Debates of May 11th, 1995

Supply

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I seek unanimous consent to delete Standing Order 78 from the Standing Orders.

[The Deputy Speaker]

I am only hesitating because I am not sure we can do that. I am told we can do anything by unanimous consent but let me consult.

The member is correct that by unanimous consent the House can do anything. The House can delete a standing order. Is there unanimous consent to delete the standing order mentioned by the hon. member for Red Deer?

[An hon. member]

No.

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the point has been made regarding this issue. We are hearing today the involvement in the House, the frustration of being in this place and trying to present an honest point of view from constituents; the total frustration I am sure the backbench on the government side and the opposition side have with representing what people stand for and what they tell us when no one is listening. That is what the electorate feels as well.

[Michel Bellehumeur, Bloc, Berthier—Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, virtue is undeniably a great thing. I agree with my hon. colleague to some extent. I agree that the government should listen more carefully to the representations made by members of this House on major issues, such as the ones the secretary of state listed as part of the so-called positive record of the government for the first 18 or 19 months of its mandate.

We agreed in principle with certain bills introduced by the Liberals. It is just that we wanted to improve them. It is most unfortunate that the government did not listen more closely to the representations and remarks made by the hon. member.

[Philip Mayfield, Reform, Cariboo—Chilcotin, BC]

Mr. Speaker, a former member of the House of Commons, Dr. Lorne Greenaway, had great respect in his constituency of Cariboo-Chilcotin. He ran into some difficulties with his party and out of conscience resigned his seat.

Subsequently he was appointed to the B.C. treaty commission. With his understanding of aboriginal issues and his concern for just settlements for all, he performed outstanding service in that capacity as one of the original commissioners of the B.C. treaty commission.

I am sorry to say Dr. Greenaway was fired. This is the darker side of patronage appointments. Dr. Greenaway was fired so there would be room for someone else. I make no comment about the person who took his place. However, a valuable member who had great respect in the community has been set aside so patronage appointments can be made in his place.

I regret this has happened. This is an indication to me and to many of my constituents and the people of British Columbia of the tone of government the Liberals are setting. We are deeply dismayed by this.

I ask the hon. member if he can recall incidents such as this, the darker side of patronage, from his experience in Quebec.

[Michel Bellehumeur, Bloc, Berthier—Montcalm, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think that this was more a comment than a question. The hon. member stated facts of which I had no knowledge. I am therefore unable to reply to his comment.

[Keith Martin, Reform, Esquimalt—Juan de Fuca, BC]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure today to speak on our Reform motion.

Today we are speaking about the failure of the government to keep its red book promises. When we were elected in October 1993 the much touted red book was supposed to be a

new tone for the people of the country, a new tone for the people in Parliament to work with. It was supposed to be a tone full of honesty that would engender public trust, that would bring more effectiveness to the House. What we have seen is a book not of hope, not of promises kept, but a book of promises that have been broken.

That is an insult to the House. It is an insult to democratic principles. Most of all it is an insult to the people of the country.

I will give some examples and then move on to constructive solutions. When I and many of my colleagues in the House were elected a year and a half ago there was great hope. With 205 new members there was great hope there would be a different mindset of doing things in the House. As individuals we would be more effective in representing the wishes of our constituents and bringing our expertise to the House, more effective in presenting our ideas and more effective in bringing members of the public who have expertise to the House to present the most constructive solutions for Canada.

Unfortunately we have fallen back into the same quagmire of business as usual-what a shame.

In the House there is great hope and potential. Many members of the House possess great skills, particularly the backbenchers. In the backbenches of the Liberal caucus there are great skills which are not being tapped deliberately because of business as usual.

When we came to the House the Prime Minister said he would give greater power to the members of the House to better represent the people of the country. Again, we see business as usual.

Instead of committees acting independently and having more power, in many cases they are merely an arm of the government, an arm of the insidious movement of order in council.

We in the House know but the people may not recognize the power structures in the country are extremely pyramidal, with power centred in the hands of perhaps a dozen individuals in the House while the rest, by and large, are under the control of the government.

We in opposition try to act in a different way to bring forth constructive solutions. However, time and again we are merely shut down, not on the basis of merit, but on the basis of politics. This does a great deal of disservice to members of the House.

I will raise one specific example which is close to my heart and one which I feel is a great shame. It is the example of the health committee, which deals with one of the most important aspects in the country, the health and welfare of Canadians. There are good people from all parties on the committee. Unfortunately the committee is merely a functioning arm under the policies of the government, rather than dealing with the big problems that affect the health of Canadians or being able to have the power to function and manoeuvre to address the problems in a construction fashion.

All one needs to do is look at the nature of what the committee is studying to find out it is not addressing the big problems. That not only applies to the health committee but to other committees also.

I implore the government to give members of the committee the power to use their expertise, to mine the talents in the country and use them to bring forth the most constructive solutions and address the biggest problems of the country today. Unfortunately that is not happening because we are dealing with politics and not with problems.

Another example is order in council decisions by very few. People are advanced to positions not on the basis of merit but on the basis of who they know in many cases; not in all cases, but in many cases. This does a great disservice to the people of the country who could do great things.

I go back to one aspect of the function of the government. When there is a problem in the House, what do we do? We do not deal with the problem. We deal with what I call studyitis, a disease pervasive not only in Parliament but also in other parliaments and governments of the world. It is an infectious disease that has infected most members of Parliament. That is very sad.

When there is a big problem affecting us, do we bring forth the most relevant studies and the most relevant and effective solutions to the problem to show a real life example? No, of course not. We study it. Why do we study it? It creates the illusion we as elected members of Parliament are working on it. We give the illusion we are actually trying to address a problem. In effect, we are telling the Canadian people we are trying to offset the problem and decision making processes.

As a qualifier, I am not saying we do not have to study things. Please, when things have been studied eight, nine and ten times, and when we literally have rooms full of studies on the same subject, why are we studying it again?

This was most graphically illustrated in the health committee when an individual from the Inuit Tapirisat society came before us when we were deciding whether to study aboriginal health. She was a very eloquent lady who was representing Inuit people. She came before us with a handful of documents, put them on the table and said: "If you want to study aboriginal health and you want to come and see us, don't bother. Go home. This is but a small example of studies that have been done on us. We don't want studies. We want action".

That brought to mind something we do over and over again not only in health care but in so many other committees. What a waste of the taxpayers' money and what a disservice to the health problems that affect Canadians and that Canadians want action on, not two years from now, but now. The

solutions are out there. Let us enact them, work toward them and see how they work. If they do not work properly we should modify them to ensure they do work properly.

Trying to represent our constituents' wishes is something we were supposed to do as a democratic society and something the Prime Minister said he would enable us to do to a greater extent.

On Bill C-68 three courageous individuals from the government stood by what their constituents said. Their constituents overwhelmingly told them to oppose the bill, which we as party oppose for very good reasons. Those individuals stood up and opposed it on second reading and within 24 hours were removed from their committees. Why? It was a penalty for not kowtowing to what the party wanted to do. Is that democracy? Is that representing our constituents? I think not.

Another aspect that affects my riding in particular is the west coast fisheries disaster. The government was supposed to do something for fisheries all over the country, from the east coast to the west coast. Unfortunately the west coast fishery is being ignored.

As a precautionary measure I take this opportunity to tell the minister of fisheries that the poachers who poached last year, the poachers who almost caused the collapse of the west coast fishery, we came within 12 hours of collapse, are already to go ahead and do the same thing again. I know from the people in the trenches the west coast fishery poachers are getting prepared now to trash our west coast fishery. Please pay heed to that and deal with it now. The DFO office in Sooke, which represents a huge area, is being closed. The hatchery that releases 750,000 fry and is staffed with one person and numerous volunteers is also being closed.

DFO officers with west coast expertise in undercover operations are being moved to the middle of British Columbia. Why? I warn the government to pay heed to this because this is not very professional.

Another aspect is the ethics counsellor. This is an excellent idea but we cannot have an ethics counsellor appointed by the Prime Minister, answerable to an MP from the government and again answerable to the Prime Minister. The ethics counsellor must have the ability to operate independently, answer to an independent group and also to have independent powers to enact what their mandate is supposed to be.

Closure is another aspect which defies democracy. We should not have that in the House whatsoever.

We cannot continue what we are doing in Parliament. We must ensure Canadians have confidence in Parliament. We must allow members of Parliament to do what they were meant to, to represent their constituents' wishes in an effective fashion. I ask the Prime Minister to allow us to do this. He must stop the top down control and bring the expertise of his party to bear down on the huge problems that affect society and the Canadian people so we can have effective, fiscally sustainable, sound and responsible policies for the people of the country which they so dearly need.

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, opposition days such as this give us an opportunity to list some of the promises that have been broken from the now dead book.

The foundation of this book was set up because canadians demanded a change. They demanded that the status quo must change. Therefore the principles of parliamentary reform, open government and accountability of MPs were something that all of us knew about prior to the election.

As a platform for a political party, all of these principles seemed extremely noble and certainly worthy of public support. As a result, a great many Canadians voted for the Liberals in the last election. As much as anything, it was a revolt against the PC party. Canadians thought they were to get a fresh new government built on the principles stated in this dead book.

A year and a half later, they are discovering that the many fine words are not being carried out. Instead they hear old line rhetoric, controlled by spin doctors and pumped out to react to everything.

How does the House work? A lot of people ask that as we tour around our constituencies. Unfortunately I have to tell them it does not work very democratically. Decisions are made primarily by cabinet and that cabinet has a whole set of criteria that it uses. For the most part cabinet members do not listen to the people.

I am often asked what backbenchers do. I tell them that backbenchers are kept in line by the party whip. They are also kept in line by travel, by perks, by keeping busy on committees, by doing reports which no one looks at.

What about the opposition? What does the opposition do? The opposition speaks in the House. Its members try to put forward the concerns of Canadians. However a lot of frustration is associated with that because no one is here to listen. The government is not concerned. Therefore I question the very democracy of this place.

Canadians demand a change. They demand free votes. They demand that members be here and listen, respond and carry their wishes to the government. They are sick and tired of spin doctors, of party hacks that control everything that happens in this place.

The Liberal red book has been exposed for what it really is. The hypocrisy of its broken promises are becoming clearer and clearer to all Canadians. As just one example, whatever happened to the GST?

Nothing happened to the GST, a clear broken promise from the red book. Even worse, the Deputy Prime Minister put her own good word on the line and said that she would resign if the GST was not gone by 1995. It never happened. Why did it not happen? Because the Deputy Prime Minister was unwilling to live up to her word and her stated principles, a perfect example of the Liberal dead book.

Let us move on to some other broken promises. How about the one that a Liberal government would not be like the Mulroney Tories? We know what Canadians thought of the PCs. Canadians were promised that invoking closure on bills and enforcing strict discipline on their MPs were the characteristics of the hated Mulroney regime but now the truth is clear.

The Liberal Party is not really opposed to these tactics. Its members were only playing the game. They have embraced these tactics and use them with random abuse, with no consideration at all for the Canadian public.

Even though a large number of its backbenchers could not agree with Bill C-68, the Liberal Party used closure to force it through second reading. It mercilessly imposed party discipline on those members of the Liberal caucus who dared to vote the will of their constituents. They listened to their constituents and were handled just the way the PCs would have handled it. The truth is out. The promises in the red book can be looked on as a fraud. I will present to the House even more evidence of that.

I had a private member's motion on which I worked very hard. It was to allow Parliament to be scrutinized by the Access to Information Act. When I first began my efforts I was convinced that I could get all party support for it. After all, greater open government was the official policy of all parties. The red book boldly stated that a Liberal government would take a series of initiatives to restore confidence in the institutions of government. Open government would be the watchword of the Liberal program.

My Motion No. 304 was the perfect opportunity for Liberals to put their money where their mouths were. If they did not vote for the motion to extend the Access to Information Act to Parliament then all Canadians would know that the Liberal commitment to open and transparent government was a sham.

To allay any concerns which Liberal members might have, I sent each and every one of them a notice that addressed the specific objections they raised during the hours of debate. The information commissioner, Mr. John Grace, was perfectly willing to reassure any member of Parliament who wondered about the impact of the motion.

In the days leading up to the vote I spoke to many Liberals who indicated they supported my motion. They said it was just what Parliament needed. However, on the day of the vote not one single solitary Liberal, clinging by his or her fingernails to the shattered promises of the red book, voted in favour of open government. The order had come down from on high: "You can talk about open government all you want, but you will never vote for it. You will be in big trouble if you do". It was a sad betrayal of the Canadian people. Everyone should remember that it happened. They will at the next election.

What happened the day the Liberal majority voted down M-304 prevented more open government. It is an example of how this place does not work and how it is not democratic. What speaks volumes is the voting record of that day. The motion was supported by all Reform members and by all BQ members. The BQ members were being harassed by government members to try to change their minds. The NDP and the Tories voted for it. Even the one Liberal independent member voted for it. However, absolutely no one on the government side voted for open government.

What is happening back home? Back home a lot of communication is going on in all 295 of the ridings across the country. Town hall meetings and all kinds of get togethers are being held. All citizens who are concerned about taxes, gun control and all the other problems are getting together.

The reports are filtering back to those members who are listening. The message is as clear as it was before the last election: "You take our message to Ottawa. Don't bring the message from Ottawa back to us and tell us how good it is for us. Don't tell us that the party tells you is good for us. We will tell you what is good for the party". That is the message but it is not getting across in this place.

I have a perfect example in my constituency. Six thousand people got together one day and said: "Do not dare vote for the GST. Do not dare pass that kind of legislation. We are telling that it is bad. You are telling us that the party says it is good, but we are telling you it is bad". I would take the results of the last election as a pretty good example of that message. The message was loud and clear. The message will be loud and clear again if the government fails to listen to the people.

We have other examples such as the Charlottetown accord. Members from all parties in the House said: "We support it". But the people said: "No, it is bad for us".

Consider gun control. Throughout the whole country people are talking to their members of Parliament about gun control but this place has put a finger down, telling them not to represent their constituents.

What about MP pensions, about which 85 per cent of Canadians say: "Get rid of the gold plated pension". What are the people in the House doing? They are saying: "They really don't know what's good for them. We know what's good for them. We know the compensation package must include this gold plated pension".

The people of Canada will speak. They will make it loud and clear. That is what is wrong with the red book. The red book speaks of all of these things but does not mean any of them. It is a total hoax perpetrated on the people of Canada. The message is clear and getting clearer.

It is obvious Canadians are demanding an openness, a transparency, an accountability for government. They are being ignored. The Liberal members of the House have no excuse. They ran on the promises of the red book and those promises are being systematically broken. The red book is truly a dead book.

[Laurent Lavigne, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Mr. Speaker, there are a few comments I would like to make, and I would also like to say, as did the hon. member for the Reform Party, that I too was disappointed in the so-called transparency of the Liberals.

Elected in the riding of Beauharnois-Salaberry, when I came to Ottawa I innocently asked to be a member of the Standing Committee on National Defence. Why? Because when the Liberals were the official opposition, the present Prime Minister said, among other things, that defence conversion was the way of the future and that, once he was in power, he would make every effort to provide additional funding for defence conversion.

I asked to be a member of the defence committee, because the committee was responsible for dealing with this matter and exploring new approaches to defence conversion. In my own riding I have Expro, a company that is still waiting for federal assistance for defence conversion, but none is forthcoming.

The first thing that happened is that one morning, we arrived in the House and the government tabled an emergency motion proposing that the defence committee consist not only of members of the House of Commons but also of senators. This took us by surprise. We discussed it in the House, a vote was taken and subsequently, both elected members and senators were appointed to the committee.

During the first few committee sessions with elected members and senators, I realized that the senators wanted to be on this committee because they wanted to travel. During the first few days the committee was in session, each senator suggested we go to Oslo because this year the NATO conference would be held in Oslo. Canada being a member of NATO, they felt they should attend this conference in Oslo.

Someone else said we had to go to Brussels. Why Brussels? Because NATO headquarters is in Brussels. Canada being a member of NATO, we had to go and visit NATO headquarters in Brussels. Someone else said we had to go to New York because the UN headquarters is in New York and Canada is a member of the UN. Someone else claimed we had to go to Zagreb in Yugoslavia, because Canada has peacekeepers in Yugoslavia.

I was flabbergasted to see every single senator rise with suggestions for a trip. I wondered what I was doing there with my plans to talk about defence conversion for Expro in Beauharnois-Salaberry.

I realized that basically, these people wanted to travel. The budget for all these trips would be more than one million dollars. There was a complaint in committee that this was truly excessive. Finally, they agreed to a budget for $800,000. They left, these worthy senators, accompanied by physicians, nurses and secretaries to take notes for the marvellous report they would make on these trips, a report that was probably shelved as soon as they got back. Now that is transparency-I think the public should know-that is today's Liberal government.

They tell us they work on these committees but, basically, they go off on some lovely trips at taxpayers expense. I refused to go on any of these trips because I thought it was outrageous. That is part of what today's motion is all about. When we talk about transparency, I think the public ought to know that. I am very much disappointed because of all this.

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have to agree totally with the member's comments. He brought out two key points. The key points are that when these joint committees are set up that is a major problem. We did exactly the same thing in foreign affairs. We put forward a motion to keep people from that other place out. It was supported by the Bloc and of course it was defeated by the Liberals.

We must remember, as the member pointed out, that the biggest carrot in this place to keep the backbenchers of the Liberal Party happy is travel. That is the biggest carrot there is. They would rise up against that dictatorial control if in fact they could not be given something. Often that travel is given as a reward.

I agree totally with the member. He is right on the money. The Canadian people should realize that.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to participate in this opposition day motion on ethics in government.

One has to wonder about the timing of this motion. This motion on ethics comes from a party that yesterday spent the whole time of the House with delaying tactics in a most unethical manner. Surely something must be said about that.

How about the political party that ran out of speakers and then proposed the adjournment of the debate in order to cause a half-hour bell in order not to have a vote? Could it be that those ethical people were afraid of not winning that vote at that particular time and they did not want to proceed with the vote? What about the ethics of that?

We are speaking of ethics. Earlier today we had an hon. member state in this House that the government had fired Dr. Lorne Greenaway of Williams Lake, British Columbia, who was sitting on the British Columbia Treaty Commission. I tried to obtain from the hon. member more details about this particular person. When I did not get more details I sent for a copy of the order in council appointments. I found out that Dr. Lorne Greenaway's appointment-a former Conservative MP, and a fine gentleman, by the way-expired on April 13. He was not fired. It expired. I have it on page 131.01 of the order in council book, which I have in my hand.

What about the ethics of members making statements like that, which are diametrically opposed to the facts? Can I put it kindly? What kinds of ethics are those? That is playing fast and loose with things that should be true.

This is on a day on which we are supposed to be debating ethics. Are we going to get an apology later for having made that kind of a statement in the House? Fat chance. Fat chance from those ethical people across the way.

Those are the same ethical people who were elected pretending to the people of Canada that MPs were overpaid and they were going to come here to Ottawa and straighten it out. They were going to eat in the cafeteria because they did not want to eat in the parliamentary restaurant. Then of course it became obvious to most of us that the cafeteria lost more money than the restaurant, which kind of destroyed that argument for the hon. members in question.

Then they said that they wanted to get rid of the limousine. They spent government time, taxpayers' dollars, having their limousine prepared. It was all made shiny, brought here in the front, and a driver was hired to do it. They came here, and do you know what they did? They put a little sign in the window pretending they wanted the thing sold. They spent hundreds if not thousands of taxpayers' dollars for a cheap publicity stunt.

[Peter Milliken, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

Then what did they do?

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

Then they had someone drive in the back laneway with another limousine, this time subsidized by the taxpayers of Canada by way of electoral contribution to the Reform Party. Shameful behaviour.

What about political reform à la Reform? Let us look at what they had to say about that. During the election campaign they produced a cheap imitation of the Liberal red book. It was a cheap imitation, because we all know how popular the Liberal red book was. I am sure members remember it well.

We of course are delivering on many of the promises in the red book. We will deliver on all of them, of course, during our mandate.

Anyway, let us get to the Reform book of promises now. Here is what they said. It is called "Better Representation in Parliament". This is a reading from the blue book of the Reform Party. At that time, the Reform members said: "Until parliamentary reform is enacted, the Reform Party pledges that having had a full opportunity to express their views and vote freely in caucus, such caucus votes always will be made public".

[Peter Milliken, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

I remember that promise.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I remember that promise well. I ask the hon. members across, will they table those votes that they have made in caucus? Why have they not made them public?

I think it is a silly idea to start with, but of course I am not the one who promised it. They did. We had much more meaningful promises in the red book.

Anyway, those are their promises. Those are the things they saw as being important. Why are they not delivering on those promises to the people of Canada? What stopped them from tabling the minutes from their caucus meeting? They said that they would do it. It is a pretty corny thing to do, but it does not matter. I mean, they are the ones who said they would do it. Why are they not doing it?

Listen to this as I read on, because it gets better. Pay attention, because we are going to read more. It says: "Reform MPs shall vote with the Reform Party majority in the House unless a member is instructed to abstain or vote otherwise by his or her constituents. The Reform Party of Canada shall provide criteria for proper processes to elicit the will of the constituency". Let us stop at that point.

Let us talk about gun control in all of this. We know that the vast majority of Canadians are in favour of gun control. How many Reform MPs are going to vote in favour of gun control? We think two Reform MPs will vote in favour of gun control. Only one did last time around.

Let us talk about the province of Ontario. Insight Canada did an extensive poll in the province of Ontario. There is not one constituency in Ontario where people who are against gun control would have a majority, not one. We did an extensive poll, and that is proven.

I ask the hon. members across, what about the Reform Party MP from Ontario? Did he not, according to this test that the Reform members have for themselves, fail the test? Did he fail to deliver on the little blue book of the Reform Party? Is that not somewhat unethical?

[Peter Milliken, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

What about Alberta?

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

What about Alberta, as the hon. parliamentary secretary said so eloquently. He is quite right again, as he usually is. Again the Reform members have missed the boat.

[An hon. member]

What did the justice minister say?

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I do not know. It is so unusual here that the Reform Party members are buttressing their own argument by quoting Tories. They are the ones who said that Tories were these bad dudes when they came here to Parliament. Now that they are here, I see a little coalition developing. They are quoting Tories.

They are hanging around with those Tories too much. Yes, yes, yes. They are way too close to those Tories. We can see them being way too close to each other. It is rubbing off. We can tell that it is only a question of time before we have the great coalition of Reformers and Tories. We know it. Those are really friends of Brian Mulroney across the way. We can recognize those kinds of people when we see them.

[Peter Milliken, Liberal, Kingston and the Islands, ON]

You are right. The similarities are very apparent.

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Your nose is growing.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

The member for Kingston and the Islands agrees with me. My colleague has just indicated that the similarities are very apparent.

Let us talk about parliamentary reform. We Liberals have promised parliamentary reform, and we have delivered. Yes, we have delivered to the people of Canada. We suggested greater influence of MPs on committees, and we delivered on that.

[Elwin Hermanson, Reform, Kindersley—Lloydminster, SK]

No way.

[Some hon. members]

No.