Debates of May 3rd, 1995

Lobbyists Registration Act

[Mac Harb, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

The ethics counsellor will now develop a code of conduct for lobbyists. The committee has ensured that lobbyists will have a legal obligation to comply with the code.

[Charlie Penson, Reform, Peace River, AB]

To whom does he report?

[Mac Harb, Liberal, Ottawa Centre, ON]

If only our Reform colleagues would have the decency to listen to a voice of reason, but they do not want to listen with how they are going on.

I will finish on this. In keeping with the spirit of increased powers for members of Parliament, the lobbyists' code of conduct will have to be reviewed by a parliamentary committee before it comes into effect. I want to ask the member-

[The Deputy Speaker]

The hon. member for Beaver River.

[Deborah Grey, Reform, Beaver River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, when he says that I have a beef, the question of course is: Where is the beef? Is this their only one Big Mac in this House? Come on.

I spoke about the ethics counsellor and then I was asked by Big Mac himself about grassroots lobbying, about disclosure, about information lobbying, about semi-annual updates. I am

talking about the half of the bill that talks about the ethics counsellor; he is talking about the part of the bill that deals specifically with lobbyists. That is fine.

There have been some good moves in the right direction. However, all of this is nothing but fluff if we do not have an ethics counsellor who can monitor this kind of stuff, who can monitor it, who will be independent and who will report to Parliament, not to the Prime Minister.

This is not good. He can talk about all the lobbying stuff in the world and we might talk just briefly in my remarks about tier one and tier two lobbyists. I thought that was kind of sweet because we talk about two-tiered things in health care around here and in that context it is absolutely horrifying. Yet, here we have something where we have two tiers of lobbyists.

[Ed Harper, Reform, Simcoe Centre, ON]

Three tiers.

[Deborah Grey, Reform, Beaver River, AB]

Three tiers. Well there are two with parts a and b. Part one is that there would be consultant lobbyists; that is tier one. Then, tier two, a and b, is that there would be in-house lobbyists, which sounds kind of cosy. We have the in-house lobbyists, which consists of the corporate in-house lobbyists and then we have the in-house lobbyist organizations.

[An hon. member]

Two tiered pensions too.

[Deborah Grey, Reform, Beaver River, AB]

It is sort of like two tiered pensions. It is sort of like two tiered health care. It is sort of like the government should be shedding two tears right now about this kind of stuff.

Let us talk about lobbyists, but let us also talk about the ethics counsellor who is not independent. He reports to the Prime Minister which is hardly anything that has any teeth in it. He does not report to Parliament. He goes to some back office upstairs and says: "Well, Prime Minister, let me tell you about the lobbyists". But who cares and who listens? Let us have it here on the floor of the House of Commons.

Some of the amendments are perhaps noble, but the right amendments were not made. That is the unfortunate part of this bill.

[Jean-Paul Marchand, Bloc, Québec-Est, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I truly appreciated the comments made by the hon. member for Beaver River. She is right on when she raises the issue of who the government is listening to regarding this legislation. The government is certainly not listening to its members: it is listening to lobbyists. The government listens to lobbyists even in the case of Bill C-43.

Earlier, the member for Ottawa Centre said that the hon. member for Beaver River was going around in circles. However, at one point, that same member was laughing when she accused the government of tabling a bill with no substance. It is as though the government is making fun of people by not tabling substantive legislation.

Such substance is not found in the details mentioned by the government member earlier, but in the comments made by the western member when she said that what we need is an independent ethics counsellor. The fact that it is not the case confirms that this government does not really intend to strengthen the legislation and counteract the efforts of lobbyists.

I have a question for the hon. member. Does she not agree that lobbyists are the only ones to whom the government is really paying any attention?

[Deborah Grey, Reform, Beaver River, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I suspect they are doing some listening to the lobbyists. Perhaps they are listening to cabinet. Perhaps they are listening to the Prime Minister as well.

I believe there is a deeper issue, a more serious malaise. The whole lobbying industry has mushroomed in the last 20 or 30 years. Something has to be done about it and I do not see the bill as going far enough in the direction to make sure people are not getting away with things, that people are not getting special deals, that they are not convincing the minister of heritage, for instance, to go to Disneyland for lunch; making sure these indiscreet things are not happening. That is what is frustrating about this.

There are many parliamentary secretaries in the House, as well as backbenchers. No matter what they do, because they did not do exactly the right thing by giving those two criteria to the ethics counsellor, this thing will not work. It will not work because it is tinkering with the system. I am sure the lobbyists watching this debate are already lobbying for changes around and tunnels and paths through the whole workings of government, getting themselves into ministers' offices and through the bureaucracy so there can be more money made and stronger ties with cabinet ministers' offices.

Lobbyists by definition are those who lobby government, naturally. They will look at this legislation. I am sure they have studied it already. They will be at the point at which they know exactly what they are after.

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

Have you ever been lobbied?

[Deborah Grey, Reform, Beaver River, AB]

The hon. member for Kingston and the Islands asks if I have every been lobbied. If he had been here for my speech he would have heard that of course we are all lobbied. People will continue to be lobbied all the time. Let us have an ethics counsellor with some teeth to get to the lobbyists who are not doing the right thing. There are no teeth. This is a toothless ethics counsellor. That is most unfortunate and yet that is exactly what will happen. If lobbyists see somebody who has

absolutely no teeth they will gum it all the way to the Prime Minister.

There are things which are seriously wrong but my time is up. I would love to go on as I love this debate but I will sit down now.

[Osvaldo Nunez, Bloc, Bourassa, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak about Bill C-43, an act to amend the Lobbyists Registration Act and to make related amendments to other Acts, which the Minister of Industry tabled on June 16, 1994. The law preceding it took effect in 1989. First of all we must keep in mind that the population has a poor opinion of the government's decision making process.

People have lost a lot of their trust in the government. We must, therefore, restore the public's trust and convince the population that the government's decisions are fair and are made on the basis of merit.

Lobbyists, influence peddlars, as some like to call them, have always held a great, and at times even disproportionate, amount of power. In March 1994, there were 944 of them on Parliament Hill. They sometimes work in the shadows and in secrecy; sometimes they are at the centre of influence-peddling; they do not necessarily work in the public interest. The work carried out on Parliament Hill must be made transparent so that the population will understand, for example, what brings the government to make a deal with a person or an organization or what motivated a regulation, a bill, etc.

This bill, although a step in the right direction, is very disappointing for many reasons. Unfortunately, the Liberals rejected all of the amendments that the Bloc Quebecois proposed in committee and in the House to improve it.

The population of today's democratic societies is demanding more and more transparency in the legislative process and in the government's decisions.

Under Bill C-43, lobbyists will have to disclose the specific subject-matter of their activities, the name of the government department or institution they will be lobbying, the communication techniques that will be used and, in certain cases, information about the true beneficiary of the lobbying. They will also have to disclose the names of the legislative proposal, bill, resolution, policy, regulation, subsidy, contribution or any other financial advantage that they are targeting.

The second important element of this bill is that consultant lobbyists, also known as professional lobbyists, will be required to report this information for each new undertaking, each mandate.

Third, the bill allows lobbyists to file their returns electronically, sets the limitation period for enforcement proceedings at two years and provides for a parliamentary review of the Act in four years.

Finally, the bill provides for the designation of an ethics counsellor who establishes a lobbyists' code of conduct and investigates alleged breaches of it.

Over the years, parliamentarians have seen their role as representatives of the people diminish. Lobbyists, however, have become a powerful force. They manage to obtain direct access to government decision-makers. Today, the main decision-makers in government are senior officials, deputy ministers, ministers and, of course, the Prime Minister.

The United States passed the first law on lobbying several years ago. It was necessary to curb some of the excesses of this profession. The emphasis was on control and disclosure, secret lobbying and pressure behind the scenes. Before immigrating to Canada 21 years ago, I had read and heard about the powerful lobbies acting on behalf of large U.S. corporations.

The Parliament of Canada has reviewed the activities of this profession several times, more specifically in the Cooper Committee's report in 1986 and the Holtmann Committee's report in 1993.

Today, we have paid lobbyists, professional lobbyists and organizations.

The bill provides for only two types: consultant lobbyists and in-house lobbyists who work for an organization or a corporation. Consultant lobbyists are independent and contract their services to clients. They will have to file detailed returns on the nature of their clients' interests.

The federal government spends $160 billion annually. That is a lot of money. We must ensure that public funds are not used to promote the interests of certain individuals who have a close relationship with, or privileged access to, the government, or to promote the interests of individuals or companies that contributed to the campaign fund of the party in power.

The Sub-committee of the Standing Committee on Industry examined this bill and heard many witnesses. I very carefully read the majority and minority reports, and I fully agree with the dissenting report submitted by the Bloc Quebecois.

The business of government must be as transparent as possible, so that public policy reflects the common good of the people and not the interests of powerful lobbies.

Canadians and Quebecers agree on the need to put an end to the confidence crisis in the population regarding their institu-

tions. However, after one and a half years in power the Liberal government has not been able to increase its transparency.

In September 1994 the media showed the lobbyists multiplying their meetings with officials before the tabling of Bill C-43 in a last attempt to curb its influence on their activities. Some lobbyists have even threatened to pursue the government if the new law forced them to disclose their political alliances.

In the case of intense lobbying regarding Bill C-43 the lack of transparency had prevented the population and parliamentarians to know the scope and the nature of lobbyists' actions. It was a strange situation; the lobbyists succeeded in influencing the very bill which was to limit their own influence. Considering these facts, the need for transparency has never been more evident.

This having been said, I acknowledge that this bill contains a number of improvements to the system regulating lobbyists. However, we have to recognize that the commitments in the Liberal Party's red book are considerably watered down in this legislative text, which could not prevent troubling events such as those surrounding the privatization of the Pearson International Airport in Toronto.

The government finally agreed yesterday with considerable reticence to having a Senate committee investigate this dubious transaction. However, I doubt that this committee controlled by the Conservatives and the Liberals will clarify the situation entirely, since both parties were involved in this matter. It is interesting to note that Fred Doucet, a former executive assistant to Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, received $2 million as a lobbyist in this transaction.

On May 16, 1994, I had occasion, during a debate on Bill C-22, to denounce the privatization of terminals 1 and 2 of this very profitable airport by the Conservative government, just two weeks prior to the 1993 federal election. It was a scandalous contract with all the appearances of the political patronage and manipulation that characterizes the end of a government's term of office. Even Mr. Nixon, whom Mr. Chrétien appointed to investigate the matter, said that the public was entitled to know all the details of the agreement.

Mr. Speaker, I request unanimous consent to continue my speech.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Is there unanimous consent to allow the member five more minutes?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Osvaldo Nunez, Bloc, Bourassa, QC]

I thank all my hon. colleagues. The Bloc Quebecois had called for a royal commission of inquiry into one of the greatest scandals of Canadian public life; the Liberal government refused.

Bill C-43 shows the government's considerable lack of courage to regulate the activities of lobbyists. We should not be shy or timid in this issue because what is a stake is the integrity of our democratic institutions and people's trust in their leaders. There should be no compromise. Last June, the Prime Minister said that measures promoting transparency, including Bill C-43, would give the federal government unprecedented transparency. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

I would like to salute the labour movement for its excellent contribution to this debate. The Canadian Labour Congress, on behalf of its affiliated unions and the FTQ, representing 2.1 million members, presented a good brief on this issue to the sub-committee on industry. It was signed by Robert White, president, Dick Martin, secretary-treasurer, and Nancy Riche and Jean-Claude Parrot, executive vice-presidents. They maintain that banning lobbying, even if it was possible, is not the solution. A way must be found to ensure that the government's decisions are never "bought" and that they never appear to be the result of lobbying.

Unions themselves lobby in favour of their membership. But unlike professional lobbyists, the labour movement has never hidden what it expects from the government. As a matter of fact, instead of hiding its views, it tries to make them as well known as possible. This has nothing to do with individuals or corporations trying to use their connections to open doors for others for a fee.

The CLC does not dispute the provisions in Bill C-43 which require labour organizations to register as organizations, not as individuals. It is willing to submit a detailed annual report providing information on its lobbying activities: legislative proposals, bills, resolutions, regulations, policies, programs, grants, contributions and other fiscal privileges.

One example is unemployment insurance. The labour movement is critically interested in this question, especially at a time when the government is trying to dismantle the system which is supposed to protect workers when they lose their jobs.

Bill C-43 deals mostly with the individual or the organization which lobbies the government, but the behaviour of government officials is also very important. We should widen the scope of the Criminal Code provisions to prohibit the offer of money, gifts or other advantages to a senior official or any employee, with the intent of influencing his or her decision.

The time limits stated in the conflict of interest and post- employment code for public office holders should be longer.

The rules applicable to lobbying should be effective and well known. For that we have to ensure that the people have access to information, without geographical or financial barriers. Therefore, all the data should be available in all public libraries.

To conclude, I believe that we have to restrict the activities of lobbyists in order to bring about a greater openness in the decision making process of the government, and in order to avoid that the wealthiest enjoy better access to decision makers through lobbyists.

[The Deputy Speaker]

If he wishes, the hon. member will be able to speak for ten minutes next time.

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

In view of the excellent co-operation, I wonder whether it would not be possible to dispose of this bill now. I think that the debate is over.

[The Deputy Speaker]

There is still a ten minute question and comment period. Is there unanimous consent to continue with this bill and to proceed with the division on this question? Is the debate over?

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

No.

[The Deputy Speaker]

It being 5.30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business.

Funding For Cultural Organizations

[Louis Plamondon, Bloc, Richelieu, QC]

moved:

That, in the opinion of this House, the government should consider funding cultural organizations on a multi-year basis in order to promote their stability.

Mr. Speaker, Motion M-213 which I tabled and which was voted on deals with the funding of government organizations, particularly Telefilm Canada, the National Film Board and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. We know the dilemma of these organizations, which do not know what their budget will be from year to year. For a long time, they have been asking funding on a multi-year basis.

It is almost ridiculous to have to beg the government for this, especially because, when it was in the opposition, it had requested it, and, during the election campaign, it undertook to follow through with this in its red book. It had even defended the very existence of these organizations. Is is a known fact that the government drafts its budget for one year and that associations draft theirs for two or three years; it is therefore understandable that these organizations would want to enjoy the same rights and to have the opportunity to draft their budgets based on multi-year funding.

Therefore, this motion asks the government to thoroughly reflect on this today and to undertake to acquiesce to these organizations' request, that is, multi-year funding with a guarantee of no cuts.

Let me say that the motion tabled today was based on misgivings. Drafted last January, even before the cuts in the last federal budget were announced, the motion was based on the suspicion that the finance minister intended to deeply cut the budgets of national cultural organizations and mainly, as I said earlier, the CBC, Telefilm Canada and the National Film Board.

On February 27, a dark day for Canadians, we learned that the budgets of the CBC, Telefilm Canada and the National Film Board would be cut by 4, 4 and 5 per cent respectively in the next fiscal year.

In the case of the CBC, this means, according to various interpretations we received during the last months, a cut of $44 million in 1995-96. According to information given by Tony Manera, its former chairman, the CBC will lose $350 million during the next three years. This is no longer a weight loss diet, this is a shock treatment.

When he was appointed, Mr. Manera was promised a fixed budget for the coming years, after the dramatic cuts the CBC had gone through under the Conservatives.

We can see that things have a habit of never changing. Liberal policy is determined by the same senior officials or based on the same principles that private interests must be served before the national interests of Canadians. It is exactly the same policy. Yesterday, I sat on the finance committee where I asked experts if, not having known that there had been a change of government, they would have guessed, simply by comparing budget speeches concerning Bill C-76, that a new government was in office. These experts answered no, adding that the policies are exactly the same as those of the Conservatives.

In the end, there is no real policy change. The only difference is that the whiners that were sitting on this side are now across the way, behaving like a lot of sheep, as their predecessors did. The best example is the member for Prescott-Russell.

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

And Glengarry.

[Louis Plamondon, Bloc, Richelieu, QC]

And Glengarry. I also remind my colleagues opposite that it is precisely on this issue of the lack of funds for the CBC that Mr. Manera resigned. An hour before the budget was tabled, Mr. Manera was given by the deputy minister of finance a report explaining the extent of the catastrophe. But to conclude that Mr. Manera's resignation was tied to these cuts was too big a step for the Minister of Canadian Heritage, the only one to be blind to the fact.

In fact, I would have a piece of advice for the heritage minister. Judging from the way he answered our questions, which he is apparently no longer allowed to answer-during question period today for instance, his colleague the Minister of Industry kept answering in his place-and from the stares he has been getting from all his colleagues recently every time he gives a clumsy answer, I sincerely hope that he did not get rid of his

driver's licence because he will be needing it before long, when he is a backbencher again.

As the CBC and other cultural agencies undergo drastic cuts, the minister continues to deny the cuts and keeps on parroting official figures. He reminds me of a bankrupt businessman who persists in denying any financial difficulty, when the trustee is already on the premises preparing an inventory of his assets. If I had a piece of advice to give the heads of the CBC, it would be to choose their friends more carefully, given that the minister claimed to be a friend of the CBC.

I would like to remind my hon. colleagues, and the heritage minister in particular, of the advantage, for our national institutions, of the multi-year financing these agencies have been crying out for many years. This kind of financing over two or three years would allow such agencies to better plan their production and distribution activities on a medium term basis. It would put an end to this chronic uncertainty which undermines the work of full time creators and freelancers as well as those responsible for controlling costs.

In addition, multi-year financing would promote the development of the imaginative and sound solutions required for these agencies to be well managed. More importantly, it would give creators a better insight into how the federal government feels about them. Instead of seeing creators as dreamers who are incapable of managing a budget and therefore have to be subsidized in a piecemeal fashion, multi-year financing would reflect the respect the federal government has for them and for their contribution to society.

Perhaps the minister no longer has any use for these institutions in this time of great progress in the communications industry, as he tells the House automatically when fielding questions from the opposition. But if there was ever a time when high standards and a strong educational content were required and had to be maintained, it is now. We do not need long studies to tell us that. All we have to do is look at the Internet to understand how important it is that new technologies be monitored and subject to standards, which are often lacking in the private sector.

On these networks, you can learn, for example, how to make bombs and other scientific experiments, which means that this knowledge is now made available to one and all.

In closing, I would like to remind the minister and his colleagues of their 1993 election promises, although I could go on and on for hours without convincing this government that it should pay attention to our artists' cries for financial help and to the justified requests by national organization executives for multi-year funding. In response to a Canadian Conference of the Arts questionnaire, the Liberals had vowed to develop a national cultural policy in consultation with the provinces during the first few months of their mandate to enable them to face the challenges of the 21st century. The Liberal Party of Canada made this commitment in writing to the Canadian Conference of the Arts and promised to include it in their famous red book, which has now become a blue book.

These commitments were clearly spelled out in the red book, but have now been completely forgotten. The Liberals also promised at the time to provide stable multi-year financing for our cultural institutions, both in the red book and in the letter and document sent to the Canadian Conference of the Arts.

In the cultural sector as in other areas, we see how the government can say one thing and do another. During the election campaign, it promised artists a better future, although it never really intended to keep its word. That is typical of both the Liberal Party of Canada and the Liberal Party in Quebec. That was demonstrated in 1982 when the government reneged on its referendum campaign commitment to carry out comprehensive constitutional reforms. Promises were also broken with respect to political party financing and unemployment insurance. After taking office, the Liberals, who used to tear their shirts in opposition, went ahead with UI reforms. I say reforms but I should really use the word cuts. These cuts were much deeper than those for which they criticized former Minister Valcourt. The Liberals also cut health care and social programs.

This is not the Liberal Party, but a party which has two different tunes: one which was used during the election campaign to get elected, and one which is used now that the Liberals are in office. The latter is very conservative; it is void of any long term objectives; it is based on a band-aid approach and it occasionally tries to alter the facts, whether in the context of an international fishery dispute or a trip abroad by the Prime Minister. But it never had a global vision for arts and culture, social programs, Canada's foreign policy, or deficit control. No global policy.

The government uses a piecemeal approach. It uses the Liberals' approach, who-after 10, 12 or 15 years in office-left the country with the worst deficit among G-7 members, with Italy. By the time they were ousted in 1984, the Liberals had managed to raise the deficit from 13 to 38 billion dollars. We are now feeling the effects of that deficit and this is why we must make cuts. But even now, the government is not using the right approach. It does not try to ensure the survival of vital organizations like the ones I mentioned and which I would call national cultural organizations.

I hope that these comments and the motion will be supported by government members, who have the opportunity, in the case of a motion like this one, to vote freely. They are not bound by the famous red book which their party shelved after only 12 or 18 months in office. Liberal members have an opportunity to express their views. They have an opportunity to support Canadian creators. They have an opportunity to show cultural

organizations that they are prepared to take a look at their valid claims. The time has come to do so.

During the hour allotted for this debate, I want to give Liberal members an opportunity to tell us to what extent they are prepared to co-operate with opposition members, to fulfil their election promises as well as the commitments they made to these groups when they were in opposition. They can do so by ensuring multi-year funding to these organizations.

I anxiously await their response, particularly with regard to their commitments and respect for creators and for Canadian cultural organizations.