Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure today to speak on Bill C-29, the Parks Canada act.
There are problems today in our parks, from endangered species to threatened habitat to species that are becoming extinct. The mark the World Wildlife Fund has given the Canadian government is a D in its behaviour and activities toward protecting our species, the flora and fauna that inhabit our wonderful country. And today the government is pursuing a bill which deals with such absurdities as making subcontractors in our parks become bilingual. Is it necessary? The answer is no.
If the purpose of language is communication, if the purpose of language is to make people understand each other, clearly bilingual services are necessary in certain areas. It is probably not necessary for the people who clean our parks, who work in our parks in many areas, who fix our parks on a contractual basis in construction. I fail to see where those individuals need to be bilingual. The government has simply not presented an idea of why that is so.
Looking at the parks, one of the biggest problems is that of resources as all industries and ministries have. As a result of a lack of resources and as a result of a lack of leadership, a major problem is that thousands of Canadian species are threatened or will become extinct. From the Vancouver Island marmot to the eastern cougar, to the Mississauga rattlesnake, to the northern right whale, all of these species and many, many others are threatened with potential extinction.
There are many solutions that we have to these problems. I will get into those a little bit later.
The money that the government will be using to force people to become bilingual could be put into other areas such as paying for enforcement officers and conservation officers and better equipment and surveillance measures for them. That would have a much more powerful effect on our parks in ensuring that the habitats of today will be there tomorrow. Instead, the government wants to pour money into a useless and futile attempt to make parks subcontractors bilingual.
There are many problems within our own areas, including the threatened extinction of many species. A situation that many people are not aware of is that Canada is a major conduit for threatened species' animal parts. The Siberian tiger, the Bengal tiger, the clouded leopard, endangered birds, animals and plant life, Canada is a major conduit for dispersing these parts from our country to other areas. It is contributing to the decimation of the population of various subspecies of tiger in other parts of the world, particularly in Asia; the decimation of the black rhino, the Javan rhino, the Sumatran rhino, the clouded leopard, the snow leopard and on and on it goes. Canada is partly responsible for that, not because of our enforcement officers, but because they do not have the resources to do their jobs.
Furthermore, there is the current situation with respect to our law. While our law provides for some serious penalties, those penalties are not being enforced. What kind of message does that give to potential poachers? It says that they can knock off those bears and send their gall bladders to other parts of the world because they know if they get caught they will only get their wrists slapped. That is an embarrassment to our country.
Furthermore, the reason poachers and people who sell wild animal and endangered species' parts all over the world are using Canada is that we have a large border, but also that our enforcement measures are wholly inadequate. They are wholly inadequate because of a lack of resources.
There are other issues we have to deal with. The current legislation protects habitat. Habitat loss is the most important aspect of why species are becoming extinct. The federal government is not taking the leadership role to work with the provinces to make sure that larger tracts of land are being protected.
Animals and birds do not know provincial boundaries. They do not know where the line is drawn between Alberta and British Columbia. These animals need to be protected on a number of levels. It requires federal and provincial leadership in order to do that. The only time we have seen effective conservation measures being put in place is when provincial leaders have taken the bull by the horns and enacted some kind of legislation to protect them. We have seen an utter absence of leadership in this government and the previous government in trying to adjust the situation.
Here are some solutions. First, stop the forced bilingualism issue that my colleagues have spoken about before.
Second, the Canadian Endangered Species Protection Act needs strengthening. It is absolutely weak and as a result our species are paying the penalty.
Third, Cosewic is a group of independent scientists. It should be used to identify the plants and animals threatened with potential extinction which need our protection.
Fourth, we can look at other programs around the world where they have used their parks and their wild spaces to generate funds which they then pour back into their parks for expansion and preservation. This strengthens their ability to preserve the flora and fauna within their boundaries.
The golden lion tamarin, a beautiful little monkey in Central America, was becoming extinct. The Belize government made the park in which the monkeys live pay for itself through aggressive marketing. The park managed to save that species and many other species within that park. It prevented the encroachment of surrounding people and expanded the park. The moneys generated from the park went toward funds for health care, clean water and education of the surrounding people. The people benefited from the park in a tangible fashion which enabled them to act as a buffer zone to protect against poaching in the park.
We can apply that same lesson. We can use our parks in a sensible, environmentally sound way to generate funds. Rather than going toward general revenues and having the Minister of Finance spend the funds who knows where, we could ensure that at least a significant portion of those funds was poured back into the parks department for expansion and protection of the habitat for many species. There is a lack of funds. This would be a very pragmatic way for the parks to generate the necessary funds for their own preservation. It could be done in a sensible way without destroying the parks at all. We have seen where this has been done in places around the world.
Fifth, we have to ensure the penalties we have on the books are severe and that they are applied to those people who commit crimes such as poaching and trafficking in endangered species.
Sixth is the aspect of differential fees. My colleague and others in the House have mentioned that it is a sham to charge the same fees for all people. Other parts of the world have differential fees for tourists and for domestic individuals. Tourists pay more. Domestic individuals who reside in the area pay nothing or very little to come and go from their parks. This model works. It is absurd to have the same fee for those who live in the park, for those who come and go from the park and for those who reside in the area. It will hamstring the ability of the parks to generate revenues which could be used to preserve the parks.
There is an enormous challenge in front of us. The preservation of wild habitats and animal species is not an esoteric intellectual argument. The pragmatic reason for it is that many species harbour direct benefits to human beings through medicine.
On a philosophical basis, what has been given to us we have a right to give to others. The fact that many species are becoming extinct, particularly amphibians, is a cold hard indicator that our ability, our environment, our survival as a species could be compromised. Many of the species in this world are harbingers of things to come. What happens to them may ultimately happen to us.
I ask that the federal government take a leadership role with respect to the parks department. I ask that it take a leadership role with respect to our endangered species and develop and put forth pragmatic solutions which already exist in Canada to try to preserve the wild animal species, the flora and fauna and the wild spaces within Canada.