Mr. Speaker, the debate today is rather interesting.
It is my considered opinion that the heritage minister is a walking, or I should say, a flying disaster. The minister envisions
herself as a unity minister but cannot even maintain unity in her own cabinet on issues which surround her portfolio.
For example the defence minister supports a Reform position that would maintain funding for CBC radio, Newsworld and RDI, but would privatize CBC television and CBC stereo. He is clearly offside with her on that issue.
The industry minister and his ministry are understandably very upset with the last minute disjointed amendments to Bill C-32, an act to amend the Copyright Act, which destroyed the process of developing a thoughtful, balanced copyright law. After destroying the committee process, she presented a dog's dinner of disjointed amendments that will create a problem of great magnitude rather than solve the conflict.
The international trade minister appears to be going bald from pulling out his hair when she stumbles forward with frivolous comments about cultural exports totalling $1.4 billion a year because she is jeopardizing Canada-U.S. trade relations. Serenity in Canada's exports of $1 billion a day is threatened by her intemperate, illogical rants about Canadian culture.
I have in hand a letter from the Minister of Transport dated November 21. It should be noted that I also have department statistics which show that as of November 18 there had been 2,237 flags issued to his constituency against the provincial average of 2,500. In the November 21 letter, three days after those numbers came out, he went to great lengths to say that flags appeared to be held up. What he was really getting at was he wanted to be able to make the following comment.
I quote from the Minister of Transport's letter to the Canada flag challenge program: "I am writing to you to inform you that any flags distributed to my constituents may be done so under the signature and mailing privilege of my colleague, the Canadian heritage minister, under whose jurisdiction the program falls, or any other way you see fit. I do not believe that it is appropriate for myself or my staff to be directly involved". Clearly, on the issue we are debating today, the transport minister was going out of his way to distance himself from the frivolousness that surrounds this entire issue which was developed by the heritage minister.
To make my case that she is a loose cannon and a walking disaster in her heritage portfolio, here is what she has actually done with this extremely expensive flag program at a cost of $15.5 million. Unfortunately, she has unwittingly proved that there are two solitudes in Canada and manufactured patriotism by flag waving does not close the gap.
I have figures indicating the number of flags ordered by riding throughout Canada. The question is: Why are these statistics divided into ridings by the Canadian heritage department? There must be something there. Let us take a look at it.
For those of us who may not be aware, flags ordered in Liberal members' ridings were sent out through their offices. That is right. The members' frank or mailing privileges were used. Of course, there is a tidy list of individuals who ordered flags which no doubt will prove to be quite useful in the upcoming election. The heritage minister in a debate with me in the House made the statement: "The flag is not Liberal. The flag is Canadian".
As proof that she is taking a hypocritical position, let us look at the details. An average of 2,000 flags per riding were ordered in every province across Canada, excluding Quebec. However, the following ridings had a considerably higher number of flags ordered. What is the similarity among these ridings? They are held by Liberal members. I would suggest that these members were encouraged to ensure these numbers in order that the minister could meet her one million flag mark.
For example, 8,000 flags were given to the riding of the minister of fisheries; 8,000 flags to Brian Tobin's former riding; 6,406 flags to the riding of the minister of francophonie; and 8,440 to Lanark-Carleton. In contrast, to show how these members pushed so hard on this program, the heritage minister's own riding only ordered 2,847.
The real telling numbers are in Quebec. With 25 per cent of the population, that province only accounted for 11 per cent of the flags ordered. The average number ordered in Quebec ridings was only 400. Again I note the following numbers of flags ordered by the ridings of Liberal members in Quebec against an average of only 400 flags per riding in that province: Hull-Aylmer, 2,944; Pierrefonds; 3,075; Gatineau-La Lièvre, 3,338; Gatineau, 3,000. This clearly establishes that Quebec Liberal members were aggressively spreading as many Canadian flags around as possible in a vain attempt to get the numbers up in Quebec.
What did all this cost and how much planning was there? At the outset the minister clearly and specifically stated that without donations the program would cost $6 million. Her press secretary, Duncan Dee, again confirmed the cost would be between $6 million and $7 million. Now the minister has applied her own mathematical skills to this program, which has cost the taxpayer $15.5 million. According to this minister, she has actually saved us $8 million because there was some wild and orchestrated speculation this past summer that the program would cost $23 million.
In summary, the program announced on February 14, 1996 according to the minister would generate patriotism, drive Canadian unity and would be funded by donations. Instead we have a
program which has had little consequence in the province of Quebec and has cost all Canadians $15.5 million. Remember, the minister originally said that it would cost $6 million but because it cost $8 million less than the wild speculation, she says she is under budget when she comes in at only $15.5 million. We can only hope the Prime Minister will not make her the Minister of Finance.
Included in that cost is another tidy little contract for the minister's former campaign manager, a senior partner at Thornley Fallis, Inc., who is not doing too badly. Since Thornley's benefactor was made Minister of Canadian Heritage, it would seem he has obtained five contracts from the Liberal government.
The minister claims to have reached her goal of one million flags. How was this attained? As I reflected on earlier, with the assistance of her Liberal colleagues. I have received calls and letters from many Canadians who never ordered the flags they received. In many cases they received two, three and even four flags. A Montreal Le Devoir reporter indicated in a story that his offices received seven unsolicited flags, again not ordered. The reporter promptly stuck them in the bottom drawer of his desk. So we ask, what effect are these flags at Le Devoir? An anonymous source in the minister's office contacted me and said that they were instructed to invent names and addresses to get the flags out so the minister could reach her goal.
I ask members of this House, did they see a great flurry of flags this past weekend, which would have demonstrated the tremendous success of this program? How successful? Students in Halifax who have seen the Liberal government gouge $4 billion from the CHST which includes funding for post-secondary education showed their contempt for this wasteful spending by ordering 750 free flags which flew from their windows in protest. This was the most significant flurry of flags that anybody could see this weekend.
All of this falls into the same category as the minister's ill thought Canadian Information Office which when announced was supposed to cost us only $20 million. Using the same mathematics, one can only assume we are going to get dinged for considerably more when the government's term is over. What are we getting for this? Not even a free flag.
I remind the House that the office is not accountable to Parliament. It is not accountable to access to information requests; they are blocked by cabinet order. Employees of that office are considered to be exempt staff which means the minister once again can stuff in as many Liberals as she can dig up and put their services to work for her own partisan purposes. The minister said the CIO would not duplicate any other government service already in place. However, what about Reference Canada within the industry department and all the other information offices run by each department? Further, a minister is responsible for intergovernmental affairs. Does his department not respond to requests for information?
The minister clearly stated that the office was not aimed at the separatists in Quebec. In her July 9 press release she said "Canadians made it clear that they are proud of their country and want to know more about each other-the office will bring measures to help Canadians to understand each other and build a stronger Canada".
She denied very vehemently that it was aimed at separatists at that time. However, only two months later the minister admitted to a reporter "the federal government has a duty to respond to the propaganda which the Quebec government spread during last year's referendum campaign". Which is the truth, her position on July 9 or her position two months later because the two things are mutually exclusive.
Only in Canada could we have members of Parliament who come to dismantle our great, magnificent nation. While I share the minister's concern about the seeds of disunity that the Bloc Quebecois and other separatists are spreading in the province of Quebec, she does not have clue one as to what it will take to focus Canadians on what it means to be Canadian.
Her office has set up a web site, for example, at the CIO office. Not surprisingly Quebecers are ignoring the information office web site in the same proportion as they ignore the minister's ill-thought out expensive flag program.
Let me now remind members of the enormous pride we, as Canadians, all Canadians, feel when we have such enormously successful winning athletes standing on the podium at the Olympic ceremonies, athletes such as Silken Lauman, Donovan Bailey, Karen Magnussen, Sylvie Frechette and Canada's special Olympians at Collingwood, Ontario. Does this not instil a greater pride in our country than a bunch of flags filtered through Liberal MPs offices at the expense of the Canadian taxpayers to the tune of $15.5 million?
On August 30, 1996 the minister insisted that the budget is sufficient to cover the costs and that she will not have to cut other programs to come up with the funds. She should tell that to the amateur athletes whose living funds are being eroded today by the heritage ministry. These are the athletes who grow to become Canada's athletes at home and abroad. Can patriotic Canadians afford to buy flags? You bet they can. Could athletes make use of the $15.5 million for incidentals like track shoes and food? I guess so.
Why did this minister blow the $15.5 million on this program when our athletes are starving to death? As part of the $414 million slashed and bled from the CBC, CBC radio, which is supported by the majority of Canadians, took a $30 million hit. With unbelievable massive cynicism last week this minister has now restored $10 million to CBC radio. The net loss to CBC radio, $20 million. The point is she is blowing away the same amount of money as she has
slashed from CBC radio and she is spending it on the Canadian Information Office.
As a consequence I move the following amendment to the Bloc motion.
I move:
That the motion be amended by deleting all the words after the words "Heritage Canada" and substituting the following therefor:
"such as the $20 million spent on Canada Information Office and the $15.5 million spent on the One Million Flags Operation at a time when cuts unprecedented in the history of Canada have been imposed on cultural institutions such as CBC Radio and direct funding to amateur sports".