that are likely to be struck down by the courts. I could go on.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Mount Royal.

The government has repeatedly abused Parliament by ramming through outrageous omnibus bills. For example, two years ago the government introduced an 880-page omnibus bill, a grab-bag of bills that the government wanted to pass quickly. In fact, it was half of the entire workload of Parliament from the previous year. As a result, the government was severely condemned for turning the legislative process into a farce.

Most recently, the government introduced Bill C-38, the 400-plus page omnibus budget implementation bill. Through the bill, the government sprung sweeping changes on our country, affecting everything from employment insurance, environmental protection, immigration and old age security to even the oversight that charities receive. None of these changes were in the Conservative platform. They were rushed into law by “an arrogant majority government that’s in a hurry to impose its agenda on the country”.

The government's actions reek of hypocrisy. In 1994, the right hon. member for Calgary Southwest criticized omnibus legislation, suggesting that the subject matter of such bills is so diverse that a single vote on the content would put members in conflict with their own principles and that dividing the bill into several components would allow members to represent the views of their constituents on each part of the bill.

The right hon. member is now using the very tactics he once denounced. It is a shame that he changed his tune when he was elected to the highest office in the land. Last spring's 400-page omnibus budget implementation bill contained over 60 unrelated matters, amended or abolished 74 pieces of legislation and devoted an astonishing 150 pages to destroying 50 years of environmental oversight. I quote:

This is political sleight-of-hand and message control, and it appears to be an accelerating trend. These shabby tactics keep Parliament in the dark, swamp MPs with so much legislation that they can’t absorb it all, and hobble scrutiny. This is not good, accountable, transparent government.

Real democracy would have allowed for the environment sections to be separated out from the omnibus bill and sent to the environment committee for clause-by-clause scrutiny. Bill C-38 repealed the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act, meaning that the assessment agency would be able to exempt a designated project from even going through the assessment process and that when environmental assessments do happen they will be narrower, less rigorous and have reduced public participation. Canada's environment commissioner says that “there will be a significant narrowing of public participation”.

We have since learned that hundreds of federal environmental assessments have been dropped. Canadians should know that after a mere 16 hours of study the finance subcommittee was left with many questions regarding the legislation. What types of projects will be included or excluded under the proposed changes to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Act? What proportion and types of current assessments will no longer receive federal oversight? How will the government define whether a provincial process is equivalent to the federal process? How will the assessment of cumulative impacts be undertaken?

During the finance subcommittee's review, Ms. Rachel Forbes, staff counsel of West Coast Environmental Law, said she did not believe the new legislation would accomplish any of the government's four pillars: more predictable and timely reviews, less duplication in reviewing projects, strong environmental protection and enhanced consultation with aboriginal peoples. In fact, she suggested the amendments may hinder them.

Bill C-38 also repealed the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act, which addressed our most pressing environmental problem, namely climate change. The law required the Minister of the Environment to publish a climate change plan each year, a forecast for emissions reductions and a discussion of how the government performed the previous year and how shortcomings would be addressed. Repealing the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act will result in a loss of domestic climate accountability measures. Repealing the National Round Table on the Environment and the Economy will result in the loss of a unique independent, unbiased organization, that's only fault was publishing evidence-based reports that did not agree with Conservative ideology.

Canadians should be deeply concerned by the repeal of the Kyoto Protocol Implementation Act as the threat of climate change is serious, urgent and growing. Nine of the ten warmest years in the modern meteorological record have occurred since the year 2000. The extent and thickness of summer sea ice in the Arctic have shown a dramatic decline over the past 30 years, with the six lowest extents having all occurred in the last six years. More disturbing still, a 2011 article in the prestigious journal Nature showed that the duration and magnitude of the decline may be unprecedented in the last 1,450 years.

However, this summer, the amount of ice in the Arctic shrank to an all-time low, destroying previous records. While scientists are enormously concerned that these changes represent a fundamental change and very little is known about the consequences of drastic sea ice reductions, the Minister of the Environment was perturbed mainly about how navigation patterns might be affected.

Bill C-38 also weakened several environmental laws, including protection for species at risk and water, and nearly eliminated fish habitat in the Fisheries Act, putting species from coast to coast to coast at risk.

Tom Siddon, the former Conservative minister responsible for the current Fisheries Act, was extremely concerned by the amendments and stated:

This is a covert attempt to gut the Fisheries Act, and it’s appalling that they should be attempting to do this under the radar.

He also said:

They are totally watering down and emasculating the Fisheries Act...they are making a Swiss cheese out of [it].

At the finance committee, he reported:

The bottom line...take your time and do it right. To bundle all of this into a budget bill, with all its other facets, is not becoming of a Conservative government, period.

Equally astounding is the fact that Bill C-38 gave the federal cabinet the authority to overrule a decision by the National Energy Board.

The Conservatives have also cut $29 million from Parks Canada and in doing so are undermining the health and integrity of Canada's world-renowned parks, risking some of our world heritage sites, significantly reducing the number of scientists and technical staff, hurting relationships with aboriginal peoples and attacking rural economies.

It is important to remember that when the Conservatives came to power, they inherited a legacy of balanced budgets from the previous Liberal government but soon plunged the country into a deficit before the recession ever hit. It is absolutely negligent and shameful that the government gutted environmental safeguards in order to fast-track development and balance its books.

The government did not campaign in the last election on gutting environmental protection. As a result, Canadians rose up in the hope of stopping the Prime Minister's destruction of laws that protect the environment, the health and safety of Canadians, our communities, our economy and our livelihoods. The Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment, the David Suzuki Foundation and the Pembina Institute are just some of Canada's prominent environmental organizations that called upon Canadians to speak out in defence of Canada's values of democracy and the environment.

The Black Out Speak Out campaign stated:

Our land, water and climate are all threatened by the latest federal budget. Proposed changes in the budget bill will weaken environmental laws and silence the voices of those who seek to defend them.

Silence is not an option.

We simply cannot afford economic development with reduced environmental consideration. We risk environmental disaster and cleanup costs, which we may pass on to our children. We must remember that we do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children.

Canadians are entitled to expect much more than what they are witnessing today both in the protection of our environment and the protection of our democratic values, which our beautiful country was built on.

[Elizabeth May, Green, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, briefly to my friend from Fort McMurray—Athabasca, he could search as long as he wants in any previous Conservative document, he will find no reference to bringing U.S. law enforcement agents on to Canadian soil to arrest Canadians. That was a surprise in Bill C-38. He would find no reference to the idea that we would kill the national round table.

My question to the hon. minister is this. If he wants to pass comprehensive legislation, I get it. The government has a majority. It can pass anything it wants, but why is there this persistent refusal to allow legislation to go on its own two feet before the appropriate committee?

[Guy Caron, NDP, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as the Minister of State for Finance knows, I am a member of the Standing Committee on Finance. I have a keen interest in finance.

In committee, we did indeed study Bill C-38, passed by the House, which changed, created, amended or eliminated nearly 70 pieces of legislation. The bill was so big that the committee had just one minute to discuss the interoperability of the RCMP with the FBI in Canadian territorial waters.

We then proceeded to study the privatization of seed inspections, and that of fish habitat.

We were not really able to do our job. The government knows full well that the interoperability of the Canadian and American police forces should be studied by the Standing Committee on Public Safety and National Security, that fish habitat should be studied by the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, and so on. We, as members of the Standing Committee on Finance, were asked to study these issues.

The government often talks about the unbelievable amount of time we had to debate all this, but let us not forget that we were changing, amending or eliminating 70 laws. Roughly 280 hours were devoted to this bill, which is roughly 4 hours of debate only for each amended law. Four hours is the equivalent of two committee meetings.

I would like the Minister of State for Finance to say a few words about the fact that it made no sense for the Standing Committee on Finance to study such disparate topics and the fact that we did not have enough time to discuss each of the amended laws.

[Ted Menzies, Conservative, Macleod, AB]

Mr. Speaker, you do reaffirm my belief in the wisdom of the Chair. I can do this on a very repetitious basis, drawing every example I use back to the fact that it requires comprehensive legislation. If the opposition wishes that I do that, I may fall into what you have suggested is not appropriate, and that is repetitiveness. I will try not to do that either.

What I was speaking about was Europe and the threat to the global economy, the indecisions, the lack of a comprehensive plan among the European Union community.

I will go back to my first statement that a comprehensive plan requires comprehensive legislation. That is what the budget implementation act, Bill C-38, was. I suggest there will be comprehensive legislation following soon to implement the rest of a comprehensive plan to keep Canada on track.

Another example I would use is in the U.S. There seems to be some indecision down there, a lack of being able to make a firm decision, perhaps a lack of a comprehensive plan such as we had in Bill C-38, which was a comprehensive legislation.

The U.S. needs to get its fiscal house in order. We are well on our way to doing that. It also needs to ensure that there is certainty in the short term so markets and investors can be confident that economic growth will not be interrupted. That is what we saw in our comprehensive legislation in the spring.

In these uncertain times, Canada's economic stability depends on the implementation of a clear plan, a comprehensive plan to safeguard our economy. This situation demands that Canada cannot be complacent. We cannot allow political gridlock and instability to stall vital economic and fiscal reforms as we are witnessing in the U.S. and Europe.

Moreover, in a rapidly changing and global marketplace where Canada faces tough competition from emerging economies like Brazil, Russia, China and India, we cannot afford to delay action to support our economy and measures to return to balanced budgets.

Therefore, in budget implementation one, Bill C-38, we actually put forward solutions to allow our Canadian companies to compete.

I think the argument is very valid, that in order for our economy to continue to grow, we need to put in place legislation and we need to do that soon. We gathered it together in a budget implementation act and we will have the second one coming soon that actually does that. It will allow our Canadian companies to compete internationally, to be able to export their resources, to streamline that process and to ensure that it is an environmentally sound plan. That is all part of our comprehensive budget plan.

The challenges that our economy faces are not small and one dimensional and neither is our plan. It is comprehensive and ambitious. It responds to the magnitude of the threats that Canada faces in this uncertain climate today.

In order to implement the plan, certain measures require legislation to be adopted by Parliament. In April 2012, we introduced Bill C-38, the one I would suggest the Liberals are referring to here today, which included provisions to spur job growth, to keep social programs sustainable, to eliminate wasteful and duplicative spending of taxpayer dollars and much more, hence, the comprehensive budget implementation bill.

Let me give the members opposite some examples of this action and explain how we plan on spurring job growth. One is by developing our resources responsibly. The NDP, when it comes to resources, has suggested it would like to implement a job-killing carbon scheme that would increase the price of absolutely everything we buy and consume. That was not part of our plan and it never will be.

Our government knows that this would not work. Instead, we are focused on responsible resource development, which will streamline the review process for major economic projects by providing predictable timelines for project approvals. It will prevent long delays that kill potential jobs and stall economic growth by putting valuable investments at risk. Most important, responsible resource development will create good, skilled, well-paying jobs in cities and communities all across this great country while at the same time maintaining the highest possible standards for protecting the environment. That required a comprehensive piece of legislation, Bill C-38.

With emerging economies in Asia and around the world providing the potential to create even more jobs and growth, our government will act swiftly to implement its plan for responsible resource development in the interests of the Canadian economy.

However, that is not all, as we have much more to do. We are making employment insurance a more efficient program, one that is focused on job creation and opportunities by removing disincentives to work and supporting unemployed Canadians.

We are also helping build a fast and flexible economic immigration system to meet Canada's labour market needs by reducing the backlog in the federal skilled worker program, returning applications and refunding fees to those who applied prior to February 27, 2008.

Our government is also making fiscally responsible decisions to ensure that spending stays in check and does not go down the path that we have seen in many European countries. To help achieve this we are modernizing Canada's currency by gradually eliminating the penny from Canada's coinage system. This as well requires changes to legislation and is why we table comprehensive legislation. This alone will save taxpayers $11 million every year.

Nonetheless, this plan is about much more than reducing spending. As a government we have a responsibility to Canadians to ensure that Canada's social programs remain sustainable over the long term. That is why in budget 2012 we took action to ensure that the retirement security of all Canadians, now and into the future, is sound by placing Canada's old age security program on a sustainable path. Beginning in April of 2023, the age of eligibility for OAS and the guaranteed income supplement will gradually begin to increase from 65 to 67. These changes reflect demographic shifts in Canada's population and are necessary to ensure that OAS and GIS are available for future generations of Canadians. This also requires comprehensive legislation so that we can enact the necessary changes to make both of these programs sustainable.

The problem with the members opposite is that they do not think down the road; they do not realize the changes that we need to make to make sure that these programs stay sustainable.

Our government is taking real action to ensure that Canada's economy continues to create jobs and grow. What, you may ask, does our government's plan do for Canadian families and communities? That would be one of the best questions to ask here today and I shall answer it.

I will talk about economic action plan 2012 and how it builds on our government's strong record by proposing new measures for Canadian families. For example, our action plan will improve the application of the GST and HST and income tax systems to a number of health care services, drugs and medical devices to reflect the evolving nature of the health care sector and to better meet the health care needs of Canadians.

That was required both in the comprehensive legislation that we passed and in legislation that will be forthcoming soon. Specifically, it would mean exempting from the GST and HST pharmacists' professional services, other than their prescription drug dispensing services, which are already zero-rated under the GST and HST.

It would also mean expanding the zero-rated treatment under the GST-HST for corrective eyeglasses or contact lenses supplied on the prescription of an eye-care professional to include corrective eyeglasses or contact lenses supplied on the order of a qualified optician who is authorized, under provincial law, to issue such an order.

It would mean expanding the list of health care professionals on whose orders certain medical and assistive devices are zero-rated under the GST and HST so as to reflect the increasing involvement of health care professionals, such as nurses, in giving orders for these devices.

It would also mean adding to the list of non-prescription drugs that are zero-rated under GST and HST.

It is obvious that we needed to open up the Income Tax Act to do that. It is part of the budget. It was referred to in the budget. It is part of our action plan. It requires comprehensive legislation to do that. That is just one of the reasons I will be opposing the motion today.

It would also mean expanding the list of GST and HST zero-rated medical and assistive devices and the list of expenses a person may claim for income tax purposes under the medical expense tax credit to include such things a blood coagulation monitors for use by people who require anti-coagulation therapy.

Every time I say zero-rated, I see a confused look on the faces of the opposition members. This is not surprising since we all know that the Liberals actually favour higher taxes. Perhaps that is why they actually opposed our budget implementation act, Bill C-38.

We know what the Liberals do when they have a chance to support initiatives that would lower taxes for Canadian families. We have seen example after example. They simply vote against these measures. That is exactly what they did with policies like the refundable working income tax benefit back in 2007. That is exactly what they did with our government's economic action plan.

Let us take a look at some of the initiatives that would also help Canadian communities but which the opposition also voted against.

Our government's plan would make direct investments in research that would support our communities. Canada's position as a world leader in research excellence is a key source of the discoveries, innovations and advanced skills that not only result in better health outcomes but also drive job creation and opportunities in the knowledge economy.

The measures in the economic action plan would help strengthen Canada's leadership position by supporting industry/academic research collaborations, as well as advanced health and public policy research initiatives of strategic importance. We all understand how important that is. The minister sitting near me here today is leading that incredible challenge, and we are winning on that.

We are announcing new chairs at universities and colleges across this country. Why is that? It is because we enacted legislation that would allow and fund that. We are proud of that record.

We have many examples. For example, in the area of health research, we have allocated $15 million per year for patient-oriented research. That was part of Bill C-38, which the opposition voted against.

I could go on and on about all the things the opposition voted against, However, I think the fundamental comment I will finish with is that I am proud to oppose the opposition motion this morning. We have great reason to think we are on the right track.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, what immediately springs to mind for British Columbians or any Canadian who wants a strong economy that protects and restores of the environment without degrading it, are the changes to the Environmental Assessment Act. We saw a massive erasing of 30 years of thoughtful process to assess the potential impacts of development and to provide direction as to how development could take place in a way that would not impact the environment. This was very useful public policy that has been undermined completely. There will be 3,000 environmental assessments a year that will no longer take place.

I do want to add that it is bad for business. We see what happens when an industry does not have the trust of the public, thanks to the intervention by the Conservative government which undermines the trust of the public in the protection of the environment with the kinds of measures that Bill C-38 highlighted.

[Joyce Murray, Liberal, Vancouver Quadra, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have a chance to speak to this Liberal motion on omnibus bills today and to why there should be a committee to review and report on how they may be used properly.

Omnibus bills are intended to be a tool for matters of housekeeping and efficiency, for grouping minor and uncontroversial updates into one place. They have a role. As a minister, I have used omnibus bills as they are intended to be used. They are intended to facilitate parliamentary debate by bringing together all the minor technical and administrative amendments to legislation that arise from a single policy decision, which is the critical part in how far Parliament and the Prime Minister have strayed.

I will not pretend that the phenomenon of abusive omnibus bills being used to bundle the major and consequential changes of numerous policy decisions is a new one, but I will contend that under the current government it has become an unparalleled expression of contempt for Canadians and a tool for the dismantling of a core principle of our democracy, that of Parliament's accountability to constituents.

In 2005, under another government, the budget bill was 120 pages long and at the time it was a record length. The opposition leader of the day, now the right hon. Prime Minister, asked:

How can members represent their constituents on these various areas when they are forced to vote in a block on such legislation...?

Exactly, is what I would say.

He denounced omnibus bills as undemocratic and a “contradiction to the conventions and practices of the House”. That is exactly so.

Therefore, I would ask today's Prime Minister where his integrity was regarding Bill C-38, his omnibus bill, presented last spring? If his words of 2005 indeed expressed his convictions, I would ask this. What happened to his convictions?

Members were forced last June to vote on a block of legislation four times the length and with 400 times the impact on Canadians compared to the omnibus bill that he so decried in 2005. Why did the Prime Minister do that and why is he preparing another such travesty of an omnibus bill that is expected to be presented this fall? Why is his tactic, this misuse of omnibus bills, so wrong? Because it does not allow parliamentarians to do their jobs for the people they represent.

Let us look at Bill C-38 for a moment. It is 452 pages long, has 753 clauses and amends 70 different acts. First and foremost, it is an abuse of democracy to lump together such an array of massive policy change. Permit me to list a few examples.

Bill C-38 increases government's power over people's lives in many domains, such as immigration, access to employment insurance, pensions and industrial developments in people's backyards, to name a few.

As Bill C-38 increases ministers' individual powers over individual people's lives, it reduces the very accountability mechanisms that make sure these powers are not being abused. That is scary stuff indeed.

The breadth of policy change in Bill C-38 is breathtaking, such as changes to the very fabric of financial security for seniors, changes in justice that are fundamental to Canada's immigration intake process, and changes to our critical environmental safety net.

Bill C-38 gave Revenue Canada $8 million a year in extra money to intimidate and punish environmental and other not-for-profit organizations that dare to speak up in the public interest. How many Canadians wanted that? How many Canadians thought they were voting for that? That is 10 times the dollars that the government claims it will be saving by eliminating the Kitsilano Coast Guard search and rescue base in the heart of the busiest harbour in Canada. Many of my constituents, every one that I have heard from, is angry about the closure of that base because they know that it will lead to preventable deaths.

Therefore, Bill C-38 was an attack on democracy, an attack on the environment and an attack on Canadian values and the Canadian people. To lump these fundamental rewrites of policy and practice into a single bill that cannot be properly examined, understood, debated, communicated nor amended is an abuse of democratic principles. That abuse of democracy must end.

The Prime Minister used to agree with me on that but that was then and this is now. I would contend that the government's reliance on omnibus budget bills is a symptom of an underlying condition, the condition of contempt. This has been amply proven. The government has contempt for democracy, contempt for Parliament, contempt for the rule of the law, contempt for civil society and contempt for Canadians.

Canada is a country built on hard work, responsibility, freedom, equality, opportunity, compassion and respect for one another. Those are deep Liberal values but also Canadian values. Canada is a country in which contempt by its leaders for its people has no place. With Canada's history of sacrifice in defence of democracy, we must never forget that Parliament is important. What we do here and how we do it matters.

Having a healthy democracy is the Canadian way. Having a government that is accountable for its actions and decisions is the Canadian way. Having transparent processes and procedures is the Canadian way. Having a government that gives people the opportunity to get involved in politics and to participate in decisions that affect them is the Canadian way.

On the flip side, omnibus bills are an affront to democracy. They are an affront to Canada's political traditions. They are an affront to the rights of our people. There is a constitutional problem with omnibus bills because the legal boundaries are unclear. There is also a problem at the political level.

However, there are solutions. I am looking at the scope of the task ahead of us. The committee is just the first step.

The committee must do its work but that is just the first step. The committee must find out how this kind of abuse is prevented in other western Liberal democracies. It must propose changes to tighten up the latitude that exists for abusing omnibus bills and apply accountability that does not exist today.

We must ask ourselves this question: Is there not something fundamentally wrong with an electoral system, Canada's electoral system, in which 25% of eligible voters can provide a governing party with a majority, a government that can then proceed to make the kinds of major policy changes we saw in Bill C-38 without due process, without respect, with contempt and with impunity?

I can picture a day when our electoral system will strengthen democratic accountability and not weaken it. I can picture a day when the proportion of each party's public representatives in this place will more closely reflect the will of the voters. I can picture this renewed Canadian democracy creating the incentive for parliamentarians to really work together across party lines on the big challenges of the day. It is time to have that conversation with Canadians. How we elect our Parliament, how we govern ourselves, how we include and consult, and how we write and debate our legislation says something important about Canada and the kind of people Canadians want to be.

The government's abuse of omnibus bills represents secrecy, contempt, exclusion and meanness. That is not Canada, that is not who Canadians are and that means this abuse of power must be fixed. We can start right now by voting in favour of the Liberal motion to end the misuse of omnibus legislation.

[Judy Foote, Liberal, Random—Burin—St. George's, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Vancouver Quadra.

I rise today to speak to the Liberal opposition motion calling on the House to do the following:

[I]nstruct the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs to study what reasonable limits should be placed on the consideration of omnibus legislation and that the Committee report back its findings, including specific recommendations for legislative measures or changes to the Standing Orders, no later than December 10, 2012.

To fully understand our motion, let us begin by examining what an omnibus bill is. Chapter 16, page 724 of O'Brien and Bosc, House of Commons Procedure and Practice, explains:

[T]here is no precise definition of an omnibus bill. In general, an omnibus bill seeks to amend, repeal or enact several initiatives.

Citing Speaker Fraser's ruling of June 8, 1988, O'Brien and Bosc further state that an omnibus has:

—one basic principle or purpose which ties together all the proposed enactments and thereby renders a bill intelligible for parliamentary purposes.

As Canadians await the impending sequel to the Conservative government's March omnibus bill, they clearly remember Bill C-38. Under the guise of implementing the budget, this 425-page Conservative omnibus bill amended more than 70 individual acts affecting an extensive list of departments, including 150 pages dedicated to gutting critical environmental protections and drastically changing the employment insurance program.

We can look at the media's response to this; it is not just Canadians from coast to coast to coast. An editorial in the Globe and Mail stated:

The federal government's 452-page omnibus budget bill contains too much for adequate consideration by Parliament, because it is really more than budget-implementation legislation. Only some portions of it are about public finance, that is, about such matters as income tax, sales tax and federal-provincial fiscal arrangements.

Another editorial in the Toronto Star said:

This is political sleight-of-hand and message control, and it appears to be an accelerating trend. These shabby tactics keep Parliament in the dark, swamp MPs with so much legislation that they can’t absorb it all, and hobble scrutiny. This is not good, accountable, transparent government. It is not what Harper promised to deliver.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague has given a very clear speech on what is happening with our parliamentary democracy.

The concerns have not just been raised in the House. I was going through some mail, which I want to share with my colleagues. I received a card signed by four constituents in my riding: Hannah, Sofia, Natasha and Dom. They said they had been very upset with the way Bill C-38 had been debated and how there were so many things in that bill. They said, “Thank you for standing up for democracy”.

As a fairly new MP, I have been really disturbed by the lack of parliamentary debate and the shutting down of the voices of members of Parliament.

What steps does my colleague think can be taken to make sure that we do not keep facing bills the size of the phone books of a very large city?

[Craig Scott, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to address the motion today by starting with the observation that there are effectively two points to this motion.

One is that the motion asks us to agree with some sentiments expressed several years ago, almost 20 years ago, by the member for Calgary Southwest, who is now the Prime Minister, with respect to a certain characteristic of what he called omnibus bills and what we are now discussing as omnibus bills in the current Parliament.

The second point is a concrete recommendation to have the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs study and report on exactly what omnibus bills are and how in fact they can be regulated within the confines of parliamentary procedure.

I will start with the second part and say simply that we would, I believe, benefit from such a study. It would clarify practice and allow a serious discussion of how bills called “omnibus”, whether by the government or by the opposition, do or do not undermine parliamentary democracy and indeed democracy at large.

At minimum, through such a study there could be a debate, hopefully not in camera, on best practices without there needing to be a decision or recommendation to give more power to the Speaker to rule on a bill in terms of it being out of order or that it should be split. We could have a study on best practices that would actually share the sentiments of all members of this House about what ideal practice would look like. Then governments, including the present government in the years of its mandate and future governments, can make their own decisions about how they want to situate themselves within a best practices framework. That is all that this report need be. Therefore, I certainly would like to commend this second part of the motion to the House.

On the substance of the issue and the specific reasons for which the motion refers to omnibus bills as problematic, it is clear that the point of order raised by the member for Calgary Southwest in 1994 talks about the problem of diversity of content in what he was calling an omnibus bill. Members should remember that this was a 21-page bill versus the almost 500-page bill that we received, which passed the House in the spring, and a much larger bill that we hear will be coming at us. However, on the 21-page bill, he says:

How can members represent their constituents on these various areas when they are forced to vote in a block on such legislation and on such concerns?

His concern was that members of the House should be able to vote on specific issues more often than is permitted when omnibus bills, or something resembling omnibus bills, become standard practice. He sees it as a question of accountability to constituents.

I would suggest that it could also end up in the context of some kinds of bills being a question of conscience. There may be elements in a bill that members would very definitely want to vote for or against and want that known and on record.

It is certainly the case that the commentator from Postmedia, Andrew Coyne, also sees it in this way when he says:

But lately the practice has been to throw together all manner of bills involving wholly different responsibilities of government in one all-purpose “budget implementation” bill, and force MPs to vote up or down on the lot. While the 2012 budget implementation bill is hardly the first in this tradition, the scale and scope is on a level not previously seen, or tolerated.... We have no idea whether MPs supported or opposed any particular bill in the bunch....

Keep in mind that 70 pieces of legislation were amended in the recent Bill C-38.

He goes on to say: “...only that they voted for the legislation that contained them”.

This is the concern specifically referenced in the motion, and it is a real concern for the reasons given by the Prime Minister in his former capacity as solely the member for Calgary Southwest, and as Mr. Coyne has just articulated the question.

It is also important to know that there is another dimension to this that is at least as worrisome. That is the subsequent use that governments or MPs from the government party make of an omnibus bill in their debates and references in the House, quite commonly in ripostes in question period. What will they do? An MP from the opposition will raise a question in question period on unemployment insurance or on food safety. Lo and behold, a minister will stand up, give some sort of answer and say that “In any case, you're the party that voted against” this, that or the other measure. “You're the person who did so, because you voted with your party”. What they are almost always referring to when that tactic is used is budget implementation bills. We know this.

We in the House know there can be many features of a budget implementation bill that everyone is perfectly happy to see and support. Almost always, when ministers answer in that way their reference points are precisely the provisions that accord a hundred per cent with the sentiments and policy of the opposition. The opposition would have voted for it if given the chance to vote separately. The government knows this.

Omnibus bills are dovetailing with what is effectively, and what we all know to be increasingly, a deliberate strategy of misdirection and indeed mistruth on the part of the government.

We must be very clear that this practice of responding to questions in this way, by attributing votes against matters that members of Parliament are perfectly in favour of, is very much a combination of deliberate party tactics. I hesitate to say this, but it is becoming more apparent that it is a culture and mindset that is taking over the government party. It is a mindset of complete subservience to a Prime Minister's Office and an approach that really plays fast and loose with the truth and demands that its MPs fall in line with that strategy.

Even today, the House leader managed to bring it up at one point in his response to a speech. He parroted the exact same nonsense we have been hearing for a month now with respect to a carbon tax. Why, I would ask, would so many respected journalists take to print over the last month to speak out on exactly this particular tactic of using the carbon tax spectre by the government, this culture of misdirection and mistruth? It is because they know that something profound is underway in terms of the extent to which untruth is becoming part of the democratic fabric of the country, to the point that we cannot talk about a democratic fabric if it takes hold as deeply as it is starting to.

I would add two final points about the democratic problems. One is the problem that committees cannot achieve any kind of scrutiny of omnibus bills. We have to take into account how democracy is profoundly limited by lack of scrutiny. We also have to understand that omnibus bills end up being a game of cat and mouse or even catch me if you can, because of how much time is spent just trying to understand what is hidden and buried in the bill.

Finally, we have to understand the role of the media. The media too need to be able to understand, report and critically discuss bills. In a world where we have media concentration and fewer and fewer journalists dedicated to this kind of enterprise, their task as part of the democratic enterprise is more and more compromised by the practice of omnibus bills.

[Bruce Hyer, Independent, Thunder Bay—Superior North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, this motion is a good one and I certainly intend to support it.

Last spring, with the amendments to Bill C-38, we had almost 24 hours of nonstop voting. All of the Conservatives voted repeatedly and recklessly against amendments that few of them had ever read. However, is this not the tip of an even bigger iceberg?

How can this House and the Liberals help to revamp our electoral and parliamentary rules so that MPs work for their constituents and Canada rather than being whipped into mindless lockstep by their parties?

[Marc Garneau, Liberal, Westmount—Ville-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Malpeque for bringing up that very important point, which I did not underline in my presentation. He is quite right. If we look at Bill C-38 there were issues dealing with the environment, immigration and a host of other subjects where committees have not only the authority but the expertise to really treat these matters as a bill makes its way through the House.

He is quite right to point out that the authority of committees and the work that is done in committees is extremely important. When we take an omnibus approach and the only committee that ends up looking at it is the finance committee, we are shortchanging Canadians with respect to the democratic process.