Debates of Nov. 9th, 1995

Canadian Unity

[Preston Manning, Reform, Calgary Southwest, AB]

Mr. Speaker, before we were so rudely interrupted we were asking the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs for the terms of reference of this cabinet unity committee.

It is simply unacceptable for the minister to plead cabinet secrecy or solidarity on releasing the terms of reference of a committee that is dealing with the whole subject of national unity.

I would ask him again. Does this committee have clear terms of reference, and could he table those terms of reference in the House?

[Marcel Massé, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada]

Mr. Speaker, the answer to the first question is yes and to the second question is no.

[The Speaker]

We ought to have this kind of break every day.

[Preston Manning, Reform, Calgary Southwest, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I need to warm up.

Maybe we could look at the membership of this committee. The intergovernmental affairs minister has said that this committee has regional balance to ensure the views of all Canadians will be

represented. How is that possible when seven out of the nine committee members are from central Canada, when the west's only representative is a junior minister who won her seat by 11 votes and when British Columbia, the third most populous province in the country, is not even represented on the committee?

About the only positive thing that can be said about this committee is that the Deputy Prime Minister is not a member.

If this committee is supposed to effectively represent every region of the country, why does the west have only one seat and British Columbia no seat at all?

[Marcel Massé, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada]

Mr. Speaker, it is not the custom to comment on the membership of committees. In this case there is clearly a regional balance. Unless we split people in two we unfortunately cannot have a balance that corresponds exactly to the percentage of the population.

Also, when the member unfairly talks about the number of votes, we should all remember the Parti Quebecois was elected by barely three-quarters of one per cent of the popular vote. That means nothing. To repeat, in a democracy the people who have the most votes get the prize.

[Preston Manning, Reform, Calgary Southwest, AB]

Mr. Speaker, could I put one simple question.

British Columbia is the most populous province in western Canada and the third most populous province in the country. It has a crucial role to play on this issue of national unity and it has a different perspective from many other provinces in the country.

Will the minister tell us why the province of British Columbia does not have representation on the cabinet national unity committee?

[Marcel Massé, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada]

Mr. Speaker, I am afraid the question reveals a wrong understanding of the country and a wrong understanding of the parliamentary system.

In our parliamentary system, with representative democracy, people are elected to express their views and their feelings about national interests in the federal Parliament. This is exactly what exists.

The country is not homogeneous. People who come from Alberta are quite able to represent people who come from other areas of the country. They are not tied down to their part of the country.

It is quite improper for the leader of the third party to assume that members of the House are only representative of a small part of the country. No. They represent national interests.

The Constitution

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Minister of Justice candidly admitted that constitutional problems and Quebec's place in Canada constituted new concerns for the government, after the Prime Minister had promised changes to Quebecers just days before the referendum.

In light of the Minister of Justice's statement yesterday, will the Minister of Intergovernmental Affairs admit that the federal strategy, which has consisted for two years now in denying the existence of a constitutional problem in the country, has failed miserably?

[Marcel Massé, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada]

Mr. Speaker, if in fact one looks at the past two years, it will be seen that the amount of popular support for the Liberal government in the first two years of our mandate has been higher than for any government since confederation.

So, clearly, we have had a level of popular support based on our accomplishments, because we have begun to address Canada's economic problems, while the Parti Quebecois and its little brother the Bloc Quebecois have not focussed their concerns on this in the least. That is what must be done.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, as usual, the Minister selects his examples and neglects to mention that if there is one place where the government has a fairly high unpopularity rating it is Quebec, totally the opposite of the other provinces.

By choosing the present member for St. Maurice as leader of their party in 1990, the Liberals thought they had solved the Quebec situation for once and for all.

Is the fact that this government convinced Canadians that there was no longer any constitutional problem not obvious proof that the Liberal government, before deceiving Quebec, deceived the rest of Canada?

[Marcel Massé, Liberal, President of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada]

Mr. Speaker, what Canadians, Quebecers included, want and what they have reaffirmed for Quebec in a recent survey, is that government focus on their economic problems.

The Liberal government, the government of Canada, has addressed these problems and cleaned its house in the last budget. I would strongly suggest to the opposition that it ensure that its big brother, the Parti Quebecois, does the same in Quebec because, like Canadians, Quebecers want their economic problems to be addressed, and the unemployment and employment problems in their province solved.

Rwanda

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I was shocked to learn that the Belgian government wants to interview Canadian peacekeeping hero, Romeo D'Allaire, for his involvement in the death of 10 Belgian peacekeepers he was in charge of during the UN mission in Rwanda. UN Ambassador Bob Fowler has known about this for a week, yet Canadians have heard nothing.

My question is for the Deputy Prime Minister. Why has the Canadian government not said something about this and told the Canadian public about this very serious event?

[David Collenette, Liberal, Minister of National Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, I think everyone in the House will agree with me when I say that Major General D'Allaire served the country with great distinction at a very difficult time in Rwanda.

As we saw with the events in Somalia a few years ago, it is quite possible for certain allegations to be made about an individual's conduct from time to time. In this case, as with that case, I think it is best that we look at the facts and see exactly what those charges are before we jump to any conclusions.

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very difficult answer to accept, considering the seriousness of the event.

Let us remember that former prime minister Kim Campbell has said that Mr. Fowler tended to downplay events during the Somalia affair. Is it possible that the government was not fully briefed by the UN ambassador about the seriousness of these charges?

[David Collenette, Liberal, Minister of National Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member talks about charges as if these were matters that were laid in some court.

I understand there were certain allegations made in some quarters by one of our allies as a result of certain activities in Rwanda. We are looking into those allegations.

Purchase Of Helicopters

[Jean H. Leroux, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the defence minister.

Yesterday, the Liberal government announced that a new contract for the purchase of new search and rescue helicopters will soon be awarded, to replace part of the previous EH-101 contract that the Liberal Party cancelled as soon as it took office.

Since the government has yet to reach an agreement over the penalties following the cancellation of the EH-101 helicopters contract with the Agusta, why has it not excluded this company from the bidding process?

[David Collenette, Liberal, Minister of National Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, the discussions with respect to compensation are being conducted by my colleague, the minister of government services. He may wish to comment further if the hon. gentleman wishes any information on that score.

I announced yesterday that we were to send out a solicitation of interest and then call for proposals from private industry to acquire up to 15 search and rescue helicopters. That process is not incompatible with the process now being conducted by my colleague, the minister of government services.

[Jean H. Leroux, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Mr. Speaker, since the Liberals condemned Agusta when the first contract was signed and requested an inquiry into this whole matter, how can the minister of defence explain that he has not deemed it appropriate to completely exclude Agusta from the new bidding process?

[David Collenette, Liberal, Minister of National Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, this is another attempt at revisionism in history.

In the 1993 election campaign the Liberal Party campaigned against the acquisition of the EH-101 helicopter because we felt that deal was too rich for the pocketbooks of Canadian taxpayers. Upon a subsequent examination once we came into office we had those original feelings confirmed. It is for that reason that we have decided to proceed with the search and rescue helicopters.

We have decided to have an open competition, which will allow any bidder who has the particular equipment and can meet the specifications to have an opportunity to take part in this initiative.

National Defence

[Jim Hart, Reform, Okanagan—Similkameen—Merritt, BC]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday I raised two incidents of alleged misconduct and cover-up by the senior management team surrounding the Minister of National Defence.

Today I want to ask the minister about his policy on significant incident reports. I have learned from the information commissioner that these reports are now only retained for six months and then they are destroyed. Significant incident reports are the documents the Somalia inquiry is based on.

Why has the minister changed the policy in order to have these reports destroyed after only six months?

[David Collenette, Liberal, Minister of National Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, once again there is a distortion of the facts.

We have been working with the information commissioner with respect to providing the documents that have been requested under access to information. It is very onerous for us right now because of the Somalia inquiry and all the attendant curiosity that has gone on. We are working with the information commissioner. I believe the information commissioner will agree that we are certainly trying to meet the expectations he has and conform to the law.

With respect to the matter the hon. member raised referring to allegations he made yesterday against two top general officers, I wish to tell him that Lieutenant-General Boyle, who he named on the floor of the House, has served notice in writing to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation of his intent to seek legal opinion and perhaps proceed in action against the CBC if there is no retraction on that story.

[Jim Hart, Reform, Okanagan—Similkameen—Merritt, BC]

Mr. Speaker, again the minister did not answer the question I posed.

Does the minister realize the destruction of significant incident reports after six months could prevent situations like the Somali affair from ever becoming public?

What will the minister do to the correct the problem?

[David Collenette, Liberal, Minister of National Defence and Minister of Veterans Affairs]

Mr. Speaker, once again the hon. member is attacking procedures in the Department of National Defence. In many cases the attacks are without much information. He attacks members of the armed forces of various ranks. He attacks the military police and their ability to do their jobs. He attacks general officers as he did in the House yesterday.

I would like to know from his leader, the hon. member for Calgary Southwest, how the member from the Reform Party, the opposition critic, can go outside the House and malign 87 general officers by calling them bandits, which means they have committed criminal offences, and sit in the House as a critic for the Reform Party.

Purchase Of Helicopters

[Maud Debien, Bloc, Laval East, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the defence minister.

Despite serious accusations of corruption made against the Agusta company in Europe and despite several requests for an inquiry made by the Minister of Human Resources Development when he was in opposition, the government continues to negotiate with the Italian firm the settlement of penalties totalling hundreds of millions of dollars for breach of contract with respect to the EH-101.

Could the fact that the government refuses to dismiss Agusta mean that it intends to award the contract for 15 new helicopters to this company instead of paying these penalties totalling hundreds of millions of dollars? Is the defence minister preparing a sweet deal?

[David Dingwall, Liberal, Minister of Public Works and Government Services and Minister for the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member is making reference to a contract the Government of Canada cancelled shortly after taking office.

I remind the hon. member as well as others that we successfully concluded the termination costs with Loral, thereby resolving that matter with that contractor.

Negotiations have proceeded with the EH-101. I am happy to report that after some very diligent, vigorous work by my deputy minister and senior assistant deputy minister an agreement in principle has been reached. I would like to provide all details to the House, which I will in several months. At that time members of the House, in particular the critics, will then have an opportunity to see whether the Government of Canada has done its job effectively in meeting the termination costs with that company.