Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak to this piece of legislation today.
I thank my hon. colleague from the Conservative Party for reminding me about the problems that we used to have as mayors at the municipal level, local level and grassroots level, the problems that we had for a number of years. I can certainly share those beliefs and those words with my colleague.
It is true that it has been happening for a number of years, including when federal governments were operated by both Liberals and Conservatives. Those are the parties that have been operating the government over the last number of years, and nothing has really changed in that respect. It certainly is time for some changes and there are some fairly decent changes that are brought about in the bill.
I really have a difficult time understanding why this particular government has a problem with trying to implement something equally across the system. Equality seems to be a word that is truly absent from its vocabulary.
It is my understanding that the Federation of Canadian Municipalities has not had one speck of input into what is going to happen to their jurisdictions as a result of the bill. A number of mayors and councillors are wondering what this is all about. Suddenly the bill is here zinging through the House of Commons and will become law before they even know how it will affect them.
This is another process that needs change. This is a process that constantly seems to prevail in this place where we know best and why should we bother conferring with other levels of government that will be affected by these pieces of legislation. I find that thoroughly disgusting and yet I am not surprised.
Having been in the House for six years, I have seen the amount of power that is handed over to the bureaucracies, as it will be done in this case. I have seen a number of bills that include the words “by order in council”, “given ministerial discretion” and “full power” over many issues. Once upon a time, the idea of “by order in council” was for emergency situations, but it now appears in all legislation so many times that it is really scary.
If I am not mistaken, in Bill C-68, which we recently debated, the words “order in council” were used 74 times in that one piece of legislation alone.
The municipalities have to sit back and wait to see what the great central government in Ottawa will come out with and how it will affect the things they have to deal with.
When I was the mayor of my home town, I recall a couple of property owners wanting to subdivide their land and build a house and a quonset. They brought all the information to the local council. I, as mayor, and six councillors looked at the proposal. We studied it carefully, discussed it with other residents of the community and decided that it was a good deal and should work without any difficulties.
However, lo and behold, there was another level of government, the provincial government, which had not even seen the situation, was not aware of the situation had not discussed it with anybody, had only looked at a little drawing of what we were talking about when we had to get some authority to go ahead with this, and it flatly denied the proposal.
It was then that I had the opportunity to bring these people into town through a challenge that I would pick them up and bring them in. I told them that they had no business making decisions without at least looking at the situation. Once they got out there and had a word with the people, and once they saw with their own eyes what they were talking about, they were able to make some changes and allow it.
The problem we have in this place on a higher level, when these kinds of things come down, is making sure the power remains in the hands of the minister, the ministerial discretion, the federal government almighty power, and making sure the bureaucracy is loaded up with power galore. So we operate in a very difficult situation.
I have to ask myself “What's new”? The democratic process in the country does not exist in this place. We just voted on a motion asking for a referendum on the Nisga'a agreement. The mighty upholders of democracy, the believers in letting the people have a say, could not even support letting the people of British Columbia have a voice. Worse yet, aboriginal people living in British Columbia have been phoning my office day in and day out asking me to encourage the government to let them have a voice because there is no accountability on many of the reserves. These people are suffering and hurting. Yet, things are rammed through without any regard for the people themselves, without any thought about the effects it will have.
What kind of a situation will we be in with the Nisga'a agreement when they become a municipality or self-governing? Will the rules apply in their situation in the same way as they do in small towns in Alberta or large cities in Ontario? Will there be equality? It is very difficult to say, but it is obvious to me that past history says that people should beware, wherever they live.
The government does not truly believe in a democratic process. Its members emerge for a vote in this place from behind closed doors after a private discussion among members of their party. Then they vote according to what the leader of their party happens to say. Their leader happens to be the Prime Minister of Canada and the puppets will obey the rule. They will vote according to what he says, and never mind what they are told in their constituencies or what people at the grassroots level have to say. They do not dare to cast a vote which does not express the view of the Prime Minister if they want to be part of the government.
If that is democracy we truly need some serious changes. I would like to see democracy reflected in bills such as Bill C-10 but it is not reflected. I would like to see it reflected in the agreements we make with our native people, the treaty agreements that have been made and the ones that will come up. Where is the voice of the people in all these things? Where does the power ultimately lie? The power of any real democracy should lie in the hands of the people. It is difficult to say that it is happening in Canada. There are too many examples that tell me it is not the case.
We have a bill before us today that gives ministerial discretion, a great power, to the federal government and to a huge bureaucracy. A panel is to be set up. We do not know for sure how the panel to observe all this will be set up, but we can almost bet it will be full of patronage.
Good old friends of the Liberal Party will make sure to fill those high places. They will serve on the panels because their view is that those of us who are not Liberal, who do not vote Liberal, are not smart enough to know what we are doing. We cannot let that happen, not in Canada.
Their attitude with regard to all kinds of legislation going through here is sad. We are at second reading stage of this bill and the fact that municipalities throughout Canada and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities have not even had an opportunity for input is a real shame.
I say shame on the federal Government of Canada, the leaders of this great nation, that it continues to bring forward legislation in this place and does not allow the real leaders of the land, the people, to have a true voice. That has to change, and may God grant it soon.