House of Commons Hansard #142 of the 35th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was workers.

Topics

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

Bloc

Gilles Duceppe Bloc Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC

Aha, Ms. Copps' flags.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

Bloc

Michel Gauthier Bloc Roberval, QC

He knows this does not make sense-

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

Bloc

Yvan Loubier Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC

This will not fly.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

Bloc

Michel Gauthier Bloc Roberval, QC

-being a reasonable man. And I know his answer does not hold water.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

Bloc

Yvan Loubier Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC

So he is incompetent. It is sheer incompetence.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

Bloc

Michel Gauthier Bloc Roberval, QC

I want to ask him, why, with this kind of flexibility, did he do nothing for the poor and the unemployed who are legion in Canada, instead of the measly measures listed in his latest budget?

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:15 p.m.

LaSalle—Émard Québec

Liberal

Paul Martin LiberalMinister of Finance

Mr. Speaker, consider what we have done: we spent $850 million to help poor families with children, and add to this our investments in tourism, in research and development and in education, all in order to create jobs.

So the question I might ask the Leader of the Opposition is this: at the request of Mr. Landry and other finance ministers, the President of the Treasury Board extended the infrastructures program, in order to create jobs. Why has Mr. Landry yet to accept the offer made by the President of the Treasury Board concerning the infrastructures program?

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

Roberval Québec

Bloc

Michel Gauthier BlocLeader of the Opposition

Mr. Speaker, with a miscalculation of about $12 billion in his estimates, the Minister of Finance should not have cut $4.5 billion from the provinces and $5 billion from the unemployed.

Are we to understand that what the Minister of Finance is about to do, with this incredible security of some $12 billion, is sprinkle a few billion dollars here and a few billion there across Canada during the next election campaign, to curry favour with the electorate?

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

LaSalle—Émard Québec

Liberal

Paul Martin LiberalMinister of Finance

Mr. Speaker, life must be tough for the Leader of the Opposition when his only criticism of the Minister of Finance is that he was too prudent in his forecasts.

May I suggest to the Leader of the Opposition that he ask his head office to accept the government's offer to extend the infra-

structures program, so that we can start creating jobs in Montreal and in Quebec as soon as possible?

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

Bloc

Yvan Loubier Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Finance.

We learn, three weeks after the budget, that the Minister of Finance has a much greater leeway than the Bloc expected. It is beyond all. As of this year, the Minister of Finance will have at least $12 billion more than he projected in his 1996 budget. Next year, it will be $17 billion.

Today in Canada, three million people are on welfare and one and a half million children live in poverty. Why did the Minister of Finance prefer to keep this colossal float rather than use this money to give people hope once again?

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

LaSalle—Émard Québec

Liberal

Paul Martin LiberalMinister of Finance

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, in responding to a question from the Leader of the Opposition, I wanted to quote someone and I was cut off.

I would like to quote the same person today, in response to the hon. member. I will be much shorter: "We are on the right road. This is not the time to quit; we must keep going. Economies are changing. We must fix public finances, control the deficit and let interest rates drop". That was Lucien Bouchard. He is right and so am I.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

Bloc

Yvan Loubier Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC

Mr. Speaker, we have never denied that a zero deficit had to be reached at some point. But here he is going too far.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

Some hon. members

Hear, hear.

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

Bloc

Yvan Loubier Bloc Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC

Is the minister aware that he could reach a zero deficit before the year 2000 by not cutting $4.5 billion in social programs; by leaving the unemployed their $5 billion surplus; by giving substantial help to job creation and by paying the $2 billion it owes to Quebec for harmonizing the GST?

The DeficitOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

LaSalle—Émard Québec

Liberal

Paul Martin LiberalMinister of Finance

Mr. Speaker, here again, the member has not asked a question. He has made a statement.

I will simply say that, when you look at the fact that the federal government transfers over $10 billion a year, including 45 per cent of equalization payments to Quebec.

We have to look at the technological partnership my colleague has set up, at the number of aeronautics companies in Quebec that benefited.

It is amazing, but we have now had five questions from the official opposition and its main criticism of the Minister of Finance and of this government is that we have beaten our deficit targets every year. We accept the criticism and we are going to keep on beating our deficit targets.

JusticeOral Question Period

2:20 p.m.

Reform

Preston Manning Reform Calgary Southwest, AB

Mr. Speaker, this morning in Vancouver a preliminary hearing began into child killer Clifford Olson's appeal for early release under section 745 of the Criminal Code.

This hearing will be an indescribable horror for the families of the victims. It should not be happening and it would not be happening if the government had acted sooner and if it had repealed section 745 instead of tinkering with it.

Outraged Canadians are holding rallies today in Vancouver and elsewhere, asking how the government could be so callous and insensitive toward the victims of Clifford Olson's crimes.

I ask the Deputy Prime Minister, how could the government be so utterly insensitive to the families of Clifford Olson's victims as to permit this hearing?

JusticeOral Question Period

2:25 p.m.

Etobicoke Centre Ontario

Liberal

Allan Rock LiberalMinister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada

Mr. Speaker, every member of this caucus has nothing but profound empathy for the tragedies suffered by the families of those victims and for the people who have lost loved ones to crime.

It is because of the victims, it is in their interests and in their name, it is for them that the government has acted so often to change the criminal law so that it might be more responsive.

With regard to section 745, it was after I met with the widow of an RCMP officer who was murdered in Saskatchewan who explained to me how awful it was for her to be at the 745 hearing but not be allowed to participate, it was after that meeting with Marie King Forest that I proposed in the House a change to section 745 to guarantee victims a role in such hearings.

It was because of the government's concern with the plight of victims that last year we introduced in the House Bill C-45, which ensures that section 745 of the code will be used only in the most exceptional cases, not at all for those who have taken more than one life, and for all the others only after a judge agrees that their case is meritorious and only when a jury unanimously agrees that they should have consideration. This government has acted on behalf of victims.

JusticeOral Question Period

2:25 p.m.

Reform

Preston Manning Reform Calgary Southwest, AB

Mr. Speaker, the minister professes this great empathy and sympathy for victims of crime and he gives us a list of tinkering measures.

What has the government done to actually act on its sympathy and empathy? It tinkers with section 745 rather than repealing it. It pays lip service to our victims bill of rights and then allows it to languish in the Parliamentary committee. It spends hundreds of man hours and hundreds of thousands of dollars on ensuring that

Clifford Olson gets a hearing and it invests no time, no money and no energy in the victims of his crime.

If the justice minister is so sympathetic, so empathetic to the victims of crime, will he commit today to enact a victims bill of rights that was presented to the House 11 months ago by the member for Fraser Valley West?

JusticeOral Question Period

2:25 p.m.

Etobicoke Centre Ontario

Liberal

Allan Rock LiberalMinister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada

Mr. Speaker, I wrote to the chair of the justice committee requesting that it undertake that task, designing changes to the Criminal Code in addition to what we proposed on behalf of victims.

Let me point to the record of the government in establishing that we have done more for victims in the justice system than any national government in memory.

The drunkenness defence was available until we acted on behalf of victims to make sure that it would not be. On behalf of victims we have introduced changes to provide for DNA testing in criminal law for the first time, putting it on an express basis.

If we look at the record of the party opposite we find an entirely different story. When we proposed changes in Bill C-37 to the Young Offenders Act to provide for victim impact statements, the Reform Party voted against it.

When we proposed in Bill C-41 elaborate provisions to help victims get restitution, the Reform Party voted against it.

Last year when we proposed the changes to section 745 which would prevent multiple murderers in the future from applying the Reform Party voted against it.

JusticeOral Question Period

2:30 p.m.

Reform

Preston Manning Reform Calgary Southwest, AB

Mr. Speaker, the bottom line is that Clifford Olson, as a result of the actions of this minister, gets a national soapbox. What victims get is a study.

In the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in the section on legal rights there are 16 provisions affirming the rights of persons suspected or charged or convicted of crimes. There is not one section, not one clause, dealing with the rights of victims of crime. Right across the country Canadians are sick and tired of that imbalance. They want a justice system that puts the rights of victims ahead of the rights of criminals like Clifford Olson.

Will the justice minister commit today to pass the victims bill of rights that is languishing in committee or will the Liberals fail Clifford Olson's victims yet again?

JusticeOral Question Period

2:30 p.m.

Etobicoke Centre Ontario

Liberal

Allan Rock LiberalMinister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada

Mr. Speaker, at a certain point one wonders why the hon. leader of the third party would ask, since every time we come forward with a measure on behalf of victims his party votes against it. If we are to have further amendments, indeed if we are to have an amendment to our charter, perhaps it should be against the shameless exploitation of victims.

One could understand why those victims were on the stage yesterday in Vancouver. They are driven by the pain of the tragedies they have suffered. One also understands why Reform members are on the stage and why Reform members are leading this band. They are exploiting the very tragedies which they pretend to decry.

Perhaps most important of all, by behaving as they are, Reform Party members are giving Clifford Olson exactly what he most wants, the only thing they can give him, a platform on which to become even more infamous-

JusticeOral Question Period

2:30 p.m.

Some hon. members

Hear, hear.

JusticeOral Question Period

2:30 p.m.

Bloc

Réal Ménard Bloc Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC

Mr. Speaker, since 1993 the American legal system has been asking Canadian authorities to extradite the Jacques Émond, of the Hell's Angels. Mr. Émond, who is now living in British Columbia, is accused of conspiring to traffic in large quantities of hashish and cocaine and of having been a full time member of a criminal organization between January 1976 and February 1990.

How can the Minister of Justice explain that after three and a half years the case to request extradition has been postponed eight times at the request of the crown and that Jacques Émond is still in Canada?

JusticeOral Question Period

2:30 p.m.

Etobicoke Centre Ontario

Liberal

Allan Rock LiberalMinister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada

Mr. Speaker, I am not familiar with the details of this case. I will raise the matter with my officials and I will reply in a few days.

JusticeOral Question Period

2:30 p.m.

Bloc

Réal Ménard Bloc Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC

Mr. Speaker, by postponing the case in this way, the minister must be aware that there is a risk of abuse of process.

Does the Minister of Justice realize that his department is creating conditions that will make it impossible to extradite Jacques Émond, thus protecting a criminal?