Debates of June 9th, 1998

Business Of The House

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Don Boudria, Liberal, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I move:

That, notwithstanding any Standing Order or usual practice, the business to be considered under Government Orders on Wednesday, June 10, 1998 shall be the report stage of Bill C-25, a motion relating to the appointment of the Information Commissioner, the third reading stage of Bill C-30 and the consideration of Senate amendments stage of Bill C-4;

That, no later than 5 p.m. on all questions necessary to dispose of the report stage of Bill C-25 shall be put and a division or divisions thereon deemed requested, provided that the said division or divisions may not be deferred;

That during the remainder of the sitting on that day, no quorum calls, requests for unanimous consent or dilatory motions may be received by the Chair, provided, for greater clarity, that it is confirmed that an amendment proposed to a motion under Government Orders is not a dilatory motion and is therefore admissible under the terms of this Order and provided that, when debate concludes on Bill C-4, the question then under consideration shall be deemed to have been put, a division thereon requested and deferred to 1 p.m. on Thursday, June 11, 1998; and

That the House shall then adjourn and shall meet at 9 a.m. on Thursday, June 11, 1998 and the ordinary daily routine of business shall be taken up at that time.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Is there unanimous consent to pass the motion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

(Motion agreed to)

The House resumed consideration of the business of supply.

Supply

[Gerald Keddy, Progressive Conservative, South Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I will continue with the little lesson in history. It is obvious a great many members of the government need to hear this history lesson.

It is quite simple. In 1993 we had a government elected with a huge majority. We did not have an effective opposition. We were in a situation where we had a government that got elected on a couple of items. I followed that election very closely and I can say with some authority that gun control was not one of those items. Gun registration was not even discussed. It was not an issue.

What were the issues in the federal election of 1993 that elected many of the members sitting opposite? The first issue was the GST. These guys were elected on the GST. They were elected on kicking free trade out of the country.

What did we get in return for that? In the first 11 months the government took power we discussed gun control in the House of Commons. We never discussed the GST. We never discussed getting rid of free trade. We never discussed any of the substantive issues they were elected on.

I want to go back to my fly fishing analogy. Someone who is fly fishing knows there is nothing like laying a nice dry fly out, letting the line go a couple of times, laying that fly on a little ripple and watching a fish come up and snap it.

That is what happened with gun control. A group of individuals could not believe this was to be rammed down their throats. They could not believe they would see this type of registration from honest citizens. They snapped that fly. The hon. minister of justice of the day played that fish for everything it was worth. He surely did.

Was it important? Was it substantive? Did it help the country? No, it did not. We ended up with 11 months of argument, 11 months of discussion. We did not gain one thing. We obtained a bill that was defective, to say the least. We have a major supreme court challenge against it. We have four provinces and two territories that have no intention of abiding by the rules.

We have gone further than that. We have made a totally separate set of rules under Bill C-68 for first nations. It is not a problem. We can do that. We can have a separate set of rules just by snapping our fingers.

I will back up because these guys lump everything together. They say that somehow if we are against registration we are against gun control. I separate the two. I am all for gun control. I am a gun owner. I am a hunter. I am a farmer. I am someone who actually uses a firearm in a safe and responsible manner. I have zero sympathy for everyone out there who abuses the rights and the privileges of owning and using a firearm. I have no sympathy for them at all. They should be slapped with the full force of the law.

However, we are not willing to do that. It is much easier to tell all law-abiding citizens of Canada that they have not broken the law or done anything wrong and if they register their guns somehow it will make things safer. It does not work like that. We have rules, laws and regulations for the people of the country and it is extremely important that they follow them.

The greatest insult was under a criminal bill. It was a criminal bill. Do members know what it is now? Now it is a safety bill. Excuse me if I cannot quite swallow that. I have swallowed a lot of stories in my life but I cannot quite swallow that one.

At the end of the day what will we have accomplished? What good will it do? Under Bill C-17 we had responsible gun control. We said to firearm owners, long gun owners, shotgunners and hunters that if they wanted to own firearms they had to store them in a responsible manner. They have to prove they are responsible enough to own them to begin with. We do want a lot of firearms sold to people with criminal records.

A number of issues were raise today such as domestic violence. Nobody in the House is so wrongheaded that they would somehow try to justify domestic violence. What have we actually done to avoid it? Will registration avoid it? I suggest that it will not. Is there a better way? Is there another way?

We had Bill C-17. We had responsible gun control. It was never given a chance to work. We had a justice minister who wanted to make a name for himself. We had a government that did not want to talk about what it was elected to talk about. It did not want to go down that road. It did not want to govern on what it was elected to do. It was elected to do a number of things and gun control was not in the equation. GST was in the equation. Free trade was in the equation. Somehow we got off track. If we want to talk about smoke and mirrors, there was never a better smoke and mirror act than this whole deal on gun control. That is exactly what it was. It was wrong-headed, it was ill thought out and it is not going to make any difference.

Now we are telling the people of Canada to register the guns themselves. They are being told to send their cards in. I thought it was Sunday morning and I was watching TV. Just send money. It does not work like that. There is a lot of confusion out there. There are a number of people who did not understand Bill C-17. They certainly do not have the first idea about Bill C-68. What we are going to have is a lot of people who will not register their guns. A lot of them will be taken into the black market.

I need some clarification. I will ask for assistance. How does that prevent crime? The government is forcing a bunch of people to do something when they do not understand the rules and regulations. It had a law that would have worked, but it did not give it a chance. It is mixing that up with registration and now it is saying it is kicking out registration, it is kicking out responsible storage and the safe handling of firearms. That is just not so.

That is not what was discussed to begin with. Registration is not going to change that one iota and members opposite know it. We cannot afford it. People will not do it. More guns will be put on the black market, which will end up in the hands of criminals. I cannot understand how government members can sit there and continue to mix up the two.

If government members want to talk about registration separately, fine. But tell me what they have done in their bill to prevent domestic violence and the use of firearms by irresponsible persons. That was in Bill C-17, but it is not in Bill C-68.

[Tom Wappel, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I listened attentively to my hon. colleague. I am sure the House will know that one of the problems with people who tell stories about fish is the reputation that these stories have, because of course with each telling the tale gets taller, the tale gets longer, and the tale gets further and further away from the truth.

Of course the very interesting thing about the hon. member's remarks was that he was talking about the fly being cast and back in 1993 the fish grabbed the bait. What the fisherman forgets is that there was an election in 1997.

All of these issues were mentioned. I am sure my hon. colleague mentioned them when he was running. The people of Canada spoke. The people of Canada said that, over all, the Liberal government was doing a good job and it deserved another mandate to continue doing what it had promised to do.

It is all well and good to talk about fishing, but let us remember that he was talking about history. Let us go back and give these people on the other side a history lesson. Obviously my friend over there needs a history lesson because he forgot that just one year ago the people of Canada gave us a second majority mandate.

Let us talk about facts. We cannot see into the future. We do not know whether or not the dire predictions are going to be correct with respect to gun control. All we know is that we are going to give it—and I hate to use the phrase—a shot to see what happens.

I ask my hon. friend, is it not true, notwithstanding his wonderful analogy about fly fishing, that there was an election in 1997 and that the people of Canada gave the Liberal government a second majority mandate? Is that not true?

[Gerald Keddy, Progressive Conservative, South Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for this opportunity because in Nova Scotia the people of Canada spoke. There were 11 Liberals from Nova Scotia prior to the election. There are zero today.

As far as the fishing analogy goes, yes, quite often the tale does not get blurred, it gets longer. That is what I am hearing from the government side. It is getting longer.

The government has blurred Bill C-17 and Bill C-68 together. The hon. member does not even know the difference between the two bills.

I am willing to do anything in the name of responsible gun ownership and gun control that will actually help to correct the issues we are talking about and that will be a positive step toward preventing violence.

I have heard nothing, and I am willing to listen, to convince me that registration and the spending of millions of dollars of Canadians' money is going to make a difference.

[Mike Scott, Reform, Skeena, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the member's intervention. I understand the fishing analogy but, unfortunately, where I live there are no fish left thanks to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans, so I cannot use that analogy. I think the member might have the same problem in his province.

I would like to ask the member, does he believe that the reason the Liberals brought Bill C-68 into this House and passed it had nothing to do with the safety of Canadians? They knew that full well when they brought it in.

It was nothing more than a deliberate Machiavellian attempt to conceal from Canadians the failure of their justice system, the failure of their inability to deal with the shortcomings in the criminal justice system. This was a way to try to persuade Canadians that the government was actually doing something, when nothing could be further from the truth.

We have a justice minister who has for over a year promised changes to the YOA and no changes have been made to date.

We have a criminal justice system that lets convicted rapists walk the streets without serving any time in jail.

Is that not the reason they brought this so-called gun control legislation in? Does it not have more to do with trying to hide their own failure?

[Gerald Keddy, Progressive Conservative, South Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, there was a serious lack of direction on the government's part. There was a serious lack of alternatives, of new ideas. They came down an old, worn out path and they walked and walked back and forth on it.

Unfortunately, they are not accomplishing a lot. The justice minister and the government did not have any new ideas. They were not willing to listen to people. They were not willing to look at alternatives. Here we have this half-baked idea and a half-baked system with no hope of it ever working.

Personally, when I eat my apple pie, I like to have it completely baked, not half baked.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I consider it a privilege to speak on this debate.

Recently a constituent of mine forwarded a column by Diane Francis contained in the May 18 issue of Maclean's magazine. The constituent was commenting favourably upon the article and requested a detailed response. I thought I should respond with some detail.

The column unfortunately betrays a woeful lack of understanding of Canadian history and an appalling ignorance of government finances, which is what we are debating tonight.

I could forgive Ms. Francis for her lack of Canadian historical knowledge, as she was originally an American citizen, however, I am unable to forgive her for her limited grasp of the federal government's finances and the role of the federal government vis-à-vis its citizens in this country.

She states “The federal government is in need of serious downsizing. It need not be involved in health, education, welfare, mining, forestry, culture or the fisheries. They are adequately handled by the provinces and the federal role should only be one of co-ordination. On the other hand, Ottawa should remain in charge of justice, economic management, international diplomacy, defence, internal security and communications policy”.

Ms. Francis seems not to understand that the government is not involved in health, education, welfare and has entered into management agreements with the provinces in the areas of mining and forestry.

For a nationally syndicated columnist this is a woeful misunderstanding of the jurisdictions involved in this country. The federal government is still involved in culture and fisheries because those endeavours do not recognize provincial boundaries.

Ottawa still remains in other areas of government approved by Ms. Francis, although its role in the daily delivery of justice services is quite limited. All in all Ottawa is pretty well out of everything that Ms. Francis thinks it should be out of and is in everything that Ms. Francis thinks it should be in. Never one to let facts get in the way of a fixed religious belief, Ms. Francis goes on to chastise the government for its enormous duplication and says that downsizing is not in the lexicon of the Liberal government.

Ms. Francis is the editor of the Financial Post . As such, she should have a working familiarity with the budget of the federal government. For hon. members present and for Ms. Francis I will go over some fundamentals of the federal budget.

The federal government has a budget of approximately $150 billion to $160 billion annually. In fiscal year 1996-97, 30% of that money went to service the national debt. The next 15% was transferred to the provinces and a further 23% was transferred to other organizations, such as the OAS, ET, et cetera. That amounts to 68% before Ottawa spends a dime on its own programs.

I am assuming that Ms. Francis does not want the federal government to default on its debts. That is possibly not true in the province which I come from, however, I am assuming that Ms. Francis wants that. I am also assuming that she does not want the amount of moneys allocated under the CHST to be reduced, especially to her favourite little buddy Mike Harris, and does not feel that the old age benefits or employment insurers are overly generous.

Ms. Francis approves of the federal government having a role in defence. That accounts for $9 billion to $10 billion. In gross numbers on a budget of $161 billion, the federal government transferred $41.6 billion to persons, $22 billion to provinces and paid $44.9 billion in interest on the national debt. That leaves approximately $50 billion or 33% on which to run all the federal programs which Ms. Francis finds so burdensome. This is essentially the only money over which the federal government has any real control.

Ms. Francis apparently approves of Ottawa being involved in defence and apparently approves that this is—

[Jim Jones, Progressive Conservative, Markham, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Are we not supposed to be debating Motion No. 1 which is on justice and not on the overall budget?

[The Deputy Speaker]

Yes. The hon. member is quite right. We are debating Motion No. 1 which deals with the estimates of the Department of Justice. I know the hon. member for Scarborough East will get to the point of the motion in due course.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the intervention of the hon. member, but you will note that Motion No. 1 accounts for $193 million worth of spending in areas of justice. In my riding that is an area of extreme significance.

These are areas of spending with which we have already dealt. We are down to 33% of the balance of the federal government's moneys, and in those moneys, of course, are justice moneys.

I am assuming that Ms. Francis approves of our spending in areas of veterans affairs. I assume she does not wish to cut off veterans from their benefits. I also assume that she does not want to cut aboriginal expenditures. She neglected to mention anything with respect to those issues, out of oversight rather than any intention on her part.

I do not wish to get too detailed for fear that the essential point will be lost on hon. members opposite.

The federal government has gone to great lengths to remove itself from overlapping jurisdiction and wasteful expenditures particularly in the area of justice. The hon. member should be aware that the justice system is largely administered by the provinces. Not only is the federal government far leaner than it was before, it is now arguably one of the most efficient governments in the world.

When you read the overblown rhetoric of this particular columnist and members opposite it sounds like sound bite journalism. One has to wonder whether members opposite and this journalist have been in a coma since 1993.

Far from being one of the most overgoverned jurisdictions in the world, just the opposite is true. Sixty-seven per cent of government revenues require virtually no bureaucracy at all. We collect it and then we ship it out.

Again I quote Ms. Francis “We have too many layers of bureaucracy doing too many of the same things. We have too many municipalities and school boards complicating our lives and adding to costs. We have too many provinces. We have too big a federal government”.

The facts point in exactly the opposite direction. To the extent that the federal government is able to remove itself from overlapping jurisdictions, it has. In some respects and arguably it has become somewhat too remote from the daily lives of Canadians. Absence of a strong federal government to provide a sense of being Canadian, Canada will degenerate into a bunch of separatist entities which plays into the agenda of the Lucien Bouchards of this world, and the Glen Clarks of this world. This is the world they—

[Mike Scott, Reform, Skeena, BC]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Following up on the earlier point of order, members opposite have been waiting with bated breath to hear the relevance in the member's intervention. We have not heard that. I would ask that we have the speaker speak to the motion rather than going off on a rant about Diane Francis.

[The Deputy Speaker]

I am sure that the hon. member for Scarborough East will want to direct his remarks to the issue of the estimates of the Department of Justice which are after all the subject matter of the motion now before the House.

If members have run out of things to say on the justice issue we can move on to one of the other motions. Heaven knows there are enough of them.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, one hesitates to say that one will get to it in a timely fashion. It is difficult to determine relevance for members opposite since one has to speak so slowly to get to the point.

Having elucidated that in fact only about 33% is available for federal government program spending and in that program spending are justice issues, I would say that is a matter of relevance and concern to all members.

As I pointed out, absent a strong federal government to provide a role of leadership in this issue, we play into the hands of the Lucien Bouchards, the Mike Harrises and the Glen Clarks of this world who fervently desire the little flag sur le hood exercise.

Ms. Francis is a great admirer of California. If we follow her suggestion, that is exactly how we will end up, one of the states governed by Washington. That is exactly where some members opposite would wish us to go. I would put a number of members in the category of fervently desiring to be nothing other than a state of the United States.

It has been a 150-year struggle to continue to identify Canada as a nation and we are by and large, in spite of members opposite, doing rather well in accordance with the United Nations identifications. By any UN standards we are doing very well.

I would recommend to members opposite as they peruse the justice estimates that they also refer to the Fraser Forum for bedtime reading. That in and of itself identifies Canada as a foremost country in this issue.

Ms. Francis and her political front, the Reform Party, do not understand Canadian history and government finances.

[Jim Abbott, Reform, Kootenay—Columbia, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we have been complaining for the longest time that we have been speaking to empty seats. This member's speech has indicated it really does not make any difference if they are here or not.

I really do not understand what this man has against Diane Francis. This rant that was supposed to be going on about justice had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with justice.

Let me ask him a question. He is flanked on either side by members who do not seem to understand the meaning of the word how. The question is, how will Bill C-68 and the registration make the streets of Canada any safer? How?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is one thing to speak to empty seats and it is another thing to speak to empty heads. The issue that was raised was the fronting of the Reform Party by this particular columnist.

To go to the member's question, it reminds me of the election and particularly of a constituent on whose door I was knocking. I was getting quite a beating about this particular piece of legislation of interest to the member opposite. As I was getting beaten up I could see that his wife was coming to the door. She had a tea towel over her arm. She slapped him and said “Don't listen to that idiot, he doesn't know anything about gun control”. That was the response of many of my constituents in Scarborough East.

Any piece of legislation, and this is under the how part, which removes guns, which makes guns less accessible to the citizens of this country is a good piece of legislation by definition. During this past election we had a terrible incident involving long guns which I know the member opposite is quite interested in, resulting in the death of a spouse and four children.

I do not care how the legislation is drafted. I do not care how the regulations are drafted. In my community of Scarborough East this is good legislation and it gets guns inaccessible to more and more citizens. Anything that does that, I am in favour of.

[Paul Bonwick, Liberal, Simcoe—Grey, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. colleague for his background on the budget and the importance this government has shown toward justice issues.

I too would like to direct a comment and a question to the hon. member on Bill C-68 as well. Bill C-68 is nothing more than a record or an accountability of all the weapons or long arms, guns that are out there in Canada. It is not dissimilar to refrigerators, automobiles, cars and animals.

Does the hon. member believe that if we create this data bank of weapons, that the police deserve to have access to the knowledge of whether or not weapons are located in a house when they go to a domestic call? Does the member think that is a good idea?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I would point out that statistically most offences involving firearms are committed by people who are known to the victim. It is something in the order of 80% or 90%. Anytime a piece of legislation is being passed which makes guns and weapons generally inaccessible to those kinds of classes of people, we are ahead of the game.

This is a matter of registration. As loath as I am to adopt the remarks of my colleague sitting with me here from Mississauga West, I am of the view that this is a simple form of registration. It is a registration that is easily filled out. It is similar to a car registration. It is similar to birth registration. It is similar to other forms of registration which a civilized society requires.

What we are trying to fashion in this country is a civilized society which is distinct from Ms. Francis' favourite country, the one to the south of us.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I fail to understand the infatuation with Diane Francis but I suggest that he might want to give her a call sometime and talk to her. I can assure the hon. member that he would probably get an education.

My friend across the way suggests that a strong, big, bloated, fat central government somehow will serve Canadians much better than a decentralized government that is better able to respond to the needs of constituents.

I want to point out to my friend that it was the federal Liberal government that broke the contract it made with Canadians with respect to how much money it would put into health care and higher education. In the 1993 election this big, bloated, fat central government and the Prime Minister said “Oh, no. We are going to continue to spend the same amount of money on health care and higher education. In fact, we will probably increase it”. The Liberals blatantly broke that promise, cutting transfers to the provinces by $6 billion. That is an unbelievably abrogation of a contract.

I would suggest to my friend across the way that history does not bear out his rosy view of federalism. In fact, if federalism worked so well, then why do we have a separatist movement in this country today that is threatening to rip the country right apart? It is because of their vision of federalism that tries to suck all the power into the middle. That is why the separatists in Quebec want to leave.

I suggest to my friend, instead of worrying about the provinces becoming another state, I am concerned about him becoming a ward of the state after that nonsensical speech he gave. I say to him the provinces were the ones that led when it came to balancing budgets. The provinces are the ones who lead when it comes to social responsibility.

When is my friend going to wake up over there and understand that all the power in the country does not belong just in Ottawa? People at the local level know how to make their own decisions and they do not need the nanny state in Ottawa deciding those things for them.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, it is appalling to the extreme that one of the leading members of the Reform Party should speak in this fashion. The two parties that would like to lead us into separation sit opposite. Those are the two parties that degenerate this country and make it a very difficult country to govern.

The hon. member's infatuation with Diane Francis, who is nothing other than a mouthpiece for the Reform Party, fails to understand in its essence the point of my speech. I can see that the hon. member has missed the point of the answers that he has been getting from the finance minister in the House of Commons as well. He is obviously not listening.

He is not listening that the CHST was in fact raised from $11 billion up to $12.5 billion. He obviously does not understand the point of tax room. He does not understand that tax room has in fact created more money in the hands of the Mike Harrises and the Lucien Bouchards of this world. He just simply does not get it.

It is typical of the Reform Party members. They do not get it. If we continue to downsize the federal government there will be no Canada as we know it.

[Joe Jordan, Liberal, Leeds—Grenville, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I want to return to the issue of gun registration. There seems to be a common thread going through the Reform Party's criticism of the justice estimates.

We have seen a lot of letters being waved around with various dates. In the United States confronted with the increase in children killing children, to the tune of about every two hours an American child is killed because of a firearm, the NRA proposes they send a great big fuzzy bird into the schools, Eddy the Eagle they call it. It is almost like Tommy the Tooth. This is their solution. They are going to go into the schools and they are going to teach kids that if they see a gun they should run to their parents. In other words, the responsibility is the child's. That is absolutely ridiculous.

But I do want to refer to the how with a letter here from Scott Newark. Members quote him all the time, except when it does not suit them.

On June 3, 1998 he said: “Having now seen the registration system demonstrated, it is clear it will live up to the claims originally made in relation to supply of important safety information for both the public and police. Further, it should be an extremely valuable tool in the detection and prosecution of stolen or smuggled firearms”. They listen to the CPA, listen to CAVEAT even when it does not suit their agenda. What would the member say about that?

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, that was a very fine question.

As far as I know Eddie the Eagle was a ski jumper with Great Britain in one of the Olympics. I suspect that Eddie the Eagle as a ski jumper was not terribly successful, as will this not be very successful.

The simple fact is that in this justice system, as imperfect as it is, it is working. I argue that crime is down. The perception of crime is up but the fact of crime is down. That is a good message. That means this government is working properly.