Mr. Speaker, as several of my colleagues have said, the Bloc Quebecois subscribes to the principles of Bill C-20 concerning the commercialization of civil air navigation services. Its objectives of efficiency, cost effectiveness, lowered operating costs, are praiseworthy ones, and we acknowledge them as such.
The reason we have reached the report stage, which is moreover the purpose of the exercise, is that we want to improve this bill. If we listen to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Transport, however, it would appear that all of the amendments proposed by the Bloc Quebecois are useless. He has said that ten times or more since the beginning of the debate. I hope he has not reached the stage of considering the official opposition useless. My purpose in speaking will, therefore, be to convince him that Group No. 5 of our amendments is not useless.
Motion No. 25 introduced by the Liberal government aims at removing section 96.1 of the bill as amended by the transport committee. This provision was added on the recommendation of the Bloc Quebecois and the Reform Party. Members will recall that members from the three political parties, The Bloc, the Reform Party and the Liberal Party voted for this amendment in committee.
I find the Liberals' about-face at the report stage rather astounding, because they are trying to exclude Nav Canada from the application of the Privacy Act. The Liberal government may claim that the Privacy Act has to be amended so that it can apply to Nav Canada.
Yet, Liberals thought it was important to include the following provision in section 96 of Bill C-20:
The Official Languages Act applies to the Corporation as if it were a federal institution.
Then why, in that case, did the government not consider it necessary to amend the Official Languages Act instead? This is a double standard.
This government is acting contrary to the spirit of openness it so often brags about.
It is transferring to Nav Canada public assets under the responsibility of the federal Department of Transports, in order to escape its obligation to inform the public, claimming that this corporation is a private service. This government is not acting properly by using an agency as a screen to avoid providing information that the public has a right to expect from a public agency.
The attitude of the Liberal government on this issue is disappointing, disconcerting and even demoralizing. As I said earlier, members of all parties supported this provision in committee. Today, the Liberals intend to use their majority in the House to defeat an amendment carried in committee. It is a pity that a majority of Liberal members will vote with the government, without being aware of the whys and therefores of Motion No. 25. One has to wonder why committee members bother.
Simply put, with Motion No. 25, the federal government is shirking its responsibilities with regard to openness, integrity and respect for the public it must inform. Needless to say, the Bloc Quebecois is firmly opposed to this motion.
In conclusion, I would like to say a couple of words regarding the comments made a little while ago by the parliamentary secretary, who would like to avoid putting the privatization process on hold because other corporations such as the CN and the CBC are not subject to the Privacy Act, so Nav Canada should not be subject to it either. This is the same as saying that it is important for this government to repeat past errors. This is a strange way to govern.
Finally, Motion No. 26, in Group 5, is presented by the Bloc Quebecois for the sake of consistency with clause 96.1. It amends the Schedule to the Privacy Act so that Nav Canada is added to the list of institutions covered by the act.