Debates of May 5th, 1998

Canada Student Loans

[Julian Reed, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister for International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, my friend's information base for the words he is using today is almost a year old. It comes off a draft on the Internet last May. The suppositions that arise from that draft have little relationship to any proposed multilateral agreement on investment.

It is an agreement that Canada is pursuing vigorously because it protects small and medium size business. That is the basic reason. The concept of some megacorporations coming in with a big foot and determining policy would have happened 30 years ago. Canada now has 54 bilateral investment agreements around the world. No one has taken us over. No one has interfered with our health care system, our education system or the way we deal with aboriginal people. Canada is the master of its own house. A multilateral agreement on investment will simply enhance that in years to come.

We want to protect our investors in other countries. They are mostly small and medium size business. They cannot afford a battery of lawyers to follow them around in litigation in the jungle out there. We need rules. We accept rules. We try to persuade other countries to go along with understandable rules so that all of us can benefit from the commerce that results.

[Bill Graham, Liberal, Toronto Centre—Rosedale, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I too rise on the question of the multilateral investment agreement.

I agree with the member from Halifax that the agreement raises important issues, but I certainly do not see them in the light that he raised them. I agree with the parliamentary secretary when he says he appears to be working somewhere about a year out of date and with a lot of rhetoric that is not borne out.

We had a very interesting meeting in my riding recently in conjunction with the member for St. Paul's. It brought a great deal of intense discussion and a lot of interested citizens to this issue because it raises very important issues of global governance. I think these are issues that the government is seeking to address in a way that is important. I think it behoves us as members to look at it seriously. It raises very important issues. That is why the constituents of my riding and the member for St. Paul's riding came. We discussed this and heard issues.

We have to bear in mind two points. The first is that the minister addressed this issue when he asked the subcommittee of the committee on trade to look at the issue. The committee on trade came back to the minister and said that foreign investment agreements could be very useful to Canada and Canadians because they could further our investments abroad and at the same further job creation here.

However they must be looked at in a certain light. It must be guaranteed that we protect our culture. We must ensure that our environment is protected, that measures are not to be restrained in protecting our environment. We would like to see core ILO labour standards inserted in such an agreement.

That makes a lot of sense. Here is an opportunity not to dump on the agreement but an opportunity to make it better for Canadians and to make it better for labour standards as well as investment. What a wonderful opportunity. Let us not miss it.

The subcommittee also said health measures, educational and social services clearly must be exempt from any such agreement because they are not appropriate matters for foreign investment.

What did the minister do? He picked up this report by the committee and subsequently filed in the House a response to the report. In his response he states that specifically the government's response addresses in detail each recommendation made by the subcommittee and agrees with all of them.

The minister is to be congratulated. For the first time we saw an international agreement being negotiated brought before a parliamentary committee prior to the negotiations being completed. This was not for us to ratify after. This was something on which members of Parliament from all parties, including the party of the member for Halifax, had an opportunity to have some input, to the point where the minister has gone to the meetings. We know now from the newspaper reports what has taken place at those meetings.

Even Madam Barlow was quoted in the newspaper the other day as saying she was pleased that this government had stood up to what it said it would do. She was impressed by the fact that our negotiators had stuck to the instructions which were given to them to deal with this issue.

Given this and given the fact that this matter is now as we all know pushed off until the fall, I wonder if the parliamentary secretary could comment as to where he thinks it might go come the fall. Is there any likelihood as has been suggested by some that this might get involved in the discussions at the WTO as well, so that we have a comprehensive approach to this very important issue?

[Julian Reed, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister for International Trade]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to commend my hon. colleague for the comments he has made about the minister's response to the committee's work on MAI. I point out that it has now been acknowledged by the Council of Canadians and by the Canadian Council of the Arts as a matter of fact that our minister has made the whole process transparent for the first time.

Negotiations over the last 35 or 40 years were always conducted very quietly. It was not because they were private, not because they were close to the vest, but because nobody was really interested in them, not until the Internet came along. Now the Minister for International Trade has realized that the time has come to open up these negotiations and make them painfully transparent so that everybody can be bored by them as they go along over the months and years. Some people are interested and they deserve to know exactly what is happening.

I should point out that the minister has also made it clear that there are reservations which are unassailable. The provisions on the protection of culture, education, aboriginal concerns, our health care, social system and so on, Canada will continue to be master of its own house regardless of what happens.

Just briefly, I point out that because talks have now been set back until October of this year, that does not mean that they are finished or over. They will resume at that time and Canada will continue to make vigorous representations.

[Jean-Guy Chrétien, Bloc, Frontenac—Mégantic, QC]

Mr. Speaker, on April 28, I asked the Minister of Human Resources Development a question about employees of the BC mine in Black Lake.

According to the information we have obtained from the placement committee, few or very few of these former employees are using active measures, with the result that only a small portion of the $3 million set aside for this envelope will apparently be used.

What I am requesting, on behalf of these former employees, several of whom are no longer receiving EI, is that the unused portion be put into the pool created by LAB Chrysotile and the Government of Quebec so that these employees, whose average age is over 52, can retire.

Of course, the best way of saving our jobs in the asbestos industry is to sell this product, which is unique in the world and has exceptional qualities. Almost two years ago, France announced its intention to ban asbestos on its territory. The entire region foresaw a domino effect and to keep this move in asbestos producing countries from having an effect in the Thetford region, we unanimously requested that a complaint be filed with the WTO against France, with respect to the agreements signed with other member countries.

All asbestos producers, the Government of Quebec, all unions, the Bloc Quebecois, the council of mayors of the Asbestos RCM, all were unanimous in calling for a complaint to be filed with the WTO.

Even a highly placed public servant—mark his name well—François Filion of International Trade, made the following statement at Thetford Mines on March 18, 1998. “For the federal government, it is not a question of whether or not we will be complaining to the WTO on France's asbestos ban, but only of when we will be doing so”. Now it is one minute to midnight. Time is of the essence. The Government of Canada should waste no time in filing a proper complaint within the next few days.

I have one question for the Government of Canada. Why does Canada not put the same effort into defending asbestos it would to defend the interests of Sherritt in the Toronto region, western Canadian wheat sales, the Pacific salmon or the famous turbot war in the Atlantic, in which Brian Tobin led the battle against Spain? Is it because the asbestos mines are located exclusively in Quebec? I am convinced that, if Quebec were a sovereign country, it would have filed a complaint long ago against the WTO, and we would have won our case.

I repeat, is the government going to continue to delay until asbestos is banned everywhere in the world, before it lifts a finger? The time for diplomacy is past. Jacques Roy could not deliver the goods, so now the Prime Minister should advise his ministers involved in this matter to act as promptly as possible.

[Gerry Byrne, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Natural Resources]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to respond to my colleague's intervention. He raised the point in discussions about BC mines in Quebec that immediate action similar to that pursued by the then Minister of Fisheries and Oceans and now premier of Newfoundland, the hon. Brian Tobin, would be appropriate in this case.

I point out to the hon. member that it was the Bloc Quebecois which later in discussions with the European Community specifically said that was inappropriate action and that if the opportunity were to arise and a sovereign Quebec were to be established, those would not be the actions of the nation state of Quebec, that they would proceed with negotiations first. Therefore, I would like my hon. friend and colleague to clarify and state for the record, as we all know in this House, that is not the position of the Bloc Quebecois on other issues.

The hon. member may agree with me that the proper resolution of this matter is in further discussions. A referral to the World Trade Organization at this point in time is very premature because discussions are ongoing.

The hon. member raised the point that active measures were not being used. I simply point out to my colleague that $3 million has been set aside for active measures for the approximately 300 miners who are affected and there has been substantial uptake of those initiatives. Of the 307 affected workers, 40 have found work at one of the other two mines run by Lab Chrysotile, the Bell mine and the Lac d'Amiante mine. About 10 workers have retired and another 40 to 50 have expressed interest in continued training.

Active measures are working. We want to continue with that. We want to tell the affected workers that the Government of Canada is on their side and we will continue to work on their labour market adjustment.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Pursuant to Standing Order 38, a motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly, the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 2 p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).

(The House adjourned at 7.37 p.m.)