Mr. Speaker, in some ways I agree with my hon. colleague from the Reform Party, particularly on the issue of retroactive raises back to January 1, 1997.
To make a quick calculation, a supreme court justice earning $148,000 and getting a 4.1% increase would end up with about $6,000, or $120 a week, more.
When I visited a sugar bush operation in my riding on Sunday, a group of women told me their average wage was $240 for 37 hours. So the increase weekly to a justice would be about half of what these women are earning for 37.5 hours. Four per cent of their $8 an hour makes 32 cents, but 4% of the justice's $148,000 makes $6,000.
I do not believe that at any time in the history of mankind, a superior court justice has resigned because he was underpaid. I personally have never seen such a thing.
Worse still, when the time comes for a judge to be appointed, nearly all of the lawyers belonging to the party in power call upon their MP, or the minister, or the Prime Minister to remind him “Keep me in mind, it ought to be my turn for a court appointment”.
I have a question for my distinguished colleague in the Reform Party. In order to make the Canadian judiciary a little more transparent, should we not add a clause to Bill C-37, precisely so as to facilitate appointments, to make them more transparent and to move away for once from a type of patronage comparable to what happens, for instance, in Senate appointments?