House of Commons Hansard #100 of the 35th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was children.

Topics

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

12:50 p.m.

Bloc

Paul Crête Bloc Kamouraska—Rivière-Du-Loup, QC

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I think we are completely off topic. This is not what is on the Order Paper. We discussed it during question period. We are discussing a committee report on codes of conduct. I think we are off topic and I would ask the chair not to allow any further reference to this question in the course of this debate.

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

12:50 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Milliken)

I am sure the hon. whip for the Reform Party is seeking to make his remarks relevant to the motion now before the House which does deal with the extension of time for the report of a committee on a code of conduct for all MPs. I am sure he will bear in mind the need for relevance in the remarks he makes to the House. I know he will do that as he carries on his remarks.

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

12:50 p.m.

Reform

Chuck Strahl Reform Fraser Valley East, BC

Mr. Speaker, what I am doing is I am detailing in lawyer terms, as you will be familiar with, an ironclad case of why we need an ethics counsellor and why this review, this extension of a couple of weeks, rather than being a waste of time, may allow the government or try to make the government do the right thing and that is to have ethnics guidelines and some advice for the ethics counsellor that is worth more than just the paper it is written on.

That is why I am building this case. There are times when it is right for opposition members, and I would think and hope government members as well, to question the use and the ethics of their own cabinet.

It is true that all members of Parliament have an ethical standard that we should adhere to, as the member for Crowfoot mentioned earlier. There are things that we can and cannot do. Those guidelines are very useful for all members of Parliament.

Also, no doubt cabinet ministers are held to a higher standard. I just went over the reasons. Cabinet ministers are the only people who get credit cards. They are the only members of Parliament who get a car and a driver. They are the only members of Parliament who have wide ranging responsibilities from coast to coast that affect government policy directly by the directives they sign.

They have a higher level of standard than members of Parliament generally, and so they should. The Prime Minister has said repeatedly that should be so.

What I am describing here in the youth minister's case is an absolute, 100 per cent case of misuse of a government credit card. One of the ministers came forward the other day and said that because these were personal items she charged on her government credit card we had no business knowing what this was about. Absolutely.

If someone uses a personal credit card for personal use it is their business. The privacy commissioner is right to ensure that the person is ensured of privacy. If someone uses a government credit card for personal use, then the person has lost some of that privacy. They have used a government credit card, a government asset and government privilege, available only to the cabinet, for personal use.

Once that happens it should become public knowledge. I am disappointed that the Prime Minister seems to believe he has to deal with is a cabinet minister who breaks a guideline only when it is convenient for the government to shuffle the minister aside.

One of the guidelines I hope will be in the report which will be tabled will deal with the whole access to information request. The way many members access information is through the access to information directive.

We ask of ministers copies of their expenses, which is routinely done, their department expenses, things they spent money on, priorities of the departments and so on. It is routinely done. I probably tabled 100 access to information requests since being in Parliament.

I hope one of the things to be dealt with in this report is why there is an early warning system given to cabinet minister when an access to information request is put in. Why do the red flags go up in the privy council office when there is an access to information request about something to do with a minister?

In other words, instead of saying "here is the information the member for Fraser Valley East has asked for", it happens otherwise. People in Canada should know. It goes through the privy council and the privy council puts the early warning flag on it.

It says to the minister: "Is there something in this pot here that disturbs you? Do you want to know about it? Is there something here that will cause some trouble?" If so, they are advised of that and so on. That is what happened to the former minister of defence.

There was an access to information request put in by someone from the media. It went by the privy council office. "Geepers creepers, sakes alive. Look at this. It could be very damaging". It is brought to the attention of the Prime Minister, the minister and so on.

After they decide how they will spin it and handle it, eventually maybe it is handed down to the person who actually asked for the information.

I hope the report when tabled will deal with that. It is only fair that the person asking for the information receives the information asked for first. They asked for it. They wanted it.

I am not sure what the Prime Minister is thinking about by setting up the two standards. The minister of national defence was forced to resign for writing a letter to a quasi-judicial body. That is fair enough. Those are his guidelines. I do not know what the guidelines are but if those were his guideline, fair enough.

What about the other ministers? The former Minister of Canadian Heritage wrote to the chair of the CRTC, a quasi-judicial board, endorsing a radio licence application of a constituent. Was that breaking the guidelines? If so, why was no action taken?

When Brian Tobin was minister of fisheries he wrote a letter to the chair of the CRTC backing francophone demands for the French Newsworld. He wanted it carried by Newfoundland cable companies so he wrote to the CRTC as a minister and asked for that to be done. Interfering with a quasi-judicial board got the Minister of National Defence fired, but Brian Tobin just becomes the terminator.

The Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development wrote to the CRTC on behalf of a temple in Toronto that applied for a religious TV channel. That is interfering with a quasi-judicial board. The minister of defence was fired for it, but it was fine for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development to do that.

I do not have it here with me today, but perhaps I will bring it when we come back. I will bring forward my top 10 suggestions for ethics guidelines for ministers since the Prime Minister does not seem to have any. It includes things like: Guideline No. 1, do not get caught. These are the tough ones. Guideline No. 2, remember you can fool all of the people all of the time and some of the people some of the time. These are tough guidelines. Another guideline is: Always check with Paul Desmarais. That is a good guideline.

I do not know what the guidelines are because the Prime Minister will not table them. They are as imaginary as his imaginary friend, the one he said he visited frequently to talk about the problems of the homeless. You probably remember that, Mr. Speaker. When he was asked by a reporter where he met this homeless friend I think the Prime Minister's response was: "I see, I said, I had, I thought, actually I don't have an imaginary friend. I just kind of made that up, but you caught me. Anyway, let's talk about something else".

The Prime Minister's ethic guidelines that he promised are around somewhere have never been tabled. That would have been an integral part of the report that the member for Elk Island would have liked to have seen tabled in this House. An integral part would have been the guidelines, how they are processed, who are they responsible for, who are they accountable to, has the ethics counsellor even seen them.

Watching the ethics counsellor on the news the other day I bled for the guy. The reporter says: "So about these guidelines?". The guy, who is digging his toe in the dirt, says: "Well, sir, actually I have not seen any guidelines". The ethics counsellor has not seen any guidelines. Against what standard does he judge these cabinet ministers? How does he enforce? What are the consequences? What is he doing anyway? I do not know if he gets paid for this job or not. Does he get paid? What does he do? Does he get up in the morning and watch "Quirks and Quarks" and then make his decisions? Does he consult JoJo? Perhaps he does. If JoJo is not available then he checks with the imaginary friend. How does he judge these people? There is nothing to judge them against.

Why does the Prime Minister not just put all this to rest, if he has guidelines, and table them, make it part of the report that the member for Elk Island would like to table in this House so that we can deal with it in its entirety, not some tromped up, last minute, drop it on the table, hope it makes it through the House guidelines at the last minute. It is not good enough. That is why today we need to talk about ethics.

The whole problem that the government is having now is with its promises. Mr. Speaker, I should sometime give you my top 10 list of the ways that the Liberal government tries to seduce the voters, but I am not going to get into that today. It is not ethical perhaps at this time. Ethics are involved with promises made and promises kept. Remember what the Prime Minister said in 1993. "There is not one promise that I have made that I will not keep". He should have signed that GST but he did not. But he just said he would keep them all.

Then the excuses started. "I cannot be expected to keep them all," says the Prime Minister. And listen to this: "Sometimes in the course of a mandate you are faced with a situation where you cannot deliver". That is kind of a contrast to his earlier statement. "You have to have some flexibility because acts of God come into the administration. No politician can see everything happening".

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

1:05 p.m.

Reform

John Williams Reform St. Albert, AB

A higher authority.

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

1:05 p.m.

Reform

Chuck Strahl Reform Fraser Valley East, BC

Maybe when he is consulting with JoJo, he can get it. But otherwise he cannot see into the future.

Imagine, acts of God interfere with the Prime Minister's ability to keep his promises. I wonder what that means to the Prime

Minister. Is that the flood in Quebec? Now, that is an act of God. That is registered. No arguments made.

But is it an act of God that the GST is still with us when the Liberals promised to scrap, kill and abolish it? Is that an act of God? When he said: "We will work with the provinces to redesign the social assistance programs," only to find out that he moved in and did it unilaterally without consultation.

Is it an act of God when he says: "I will renegotiate the FTA and the NAFTA agreements. I will not sign it the way it is" and then two weeks later he signed the whole thing?

Is it an act of God when he says: "We will develop a code of conduct for public officials to guide cabinet ministers and members of Parliament and Senators? And there is no code of conduct.

What prevented it? What act of God? What premonition? Perhaps some Epiphany? What was it that came on the Prime Minister and touched him in such a way that he could not follow through with his promise of a public code of conduct for his cabinet? There is no excuse. It was not an act of God, it was an act of omission. I hope that the people watching and listening and keeping track will say: "You promised, Mr. Prime Minister, when you said in 1993 there is not one promise you have made that you will not keep, judge you on you record," they will say: "You omitted, Mr. Prime Minister, to keep your basic, ethical promise of a code of conduct for your cabinet".

It probably also applies to whips. All of us would be covered under this code of conduct. He has failed to deliver on that. He promised it. He has not given it to us. It is no wonder that the member for Elk Island has had to ask for an extension in order to get the proper code of conduct and the proper ethics highlighted for the benefit of all members of Parliament and especially for the cabinet.

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

1:05 p.m.

Reform

Margaret Bridgman Reform Surrey North, BC

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the hon. member to direct some comments toward the public's distrust of politicians. We have seen the public's trust in politicians erode over the years. This is the highest court in the land when it comes to setting rules and regulations by which to govern society. A certain onus falls on individual members when they are elected to a position as a member of this House to demonstrate leadership qualities.

To demonstrate these leadership qualities we certainly cannot embark on a "do as I say, not as I do" philosophy.

I would like some expansion on the perception of the public of how this kind of blatant disrespect for ethics in a position of this nature has come about and how it has eroded political credibility.

Committees Of The HouseRoutine Proceedings

1:05 p.m.

Reform

Chuck Strahl Reform Fraser Valley East, BC

Mr. Speaker, I can talk for a couple of minutes about why the faith of Canadians in politicians has plummeted so severely.

It has been a sad trend to watch how people have placed politicians somewhere down on the bottom of the list with snake oil salesmen as people to trust. It is unfortunate because I do not believe it is necessary. It is unfortunate and I do not believe it is necessary. The government does not seem to understand, and the Prime Minister has not grasped, that there is no shame in stepping aside while an investigation goes on.

There is no shame in a senior official stepping aside and saying that while there is a cloud over my administration, while there is some question about this, I want a complete airing of the facts and I am stepping down until my name is cleared. There is no shame in that. That is a proud moment when you are able to come back to your peers and say that the investigation is complete, it has been fair and open and the facts are all out on the table. We give a nice round of applause and the minister comes back into a position of trust. That is a proud moment. That is assuring and reassuring the Canadian people that the ethics issue is taken seriously.

When you are not prepared to lead by example, when there is some white out on the expense account but you are told: Take my word for it, all is good. I will not tell you what it is, what it is about, how long it took to pay it back or the details, it is my own little secret because it is personal. People look at that. It might be true, they hope it is true but they cannot see it. There is a perception that something is going on. Normally there is no white out for routine business. It is done because there is something being covered or hidden on whatever it is that was changed.

It applies not only to ethical things that involve money. It involves leadership by example in other areas such as the government's plan for something that is as integral to our social system as the Canada pension plan. I hear the government say the only solution is to double the premiums and slash the benefits and that is it. However, members of Parliament get a pension plan fully indexed after six years. That is what breaks the trust with politicians and their constituents.

The member for Beaver River was the first Reform Party member to quality for the MP pension. The papers were brought into her office and basically it came down to her being told that if the MP pension was too extravagant, to opt out of this pension plan, put your money where your mouth is and there is a chance to do it right now. When the member for Beaver River looked at this asked: What is this program worth to me? She was told the pension plan at that time was worth $1.4 million.

The member for Beaver River said, I am sure with some hesitation and trembling because it is a lot of money: "This is where the buck does not pass. This is where the rubber meets the road". She signed away $1.4 million. Why did she do this? Because she had given her word.

It is not fun to give up $1.4 million. It was hers, it was right in the papers and she had it. It could not be taken away except by her own free will. She said: "There are tough decisions to be made and there were promises made in the last election". When the crunch came, even if it was a personal sacrifice, the hon. member stepped up to the batting box and hit a home run. That is why I have respect for the hon. member as the chair of our caucus which exceeds the respect I have for anybody in this House, on that side of the House especially.

She put her money where her mouth is. She showed what ethical conduct is all about. She set a standard to which the rest of us will try to adhere. I opted out of the pension plan as well. We had some leadership in our caucus. We made a promise and we kept it. Ethical conduct is directly linked to the appreciation that constituents have for their MPs. There is a direct correlation between ethical conduct and that appreciation. When we see the ranking of MPs going down, it is tied entirely to that. People always ask me: "How do I know you will keep your word? How do I know I can trust you? How do I know that you will do what you say you will do?"

Keeping ethical standards will restore people's faith in parliamentarians. That is what should be happening here today and in the past while with the Prime Minister. It has not happened. That is too bad because the respect for parliamentarians will continue to drop until he gets that straight in his mind.

(Motion agreed to.)

PetitionsRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Bloc

Paul Crête Bloc Kamouraska—Rivière-Du-Loup, QC

Mr. Speaker, I am tabling today a petition signed by more than 12,000 people, the majority of whom-over 10,000-live in my riding, who are calling for the abolition of the Senate.

This is their response to members of the Liberal majority, who voted against the motion this week, and to Reform members, who have just made us waste an hour on an issue on which Canadian taxpayers' money is continuously being wasted. The people's answer is the 12,000 signatures I am tabling today.

PetitionsRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Liberal

Roger Gallaway Liberal Sarnia—Lambton, ON

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present eight petitions today, duly certified, dealing variously with criminals benefiting from the proceeds of crime, taxation, sexual orientation and public hazards.

Questions On The Order PaperRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Dartmouth Nova Scotia

Liberal

Ron MacDonald LiberalParliamentary Secretary to Minister for International Trade

Mr. Speaker, I ask that all questions be allowed to stand.

Questions On The Order PaperRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Milliken)

Is that agreed?

Questions On The Order PaperRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Questions On The Order PaperRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Liberal

Bob Kilger Liberal Stormont—Dundas, ON

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if we could ask for the unanimous consent of the House that the Chair see the clock as being 1.30 p.m.

Questions On The Order PaperRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Milliken)

Is there unanimous consent to call it 1.30 p.m.?

Questions On The Order PaperRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

Point Of OrderRoutine Proceedings

1:15 p.m.

Bloc

François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC

Mr. Speaker, if you were to seek it, I believe you would find unanimous consent to adopt the following motion:

I move:

That nothwithstanding the Standing Orders and the practices of the House, Bill C-347, an act to change the names of certain electoral districts, be now considered at second reading stage, and that the House proceed to dispose of the bill at all stages, including Committee of the Whole.

Point Of OrderRoutine Proceedings

1:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Milliken)

Could I seek the clarification of the hon. member and the House? Is it intended that we proceed with this bill first, and then if there is time following that we proceed with the bill listed for consideration on today's Order Paper?

Point Of OrderRoutine Proceedings

1:20 p.m.

Liberal

Bob Kilger Liberal Stormont—Dundas, ON

Mr. Speaker, once we dispose of this bill, given the unanimous consent already granted, we would move it at all stages. There will be at least one amendment when we go to committee of the whole. Once that matter has been completed, we would move to today's scheduled Private Members' Business.

Point Of OrderRoutine Proceedings

1:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Milliken)

The House has heard the terms of the motion moved by the hon. member for Bellechasse. Is there unanimous consent?

Point Of OrderRoutine Proceedings

1:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

(Motion agreed to.)

An Act To Change The Names Of Certain Electoral DistrictsPrivate Members' Business

1:20 p.m.

Bloc

François Langlois Bloc Bellechasse, QC

moved that Bill C-347, an act to change the names of certain electoral districts, be read the second time and referred to a Committee of the Whole.

Mr. Speaker, I want to take a few seconds to thank the chief government whip, the hon. member for Stormont-Dundas, and the coordinator of the Reform Party caucus, the hon. member for Fraser Valley East, for the non partisan work they did during the discussions that led to the tabling of this bill. They showed great class throughout all the stages. In my opinion, this bill will improve the representativeness and particularly the description of the various regions represented in this House.

An Act To Change The Names Of Certain Electoral DistrictsPrivate Members' Business

1:20 p.m.

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Milliken)

Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

An Act To Change The Names Of Certain Electoral DistrictsPrivate Members' Business

1:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

(Motion agreed to, bill read the second time and, with the unanimous consent, the House went in committee thereon, Mr. Milliken in the Chair.)

An Act To Change The Names Of Certain Electoral DistrictsPrivate Members' Business

1:20 p.m.

The Deputy Chairman

Order. House in committee of the whole on Bill C-347, an act to change the names of certain electoral districts.

Shall clause 1 carry?

An Act To Change The Names Of Certain Electoral DistrictsPrivate Members' Business

1:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Agreed.

(Clause 1 agreed to.)