Mr. Speaker, the motion we are debating today says that the government should consider implementing a new program of mining incentives which would encourage exploration and development in Canada.
Mining is one of the most important industries in Canada. It deserves the government's attention. It pays the highest average wage of any industry in the country which is over $200 a week higher than its next highest wage category of transportation and communication. Mining products total 15 per cent of our exports. It is a very important industry.
Investment in the exploration of new mines is less than half of what it once was in the early 1990s. In real dollars investment in the early 1990s was around $800 million annually. This year it is expected to be $300 million or maybe less. Exploration and development have fallen drastically because Canada has failed to provide a favourable investment climate.
Canada used to be a world leader in mining activity, but that leadership is in jeopardy. Other nations now offer a more favourable environment for mining companies. Canada has fallen from first to fourth place in attracting new investment. We have not opened a major new mine in the last five years. We need to address the problem quickly, not by the year 2000, not within the term of the government's mandate. We need to start now to turn the situation around.
The motion before us speaks about incentives for the mining industry to stimulate exploration and development. What kind of incentives are being talked about? Is it some huge program of cash rebates? Are costly tax breaks needed so that the industry can flourish once again?
I intend to support this motion but I want to make sure to let members know what we mean by incentives. For the Liberal or the socialist, an incentive is some kind of government assistance. It is a handout. It is a grant, a transfer or a tax shelter that is big enough to overcome the disincentives that are found in the industry. If there is over-regulation, for example, the government handout will be enough to induce companies to overlook inefficiencies in the system.
These types of government programs are like giving an oxygen mask to someone who is choking instead of just loosening the rope that is hanging around the neck.
For the free enterpriser, the entrepreneur who is a self-starter, an incentive is not a grant from the government where it picks some winners and losers in the industry. An incentive is merely an opportunity.
If I know miners at all, they are free enterprisers. They are risk takers. They are self-starters. They do not want special help. They want a level playing field and an opportunity to show their skills, develop the resources for the good of the country and for their companies.
We were talking with someone from a major mining association who represents mining companies yesterday. He told us that the industry is not looking for handouts. That is not what it needs. The industry is looking for the government to get out of its way so that it can get on with doing what it does best.
I am supporting this motion today because that is what I mean by incentives. I mean deregulation, not in a way that harms the environment, but in a way that makes government approval processes more efficient.
Government departments and different levels of government should communicate with one another to harmonize contradictory or overlapping legislation. Right now this is Canada's problem. The government strangles the industry with red tape, then someone
wants to come along and give the industry an oxygen mask of government incentives. We say, take off the red tape and the industry will be healthy again on its own.
Today we had a representative from the Mining Association of Canada appear before the standing committee. He said: "The current regulatory system is choked with red tape. Regulations, guidelines and decision making processes duplicate and contradict each other from one department to another and between the two levels of government". We have to solve this problem.
The industry also needs security of land tenure and security in Canada's legal regime. Mining companies have to know that when they start a project they are going to have an opportunity to finish it.
Security is also necessary in the new environmental assessment process. The government has made wonderful noises about this problem. I am sure the hon. parliamentary secretary is going to try to sum this up.
The Minister of Natural Resources has said many of the right words to the industry and made many good promises. The red book, the Liberal mining platform and the White House mining initiative are all full of great words.
The industry minister promised action on streamlining regulations this year, 1995. However, to quote Greg Waller, an executive with Cominco, obviously exasperated with the government's lack of action to date, says: "The mining industry is getting impatient with the empty words".
An example happened this last week. I received copies of two separate letters from the provinces addressed to the Minister of Natural Resources, one in September and one in October, requesting, almost pleading for a meeting between the minister, the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs and their provincial counterparts. They did not even get the courtesy of a reply from the Minister of Natural Resources until a provincial minister talked to me late last week.
I raised the issue in the House last week. I find out now the minister had a conference call with the intergovernmental affairs minister and the provincial minister. That is a start. It is a shame it takes two and half or three months to arrange a simple teleconference call among three parties who say they are interested in getting to the bottom of this regulatory problem.
There was a good presentation on regulatory reform in committee today. There were some specific recommendations and reforms that would help the industry. Many of those ideas were adopted by an all-party committee in last year's report "Lifting Canadian Mining Off the Rocks". These all-party resolutions were brought to the government. They were recommendations from all sides. Not a single one of those recommendations has been adopted to date.
Again, they are good words, nice words, but we do not need more words. We do not need more committees. We do not need more studies. We do not need more talk. We do not need more task forces. We do not need government inquiries. We do not need empty promises. We know the problems. We know what to do to fix them. What is needed right now is not knowledge, more ideas. We need the political will to get the job done.
Here is part of the conclusion from today's presentation by the mining association: "Real progress requires the removal of costly regulatory systems that are process based rather than performance or results oriented. This implies a willingness by the federal government to let go of outdated and expensive centralist systems. It is a willingness which has not been expressed in concrete action to date".
We need to get away from an expanded role for the federal government in the mining industry. The federal government must get off the industry's back and out of its pockets and allow the industry to rise to the prominence it should have. That should be left primarily with the provinces and the federal government should remember that.
We are dealing with two philosophies of government. Is the role of the federal government an ever increasing one or should it take heed from what the industry, the provinces and many Canadians are saying? They are saying the role of the federal government is not to continually expand into areas of provincial jurisdiction; the role is to see where there is overlap and then to withdraw and allow the provinces to get the job done.
The Minister of Natural Resources has been politely applauded for saying the right words to the natural resources community. She talks the talk, but can she walk the walk? Her political honeymoon with the industry will soon be over unless she produces results to act on the good intentions she has expressed.
The problems with regulatory reform are the first test of this minister's real political will. Will she be able to overcome her colleagues around the cabinet table who are calling for natural resource industries to sit on their hands watching as sustainable development slowly devolves into sustainable preservation? I hope she has that will. I hope she will be able to stand up to her colleagues, stand up for a more rational approach to environmental assessment, stand up for Canadian jobs and expertise and development.
I call on the minister to back up her words with some action starting today. Provide the only real incentive the Canadian mining industry wants and needs which is substantial, positive regulatory reform. She knows what has to happen. Let us see it happen. Let it happen now.