Debates of April 19th, 1999

Supply

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Madam Speaker, certainly I have heard the parliamentary secretary say that the Prime Minister will consult with parliament before he commits to any ground troops. It still comes back to the very question today which is, are we going to have a vote on it?

It is pretty hard to justify to the Canadian public that the government would not vote on committing the lives of men and women in our armed forces. What is really wrong with that?

[Julian Reed, Liberal, Halton, ON]

Madam Speaker, I would point to the response I gave to the Bloc critic. Historically, successive Canadian governments have maintained that it is best to present unanimity from all sides of the House on a decision of this gravity and magnitude.

I appreciate the hon. member's position. It is another point of view, but it is not the point of view that has been held historically by the governments of this country.

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Madam Speaker, the motion before the House today is relatively straightforward. It calls on the government to commit itself to hold a debate and a vote prior to the commitment of any ground troops to the war in the Balkans.

There is really nothing odd about such a request. There is nothing controversial or partisan about this motion. It is consistent with the best democratic traditions this country can lay claim to.

What is odd is the fact that the government did not itself bring forth a votable motion on this issue. What is controversial is the government's repeated refusal to allow such a debate or vote to occur. That is what gets our constituents asking why the government will not let this go to a vote.

The refusal to allow the House to decide what the role of this country should be in a war is truly astonishing. Let there be no misunderstanding. The government does not have a mandate as a result of the three take note debates on Kosovo. Its claim that it has such a mandate are simply unacceptable and is certainly not why any of us participated in those take note debates.

In August 1914 this country was simply notified by the Governor General that it was at war. The decision was made in London. In September 1939 Canada waited 10 days to enter the second world war on the side of Britain and France, 10 days in which parliament debated and voted on the issue. On September 9, 1939 Prime Minister Mackenzie King accepted that the Commons should decide if Canada should go to war.

That has not happened in 1999. Our pilots have already flown more than 100 combat missions and the present government has repeatedly argued that we are not at war. That position is simply a word game and would please many of the lawyers here, but it certainly does not please the Canadian public. The man on the street, the members of this House and our adversaries in Yugoslavia see things a lot differently. They are calling this war.

In 1991 when we supported the UN coalition, this House also debated and voted on a resolution concerning Canadian military involvement. At that time the current Prime Minister, then the Leader of the Official Opposition, criticized the Mulroney government. I quote: “Really Canadians have had enough of these ambiguities and playing the dice on the table without telling Canadians exactly what the situation is. Should we have Canadians involved in war, yes or no?”

The high-minded principles so strongly endorsed just eight years ago seem to have been mere words, nothing more. They have apparently been forgotten by the Prime Minister. They have vanished like smoke in the political wind.

The foreign affairs minister is no more consistent. Before this House in 1991 he said: “My deepest concern is that they, the Tories, will be simply using parliament to try to rubber stamp or ratify decisions already taken, as opposed to letting parliament be the forum in which those decisions are formulated”. Last Thursday in the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade he also appeared to forget his concern for this House. He argued that because this is not a republic, the crown retains the right to make foreign policy and to decide matters of war and peace.

Canadians might rightly ask what is the cause of this uncertainty? Why would ministers with such long parliamentary careers change their opinions so drastically? I will not try to offer any answers to those questions. Given this lack of certainty on the government benches, I would suggest we err on the side of democracy. It is, after all, what this country expects. We preach democracy abroad, we sell democratization to other countries, and we must practise it at home.

Eight years after the gulf war this country finds itself once again involved in a war. It does not really matter at this point in the debate that our current military intervention was not sanctioned by the UN. It does not really matter in our debate today if NATO's long term strategy is unclear. It does not really matter that we have no idea what the long term objectives of the current conflict are, beyond the basic moral considerations that my hon. colleague the Leader of the Opposition raised a week ago.

These issues are not the most pressing issues of the debate today. The government's arguments that we cannot debate something that has not yet happened is equally unimportant. This motion is to commit the government to a debate when and if the need to send ground troops should arise. A week, a month, whenever that should happen, we should have a vote in this House.

This motion is not about the war. It is about Canadian democracy. Because this issue is so important to our democracy is why I can strongly endorse this motion before us today. Despite the fact that I might disagree on many other Bloc ideas, certainly this is one we should commend it for.

This chamber is the House of Commons. It is the only place in the entire land that the elected representatives of the Canadian people can meet and debate the future of our country. This room, not the cabinet chamber, is the focal point for our democratic system of government. Here the government of the day must answer to the people through their elected members of parliament. Here the laws are made. Here the great issues that affect our people are supposed to be decided.

Before we send any ground troops to fight in distant lands, members of parliament must take a position. It is the only right thing we can possibly do. I do not want to ever stand accused by the parents, wives, husbands, children of our soldiers that I failed to take a stand in this House and ask all the questions that should be asked.

This government does not seem to want to understand these simple facts. The motion before us is not an attempt to embarrass the government. It is not about expressing confidence or lack thereof in the Prime Minister and his cabinet. It is quite simply a call for the government to respect the rights and privileges of parliament and to adhere to the most basic standards of Canadian democracy.

The precedents of 1939 and 1991 clearly and forthrightly demonstrate that matters of war and peace are not, I repeat not, the sole prerogative of the crown in this country. The Prime Minister and foreign affairs minister understood this in 1991. I am at a loss to explain why they have forgotten that fact in 1999.

The motion before us is several weeks overdue. The official opposition has been urging for some time the necessity of a vote in the House before Canada commits ground troops to the ongoing war in Kosovo. The other opposition parties have also agreed with us and have been urging the same thing. I commend my Bloc colleague again for having brought forward this motion today.

There is a saying that there is a time and a place for everything. The time for a votable motion on the deployment of ground troops to Kosovo is now and the place is in the House.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Madam Speaker, I heard the hon. member say that he strongly endorses this motion.

I would ask that the hon. member note that there was debate in the House in November and further debate in February. The minister appeared before the committee in March. Then there was a further debate last week which went through to the wee hours of the morning. I thought that parliament had a strong attack of me-tooism in the entire debate. There was very little dissent from the position the government had taken.

I am a little hard pressed to know how the hon. member strongly endorses what is quite easily and arguably a vague and confusing motion. Is this a motion on a vote to vote, or is this a motion on a possibility or a hypothetical situation? Does the hon. member interpret this as a matter of confidence in the government?

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Madam Speaker, it is certainly not a matter of confidence. As I pointed out, it should be a non-partisan approach to the whole question when we are talking about the lives of our soldiers.

Regarding the take note debate, I cannot believe that anybody in the House would stand and say one, that that was a debate and two, that it was an opportunity to let every member in the House become informed on the issue. I do not need to talk about how many people are here when take note debates occur in the middle of the night, but certainly it is not many.

When we talk about lives, when we talk about something as important as war, we say that we should put it to a vote. We believe that most parties in the House would vote honestly and would vote for support of what is happening in NATO. I think that would be the case.

I do not understand what the government is so afraid of in putting this to a vote. Once that vote occurs and the majority position is held, then I would hope that 100% of us would support our troops in this war situation. But put it to a vote. That is politically such a wise thing to do I cannot imagine why the government is not doing it.

[Benoît Sauvageau, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Madam Speaker, I thank the Reform Party critic, who congratulated the Bloc Quebecois for moving this motion. As we can see, and as the hon. member pointed out in his reply to the Liberal member, this is not a partisan issue. This is very clear in light of the position stated by the hon. member.

Earlier during the debate, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs said “Yes, but in 1991 we had to wait several months before being allowed to vote on the Iraq conflict”.

Does the foreign affairs critic for the Reform Party think that a vote should take place after the conflict? Also, does he agree with the Liberals that this is a hypothetical issue? Considering that 43 mass graves with tens of thousands of bodies have been discovered, this is an urgent situation.

The parliamentary secretary said that a decision could be made at the last minute. Has the hon. member ever heard of the House being urgently recalled for a special vote?

[Bob Mills, Reform, Red Deer, AB]

Madam Speaker, I have been talking about Kosovo in our caucus for at least a couple of years, so it is not a surprise this was going to happen.

Concerning 1991, I will go back to the outrage and total disgust the Prime Minister and the foreign affairs minister voiced for the then Conservative government for not bringing it to a vote immediately before troops were deployed. I have pages and pages of quotes from committee and the House of how upset they were because it was not put to a vote. They then condemned the government for putting it to a vote so late.

Now that the Liberals are thinking about doing the same thing, how can they speak with any conscience at all on an issue like this?

[Gordon Earle, NDP, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, since the beginning of recorded history the human race has faced crisis after crisis. The world today seems to be moving in a new direction, which history will undoubtedly see as the crises of our era. While wars between nations were the reality earlier in our century, this phenomenon now seems on the verge of disappearing.

I am not telling my colleagues anything they did not already know when I say that today's wars are increasingly taking place inside national boundaries. Pluralist countries, in the grip of extremist tendencies, see the various groups represented in their population shift from an attitude of peaceful coexistence to one of pure and simple belligerence.

When this happens, a great many of the victims are found among the civilian population. This is deplorable enough, but it is made more deplorable still by the fact that the worst violations of human rights occur in these internal conflicts. The principle of national sovereignty forbids any intervention from outside, so that the international community could justify its failure to intervene if it considered nothing but that principle. But do we understand the cost of failing to intervene?

There is one thing we should never forget about the sacrosanct principle of national sovereignty, and that is that a nation's sovereignty counts for nothing if it does not exist for the much greater good of the sovereignty of its population.

The roll call of these new-style conflicts is a long one. The names of a few countries will suffice: Algeria, Sierra Leone, Rwanda. They will forever be associated with the atrocities of which they were the theatres and their populations the actors, the spectators and the victims. While our attention is turned elsewhere, some of these crises continue to rage. But no example is more striking by its immediacy and its scale than the crisis in Kosovo.

We are here today debating this motion for that very reason, the very seriousness of this crisis. The motion cuts to the heart of why I entered politics.

When I was campaigning, many people who came to the door, young and old alike, told me their concerns about politicians. They were very cynical about the political process. Many of them said that they were so discouraged they were not even going to vote. I told them not give up that basic right to vote because it is one of the basic principles of our democracy. The minute we give up that right to vote, we give up our opportunity to change what we are unhappy about. We give up the right to be a part of influencing decisions that affect our lives. The right to vote is a very important. I told them that I do not care whether they voted for me or for the next person as long as they got out and exercised their right to vote.

Today, in this particular situation, we need information. In order to assess this situation, it is important to have the proper information. We know that information is one of the first casualties of war. The difficulty we have today in assessing the crisis in Kosovo is that quite often we do not know if the information we are getting has been screened or if it is propaganda from one side or the other side. This creates difficulties in assessing the situation and making decisions. This is all the more reason why it is very important that this matter come before parliament. We need to become as fully informed as possible.

It is also important in this case to have a vote because we are, in fact, sending our men and women off to war. It is a very serious situation. When people are being sent off to put their lives and limbs at risk, it is important that we as Canadians have a say in that matter.

I was very concerned about a phrase used by by the Minister of Foreign Affairs when he was discussing the involvement of a vote. He mentioned “cabinet government”. We recognize cabinet government is important. We do recognize that government does have the right to govern and that it does have a responsibility that it cannot pass off to someone else. However, that responsibility does not mean that it cannot consult with, it cannot be guided by a vote or it cannot bring other input into the situation.

Flexibility to act was mentioned earlier. Flexibility to act comes when we have as much information, help and guidance as possible. That does not mean giving away the right of government to make the final decision. It means that government makes its final decision based on all reasonable input, information and votes. It is therefore very important to not confuse the issue of cabinet government with the right of parliament to vote.

I feel it is very important to have adequate guidelines before committing our men and women to any kind of action on the ground, whether it be peaceful action or more aggressive action. We should know what is involved. We should know, for example, what kind of equipment is going to be used, how well the men are going to be prepared and what kind of support they are going to get. We also need to know what kind of support these people will get when they come home from missions because it has been an issue before.

Another concern I have is with reservists. We understand that reservists can be called into action to help defend their country but the government will not guarantee them their jobs when they return home from service. What would they be facing when they returned home? Would they be facing the same situation as merchant marines who, after serving their country well, came back to find themselves without jobs, without opportunities to advance themselves and with the government saying it had no responsibility for this?

These are some of the issues that have to be dealt with when we are talking about sending our men and women as ground forces into Kosovo. This is why it is all the more important that parliament be able to debate in a meaningful way and have a vote on the issue.

Quite often the government says that it has had debates and that opportunities have been give to express opinions. That is true. We have had debates and opportunities were given to express opinions. However, these were not punctuated with the right of parliament to then make this action concrete with a vote.

I would compare this to the people who talked to me at the door expressing their concern about politicians and about a having a say in society. Those people who expressed their views by saying they were not going to vote, are similar to the take note debates that we have. There are lots of views and opinions coming forward but no further action. However, the ones who went out and voted afterwards transmitted their views into action, which is what we need from this House of Parliament. We need to be able to transmit those views that are brought forth in debate into action by the very important democratic right to vote.

As members can see, I strongly support the motion that has been put forward. I feel that if, as a member of parliament, I am not given my right to vote on this issue, then all those people who elected me and who I represent have lost their right to vote and their say on this issue of very great importance to Canadians. The people's voices are heard are through their elected representatives. If we in the House of Commons do not have the right to vote on this important issue then we have deprived all Canadians of their say and their right to vote on this issue.

I urge all members to give this very important motion serious consideration and support.

[John McKay, Liberal, Scarborough East, ON]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member will appreciate that some precision is needed before one can vote. He said that it is very important and he encourages his constituents to vote.

The real question is not whether we should or should not vote but rather what exactly it is we are voting on. Are we voting on whether we have the right to vote? Are we voting on a hypothetical situation? Are we voting on whether or not Canada should go to war?

I would be interested in the hon. member's interpretation of what this motion means? As I read the motion, that the government submit to a debate and a vote on the possibility of sending Canadian soldiers to the Balkans, it is, in my mind, a very vague motion. I would have encouraged the drafters to be far more precise in their motion.

Given the vagueness of the motion, what is it the hon. member thinks he will be voting on when he stands up and is afforded the opportunity to vote on the motion?

[Gordon Earle, NDP, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, I understand the hon. member's concern. People obviously do not want to deal with hypothetical situations. However, we are dealing with a principle. The principle is that we should have the right to vote on the very important question of sending men and women off to war. If it does not happen we will not have to vote on it, but if it does happen we should have that right.

The government has thus far refused to make the commitment that it will even guarantee us the right to vote on that issue. It has been indicated that it will be a cabinet decision or the Prime Minister will decide. We are simply saying that as parliamentarians we want to be able to decide. That is the essence of the motion. We can quibble with the wording if we want but I think every member knows within their heart exactly what the motion means.

[Ghislain Fournier, Bloc, Manicouagan, QC]

Madam Speaker, I do not mean to blame you, but I rose four or five times to speak. I am very anxious to tell the House what our feelings are with regard to the conflict in Kosovo, but I will content myself with the one minute I am allowed to put a question to the member who just made some good comments.

Today I would like this debate to be non partisan. I would like to know whether we can co-operate. Just as we talk about globalized markets, could we not talk about globalizing peace, and work together with all concerned states at making it long lasting?

I would like to ask the member whether he shares our view regarding the globalization of peace.

I will have the opportunity to speak again during the course of the day.

[Gordon Earle, NDP, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, I very much agree with the concept of globalized peace. I certainly agree with people getting together to do everything they can to bring this about.

I believe in my earlier remarks on Kosovo I said that it should not be a we and a they thing. I personally do not see it as us against the government or the government against us. I see it as people working together to try to bring about some peace to a very troubled part of the world. That is very important.

I agree 100% with the hon. member that when we are dealing with the lives of individuals we should be looking at issues in an non-partisan way.

[Jean-Paul Marchand, Bloc, Québec East, QC]

Madam Speaker, I would like to congratulate my colleague for his speech and support for the motion. I would like to ask him a question regarding the vote.

Everyone agrees that what is going one in Kosovo is barbaric to an extent rarely seen throughout the history of mankind.

We are wondering whether to send in troops to push the Serbs out of Kosovo. I would like to ask my colleague this: would he vote in favour of sending troops to Kosovo to force the Serbs out?

[Gordon Earle, NDP, Halifax West, NS]

Madam Speaker, there is barbaric behaviour on all sides of this conflict. One could argue that what is happening is barbaric with respect to the Serbian action against the Kosovars, but it is also barbaric when poisonous fumes are being released into the air, destroying our environment. There is barbarism on all sides.

We are getting into the hypothetical, and I use it advisedly, when we talk about how we would vote on the matter. I would have to know what the details would be with respect to ground forces. That is what we are asking of the government, to commit to bringing these things before us so we can debate them fully and then vote on them.

[André Bachand, Progressive Conservative, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Madam Speaker, it is no pleasure for me to rise today to speak to the Bloc Quebecois motion on the war in Kosovo and the probable sending of ground troops.

We are, of course, going to support the Bloc motion, but not the amendment. Nevertheless, one can never say one rises with any pleasure in this House when the subject is war, when men, women and children are dying because of the actions of their regime, but also because of the actions of those who want to see the end of that regime, in other words NATO.

Yet this must be discussed, debated and indeed voted on. There has been reference in recent weeks to the gulf war. There is nothing perfect about war, certainly; in fact, war is imperfect. Yet, as far as information and consultation of parliamentarians and of the Quebec and Canadian public is concerned, it is important.

I will take a few minutes of the short time I have available to me to give a very brief overview of the events of 1990-91. But first I have two comments to make.

If there is one thing that is insulting to an MP—or perhaps I just lack experience—it is the take-note debates, as this is a way to cast aside the legitimate work of parliamentarians by invoking extraordinary rules, which means doing away with the traditional rules on which this parliament is built.

Since 1993, the government has made use of extraordinary measures, during debate, that go against the rules that make parliament run smoothly are concerned: no quorum calls, no votes, no amendments and so on. Since 1993, this government has, on several occasions, used extraordinary rules for essential debates, which makes the debates meaningless. I trust there will be no more of this.

It is true that the Minister of Foreign Affairs gave evidence before to committee. The last time, he stayed two hours and a half, and I salute him for that.

That was not, however, what we had asked for. We wanted a complete briefing for MPs, not the extension of Oral Question Period this turned out to be. Perhaps it was a bit better than nothing, but we did not get any information. We have been at war for one month, and there has never been any official briefing.

We have been promised one this week. The foreign affairs committee is going to meet and is supposed to get a briefing, a month after the war started. In the meantime, we have tripled our military presence, maybe even more than that. This is what we are being told here. This war was off to as bad a start as far as parliamentary rules are concerned as it was from the military point of view.

I am not an expert on military issues, but this seems to be an improvised war. The gulf war had all the negative characteristics of a war, but members will recall that all necessary preparations were made. Everything was there: aircraft, ships, ground forces.

We told Saddam Hussein: “Listen, either you leave Kuwait or we will take action”. We took action. We did not have to double or triple our initial commitment in the process. We were prepared.

Regarding the gulf war, on August 2, 1990, Saddam Hussein tried to invade Kuwait. On the same day, the UN security council passed its first resolution. The UN does not exist for nothing. It is there to serve the international community. The first resolution urged Iraq to get out of Kuwait.

On August 6, in the middle of the summer, resolution 661 regarding economic sanctions was passed. On August 10, the then Prime Minister, Brian Mulroney, made a statement. I am doing my best to make a brief summary of the sequence of events. He said in that statement that Canada was willing, if necessary, to support the deployment of troops. At that time, we were mostly talking about ships. The first ship left Halifax on August 24.

On August 25, resolution 665 said that we would use whatever means necessary to apply economic sanctions.

On September 14, the cabinet agreed to send CF-18s if necessary. The first debate took place on September 24. No guns, no shots had been fired. Not a missile had been launched. Nobody had died because of the allied forces. The first debate was held, a 14 hour debate.

The motion condemned the invasion of Kuwait and led to Canada's support for troops to be sent under the aegis of the United Nations, a multinational force. In September, we debated this, and a vote was held.

Another motion was debated on November 28 and 29. No missiles had yet been launched. We had a second debate. What was going on? We had a debate before anyone started shooting. We had a second debate, with a vote, to support resolution 660. A Liberal amendment, which we have talked about, was rejected by the House.

Once into January, things started heating up. There were cutoff dates for Saddam Hussein. On January 11, the Leader of the Opposition at the time, our current Prime Minister, as a member of the Privy Council, was informed by the prime minister of the time. No missiles had yet been launched.

The current Prime Minister, then Leader of the Opposition, was entitled to a briefing, because of his position. We have been waiting a month for such a briefing. The first official briefing for a leader of an opposition party was held this morning, one month later, because he is a member of the Privy Council. One month later. Missiles have been launched, our military involvement has tripled, but it took a month before there was a briefing.

In addition, the Leader of the Opposition at the time, the current Prime Minister, said on January 16, 1991, after being informed in detail:

“War in the gulf is useless and dangerous”.

I am not sure that he does not regret his words today.

In January, we had our third debate, and no missiles had yet been launched. We debated for 46 hours. On January 16, Operation Desert Storm started.

There were three debates and three votes on hypothetical questions. Were we going to war in the Persian Gulf or not? These were hypothetical questions. Those in the House at the time had the opportunity to debate the questions on three occasions. It is a parliamentary privilege to vote. But it was on a hypothetical question. Were we going to fight or not? It came up three times.

As I said earlier today, the government is going to have to understand that parliamentarians and this parliament are a tool. We need to have accurate information. We all know what is going on in Kosovo, or at least we know what the media tell us, because we cannot trust the government.

We know what is going on in Kosovo. We know that major crimes are taking place. What is the exact nature of these crimes? We have our suspicions. There is increasing talk of mass graves. We know that there are problems with Montenegro and Macedonia, and that problems with Hungary are not far off. Trouble is brewing over there.

One month after the first military intervention, we have still not had a vote. Could we at least have a real debate, a vote on what has gone on, and if we are officially sending ground troops, could that be debated and voted on as well?

Unfortunately, we have much to learn from wars. Nothing is ever perfect. The last time, parliamentary committees were put to work. I hope the government will understand that parliament is a tool. War is madness, but parliamentarians and the public can bring about peace.

[Myron Thompson, Reform, Wild Rose, AB]

Madam Speaker, earlier today the member for Red Deer reminded me that the present Prime Minister and the present foreign affairs minister rose in the House a number of times condemning the Conservative government for the lack of debate and the lack of a vote on the 1991 Desert Storm crisis. Today we see the opposite occurring. According to the Liberal government we are not to have a vote. We are not having the kind of debate we in the opposition would like to have. The Conservatives are now attacking the Liberals for not doing exactly what they were attacked for in 1991. The whole process gets a little confusing.

I remember in the last parliament the debate on whether we should send troops to Bosnia. Much to our dismay, while we were debating whether we should send troops to Bosnia, we learned that the troops had been sent three days before the debate began.

I certainly agree with the motion. We should have a vote on the issue. However, would the member not agree that before we can accomplish anything legitimately in the House of Commons that we really need some serious changes in terms of open, honest, transparent debates and freer votes to vote the wishes of the people we represent and not the wishes of the party whips?

[André Bachand, Progressive Conservative, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Madam Speaker, our role today is not to criticize and tell the government that it did not do a good job back then, but that it is doing better now. That is not the idea.

There is lots of time for partisanship. We wanted to respond to the government's statement that there has been debate. That is nonsense.

The member is perfectly right. It is time, and perhaps even a bit too late. At some point it will perhaps become clear that things have gone further than we think. We will perhaps find out too late that things have already gone too far and that we are in much deeper than we thought.

We agree that we must have accurate information and a genuine debate in accordance with the rules of parliament, but time is of the essence because the situation is changing very quickly.

[Daniel Turp, Bloc, Beauharnois—Salaberry, QC]

Madam Speaker, first of all, I want to say that I agree with the criticisms the hon. member for Richmond—Arthabaska made about the briefings given by the government.

We learned earlier this morning that instead of being briefed tomorrow morning from 8 to 9 a.m., we would be called to a half hour briefing tomorrow afternoon, and we do not know yet if we will get the briefing we were promised for next Thursday.

The government is not forthcoming. They obviously have something to hide. They lack transparency and, throughout this debate, we have to blame the government as often as possible.

Our colleague from Richmond—Arthabaska indicated that there is a major precedent in this House that should govern us, that should inspire those who, for several years now, have been addressing the issue of sending troops abroad.

Our colleague said that his party will be supporting our motion, and we appreciate it. However, he also mentioned that he will not be voting for the amendment. Why will he not support the amendment?

In 1991, his party ensured that debates and votes would be held before troops are sent in. The Bloc Quebecois would like the vote to be held before troops are sent abroad and that can be done, as we saw in 1991.

[André Bachand, Progressive Conservative, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will be very brief. The fact is there was a UN mandate in the case of the war in the Persian Gulf. The security council had agreed on certain resolutions and on the need for military intervention, and parliament was then consulted.

Now, if we use words like prior to the possibility of, this means that before we go to the UN, we need to reach an agreement here. The logistics of it all become a bit difficult.

However, I do understand my hon. colleague's concern, and after the conflict, we will eventually have time to review the whole matter and improve the system.

[René Laurin, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, today, we are having another debate on the very important issue of Kosovo. This time, we wanted to make sure our demands would be crystal clear.

Over the last 20 days, in fact since the very beginning of the crisis in Kosovo, we have asked many questions. And each time, we have been given answers that were incomplete or evasive, answers that were not answers.

Today, we are asking the government to give us an opportunity to vote clearly. Obviously, this requires that the government give us the relevant information, because, before we can make an informed decision, we need to have all the available information.

The government still has a long way to go in that regard and this is why we ask the government, in the case of new developments regarding the commitment of ground troops to Kosovo, to hold a debate and a vote on this issue.

The government said no. This morning, its representative, the secretary of state, told us that the government's refusal was based on considerations of convenience and availability.

How can members of parliament officially express their opinions in the House and speak on behalf of their taxpayers and represent them well, if not by a vote?

In a democracy, the only way members of parliament can make their positions known officially and without ambiguity is by voting. Of course, we can always deliver speeches, which is what I am doing right now. That is what the government has allowed us to do so far on the issue of Kosovo. The government said it would consult parliament by giving members an opportunity to express theirs views on the issue. So far, more than 130 members have taken advantage of this opportunity.

But a speech is quite different from a vote. In a speech, we can always qualify our statements.

We can always make sure there is a way out. But when time comes to vote, you either say yes or no. This is very clear.

I believe that the taxpayers each of us represents in our respective ridings have the right to know where their member of parliament stands. Does he agree or not with what is coming next in Kosovo? Yes or no, does he support ground military action?

In a speech, the member can always say “I agree as long as” or “I disagree because of such and such event or because such and such condition was not met”. But this is not voting. You cannot vote conditionally. You either vote for or against a proposition. The taxpayers to whom we are responsible are entitled to know how we feel on the issue.

Why are taxpayers entitled to that type of respect? First of all, because it is the very essence of our democratic system. Taxpayers are entitled to know what we came here to say on their behalf. Secondly, because this Kosovo crisis is far from being over. It is not only about the actual crisis and its bombing raids that are not over yet. Besides, we do not know when all this will end. There might be ground attacks or not. We do not know. But what we do know is that it will be long.

And even when a peace agreement is reached, many weeks, months and even years will pass before the Kosovo problem is settled. Canadian taxpayers will therefore certainly be involved again.

They might be asked to make sacrifices to help the government respect the commitments that will have been made during the Kosovo war. Taxpayers are entitled to know right now what these commitments are, how far we are prepared to go, how far we are able to go, and what choices they will eventually have to face because of the decisions that we are making now.

Taxpayers are entitled to know if today in Canada decisions are made in the minister's office or the cabinet, without a vote in the House. Cabinet is ready to commit astronomical amounts. They were talking about $100 million just to take in 5,000 refugees. That was simply for bringing 5,000 Kosovars here. Needless to say that has been put on the backburner for now, but the amount forecasted was $100 million.

If it costs $100 million to take in 5,000 Kosovars, how much more does it cost to provide 18 CF-18s, in addition to the troops already deployed and the humanitarian assistance already provided to the refugees still in Kosovo, Albania, Macedonia and other adjacent countries?

We figure that several million dollars have been committed to date. We are asking that the government tell us the truth, be transparent and allow us to vote for or against this.

So far, we have not hassled the government too much. So far, we have supported its positions. We have supported them because we thought it was essential that help be sent to Kosovo, where children, women and entire families live under the threat of being killed, harmed or deported. These people are sick, they do not have a home or anything to eat.

It was therefore essential that we give our support.

But now that the process has been initiated, we can take the time to ask ourselves other questions. The decisions we make are made for humanitarian reasons, but they must be made by laying everything out on the table, so that we can all give to the taxpayers of this country, our fellow citizens and constituents, information about the positions we all agreed on.

The government has no reason to prevent us from debating this issue and voting on it. Why would it deny us this right? The readiness argument does not hold.

Armed conflicts do not break out every six months. And if ever there was another one, our motion is not asking the government to settle things for all times to come. It is asking the government to ensure that we will have an opportunity to vote on the sending of troops for peacekeeping, or for other purposes, in Kosovo and in the Balkan region. This is what we want to vote on.

We are not committing ourselves for other times to come. We are not asking the government to promise us anything for other times. We are saying: “We have this situation. In this particular situation, we are asking the government for the right to fully exercise democracy, for the right to be informed and, mostly, we are asking it to give us an opportunity to express our opinion, to give our approval with a full knowledge of the issue”.

That is the least the government should commit to.

[John Richardson, Liberal, Perth—Middlesex, ON]

Madam Speaker, the government stands against the motion on the floor for pretty solid reasons. It breaks with Canadian parliamentary practice. It deals with a hypothetical question which is clearly stated in hypothetical terms. It would set an unworkable precedent in tying the hands of the government when it comes to the timeliness and effectiveness of future deployments of Canadian forces whether in a combat or peacekeeping role such as in the Balkans or anywhere in the world.

In the Canadian parliamentary system the responsibility for deploying Canadian forces lies with the government. For example, there was no formal parliamentary resolution in our entry into the Korean war. Even in 1939 there was no specific resolution declaring war on Nazi Germany. Parliamentary approval for the government's policy was shown through support for the Speech from the Throne and the defence estimates. There was no vote at all in the declaration of war against imperial Japan.

Since 1950 there have been over 50 peacekeeping support operations of varying sizes. In many of these cases parliament was not consulted at all. In the case of roughly 20 major missions which were debated in the House, there were only five recorded votes and three motions were agreed to without a recorded vote. Only three of these occurred prior to deployment: the Congo in 1960, Cyprus in 1964 and the Middle East in 1973.

If the opposition party really disagrees with deployment it should not hide behind procedural motions. It should have the courage to introduce a motion of non-confidence in the government. Our government has delivered on its—

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

I am afraid I must interrupt the hon. member. We are on questions and comments and not on debate. I trust the hon. member is aware of that and can ask his question.

Does the hon. member have a question of the member who spoke?

[John Richardson, Liberal, Perth—Middlesex, ON]

I question my position to speak being given to the Bloc Quebecois.

[René Laurin, Bloc, Joliette, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will comment on my Liberal colleague's comment.

We made comments because it was our turn to do so. We have not taken anybody's turn. We have 20 minutes to make comments but we agreed to share our time. My comments were of normal duration.

I will use the comment the member of the Liberal Party started making to tell him I find it surprising that he would invoke parliamentary practices to deny the House such a vote.

When it is time to send a delegation of 5, 6, 7, 8 or 10 members abroad as part of a parliamentary association or other group, the House is asked to authorize the required funding. It is deemed important for the House to vote on this matter.

Today, we are talking about eventually sending soldiers to risk their lives in Kosovo, and it is deemed not necessary for the House to vote on this. We are told that a cabinet decision will be sufficient. If it takes the approval of the House for 10 members to travel abroad, its approval should also be required to send hundreds or thousands of soldiers abroad.

[Sarkis Assadourian, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I followed with great interest the hon. member's presentation.

We have to remind the hon. member, as my colleague mentioned earlier, we have sent our peacekeepers overseas many times and we never had a debate. Over the last five years I can remember five or six debates and the hon. member participated in them.

Further, last week when the Minister of Foreign Affairs was asked the same question he replied that none of the European nations debated or discussed the issue. The U.K. is sending thousands of soldiers to Kosovo and has never debated it. The U.S. has sent many troops and aircraft and it has never had a debate.

This year we have had a debate. Everybody is free to express their opinions.