Debates of Dec. 1st, 1998

Aids

[Allan Rock, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, today marks the 11th World AIDS Day. It is important to reflect on the problems and the challenges before us, and to develop an awareness of the risks involved, particularly among young people.

It is to that end that we have adopted a Canada-wide strategy against AIDS. The Government of Canada has displayed leadership in this matter and on the issue of drug research.

We are now improving the approval process for new drugs, and we have already taken action in that respect. This is in the public interest.

Health

[Jean Augustine, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to ask on world AIDS day if the Minister of Health could tell us what is being done to combat this terrible disease which is a growing epidemic, especially among young people around the world. Recent statistics show us that half of new HIV infections are among young people. What is the strategy to combat this terrible disease among young people?

[Allan Rock, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, this morning I published the first annual report from the Government of Canada to Canadians on the progress of our strategy against HIV and AIDS, a strategy in which we are investing $42 million each and every year.

While there are daunting challenges before us there were some encouraging things that were reported this morning. We are working in partnership with Canadians. The voices of the communities are being heard. We are targeting youth in particular, aiming toward prevention through education and instruction. We are investing in research. We are supporting community efforts. We are focusing this year on youth.

[The Speaker]

The oral question period that just ended was a little more difficult than usual for all members. One must realize, as I do, that we sometimes get a little carried away during question period.

During today's oral question period, one member, the Prime Minister, used the word “hypocrisy”. I asked him not to use that word, and when the hon. member for Roberval took the floor, he also used the word “hypocrisy”. I asked him not to use such a word and, later, for some reason, the hon. member said that another member was a “hypocrite”.

I find this language to be unparliamentary. I asked my colleague, the hon. member for Roberval, to withdraw his comment that another member was a hypocrite, but he would only do so if the other member also withdrew his comments.

It is now up to me, as Speaker of the House, to make a decision.

This is not a simple decision to make, and I once again address myself directly to my colleague, the hon. member for Roberval, for whom I have a great deal of respect. I respectfully ask him to withdraw the word he used, when he said that another member was a “hypocrite”.

I address myself directly to the hon. member for Roberval and I ask him to withdraw his comments.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, may I ask you to look at the blues before making your decision?

It is my impression that there is an important nuance between what I said and what you tell me I said. I believe that looking at the blues would be the best thing for you, for myself, for everyone and for the Standing Orders. After that, you and I can take the proper steps within the parliamentary process.

If I might ask you this rather small favour of looking at the blues and we can then discuss this situation again. I will make honourable amends, if necessary.

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask you to check the blues first. Is it possible to ask you to do so?

[The Speaker]

As the hon. member said, there may be some nuances in the words used.

In my judgment, the words used, the words “il est un hypocrite”, he is a hypocrite, caused a disturbance in this House, in my opinion. For that reason, I am asking the hon. member once again—

[An hon. member]

The Prime Minister provoked it.

[The Speaker]

Once again, in my judgment the words used during the Oral Question Period by the hon. member for Roberval, were unparliamentary. I ask him once again to withdraw the words he spoke.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have great respect for the Chair, for the institution, but for once, I will have to accept your verdict. Unfortunately, I cannot comply with your request. It goes against my principles.

I consider that I have been unfairly treated compared to the Prime Minister.

Naming Of Member

[The Speaker]

It is not with great pleasure that I say the following:

Mr. Gauthier, I must name you for disregarding the authority of the Chair.

Pursuant to the powers vested in me under Standing Order 11, I order you to withdraw from the House for the remainder of today's sitting.

Privilege

[Randy White, Reform, Langley—Abbotsford, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege with regard to yet another leaked document, this time on the subcommittee on sport.

I propose to spend a brief amount of time on this, but I will suggest a solution to the House on behalf of our members on how to curtail this.

While browsing through press clippings this morning I noted that the debate on the report of the subcommittee on sport began on Friday in the Toronto Star . Tim Harper in an article makes the following comment: “Canada's professional sports teams would be eligible for tax breaks if they can show they are providing substantial revenues to their communities but need some help to continue, a committee will recommend”.

It goes on to quote the chairman, the member for Broadview—Greenwood, saying: “His committee will recommend Canadian sports franchises playing in North American leagues could be eligible for tax breaks if—” and it goes on and on. The article lists a number of items from the report.

The Saturday edition of the National Post on page A17 reports much of the same thing and uses the language “A Commons committee recommends”, and on it goes.

Today in the Ottawa Citizen the debate continues on the report. In an article Gare Joyce states that the opposition members leaked details of the report late last week.

We have circumstantial evidence that points to the chair openly discussing the report and the article in the Ottawa Citizen actually cites members as leakers. Whatever the case may be, there are leakers among us.

I am not surprised this committee is ignoring parliamentary practice since it was this committee in fact that decided to ignore parliament altogether when it travelled to Toronto without the permission of the House. It is my understanding that the committee actually brought with it a host of Commons interpreters and other staff.

This committee and its members have absolutely no respect for parliament. But then again, why should they? Leaking a report before it is tabled in the House is more common than waiting for a report to be tabled.

There are some recent examples are, Mr. Speaker, and you have heard them all from us. There is the third report of the justice committee, the fourth report of the fisheries committee, the second report of the health committee, the child custody report, the foreign affairs report, and now the report on sport in Canada.

What is happening here, Mr. Speaker, is that these people who leak this information are being rewarded by getting a hit in the news and the news organization that receives the leaked information gets a news scoop.

Since there is no deterrent for leaking reports, reports continue to be leaked in this House. This has happened so often without the House taking responsibility that committees and their members have now decided to ignore parliament altogether. I wonder what will be next.

If parliament is going to be known as a good place for a leak, then we have to talk about a little more transparency on the issue. We might as well openly leak reports.

I am faced with this situation with my colleagues. We have not leaked reports but we are sick and tired of reports being leaked from all of the committees. Either these reports will stop being leaked from these committees or this party here will consider reports from committees to be open public documents.

I ask, Mr. Speaker, that you consider this and consider that time after time we come to this House and appeal to you to have this sort of thing stopped with no satisfactory resolution whatsoever.

[Dennis Mills, Liberal, Broadview—Greenwood, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I can only speak to that portion of the member's remarks that deals with the subcommittee on sport. I can say two things. It was approved in the heritage committee this morning that the report would be tabled here on Thursday morning. I can also say to the hon. member that he will not find one sentence of any article anywhere in this country in the report that will be tabled here on Thursday. The report as of this minute has not been leaked in any way, shape or form to the press.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, the chair of the subcommittee in question has just indicated that to the best of his knowledge nothing that is in the report in fact has appeared elsewhere.

May I respectfully recommend to the Chair that before determining whether in fact there has been a leak, let alone what is done with it, that one should await the tabling of the document in question. That would not ascertain whether there has been a leak but it certainly would ascertain of course if the allegations made today in the media are false. We would at least know that as a first proposition.

That being said, I understand that the procedure and House affairs committee has received representations from hon. members. In fact it intends to start a discussion of this issue very shortly and of course subsequently to report its findings to the House.

There are two things. One, we do not have a copy of the report of the said subcommittee before the House and no way to compare whether or not the allegations in the paper are factual. Two, we should also wait for the report of the committee on procedure and House affairs.

That being said, I must say that I profoundly agree with anyone who suggests that it is improper to leak reports from standing committees. I as a parliamentarian and all members of this House have the right to be the first to know of what is prepared by a committee of our own colleagues. I fully subscribe to that proposition and I fully condemn anyone who attempts to make a report of ours as members of parliament available to someone else before our own colleagues.

[Bill Blaikie, NDP, Winnipeg—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to say that I share the concern expressed by the House leader of the Reform Party and for that matter by the government House leader about the pattern of leaked committee reports.

I will have more to say on a subsequent point of order about question period, but one just feels the whole place here is teetering on the brink of chaos. People each in their own way are showing no respect for a variety of customs that have been established in this place to keep us from descending into chaos. One of those things has been the provision that committee reports are private and confidential until such time as they are tabled in this House.

This is part of a larger pattern of disregard for the House. It is not surprising to me, although I say this in no way to excuse it, but over time members would come to see the media as the place to make announcements when a pattern has developed over the years where the government itself does it. The House itself is used less and less by ministers, by the Prime Minister and by the government to make announcements. It is not just committee reports that we read about in the paper; it is government policy announcements and other kinds of major announcements that we read about in the paper. It is a pattern that is destroying this place.

Mr. Speaker, I do not know what you can do about it because in the end it is something we all have to do something about. It does not just have to do with committees. It has to do with a pattern of government disregard for the House which has caught on and which has become endemic and is reaching its way into every aspect of our undertakings here.

I would urge members in whatever their capacity, whether they are government or opposition, that wherever they have an opportunity, to uphold the view that here is where we hear about things first. Here is where members of parliament get elected so they can hear about things first, instead of reading about it in the newspaper whether it is a committee report or an announcement by a minister. Then we can get back to being a parliament for a change.

[Chuck Strahl, Reform, Fraser Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the comments of the House leader of the NDP. As usual I appreciate his experience in this place and his observations of what has happened over the years. It is well known that members of the Reform Party are willing to look at new ways and different ways of doing business in this place.

There are things that need to be respected. What needs to be respected are the rules that we have agreed on going into the game. As happened yesterday, rules were changed on Private Members' Business by resolution of the House. That is how you change the rules and until such time you live under those rules.

But when constantly day in and day out and week in and week out reports are leaked to the press, ideas and balloons are floated in the press, then imagine the whip's job as he tries to get people into committee and argue with them that it is important work of parliament and we are doing the people's work by doing these studies. People come back to me and other people in the party and say halfway through that it is totally irrelevant because the government leaks it to the media.

The question of was an exact quote attributed verbatim out of a report does not matter in this instance. On talking about the sports report that was leaked earlier, when someone quotes somebody as saying that his committee will recommend Canadian sports franchises playing in North American leagues could be eligible for tax breaks, that may not be a word for word quote out of the report, but what is the difference? The report is out. It is now public debate. The work of committee members who have been slogging it out for months on that report is now irrelevant. We may as well all go down and talk to our favourite reporter and duke it out.

That is not the way to come to consensus. Members of parliament who do not like that can come to this place and try to change the rules. But the rules should be followed.

This party is following the rules. I believe this side of the House is following the rules. That side of the House had better smarten up or, as the House leader of the NDP has already said, we are going to devolve into more disrespect for parliament unless they get their act together.

[The Speaker]

As was stated by the hon. member for Winnipeg—Transcona, we are indeed talking about a broader problem. It is a problem here with parliament where we were elected to serve.

What we have with the point of privilege that was brought up by the hon. member for Langley—Abbotsford, at least at this point from what I can hear, is that the hon. member is saying that someone from the government side leaked a document. He does not name a member but he seems to indicate that one of the members may have done it.

The member that he seems to have indicated, the member for Broadview—Greenwood, stood on his feet and as an hon. member he told us here in this House that he and no one else that he knows of has leaked this particular document.

We are right about one thing, that we do have the rules in the House and ultimately the rules are going to be kept by us, the members of this House. I do not know how many times that I as the Speaker have to appeal to all members. These rules are made for all of us.

At this point, from what I have heard, we have a dispute on the facts of what happened. I find that there is no prima facie case for a point of privilege.

However, how many times do we all stand in this House and bemoan this fact? The government House leader says that he is absolutely opposed to anything like this. We have the Leader of the Opposition who is absolutely opposed. The spokesperson for the New Democratic Party is opposed. We all agree and yet these things still go on.

Unless we the parliamentarians together make a decision as to how we are going to conduct ourselves in here, we must not just deteriorate into the chaos of pointing fingers at one another.

I find that there is no prima facie case for a point of privilege.

I appeal to all my colleagues that unless we want to make this place work, it will not work. I appeal to your sense of honour that this type of thing should not happen. The best place for these announcements is here in our House where we are. This is where they should be made.

I encourage all of you, whoever the person is who leaked this, if they are indeed in this House or close to the people in this House, in the name of respect for this institution, that this cease forthwith.

Points Of Order

[Bill Blaikie, NDP, Winnipeg—Transcona, MB]

Mr. Speaker, my point of order has to do with question period.

As some members know, like some other members around here I am closing in on 20 years in this place and I have to say that was one of the worst question periods I have ever experienced. I think we all have some thinking to do about what is happening in question period and what happened to it in the extreme today.

I do not think we can continue in a situation where there is this sort of collective bellowing and clapping that goes on after every exchange. This is not a soccer game here for God's sake.

I can be as partisan as the next person. I like a good heckle and a good exchange, but everything that has been happening throughout this fall is going beyond the beyond.

I must confess a collective self-interest in the matter. It is not just a question of decorum for us, it also a question that the smaller parties get pushed off at the end of question period when this happens. The people who are generally at fault in this, who have the power collectively in their numbers to bring the House to a standstill, are not the people who suffer. Either the government or the Bloc or the Reform Party each take its turn at this and who suffers? Who gets pushed off at the end of question period? It is not the people who have the power to create this kind of situation.

I am concerned about it from the point of view of the NDP and the Conservatives, but it is not just that. It is also the people on the end of the list for the Reform Party, on the end of the list for the Bloc and the government backbenchers who were on the list. I do not think we can tolerate this situation any longer.

Mr. Speaker, I plead with you to rethink your own tactics in this regard. I know that you do not want to say “order”, but I am very concerned that the tactic which you employ of simply standing until the House reconvenes, until it quiets down by itself, is not working. As much as I know your reasons, which I think are noble, for not wanting to say “order”, there are certainly times in this place for the Speaker to intervene and say “order”, as speakers do with gavels or orally in parliaments all around the world. There is a time and a place for this. I would urge you to rethink your strategy in this regard because it is visibly, obviously, clearly not working.

Today was a perfect example of that. There were moments when I felt that an intervention by the Chair might have brought order or might simply have moved us on. If you feel one party or another is contributing negatively to decorum, move on to the next party. Do as speakers in the past have done and use the discretion of the Chair to punish people who are not contributing to decorum.

It may be that people who are members of the parties which are acting up will be punished for the sins of their colleagues, but collectively they will have a discussion about it after the fact and maybe better behaviour will come of it.

When people watch this on television they cannot tell who is yelling. All they see is you, Mr. Speaker, so they think we are all yelling. We are not all yelling. Some of us are sitting here hoping the place will get quiet so we can get on with our questions. It does not help the public perception of the House of Commons to have you standing there for literally five minutes at a time sometimes, as was the case today, while there is this terrible background noise. It cannot be good for parliament in terms of its perception and it certainly is not good for parliament in terms of its everyday practice.

[Peter MacKay, Progressive Conservative, Pictou—Antigonish—Guysborough, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I feel compelled to add to the remarks of my colleague from Winnipeg—Transcona. He is absolutely right when he says that those who are perhaps the most active in this raucous behaviour that is delaying question period are the direct beneficiaries of that behaviour and that the people who pay the price are those in the smaller parties.

Let us have something else on the record. The loss of two or four questions from the two smallest parties in this House is significant in terms of our overall presentation and our ability to participate in a fair way in the question period process.

Mr. Speaker, I appeal to your sense of fairness and even-handedness that you do intervene and that you move quickly. There should be some consequence for the type of behaviour we have seen displayed.

There are certain members who continuously and repeatedly ask questions that cause this place to deteriorate into an uproar and there seems to be little consequence for that behaviour.

Mr. Speaker, I appeal to you and ask you to use your discretion in the Chair to move quickly. As has been stated previously by the hon. member from the NDP, there has to be some sense of fairness and justice if question period is to work.

I certainly do not have the experience of the previous member, but in the short time I have been here, in the past number of months, I have seen the deterioration. Perhaps today was an aberration, but I believe that there has been deterioration. There has to be some intervention on the part of the Chair if this behaviour is to stop.

[Gary Lunn, Reform, Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to put on the record that I am also disgusted to be one of the 301 people sitting in the House today. I am ashamed to be part of this collective House and what went on in here.

I concur with the comments of both of the last two members who spoke. It is not just today. We have seen this all fall.

Look, for example, at what happened today. There was no punishment by throwing the member out of the House for the rest of the day. Mr. Speaker, I suggest that you have to take serious action and maybe even not recognize people in the future. Something has to be done to bring decorum back to this House.

I said to one of my colleagues “I wonder what it looks like through the eyes of the camera, to the people out there? How bad is it?” I can say that I was disgusted to be one of the members sitting in the House today. We are collectively part of this institution and it is time we changed this situation.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Mr. Speaker, I do not specifically want to comment on the strategies employed by the Chair, other than to indicate my support for the Chair and its occupant.

I do agree that this was not one of our better days. I do not want to say it was the worst one we have ever seen. I have been around here a long time too and I remember a number of others. But it is true that this was not up to the standard which we have established over the last year, year and half or perhaps before that.

Maybe one good idea would be for all of us, as we gather tomorrow at our weekly caucus meetings, to review and gather our thoughts to determine what we can do.

In the spirit of the season, notwithstanding the insults flying across the way, we should do what we can to co-operate at least over the number of days remaining before we adjourn for the holiday season.

If there are parties that have been aggrieved today, and no doubt some were because of the shortage of questions, maybe if we do a better job of being brief in our questions over the next few days, then we will at least make up for any grievance that might have come forward today.

That is what I would hope and I offer it as a suggestion not to the Chair, but to all of us, to help make this place work better over the next five or six days until we adjourn for the holiday season.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague, the parliamentary leader of the NDP, has just raised a very important point.

Your, in my opinion very harsh, ruling against the hon. member for Roberval was made on the basis of order or disorder. Our colleague earlier—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[The Speaker]

There will be no questioning the Speaker's ruling. The matter is closed, and I want no more discussion of the hon. member for Roberval.

I would ask my hon. colleague to direct his remarks to the point of order raised by the parliamentary leader of the New Democratic Party.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, if the government House leader would let me continue, I would have an opportunity to establish a direct connection with the point raised by our colleague from the New Democratic Party.

A moment ago, and you did not interrupt him, our colleague from Saanich—Gulf Islands suggested that the ruling you had just made was not a real punishment of our colleague.

Anyone who knows the member for Roberval knows that he is an experienced parliamentarian with profound respect for parliamentary institutions and, as such, fully aware that his decision not to comply with your ruling—

[The Speaker]

I have asked that no reference be made to the hon. member for Roberval. If you have a point to make, please make it now so that we can continue. I do not want any further reference to the hon. member for Roberval.