Debates of March 22nd, 1996

Canada Transportation Act

[Jim Gouk, Reform, Kootenay West—Revelstoke, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Reform Party will be opposing all four motions. We are opposing motion No. 10 simply because we cannot find any rational justification for this amendment whatsoever.

In the case of motion No. 11, the authority being asked for already exists through the agency and that is where it belongs. The minister does not need to have the lever of power on everything which is what this motion asks for.

Motions Nos. 12 and 13 relate to previously insupportable motions by the member.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, the government will not support motion No. 10 because section 50 of the act already allows for all information that is legitimately required to support transportation policy discussions be collected.

The integrity of every kind of confidential reporting to government depends on the circulation of data being kept to the essential minimum to ensure against risks of intentional and unintentional disclosures.

As members know, some provinces already operate transportation enterprises that compete or negotiate with the federal carriers and would have at least the appearance of being in a conflict of interest if they would receive confidential data in the manner prescribed by this motion.

The government does not support motion No. 11 because, as I said earlier, section 50 allows for the collection of all information that is legitimately required. The proposed authority under motion No. 11 to separately specify the collection cost data for railways is obviously redundant.

Similarly, for motion No. 12, I refer to what I said with respect to motion No. 10. The government will not be supporting motion No. 12 either.

What I said about motion No. 10 applies to motion No. 13. Already there is a section in the act which allows for the collection of all information, and as responsible representatives of the people, we are required to ensure that there is a reduction of risks of intentional or unintentional disclosures of data that would put people in an embarrassing situation or in a conflict situation.

[Simon de Jong, NDP, Regina—Qu'Appelle, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I am surprised to hear both the spokesperson for the government and for the Reform Party joining again together to protect the interests of the large railway companies at the expense of the people who are affected by those decisions, in this case the provincial governments.

All of our motions have been requested. The inclusion of the three new clauses were called for by the representatives of the three prairie provincial governments in their submission and appearance before the transportation committee. These new clauses are extracted from the previous Railway Act provision, sections 351 to 354.

Also under these provisions, provincial governments which have since 1972 been receiving confidential cost information concerning the railways would continue to do so.

There has never been a question of the confidentiality of this information ever being compromised by the prairie governments. For the government and the Reform Party to raise the issue now is nonsense. It has never been a problem.

The information is required if the provinces are to continue to have meaningful input with the Canadian Transportation Agency when the agency establishes maximum grain rates and inter-switching rates, for example. There are some real reasons why we are introducing the motions.

The prairie provincial governments had requested them and it will make things easier for them. I understand why the government and the bureaucrats are not interested. I suspect that what we are hearing from government members is what the bureaucrats have been telling them. However, I am really surprised to hear the Reform Party members consistently coming out in favour of the interests of the large railway companies.

Maybe it is the fact that they are just paying off the debt of $40,000 that the CPR donated to the Reform Party last year. Perhaps today is the payback period.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

The question is on Motion No. 11. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Some hon. members]

No.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

In my opinion the nays have it.

I declare the motion defeated. I therefore declare motions Nos. 12 and 13 defeated.

(Motions 11 to 13 inclusive negatived.)

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

We will now go to group No. 8.

[Paul Mercier, Bloc, Blainville—Deux-Montagnes, QC]

moved:

Motion No. 18

That Bill C-14, in Clause 98, be amended by replacing line 37, on page 42, with the following:

"the Agency, the obtaining of an environmental assessment and compliance with zoning by-laws in the municipalities in any province affected by the railway line."

[Jim Gouk, Reform, Kootenay West—Revelstoke, BC]

Mr. Speaker, a point of order. Since there are about three minutes left for debate, would it be in order to suspend debate now rather than having about a sentence and a half said by the first intervening member, only to resume later? Would it not be better to end it now?

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

Would it be helpful if I presented the last motion and then see the clock as being 1.30 p.m.?

[Jim Gouk, Reform, Kootenay West—Revelstoke, BC]

moved:

Motion No. 19

That Bill C-14, in Clause 101, be amended by adding after line 19, on page 44, the following:

"(5) The Agency may make regulations requiring railway companies to include in agreements relating to the construction or maintenance of a utility or infrastructure crossing prescribed terms and conditions specified or referred to in the regulations or to make such agreements subject to these prescribed terms and conditions."

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

Shall I call it 1.30 p.m.?

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

It being 1.30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed in today's Order Paper.

Pearson International Airport

[Jim Gouk, Reform, Kootenay West—Revelstoke, BC]

moved:

That in the opinion of this House, the government should strike an impartial public judicial inquiry into the total process of awarding and cancelling the 1993 Pearson airport redevelopment contract, leading up to and including the allegations that the Prime Minister of Canada solicited a $25,000 campaign contribution from Paxport Inc. just prior to the last Liberal Party leadership race and the awarding of the Pearson airport contract to Paxport.

Mr. Speaker, I believe that the only way we are ever going to clear the air on this whole odour of the Pearson development contract is to have a full, genuine, public judicial inquiry. I have called for that for over two years.

I am going to do a little bit of crystal balling. I suspect that in responding to this today the government will say that there has been an investigation, that the Senate held a full hearing.

Let us see how impartial the Senate investigation is. On one side the Liberal senators are justifying what the government did. On the other side the Conservative senators are trying to justify what the Conservative government did just before its defeat in 1993. But who is really interested in Pearson airport? That is the real question. Somebody needs to be concerned about Pearson airport, about the right of law, about the people in metro Toronto, about the flying public and about the Canadian taxpayer. Who was there representing them? Nobody.

Before I leave the subject of the Senate inquiry, I might add that at the inquiry the senators on both sides were able to call any and as many witnesses as they wanted to call. Despite having that ability, the Liberals only managed to pull in two or three people out of all the witnesses who came forward who supported their position, and they were on the Liberal payroll. I do not think that was a particularly good defence for the Liberals.

There was another investigation. Perhaps this one was more impartial. There was an investigation when the government first took office. The government said it was going to investigate this deal and if it found it was not a good deal for the Canadian taxpayer, it was going to cancel it. Was it an impartial investigation? Let us see. The investigation was done by one person, Mr. Robert Nixon. Mr. Nixon had 30 days to investigate this deal but he actually took a little less time. He received $80,000 for doing it.

Who is this Mr. Nixon, this impartial investigator? It seems he is a long time Liberal supporter, party fundraiser, treasurer for the Liberals in Ontario, father of a sitting Liberal member of Parliament in the current Liberal government. What did he get for doing this? He got $80,000, but the government will argue there were a lot of costs so he really did not make a huge amount of money.

Did he get anything else? Immediately after he put in his report with no substantiating evidence whatsoever, which said that it looked like a bad deal which he thought the government should cancel, the government responded by saying: "Good enough, Mr. Nixon. For that we are now making you the chair of Atomic Energy of Canada". That is really impartial.

How did we get into this mess in the first place? During the 1993 election the Liberals needed an issue. They needed a few issues. Everybody needs issues at election time. The Tories were really on the outs. They were accused of anything and everything and I suspect they were guilty of most of what they were accused of.

One of the things the present government accused the Tories of was having a corrupt deal in the Pearson development contract. The Liberals accused them that it was a pay off for their Tory friends and supporters and said that they were going to investigate it. I do not argue with the premise to look at it.

We started to investigate the contract in the House under the guise of Bill C-22, probably the most undemocratic piece of legislation this government has brought forward since 1993. I wanted to see if there was justification for the $30 million these very generous Liberals on the other side were going to give the consortium. I questioned whether those in the consortium should even get that, given all the things they were accused of. When I began to investigate this to decide if I should be arguing against giving them that much, to my surprise I could not find one single solitary piece of evidence to justify cancelling the contract in the first place.

I have never questioned the government's right to cancel the contract, only the relative wisdom of it. I certainly questioned the passing of a piece of legislation that enabled the government to cancel the contract retroactively which in effect would say that it never existed, that would set the compensation by legislation and that would ban the consortium from seeking redress from the court. The Minister of Transport then proceeded to call them corrupt and a great number of other names. He then took away their ability to defend themselves in court. We have found absolutely no justification for this.

However secret government documents came to me. When I say secret I mean documents that came to me stamped "secret". They

cannot get more secret than that. When we finally got our hands on these documents they did not support the government's position. They in fact clearly instructed the government beforehand that it was making a bad move.

After two years the Prime Minister, who has not produced one single piece of supporting evidence to justify the legislation dealing with the Pearson airport, has not been able to get royal assent. When the government brings forward legislation and it is defeated, that is a motion of non-confidence. After two years the government cannot get the bill through the Senate. It has never passed. After two years it has failed. That is as close to a message of non-confidence we can give to this government as it is likely going to get in this session.

I am using the Prime Minister primarily because the then Minister of Transport and the now Minister of Transport, who no doubt are going to end up trying to support the Prime Minister on this sad piece of legislation, it is not their bill. It was the Prime Minister's bill all the way and there should not be any misunderstanding about that.

The Prime Minister and his lackeys have repeatedly attempted to justify the cancellation of the Pearson contract by saying it is far too rich a deal, that it is taking far too much taxpayers' money and shoving it into the pockets of Tory supporters, that it is just too great a return on their investment to justify letting it proceed.

A few things have turned up. When we investigate this we find that there are more Liberals than Tories in this. Now it has gone to court. A lot of people are not aware because the bill never passed, which amounts to a non-confidence motion on the government, that it went to court in Ontario.

The contract holder sued the government for breach of contract and the court said: "Guilty. The federal government is in breach of contract". Of course the federal government has tons and tons of taxpayers' money and it just trots down to the justice department and says: "Start preparing our appeal". When the government has unlimited funds it can prepare the best appeals in the world and it did. The courts again said: "Guilty. You are wrong. It is a breach of contract and you are going to have to pay". The matter is now in court to decide on the damages. The government is being sued for $600 million to $650 million.

The government has a defence. Members opposite should have some patience because we are going to defend the government. We are going to tell everybody what the government is using for this wonderful defence. Again, the government has all the justice resources in the world available to it. Keep in mind what I mentioned earlier about how the Prime Minister and his lackeys said the reason to cancel this deal was because it was far too rich and gave those Tory hacks far too much money, that the rate of return was way too high for the investment. What did the justice department come up with for a defence?

[An hon. member]

A drunken defence?

[Jim Gouk, Reform, Kootenay West—Revelstoke, BC]

Maybe a drunken defence would be good. That might explain some of it.

The justice department went into court and said: "Your Honour, we should not be paying any compensation to the contract holders because they are mainly looking for compensation for lost profit and the actual fact is this was a terrible contract. They would have gone broke, lost their shirts and would not have made any profits so why should we compensate them for any?"

Is it not interesting that the government talks out of both sides of its mouth at the same time. That is quite a trick. Mind you, the Liberals have had decades and decades to practise with many years in opposition. I do not know how well they could practise it on this side of the House because when they go to the other side they say everything differently. Perhaps they got confused and thought half the time they were on this side of the House and the other half they were on that side and that is why they have two different stories on the same thing.

The Prime Minister has repeatedly misinformed the public on the matter of lease revenues. He said that we are giving up all these revenues that we currently get. That is a-well, I cannot say what I was going to say; I almost let it slip out. That is wholly inaccurate. I think that term is acceptable. It is wholly inaccurate because we have public government documents which clearly show that the lease payments are deferred during the construction period but they are repaid with interest. That is hardly what the Prime Minister has been telling everyone.

The Prime Minister also deliberately disregarded government reports. Again these were stamped as secret all over them. These government reports clearly pointed out that cancellation of the contract would leave the government open to damages ranging from $500 million to $2 billion of taxpayers' money. Right now it is in court defending an action for over $600 million plus the cost of defence.

The manner in which the Prime Minister cancelled the contract brings into question the value of a contract signed by the government in the event that the government changes. The Prime Minister again deliberately disregarded secret government documentation which pointed out that the legislation limiting the government's liability left the crown open to many problems, including severe capacity and congestion problems at Pearson, increased construction costs and the danger of undermining the government's future leasing and contracting process. This is in a report that went to the government before it brought forward this odious piece of legislation.

The Prime Minister has spent $2 billion on false government job creation, the infamous infrastructure program. Call it infrastructure, fine. If we need some money to kickstart the infrastructure repairs in this country that is one thing, but to call it job creation is an absolute farce. The government spent $2 billion on this and it has virtually no permanent jobs. It is something like 4,500 permanent jobs.

The cancelled Pearson contract would have created 14,000 person years of construction employment with 1,200 new jobs at absolutely no cost to the Canadian taxpayer whatsoever. Now the government, in addition to this $600 million or $700 million worth of compensation that it could lose in court, in addition to all the legal costs that it is incurring, still has to do something about terminals 1 and 2. The consortium was going to spend $850 million of private investors' money in that.

The costs have gone up so we are now looking at $1 billion, or $1.2 billion which was the last estimate I heard. Where is the government going to get this money? It is not in its wonderful budget. Maybe it is going to spend the surplus money, but gee, it cannot. That is the money it is giving to Atlantic Canada to try to buy away the GST. I do not know where the government is going to get it.

The Prime Minister's mishandling of the Pearson contract has jeopardized 1,140 airport jobs, 560 direct off airport jobs and over 3,000 indirect jobs in the metro Toronto area. It also results in a tri-level government tax loss of $72 million a year.

Bill C-22 works against the interests of metro Toronto and all Canadians because after introducing open skies, things that have been long awaited for in the aviation industry, it has now jeopardized the future potential of Pearson airport as Canada's primary hub.

The final point I would like to raise is an allegation. I stress it is only an allegation that has come from many sources. The allegation is that the Prime Minister solicited a $25,000 contribution from one of the principals in the Pearson consortium for his leadership campaign fund.

There have been lots of allegations of this. The Prime Minister had the opportunity to at least partially dispel this. Part of the reason we cannot prove this one way or another is that his law partners refused to disclose documents because they are confidential. They are covered by the Privacy Act of lawyer-client confidentiality. The Prime Minister could have released all those documents to the public but he did not choose to do so. I think we should have a full and proper investigation to determine what these are.

I will close by making the same offer to the new Minister of Transport which I made to the old Minister of Transport. It can be the Prime Minister, I do not care who it is, who stands. If he is going to defend this then he had better be prepared to defend it publicly. I offered to publicly debate this with the previous Minister of Transport anywhere, anytime. One of the nation's television networks was prepared to cover it. I pointed out to him then as I point out to the new minister now, that the balance should be in their favour.

The Minister of Transport can go armed with all his assistants, the deputy minister, the assistant deputy ministers, all his special assistants, executive assistants, all the justice department lawyers, and I will come armed only with the truth. The venue for the new minister, if he wishes, can be the University of Victoria in his riding or it can be one of the lighthouses he vowed to save after they pulled his bacon out of the straits when he was about to go under.

The offer is open and it stands but there needs to be full public disclosure on this. It has not happened and I suspect with the Liberal government it never will.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, I hope I will not collapse to the same sort of seductive attraction that rhetoric holds for my colleague opposite. I hope we will be able to look at the facts rather than engage in disparaging repetitions of allegations from sources he well knows are suspect at the very best and at the very least motivated by self-interest.

We can address the issue in the motion presented by the member but we would also have to take a look at the premises he has cast forth in the House about the process. He says this has been an undemocratic system. He says that in the House where people get elected, where people have to go through a lot of trials to get the public to appreciate the position they will present in this place, in a place which is open and being televised today all over the country. Nothing is being hidden.

This is a House which authorizes committees both from the House as well as in the other for public inquiries that he requests. Then he says the system is undemocratic, it does not work. His colleague beside him says this place does not work. Why did you seek office? You come here to make it work.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Kilger)]

I take note on this Friday afternoon, as the week draws to an end, that there is a difference of opinion, but please express it through the Chair.

[Joe Volpe, Liberal, Eglinton—Lawrence, ON]

I guess I was letting the truth, the facts and the evidence that have come forward over the course of the last several months influence my approach to this discussion. It is unfortunate that my colleagues are not infected by the same kind of democratic disease.

My good friend from Kootenay West-Revelstoke admits the Prime Minister and the government were well within their rights to cancel this deal. He questions whether deals with governments can be considered legitimate because they are prone to be cancelled. Can anyone imagine that, in 1993 right in the middle of an election campaign in which the Pearson airport deal was a nationwide issue?

As one who comes from Toronto and was very much in tune with what was going on at Pearson, I see a colleague opposite refer to an issue that was of national significance, controversial to say the very least, and the government of the day proceeded, nonetheless, to sign a deal. Can anyone imagine that he would then be surprised that it would be cancelled because it had been advertised that it would be? He should direct his anger at the former administration, but unfortunately there are none of them any longer in this place to take some accountability.

I hope members will forgive me if I chastise or perhaps simply chide my colleague and ask him why he continues to defend the indefensible.

I am astounded that the member is asking for yet another review.

The first review was in the public context of the election. It was there for everyone to see, but it was not sufficient. Even though we followed through on our promises, the member asks for continuing expenditures of taxpayer money on an inquiry that has already been held.

We should not be considering a judicial inquiry or a Senate inquiry. That has already been debated in the Senate and it was decided the Senate inquiry would have the power to send for people, for papers, for records to examine witnesses under oath and heaven knows what else.

As the hon. member knows, on May 4, 1995 the special committee of the Senate on the Pearson airport agreement was formed with the following mandate: "That the special committee of the Senate be appointed to examine and report upon all matters concerning the policies and negotiations leading up to and including the agreements respecting the redevelopment and operation of terminals 1 and 2 at Lester B. Pearson International Airport and the circumstances relating to the cancellation thereof".

That committee sat between July and November and heard testimony from over 60 people including all major private sector participants involved in that project, from former ministers and senior public servants who acted on the government's behalf to the people who were protecting their own private interests. That was fine.

In addition, the committee reviewed thousands and thousands of pages of documentation. The evidence demonstrated conclusively that the Pearson airport deal was not in the best interests of the country in terms of substance and process.

[An hon. member]

That is a bald faced lie.