Debates of Oct. 30th, 1997

Supply

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak on this motion which has to do with a much broader issue and which I know all members are very sensitive to. Indeed the issue of alcohol and its impacts and pervasiveness on our society is one of the most serious issues that a Parliament could face.

The motion before the House basically asks parliamentarians to request a House committee to review the issues related to deterrence and propriety of penalties with regard to impaired driving.

The issue of drunk driving has been with us for so long. We have heard the statistics over and over again, to the extent that I believe the public and parliamentarians have become desensitized to the seriousness of the problem.

I would like to share with the House and all hon. members some of the statistics to do with the misuse of alcohol. Over 19,000 deaths per year; 45% of all motor vehicle collisions; 30% of fires; 30% of suicides; 60% of homicides; 50% of family violence; 65% of snowmobile collisions; one in six family breakdowns; 30% of drownings; 5% of birth defects; 65% of child abuse; 40% of falls causing injury; 50% of hospital emergencies. There is over $15 billion of additional health care, social programs, criminal justice and lost productivity costs that all Canadians must pay for. All of these items are directly or indirectly caused by the misuse of alcohol.

I want to pay tribute to Mothers Against Drunk Driving. This organization has had a long history of advocacy with regard to alcohol. One of the founders of MADD, Mr. John Bates, has been a very dear friend and supporter of mine in alcohol related issues. They were here recently on the Hill. They have done an excellent job. I believe they are singularly responsible for this issue finally getting the attention in the House that it deserves. I congratulate them and thank them for doing a job very well on behalf of all Canadians.

This is not a simple issue. One thing is clear and everyone should understand that it is impossible to conceive how anyone could vote against this motion before the House today. Canadians should always expect their parliamentarians to determine and review to make sure that the very best job has been done with regard to deterrence against behaviour such as drunk driving. Canadians should also expect that the penalties associated with criminal offences are updated and appropriately put in place. That is what they expect of us. This motion does nothing more than simply ask parliamentarians to ask the justice committee to do that review and as appropriate to come back to this House with a bill to make any appropriate changes.

I certainly will be supporting this motion. I believe it transcends politics and the partisanship of politics. I believe and I hope that all parliamentarians will support unanimously this motion so that we can commence the process on dealing with a broader range of alcohol related problems in Canada.

I went through a list of direct or indirect consequences of alcohol misuse. I want to comment a little further on some others. In statistics I received from the Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse in its 1995 report, there are some 19,000 deaths per year.

One of the things I found astounding was an incident where a person who was impaired while driving a motor vehicle killed an innocent pedestrian. The pedestrian's loss of life was attributed to trauma, not to alcohol. When I see statistics dealing with alcohol, we have to ask questions about the dimensions: Are there directs and indirects included these numbers? I believe the numbers are far worse than anybody is prepared to publish.

Think of things like family violence. About a year ago there was a special conference on Parliament Hill co-sponsored by Health Canada, the equivalent agency in the United States and the National Action Committee on the Status of Women. The cost of spousal abuse and domestic violence in Canada was estimated to be $2.1 billion. Imagine the opportunity and the dimensions here and what we could do if we could get a handle on it.

I believe domestic violence is in much the same boat as drinking and driving in that we have become desensitized. This is 100% preventable. It is totally irresponsible and totally against the family and Canadian values that we hold so dear, yet we do not do anything about it. We tolerate it for who knows what reason, but it must stop. We can do better. We must do better.

One in six family breakdowns are due to alcohol misuse. Has anyone ever considered how pervasive the impacts of family breakdowns are? After the Vanier Institute said that the divorce rate was up to 50%, Statistics Canada said no, it is really only at 33%.

One of the things they all forgot about was the fact that over a million relationships in Canada are common law and totally escape the statistical analysis. Seventy-five per cent of common law relationships break down within the first five years. Of all those relationships, 60% of them involve children. The real victims of family breakdown are the children. Yet if we look at the statistics, one in six of those are directly due to alcohol.

Birth defects. Fetal alcohol syndrome accounts for about 5% of the birth defects. It costs Canada about $1.2 billion a year to deal with the additional health care, special needs and social costs associated with fetal alcohol syndrome.

If Canadians want a tax break, we could easily fund a tax break by dealing with some of these problems. We cannot have it both ways. We cannot be irresponsible in our actions and be spending billions of dollars for our carelessness and our irresponsibility and at the same time expect that we can do other things as well.

We have ways of ensuring that good things happen in Canada but we have to find new ways. We have to set a new urgency for all Canadians that we will not be desensitized any more.

In addition to addressing the issue specifically raised in the motion, there were two other items. One is health warning labels on the containers of alcoholic beverages. Alcoholic beverages are the only consumer product in Canada that can hurt you if misused but which do not warn the consumer of that fact. Pills warn you not to drink when you take the pills, but the drink does not warn you not to take pills when you drink. It makes no sense. We have a bill before the House. Hopefully, we will get support.

The last item is Drink Smart Canada. I want to simply read into the record Drink Smart Canada's message: If you are with a friend, family member or acquaintance who is drinking and becoming at risk of hurting themselves and others, you should intervene in an appropriate fashion to make sure that they do not become just another tragic statistic.

We all have a role to play here. I am proud to support this motion and I thank hon. members for bringing it forward to the House.

[Mark Muise, Progressive Conservative, West Nova, NS]

Mr. Speaker, drinking and driving is a very serious problem. It is a problem that causes a lot of hardship for families. It causes financial hardships. It causes hardships for our society.

I would like to relate a story that was related to me and which I think puts this issue very much in perspective. I was told that a young man left home one evening and he had been drinking. He was in an accident and two people were killed. After he came out of the coma, the people had to tell him that the two people who had been killed that terrible evening were his parents. When I was told this, it really gave me shivers and I sensed what this problem was really all about.

I do support Mothers Against Drunk Driving and I support this motion. I thank the member for putting it forth.

[John Bryden, Liberal, Wentworth—Burlington, ON]

Mr. Speaker, during question period today the health minister in reply to a question from the opposition said that Canada has one of the toughest anti-tobacco laws in the world. He also mentioned that this government, Health Canada, was planning on spending $100 million on tobacco control in the next few years.

Tobacco never killed people on the highway. Tobacco never broke up families. Tobacco never led to beatings. Yet the government, and governments traditionally, not just the current Liberal government but the government before it, Health Canada, has a whole division and countless employees focused on tobacco.

I wonder if the member for Mississauga South would give his feelings with respect to why Health Canada does not invest at least an equivalent amount of money on alcohol control. Why do we not have a tough alcohol law?

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot speak for the Minister of Health or Health Canada, but I do believe that the member raises a good point. It is up to all parliamentarians to define the priorities for our government to consider. This motion has raised this issue to the level where it will get the attention.

What we need to do is to demonstrate that we are no longer desensitized to the problem and that we are prepared to advance this as a starting point with regard to impaired driving, and also with regard to the broader range of impacts associated with the misuse of alcohol because of its pervasiveness and the severe impact it has on all Canadians.

[Philip Mayfield, Reform, Cariboo—Chilcotin, BC]

Mr. Speaker, there is an attitude among Canadians that drinking is okay. Most people do not get caught and when something like this happens, well it is too bad it happened to them. It is always thee and thee but never me.

We in the Reform Party have a fairly hard line about consequences for drinking and driving. I would like to have some of my Liberal colleagues come out and say what they think it would take to stop people from drinking and driving, to change the attitude.

We can give all the education courses in the world, but if somebody wants to drink, he is going to do it. How are we going to deter that person? I have suggested taking their licence away for life if they drink. What about taking their vehicle away so they cannot have a vehicle?

No one really wants to have the courage to say this is what needs to be done. The committee needs something on record from this debate about some of the alternatives to what is happening now to prevent those people from getting behind the wheel and driving when they are drunk.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I understand the frustration of the member. We all do, because we have provincial jurisdictions that are responsible for the application of the laws. But I believe this is the kind of work that the motion is asking the committee to do, to explore these things. I think he is quite right.

However, I would ask all members to be open to preventive measures as opposed to dealing in a reactive fashion after the problem has occurred. We cannot say enough about the value of public education. We cannot say enough about advocacy groups like MADD. There is a good group out in B.C., the Alcohol-Drug Education Service, Mr. Art Steinmann and his group. They are excellent. They have been working tirelessly in the background.

We need to work with them and support them to make sure that all Canadians express their views and give us the support we need to make sure that we have done our job to the extent that we can influence deterrence, penalties as well as public education.

[Louise Hardy, NDP, Yukon, YT]

Madam Speaker, I rise in support of this motion. In many ways I am very moved to be speaking on it today.

Intoxication should not be an excuse for anything. It should not be an excuse for sexual assault, for death or for murder. We should not be accepting any level of blood alcohol content as an excuse.

I do not think anyone should be allowed to drink and drive. Therefore, my hard line is that we do not have any level that anyone can say there is room for error. You cannot drink and then drive.

As long as we say drinking is all right, we will be facing the tragedy that has happened over the last 30 to 40 years. When people drink their decision making is impaired. It is impaired as to whether they decide to drive. It is impaired as to whether they decide to have another drink or another 10 drinks and then drive. They should not have any discretion in that area.

In deterrence, if we are going to look at preventive measures, then we have to have it at all levels.

The Yukon had a Youth Empowerment and Success Program that was cut, I learned today, by the federal government. This dealt with the very area in Yukon where there is a large percentage of drinking and driving: the youth. Pulling out this strategy to prevent drinking and driving or other drinking related abuses is now not available.

National statistics show males between the ages of 25 and 35 are the drivers behind the wheels of those vehicles. Therefore, we should not allow advertising that glamorizes the drinking lifestyle, that everybody is happy as long as they have a bottle of beer beside them.

When it comes to our judicial system I think our judges should have discretion. I would like to say “Yes, let us just take away their vehicles and that will solve the problem”, except that the rest of the family may depend on that vehicle and someone's employment may depend on that vehicle. Therefore, we are causing others to suffer who should not suffer because of an individual's decision to drink and drive.

Our judicial system should have a process for appointing judges. If we want discretion we need to know whose discretion and how they got into those positions of trust.

When it comes to enforcement, we have to know that the RCMP are not letting their friends go when they stop them for drinking and driving. We have to know that the RCMP are well enough staffed so that at the peak hours when people drink and drive, between 6 p.m. and 3 a.m., they are there to stop them.

My city of Whitehorse has two RCMP on duty through the night. That is not adequate to deal with drinking and driving, among the other responsibilities that they have to take on. If we are serious about deterrence, we need to be prepared to give the resources to the RCMP so that they can deal with drinking and driving.

When I grew up in the Yukon, as a teenager it was still legal to drink in public. It was legal to drink and drive. That was just over 20 years ago. Public attitude has changed dramatically since that time. You can no longer drink in public and you can no longer drink and drive. But the attitude still is prevalent, as it is elsewhere in Canada, that it is all right to drive and to drink.

I commend my colleague across the floor for describing what it took for her to make a stand and not let her friend drink and drive. By doing that in our daily lives we will make changes.

I also believe once someone has transgressed, once they have driven drunk more than once, we do not need to give leniency any further. At that point we should take away the vehicle or there should be a substantial fine and there should not be available legal loopholes to avoid the guilt of what someone has done.

I will finish with my own story on this issue. In Yukon in the early seventies it was a different atmosphere. I was in a boat with my father who had been drinking. The boat tipped. After I watched my father drown, I swam to shore. That left my mother, who had a part-time job, to raise eight children. Drinking and driving is not a statistic for me. I thought after many years you come to grips with trauma of that nature. It is not easy and it does stay with us.

I am honoured to have the opportunity to speak on this debate. It is our chance to make a statement to our fellow Canadians that this matter will be taken seriously and we will not allow drinking and driving. If you are going to drink and operate any motorized vehicle, you are responsible for your actions. We will hold you responsible but we will also show compassion. I believe that is why we are here.

For those reasons, I support this motion.

[Roy H. Bailey, Reform, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Madam Speaker, it was with interest that I listened to the discussion and to the gentleman on the opposite side when he gave us details of what alcohol cost Canadians each year. It would seem to me that if we threw the stuff away we would get our deficit in order in a short period of time.

I do not doubt the authenticity of the statistics at all. I believe they are true.

What bothers me more than anything else in listening to the debate are the words “we must use compassion”. I am a compassionate person but I have had experiences in my life of picking up dead children at the scene of an accident, of going to homes of teenagers who have been killed. It is very difficult to move toward compassion when you see the person who caused the crime, who caused the death, go to the courts and within no time at all be out on the street with a minimum fine and a minimum restriction.

What bothers me is listening to a teenager who has been given an alcohol charge saying “I wonder who the judge will be. I would sure like to get that one because he is not as hard”. It reminds me of the cowboys lining up to draw a horse. They want to get an easy horse because an easy horse is easier to ride.

We must be more conscious of what we are dealing with here. The people who brought this to our attention came as a lobby group. They did not come asking the government for money, as most lobby groups do. They did not come asking for anything but that we take an honest look at this national disgrace. They called it a national tragedy. It is a disgrace and Canadians can no longer allow it to go on.

When you ask people what they think of our courts, our courts are going down this way every day because of the decisions being handed out. On my way driving in to the House of Commons I heard a report about a man who had been bludgeoned to death. The police picked up the perpetrator's trail, followed the blood trail to a house and arrested him. However, it has been thrown out of court because the proper procedure for the search was not followed. That sort of decision is an example of the decisions which are ripping the guts out of Canadians. The decisions brought down in alcohol related incidents are doing exactly the same thing.

Abraham Lincoln said that alcohol has many defenders, but nobody has ever come up with a defence.

When this motion goes to committee we must listen to what our constituents are saying. Do not worry about the legal part of it, first of all we should listen to what our constituents are saying. They will support the resolution which is before us with an overwhelming majority and with a great deal of enthusiasm.

It is fine to say that an accident happened and that it really was not the driver's fault because he was not in control of himself. He was in control of himself when he started to drink. When he started to drink he was cognizant of the fact that he could cause harm to himself and other people. I do not think for one moment that Canadians are going to continue to listen to our courts using that as an excuse, permitting those who perpetrate a crime to walk away free.

I was driving in Saskatchewan the other day when the news reported that two young ladies had been shot in a service station at night. I used to work in that area. Then the names were reported and it shocked me. The one person involved with that double murder is now walking the streets of Saskatchewan. The people of that town are livid because of the decision of the court.

The court is saying that people were not really responsible. They must have been responsible when they started drinking. They must be responsible for the deeds which they have done.

I hope when we go to committee we do not let bleeding hearts take over and not honour the commitment of this motion. I hope we do not put anything in the way of the Canadian public receiving justice when it comes to this very serious topic.

I know very well from my experience that we need a victims' bill of rights. Everybody seems to have rights nowadays. What about victims' rights? Why are we so afraid of victims' rights? Why are we so afraid of the mother who has lost a three-year-old child? Does she not have any rights?

We know more than four people are killed needlessly every day. Let us suppose that one MP is killed every day for the next 300 days. Just think about it. Are we more important than our constituents? Not one bit.

I know this much. If four of us were killed in a traffic accident, if we were clobbered by a drunk driver, and the next week if four more of us were killed, we would be very quick in this House to come up with something which is a lot stronger and a lot more punishing than what the MADD organization is proposing.

We should not place ourselves above our constituents. Sometimes I think we do. My constituents are important to me. I know what they are thinking about this. Every newspaper in my constituency carried my article in support of MADD. I received very good reports from that article.

They want something more than what we have at present. If we come out of committee with no changes and with nothing more than what we have at the present time we have failed abysmally. We have to show the Canadian public now that we in the House are serious. We are the highest court in the land. We make the decisions and the judiciary carry them out.

I am not saying we should not allow a judge leniency. I am saying that we have to make the message clear to the Canadian people. The message we are giving right now is not a very good one. Let give all the emphasis possible as legislators and bring some credit back to the House. We will gain respect quickly if the motion goes forward and we do something more than what I fear may happen.

I will be supporting the motion and I wish it all the best in the final result.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

It being 5.15 p.m., it is my duty to interrupt the proceedings and put forthwith every question necessary to dispose of the business of supply.

Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

Question.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

The question is on the amendment. Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the amend-ment?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

I declare the amendment carried.

(Amendment agreed to)

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

The next question is on the main motion, as amended.

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

[Some hon. members]

Agreed. (Motion agreed to)

[Pierre Pettigrew, Liberal, Minister of Human Resources Development]

moved:

That, pursuant to Standing Order 68(4)(a), the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights be instructed to prepare and bring in a bill to amend those sections of the Criminal Code which deal with impaired driving in order to (a) enhance deterrence; and (b) ensure that the penalties reflect the seriousness of the offence.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

Does the hon. minister have unanimous consent of the House to move the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

Carried. (Motion agreed to)

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

Does the House agree to say that it is 5.30 p.m., so that we may continue with the business of the House immediately?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

It being 5.20 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's Order Paper.

Newfoundland Unemployment

[Norman E. Doyle, Progressive Conservative, St. John's East, NL]

moved:

That, in the opinion of this House, a special committee should be established to study the severe unemployment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Madam Speaker, it is no with a great sense of pleasure that I arise today to present my private member's motion that the House establish a committee to study the chronic unemployment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador.

The unemployment rate in Newfoundland is one of the most glaring failures of Canadian Confederation. I am under no illusions today that by simply introducing this resolution we will solve the unemployment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador, but I have to start somewhere. I promised the good people of St. John's east, many of whom are unemployed, that I would bring their concerns to the floor of the House of Commons.

Every poll that has ever been done in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador indicates the one pressing problem that has always been on the top of the agenda is unemployment. As we talk about the unemployment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador today the Canadian economy is rebounding, but in Newfoundland the situation seems to be worse than ever.

Right now in Newfoundland we are losing people at the rate of approximately 7,500 per year. That may not seem to be all that serious in the Canadian context, but when we consider a small province like Newfoundland and Labrador with a population of only a half million people losing 7,500 people per year is very serious indeed. It has a devastating effect upon the collective well-being of the people.

Only a few weeks ago I had a meeting on a little island off the coast in my riding. It is not too far from St. John's. It is a small place called Bell Island. It used to be a great mining town from the late 1800s up to 1966 when I believe the mining operation closed down.

Until recently it had a population of about 10,000 or 12,000 people. Now the population has gone down to about 3,500 people. I had a meeting with the mayor of that island, Gary Gosine, who indicated that he could drive around his town almost on a daily basis and point to houses that are empty because people are leaving to go elsewhere. They do not have any jobs there and the population of that little area has gone down from 5,200 or 5,300 people down to 3,500 people in a very short period of time.

We are losing people at the rate of 7,500 per year. For a population of a half million that is devastating.

The Newfoundland unemployment problem has been studied many times. When I served in the Newfoundland House of Assembly we set up a royal commission to look at the problem. There were no obvious or quick solutions at that time. Our economy is largely a resource based economy. We depend upon fish, minerals and paper products. It is a resource based and export based economy.

The new global economy is a knowledge based economy. While we do have somewhat of a high tech industry in Newfoundland it is a very small one. In spite of that we are to a small extent in the business of exporting some of our engineering skills in the marine area and in the offshore oil and gas sector. The growth we are experiencing in these sectors is not enough to even remotely offset the bleeding that is occurring in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Two areas of our economy that have been hit very hard over the last number of years is the fishery and the public sector. The northern cod fishery is in a very bad way. About 30,000 fishermen and plant workers are on TAGS in Newfoundland, the Atlantic groundfish strategy as it is known. Most TAGS money has been used directly by people to keep bread on the table.

As the auditor general pointed out only recently in his report, the millions of dollars spent on training through TAGS was really a waste of time, a waste of energy and worst of all a waste of money. Most people were in a holding pattern. They were waiting for cod to come and therefore were not all that interested in moving on.

Many fisher people, especially the older generation of fishermen, got involved in the fishery back 25, 30 or 35 years ago. They had limited formal education. When TAGS came out they found themselves in the position of probably having to get a high school education before they could move on to the various technical schools they were expected to become involved in and enrolled in.

I have always said it is bureaucratic insanity to expect people with limited education who have been on fishing boats for 25 or 30 years to suddenly upgrade to a high school education, get into a technical institute and sit down in front of a computer. For what purpose? I do not know. A lot of the money spent on various training programs, we have to agree with the auditor general, fishermen and other people, was a waste of money.

A lot of these people have been waiting for the fishery to rebound but it has not rebounded. The reality today is that the federal TAGS program is about expire. The vast majority of the people on TAGS are at a loss what to do next. They have hung on but it seems now that they will be hung out to dry.

Politicians in the House have shouted across the floor that TAGS was a mistake and should have ended sooner than later. I agree the TAGS could have been a much better program. It could have encouraged people to leave the industry through licence buyout and early retirement programs. Training money should have been directed to people who were either young enough or enthusiastic enough to want to go ahead with a career change. It could have encouraged people to leave the industry.

Most of all I keep saying the federal government could have been brutally honest with people and not given them an indication that their future prospects in the fishery were good. Instead, we are faced with thousands and thousands of people whose incomes will soon be cut off, who have not returned to the fishery, who have not retrained for this new economy that we are into, who cannot afford to move away to find work and whose immediate prospects happen to be welfare.

I get hundreds of people coming through my constituency office in St. John's on a weekly basis. My mind goes back to the Prime Minister at his town hall meeting where he was talking to an unemployed woman looking for a job. The Prime Minister, in a cavalier way, said “Well, maybe you can move on to another part of our country”. At the same time, while the Prime Minister was making that kind of a submission to that woman, he had terminated the mobility assistance program. These people, already facing unemployment, are now also faced with having to stay where they are because they do not have the money to move on.

The public sector plays a very important role in the Newfoundland economy, a much bigger role than it should play probably. Federal transfers for equalization in health and education make up about half of our provincial budgets. We do have our share of equalization payments. The unemployment insurance system provides income to large numbers of seasonal workers.

When the federal government decided a while ago to get its fiscal house in order, it was devastating for the Newfoundland economy because the federal transfers to the provincial government went down hill drastically and, of course, the provincial government started to make its cuts to make up for the federal government's transfers going down.

The provincial government then passed the cuts on to the various municipalities as well who in turn made all kinds of cuts which again had a devastating effect on the economy. The lay-offs at all levels of the public sector not only reduced the services, they also flooded the job market with some of the best and most well-educated people we had. That is why the Liberal Party is doing so poorly in Atlantic Canada. It has not really got into showing the people of Atlantic Canada that it cares about the unemployment problems that we have.

We cannot impose the kinds of dynamics of a central Canadian economy or a western Canadian economy on the people in the Atlantic region because it makes no sense at all.

We can talk about the problem all day but what are we going to do about it? I want to make a few suggestions, although I stand the chance of running afoul of some of the more right wing attitudes that are displayed in the House every now and then. First, the TAGS program cannot be cut off cold turkey. That cannot be done without a transitional program. Thirty thousand people cannot be thrown on to the streets with nothing to do and nowhere to go.

We need licence buy-outs. We need training programs that will address the real jobs that are out there. We need a generous retirement program. If these initiatives happen to go beyond what might be considered to be normal, well so be it. Just as Quebec is a distinct society in its own way, then Newfoundland, when it comes to the kinds of economic circumstances that we have to live with, is distinct as well. The alternative is to do nothing and to run the risk of an awful lot of social unrest.

Newfoundland, like the other provinces, needs a better deal in the equalization program. We need a better deal in Confederation, in particular in equalization. It keeps us from starving but it also keeps us permanently poor as well.

Much has been said about the Voisey's Bay nickel mine in Newfoundland. I have a great deal of confidence that it will be a great mining industry when it is fully developed. It is worth billions of dollars.

We must never forget, however, that every dollar Newfoundland gets in taxes and royalties is subtracted dollar for dollar from our equalization entitlements. To be one dollar better off, we must first raise a billion dollars a year in extra revenues just to overcome the loss of the equalization.

In the case of Hibernia, we had a special management deal whereby we would only loose 70¢ in equalization dollars. This is a good start. We need a better formula than that if we are ever going to catch up and go out on our own. The formula needs to be extended to all major resource developments. On paper we have a lot of resources in Newfoundland and Labrador. Under the current arrangement, we will never break free and close the poverty gap.

I realize I am running out of time. Maybe later on I will have a chance to say a few more words. I appreciate the opportunity to say a few words on this.

[Bob Nault, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Human Resources Development]

Madam Speaker, the motion we are debating asks the government to spend resources to study the employment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador. I want to read it again so the people who are watching understand what the motion is intended to do.

That, in the opinion of this House, a special committee should be established to study the severe unemployment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador.

I would like to assure the member that the government is aware of this very serious issue and recognizes the need for long term structural solutions. I do not think that anybody on this side of the House would contest the fact that we need to pay serious attention to regional disparity.

Historically my party has been the one to most seriously address many of the regional problems that the member would have us examine.

Earlier studies led us to employment insurance reform, the first major reform in 25 years. We knew that we had to have more in the way of active support for work. We knew that we needed to invest in people who have invested in themselves. We knew that helping Canadians back to work was the only solution to problems of Atlantic Canada and that is what the employment insurance reform sets out to do.

While I am in favour of understanding a problem before leaping into it, there is a time for study and a time for action. The government believes the time for action is now. We are doing it in a partnership with the provincial government.

Over the last 10 years many studies, both comprehensive and specific, have examined the unemployment situation in Newfoundland and Labrador. One example, and the member mentioned it, a royal commission of the Government of Newfoundland, known as the House Commission, looked at the problem in the late 1980s. This led to a comprehensive analysis of the province's economic position and became the basis of the province's strategic economic plan. That plan is still being put into practice.

Today I want to talk about some of the things we have done to make the problem better. From everything I have seen the people in the member's riding are probably more interested in our solutions than our ability to talk more about their problems. Rather than revisit the whole issue again we want to better use our resources to help the people of Newfoundland and Labrador get back to work. That is why in 1997-98 the government will invest $89 million in active employment measures for Newfoundland and Labrador.

Here we are talking about targeted earning supplements, targeted wage subsidies, job creation partnerships, self-employment assistance and skills, loans and grants. But we have also learned that it is more important than ever for us to work even more closely with the provinces.

Thanks to the labour market development agreement we signed with the province, both levels of government will co-manage the programs that will get Newfoundlanders working again. The agreement means made in Newfoundland solutions that are tailored to the particular circumstances that characterize the Newfoundland economy. This kind of partnership recognizes that each side has something to offer and that no solution is really possible unless both levels of government work together.

One of the components of employment insurance reform is working especially well. We have heard a little bit of it in the House, but I want to mention it. The program that we launched, called the transitional jobs fund, of some $300 million in July 1996, is now starting to have an effect in Newfoundland and Labrador. That fund works with the private sector and with the provincial and municipal governments, as well as with community groups.

Like the labour market development agreement, the fund works because it is based on partnership. As of October 14, that transitional jobs fund had provided $26 million to 70 projects in Newfoundland and Labrador. That money leveraged another $85 million.

The question that is always asked in this place is, did all that money create jobs? You bet it did. So far, the transitional jobs fund has created some 2,016 new jobs in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Let us take just one example so we can put it in people terms when we talk about the 2,016 people who have found new employment because of the transitional jobs fund. Let us start by talking about the Millennium Diagnostic Services. We have helped create 46 permanent full time jobs there. Some of those people probably live in the member's riding. Millennium is setting up a private sector blood testing facility. This facility will provide services to the Canadian Blood Bank Corporation and has big export plans. Even more jobs will probably be created in the future.

We are not talking about make work either. We are talking about medical personnel, lab technicians and support personnel, exactly the sort of people that Newfoundland needs in a high tech world. Those are well paying jobs.

I could go on because there are a number of different issues we could put together, but I do not want to spend a lot of time on the success stories. I want to talk about where we need to go in the future.

The other successful program is the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. As of 1996, the agency reported that it had created or saved 82,000 full time long term jobs. The premise of the member's motion suggests that the government of Canada does not know which way to turn, but the evidence says otherwise.

The 46 people in St. John's who got the new jobs, or what is going on with the other 2,016, or the 82,000 that we have saved, tell this House that the problem is no longer just finding data, the problem is finding jobs. We are not interested in waiting any more. We have the information we need and we will only conduct new studies on specific issues as they arise.

For example, Mr. Eugene Harrigan, the associate head of human resources development's Ontario region, will lead a review of the impact of the end of the Atlantic groundfish strategy on program clients, their communities and provincial finances. This will help the government and our partners to develop forward looking solutions.

We have programs that are working and we have results. Things are happening. Now that we are working more closely than ever with the province, even better things will start to happen.

In the short time that I have, I have given the House concrete examples of how real people at real companies are being put back to work. I want to thank those people in the programs who are trying to help depressed areas like Newfoundland and Labrador. I want to emphasize that we are on the right track. People have to be patient and give those programs an opportunity to work.

[Rob Anders, Reform, Calgary West, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have been in the House a short while and I have heard the term study I do not know how many times.

I would like to read the motion of the hon. member for St. John's East which we are debating today:

That, in the opinion of this House, a special committee should be established to study the severe unemployment problem in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Well there is a new idea. They are talking about studying the problem again. Let us look at the history of studies.

First of all we have a regular standing committee which looks into the issues of the fisheries. The Government of Newfoundland has just completed an analysis of the TAGS program and the problems in Newfoundland. We have the government across the way which says that studies are not the way to go but indeed it has hired Eugene Harrigan to go ahead and study TAGS when the auditor general has already put out a study on TAGS. Those are four studies I count so far.

We do not hear the Tories apologizing for NCARP, the northern cod adjustment and recovery program. They do not apologize for that at all. Indeed they had a little bit of a tag team going. They had John Crosbie and they had curly, their current leader, doing a tag team on it. Curly was the environment minister and he ignored the scientific studies that came out indicating that the fish stocks were depleting and did not do anything about it. John Crosbie knew at the time—