Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin my debate on Group No. 1 by saying that in general we in the Reform Party believe the provinces ought to be more involved in issues that affect them directly.
In general, we agree with the impetus of the motions in this group put forward by the members of the Bloc. I would like to qualify that agreement and also ask a question about the reasonableness of this in terms of the total amount of bureaucratic and administrative time that would be taken to administer these things as they are proposing.
They are basically saying that before the governor in council appointments are made they should be approved by the various provinces. Although I said that in general we agree the provinces should be more involved in the workings of our country, I do not believe it should be done in this way.
They speak of contacting the lieutenant governor in each province. If we stop to think about it, the lieutenant governor is an appointed, unelected position, so this is not necessarily going to get the democratic input from the people. That would probably be the greatest reason for us to oppose most of the motions in this group.
I would like to speak about several of the motions. The hon. member from the Liberal Party who spoke earlier talked about the necessity of having input into the board of the National Capital Commission. He was quite concerned that there should be more representation from areas around the region. In other words, if they are not a part of Ottawa they should be included if they are adjacent to Ottawa.
There are two parts to the administration of the different functions. Whether it is the National Capital Commission, one of the museums, or something else, these people do two things. They generally oversee the administration of the facilities. And they are wonderful facilities; I do not want to minimize them in any way. However, another aspect of this, which is so important and which is overlooked, is that the taxpayers come from across the entire country.
I did not have the privilege of visiting the canal during the winter festival, but I was told by someone who went there that every garbage can has NCC written on it. In other words, the National Capital Commission owns the garbage cans. I suppose that is good. If there are people skating on the canal they have to have garbage cans, and if it is under the jurisdiction of the National Capital Commission then they should be identified. However, the question occurred to me: What possible fiscal interest could any voter living more than 100 miles away from Ottawa have in buying garbage cans for the city of Ottawa?
I would be opposed to the idea of concentrating more heavily the representation on the board in terms of the people who want to spend the money and try to increase it for those who are more distant, who would have a greater interest in trying to save the money.
It is sort of a spend versus save conflict we have, and it needs to be balanced according to the different regions. There is no doubt in my mind that the formula should specify very clearly which regions of the country the members should come from. I do not think it should necessarily be the lieutenant governor in the province who should be involved in the consultation. There should be a better mechanism for that. Perhaps it could be the choice of elected legislatures putting forward a slate from which people could be chosen.
While we appreciate the general principle the Bloc members are after, we would be opposed to most of the amendments on the basis of their practicality.