Debates of Nov. 25th, 1998

Tobacco Act

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

That is all but that is enough. Why will it not do something about it? That is the part that is so bizarre. We are spending $10 billion in health costs as a direct result of smoking and bringing in $2 billion in revenue.

Some people have power over the government that goes beyond our wildest dreams. I would identify those people as being the cigarette manufacturers of Canada. They are giants.

I want to give the House an example of who some of those giants are. There is the Imperial Tobacco company, which I am sure most of us have heard about. It is a Montreal based company. It is the dominant player in Canada, with a 67% share of the market. It is owned by a British company called B.A.T Industries, which again is a big multinational conglomerate.

I think hon. members will be surprised when they hear what Imperial Tobacco owns.

Imperial Tobacco Limited is Canada's largest tobacco company. Its operations include leaf tobacco buying and processing, and the manufacture and distribution of a wide range of tobacco products. Its major brands include Players, DuMaurier and Matinée. The company is also the largest seller of cigars in Canada, with brands such as House of Lords, White Owl and Old Port. I guess we have heard those names.

It is really interesting to find out that this same conglomerate owns a drugstore chain called Shoppers Drug Mart. That is pretty powerful, but it does not end there. It also owns some trust companies. Some of its holdings include the Canada Trust Company, Canada Trust Realty Inc. and Coldwell Banker Affiliates of Canada Inc. It is pretty big.

I think we would have to believe that these people have some influence on the government when it comes to legislation and what they want to see the government do. Basically they do not want to see the government do anything. If the government really did want to do something concrete about smoking it would adopt Senator Kenny's bill, Bill S-13.

This is interesting, because last week Senator Kenny's bill was introduced in the House of Commons and immediately the government House leader jumped to his feet and used every measure he could to keep this bill out of the House. In other words, government members were using procedural arguments to keep Senator Kenny's bill out of the House of Commons because they are afraid of it. They are afraid of it because this bill would do something about smoking in Canada, particularly among young people. In Canada there are a quarter of a million new smokers coming on line each and every year. Something has to be done about that.

Senator Kenny's bill would do something about that. But the government, if it has anything to say about it, is not going to allow this bill to survive the test on the floor of the House of Commons. The government brought in all of its legal minds to launch challenges against this bill, even though it was introduced by the member for St. Paul's, one of its own members. Government members are going to use every means they can to keep it off the floor of the House of Commons.

This is a strategy on the part of the government. The battle is not coming from the health minister, because the health minister is on record as saying that Bill S-13 has merit and that it is a good bill. Unfortunately, he is out-voted in cabinet. There is one person in cabinet who has more clout than the health minister, which I think is recognized by just about everyone in the House, and that would be the finance minister. The finance minister rules the day in the government and he does not want this bill to come in.

What this bill would do is put a 50 cent levy on every carton of cigarettes manufactured in Canada. This levy would be applied at the manufacturer's level. This is not a tax, but a levy.

There are all kinds of precedents which indicate that this levy is no different than any other levy imposed from time to time on certain industries. We would use the argument of intellectual rights and the 5 cent levy imposed on blank cassettes which was passed in this House a number of years ago. That is just one argument that we would use to say that a levy is indeed appropriate and that there is a difference between a levy and a tax.

The fight is coming from the finance minister. Taxation is sacred to the finance department. In other words, it wants full control of every dollar that it is capable of extracting from our back pockets. It does not want to give up any revenue or any tax points. It does not want to give up its future ability to tax.

This 50 cents a carton is being opposed by the finance minister. I want to compare this to the EI account. We have heard the argument in the House that the finance minister is sitting on a $20 billion EI surplus which goes into the consolidated revenue fund. That is why the finance minister likes it and does not want to give up control of it. It allows him to manipulate the books, balance the budget, declare a deficit free accounting procedure, etcetera. The government loves it. I guess we cannot blame the finance minister for loving it because it allows him to do a little bit of manipulation.

The government does not want to see the same thing happening with this levy at the manufacturing level. This 50 cents per carton would be used to educate young Canadians, but it would not go into the consolidated revenue fund. Therefore, the finance minister would lose control. One might ask “What would be wrong with that?” The government gives and the government can take away.

Does anyone in this House remember David Dodge? Is it not correct that David Dodge was the deputy minister in the finance department in the days of Don Mazankowski and Michael Wilson? He was certainly a senior official in finance during those years.

David Dodge is now the health minister's deputy minister. Talk about the system perpetuating itself. We have someone who in the past gave Michael Wilson and Don Mazankowski, former finance ministers, advice, who is now giving advice to the health minister.

In my conversation with Mr. Dodge he said “I would be worried about this because it means that parliament is giving up its ability to tax”. I said “Listen, I hate to disagree with you, sir, but if parliament places that 50 cent levy on the manufacturers it is also saying that we can take it away if it does not work”, which we could do. There is no argument about that. In fact, Mr. Dodge really did not comment on my suggestion that if we impose it we could take it away if it did not work.

It goes back to that fundamental argument that the finance department does not want to give up control, as it does not want to give up control of the EI fund. It is a surplus that it loves to play around with.

The health minister promised to put $100 million into education over the next five years.

[An hon. member]

Peanuts.

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

Absolutely. It is peanuts. Incidentally this would break down to about $20 million a year.

Ten million dollars would be going toward education and the other $10 million would be going toward enforcement. In other words, I guess we would have cigarette police out there.

Senator Kenny's bill would raise $120 million a year at the manufacturing level which would be about 5 cents a pack. This is so illogical I cannot believe it. But the finance department argues that it could not do that because that would break its agreement with the provinces not to raise taxes or prices on cigarettes from coast to coast. In other words, there has to be federal-provincial agreement to do that.

That in itself is a fallacious argument because what the government is basically arguing is that if we indiscriminately raise the price of cigarettes across the country we are going to get into another smuggling problem like we had in the early nineties.

The smuggling problem was addressed by the government in 1994 when it capitulated again to the cigarette giants, the cigarette manufacturers, the tobacco people. It was the single largest reduction in taxes in the history of Canada. It cut the price of cigarettes almost in half by taking away a big chunk of the tax component.

The government caved in to the smugglers at the expense of young Canadians. Because of that capitulation we have seen the single largest increase in the number of new smokers in the history of Canada ever since, year after year. It is just like a rocket taking off.

What we are saying is that the time is right to enforce that 50 cent levy per carton at the manufacturing level. Why is the time right? Because if we look to the border states of the United States we will find that we are pretty well on par with where they are in terms of price.

The smuggling issue is not going to be as big an issue as it was in the past. Although, I think what we should have done then was to enforce our own laws and get tough on the smugglers. I do not think we should have capitulated to the Mafia kings or the smugglers, but this government did.

Let us take a look at my home province of New Brunswick. In New Brunswick people are paying $3.74 a pack. That was as of September 30, 1998. If we bought a pack of cigarettes in the state of Maine today we would pay $4.10 Canadian, given the fact that our dollar is much weaker than theirs. That is another story.

In other words, in Canada we would pay $3.74 and in Maine we would pay $4.10. There would be a 36 cent difference in our favour. We have room to increase the cost to help educate young Canadians about smoking. I think the government should do it.

This is something that I have to put on the record. The tobacco manufacturers have absolutely no credibility when it comes to arguing their case. The manufactures at one time argued that there is a death benefit to smoking. They actually commissioned a study to prove this. The manufacturers said that there is a net gain in Canada if we all smoke.

Their reasoning went like this. If we smoke we are going to die younger. Therefore, we are not going to be collecting as much old age pension because obviously we will be dying younger. We are not going to be collecting as much Canada pension because we will die younger. We are not going to be receiving any health care benefits because we will be dead. Cigarette manufacturers actually commissioned that study and expected Canadians to believe it.

I go back to my basic argument. The attack on cigarette smoking can only be done in three ways. It has to hit the price, that is the tax on cigarettes, because the government can control prices through taxes. There is a direct correlation between price and consumption. Economists call that fundamental pricing theory. In other words, if the price is high enough fewer people will smoke the product because they will put their money some place else.

The second way is advertising and the third is education. In other words before we could support any tobacco legislation in the House, all three of those components have to be in the bill. Unfortunately they are not in the bill. It has been weakened and weakened badly.

[Elinor Caplan, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Health]

Mr Speaker, I want to make a comment. I listened very carefully to what the member had to say. I am not questioning his motives, but I am questioning the theory and the thesis he has put forward.

I want to tell him, members of the House and anyone else who is watching, that he is wrong. He should be as proud as we are that Canada has a Tobacco Act and now a tobacco amendment act in Bill C-42 that will make us among world leaders in legislation. We also have in place a commitment to education policies which hopefully will respond to our desire to educate young people, to give them the information they need and to encourage them not to start smoking.

Canada has been a world leader in smoking cessation policies. Canada is a world leader in our legislative initiatives. I know that is really hard for the member opposite to take. I understand that. I actually think he is quite a nice guy. When I heard him speaking I just had to say to him, notwithstanding all that, that he is absolutely and completely wrong.

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

Mr. Speaker, now that I know I am a nice guy I feel a lot better. We have to talk about reality in this place. We have Bill S-13 before the House that will be ruled on by the Speaker as to its legitimacy. It will do something about smoking in Canada, particularly for young people.

I ask the member to put her money or her vote where her mouth is. She should support Bill S-13 which incidentally was introduced by one of her own backbenchers who happens to be a medical doctor.

Senator Kenny went around the country from coast to coast. I have here documentation from the Canadian Cancer Society telling us in study after study of the harmful effects of smoking on young people. I have a box of letters. I will not touch it and then it is not a prop. I had to use two soldiers and a pack horse to get the letters here from my office to show the Canadian people how important the issue is.

I was first elected in 1988. I have never had as many letters on a topic as I have had on the smoking issue. I have received thousands of letters. They are going to other members in the opposition parties and to members of the government. That type of evidence suggests Canadians want something done about smoking. I will entertain other questions from the floor.

[Lorne Nystrom, NDP, Qu'Appelle, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I have also received a lot of letters. However there was one topic I received many more letters on, and it was the GST brought in by that member's party. Did he not receive more letters on the GST?

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

Mr. Speaker, that is the problem with the institutional memory around here. The member who just asked that question used to sit in this very seat. I hope I am not contaminated by that type of thing. All I can say is that I received a lot of letters on the GST. In 1993 I paid a huge political price on that issue.

Canadian people will pay a huge price in terms of deaths and in terms of addiction if we do not do something about this very serious issue.

In reference to the same point made by the veteran member from Regina, Saskatchewan, it is funny we were so wrong in the GST that the government just wrapped its arms around it. We do not even hear you saying anything about it, Mr. Speaker, nor any other member over there. Probably it goes back to that same person I talked about in the finance department, David Dodge, giving Michael Wilson and Don Mazankowski advice. Now he is advising the government. I wish he would go back to finance and stay away from the health minister.

[Charlie Power, Progressive Conservative, St. John's West, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question of the member for New Brunswick Southwest who is doing an excellent job critiquing the very good piece of legislation we are talking about, Senator Colin Kenny's Bill S-13.

[Elinor Caplan, Liberal, Thornhill, ON]

How about Bill C-42?

[Charlie Power, Progressive Conservative, St. John's West, NL]

We were talking about it and the member was talking about it. I want to ask the member relating—

[Elinor Caplan, Liberal, Thornhill, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I believe Bill C-42 is before the House and I would ask you to remind the member that is the bill we are addressing.

[The Deputy Speaker]

I am sure the hon. member for St. John's West is a very diligent member. He would certainly turn his question to something that was relevant to the speech given by his colleague, the hon. member for New Brunswick Southwest, which after all was strictly relevant, as I recall, to Bill C-42.

[Charlie Power, Progressive Conservative, St. John's West, NL]

Mr. Speaker, I will happily rephrase the question.

In this case we take in $2 billion worth of revenue for taxes on tobacco in Canada. It costs Canadians $10 billion. I am wondering why there is so much opposition to another bill that was discussed as well. We are trying to raise a miserly $100 million to assist young people to stay off tobacco, to be able to lead normal healthy lives.

How is it that in the U.S. tobacco companies are willing to pay $202 billion to show that the products they sell are so unbelievably harmful to citizens of the United States of America? I also want to say how profitable tobacco companies must be to be able to offer $202 billion to settle some lawsuits.

Why is it so difficult to raise a small levy in Canada to help our young people stay off tobacco?

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

Mr. Speaker, that is the question I cannot answer. That is what makes this whole exercise so bizarre. The numbers are obviously against doing what the government is doing, to try to phrase it properly.

I have some letters sitting on the desk of the member who happens to be the finance critic for my party. He sent me a little note. I think he is over in his office and one of the pages just brought it. He wants me to tell Canadians that the tobacco tax reduction is the only tax cut the present government has given the Canadian people since taking office in 1993.

In reference to the question, I am perplexed as to why the government would go down a road which is such a sorry road. It has an opportunity to do something and it is not doing it. All I can say is it has to be caving in to big business, to the big tobacco manufacturers. I do not think there is an answer other than that.

[Sheila Copps, Liberal, Minister of Canadian Heritage]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the member for New Brunswick Southwest could redirect a question to the member for St. John's East who a few moments ago spoke in high praise about the policies of Canada. Of course we will recall that the member's party voted against Canada. I wonder if he could now inform the House whether he really thinks it is a good deal to be in Canada.

[The Deputy Speaker]

I am not quite sure how the member for New Brunswick Southwest will redirect any question to one of his colleagues. Maybe he could answer this question.

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I think the heritage minister has had too much caffeine today. I cannot fathom that question. With due respect to the minister of heritage, I think she has this confused with her flip-flop position on the GST.

[The Deputy Speaker]

It seems to me maybe there has been a lot of caffeine on every side.

We could perhaps resume debate at this point, but given the time do members want to see it as 5.30 p.m.? Or, do they want to have five minutes of debate and have the speech interrupted? I am in the hands of the House. Does the hon. member wish to start his remarks?

[Grant Hill, Reform, Macleod, AB]

Yes, Mr. Speaker. On Bill C-42 I thought I might go over the Liberal record on tobacco. This is a summary of all the things that have happened since I have been in the House, since 1993.

First, the government reduced prices to combat smuggling. Second, it caved in on plain packaging. Third, it passed Bill C-71. It weakened Bill C-71 by giving in to Grand Prix racing, and with the ongoing weakening from other sponsorship groups the result is Bill C-42.

It is very instructive to look at what has been the result of these measures. It is not that tough to do. One can actually go and look at statistics on tobacco consumption in Canada as I have done.

The statistics I will be presenting today will be very specific for Canada since 1991. The reduction of tobacco smoking in 1991 was 6.16%. This trend had been going on for many years. In 1993 it dropped to 3.49%. In 1994 for the first time in 30 years it went up to 9.20%. I want this to be plain. This is total market for tobacco. That includes tobacco smuggled and tobacco used in Canada. Some would look at statistics and say we do anything we want with them. If the U.S. statistics are compared with the Canadian statistics they have been in lock step for those 30 years.

In 1994 the Canadian statistics took a dramatic jump. The jump was directed, and Statistics Canada shows this plainly, at our youth. The bill is weakening a pretty good bill, Bill C-71, which Reformers supported. I am proud to say Reformers were able to actually prevent procedural wrangling on that bill.

Bill C-71 was directed at youth. It allowed advertising to still go toward adults who had already made the decision to smoke. In adult only publications and in bars it was quite legitimate for tobacco companies to advertise. That took away from the tobacco companies a tremendous lever, the lever of court challenge that would make Bill C-71 no longer legal. We now have a bill which groups involved in health are saying is a weakening.

I will end my speech now so that we can carry on and vote on Bill C-42.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Is it the intention of the House to proceed with putting the question? Is the House ready for the question?

[Some hon. members]

No.

[The Deputy Speaker]

It being 5.30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of Private Members' Business as listed on today's order paper.

Parliamentary Privilege

[John Solomon, NDP, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

moved:

That, in the opinion of this House, members of the House of Commons and senators should be treated equally before the law and therefore the parliamentary privilege that allows members of the House of Commons and senators to refuse to give evidence in a Canadian courts of law should be abolished.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague, the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, for seconding this motion.

I am pleased to speak on this motion today, particularly since I drafted it two years ago as a result of some unfortunate circumstances in my home province of Saskatchewan but which could continue to have some importance as efforts to discover the extent of government's involvement in the APEC issue unfold.

MPs and senators do not have to obey a subpoena to testify in court, ever. I think that is wrong, as do many other Canadians. So I moved Motion No. 53 to remove that absolute privilege. I would like to explain why.

Motion No. 53 seeks to eliminate the privilege of members of the House of Commons and senators to evade an obligation to testify before a court or civil proceeding. It is a privilege I am not sure many new MPs realize they have. The principle behind the privilege not to attend a court of law and give evidence is that attendance at the House of Commons or the Senate is the first call on a member's or senator's time. There are practical reasons for this principle and historic reasons for the rule being written in such an absolute fashion.

But there is a competing principle that parliamentarians should not be above the law. We need to reconsider how we reconcile these two principles and allow for some time in MPs' schedules to show up in court if they are needed.

In October 1996 when I drafted this motion we were in the middle of a series of trials in Saskatchewan regarding allegations of fraud, theft of public funds and breach of public trust. The charges dated back to the period from 1986 to 1991 and involved members of a previous provincial government, both cabinet members and members of the legislative assembly.

In January 1995, 11 current and former MLAs, including former deputy premier and now Saskatchewan Senator Eric Berntson, were trying to evade testifying in a preliminary inquiry into charges against former PC caucus communications director John Scraba. The Court of Queen's Bench ruled that they had to testify.

By October 1996 one staffer and twelve former Conservative MLAs had been charged. By then five had been convicted, three were acquitted and one committed suicide. At that time former Lloydminister MLA Michael Hopfner was on trial. He called Senator Berntson as a witness. A subpoena was issued but police could not serve it on the senator on the Parliament Hill precincts because of his parliamentary privilege. The senator in any event was not required as a matter of parliamentary privilege to answer or to even acknowledge the subpoena.

Senator Berntson would not discuss his reasons for this action with the media, but the Senate's legal counsel, in a letter to the senator's personal lawyer Clyne Harradance, apparently confirmed that Senator Berntson was entitled to refuse the subpoena all together as part of his parliamentary privileges and immunities.

I will go into the specifics of the privilege issue shortly. To continue the story, the issue was raised at that time by several members of parliament, myself included. It was the subject of media stories and several columns and editorials. There was a public outcry against the way the senator seemed to be hiding behind his parliamentary privilege. There was even a suggestion in some quarters that by appointing him to the senate, the former prime minister was deliberately availing Senator Berntson of this potential cover.

Three weeks later the senator wrote an open letter claiming he was not trying to evade testifying by invoking his Senate privileges and he eventually took the stand. Mr. Hopfner was convicted and sentenced to 18 months in jail. Three months later, on January 24, 1997, Senator Berntson was charged with breach of trust and two counts of fraud. Five other individuals were also charged that day, bringing the total number of individuals charged to some 20 people. Senator Berntson resigned the next day as deputy leader of the opposition in the Senate and also from the Tory caucus pending both the preliminary hearing held this time last year and his trial before a judge which it was recently announced will commence January 11, 1999.

Senators and members of parliament do not have the privilege to avoid arrest or even to escape criminal charges but they may not be compelled to appear in court as witnesses or to serve on a jury, according to Beauchesne's sixth edition, citations 89 and 90. Citation 89 refers to the privilege I would like to abolish, namely that no member may be compelled to appear in court as a witness.

Beauchesne's sixth edition was published in 1989. Citation 91 states: “Neither the House nor its members have ever made any specific claims to freedom from service of process within the precincts”. No sooner was it published than the situation changed. In March 1989 Edmonton MP David Kilgour, now a Liberal cabinet minister, was served with a subpoena in his constituency office to testify—

[The Deputy Speaker]

I am sure the hon. member knows he cannot refer to the hon. member by name but by secretary of state.

[John Solomon, NDP, Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, SK]

Mr. Speaker, I stand corrected. I apologize and withdraw that. The secretary of state was served with a subpoena in his constituency office to testify in court about a meeting he had with constituents a few years before. Speaker Fraser ruled: “The service of a subpoena within the precincts of the House of Commons is improper without the permission of the Speaker”.

The member at the time and now secretary of state was asking Speaker Fraser to extend the definition of privilege to encompass something akin to a solicitor-client privilege between an MP and his or her constituents. Speaker Fraser declined to do so. The current secretary of state may have a point in wanting to extend our privileges on that score but I am seeking to limit the blanket waiver against MPs or senators having to testify in court.

I do not believe MPs or senators should have an unfettered privilege to refuse to testify in court as witnesses. The primary claim of parliament to members' attendance no longer demands this blanket waiver. I make reference to the practice created in Britain in the 1600s to safeguard MPs from King Charles I who often imprisoned outspoken politicians. It also prevented poorly paid MPs from being thrown into debtors prison for non-payment of debts. Enshrined in the Canadian Constitution Act of 1867, the privilege grants members the right to speak in parliament without fear of harassment for what he or she says. I still support that privilege without which we would be handcuffed as spokespersons for our constituents and others outside our ridings.

MPs and senators are exempted from jury duty because of their obligation to serve the nation's highest court, parliament. Parliamentary privilege exists to ensure the people's representatives are free to work in the public interest. I maintain and support that point of view.

Beauchesne's and Maingot assert that the two houses of parliament have the first call on the attendance of their members. Fair enough, but that principle was elaborated in the specific rules of privilege before the invention of the airplane. At that time parliament was called for a session that lasted some months and then prorogued at the end. MPs and senators had to travel for up to a week and maybe more sometimes to attend the session. They travelled by train or horse and buggy.

Today a parliamentary session is never prorogued until just before a new session is announced, usually the day before or the day of the new session. However, the House and the Senate adjourn regularly and even predictably because of our calendar. MPs and senators can fly anywhere in Canada in under a day if they really need to. Therefore I believe it is not necessary to assert the primary claim of parliament to members' attendance by giving members an unfettered right to avoid testifying as witnesses in court. MPs or Senators who have information relevant to non-frivolous criminal or civil proceedings should be required to testify like any other Canadian so long as the Chamber is adjourned or prorogued.

Of course as whip of the NDP, I would not want to see a situation where one political party could subpoena MPs from another political party to defeat a government with respect to a vote or ensure that a close vote was passed, for example. But the current blanket privilege makes Canadians believe parliamentarians are above the law.

Many people in Saskatchewan two years ago told me they thought Senator Berntson was exercising his privileges not out of a sense of the importance of his work in the Senate but to avoid giving testimony at one trial that might later lead to his own criminal charges. Although I do not want to comment on a matter that is currently before the courts, I can say that it was not so impossible to see how they might come to that conclusion.

What will happen if the RCMP public complaints commission should subpoena the former solicitor general or the Prime Minister? A subpoena cannot be served on Parliament Hill without the permission of the Speaker. The public complaints commission has the powers of a board of inquiry, but the Prime Minister is saying there is no precedent for him to testify if called.

I do not believe we should give prime ministers or cabinet ministers or MPs any shields to hide behind anymore, in particular as they appear as witnesses. My motion is intended to modernize the rules of parliament and the rules for parliamentarians to maintain public confidence in their elected representatives as well as to ensure an equitable justice system and to make sure that politicians are not above the law.

I hope hon. members will find the motion worthy of support. I look forward to addressing their comments at the end of the hour.