Debates of May 11th, 1999

Public Sector Pension Investment Board Act

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.

[Some hon. members]

Yea.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

All those opposed will please say nay.

[Some hon. members]

Nay.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

In my opinion the nays have it.

And more than five members having risen:

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

The recorded division on the motion stands deferred.

We will now move on to Group No. 2.

[Eric C. Lowther, Reform, Calgary Centre, AB]

moved:

Motion No. 15

That Bill C-78, in Clause 53, be amended by replacing line 9 on page 29 with the following:

““surviving spouse” in relation to a contributor, means”

Motion No. 17

That Bill C-78, in Clause 61, be amended by replacing line 19 on page 38 with the following:

“under this Part to the surviving spouse and children of”

Motion No. 18

That Bill C-78, in Clause 62, be amended a ) by replacing line 12 on page 40 with the following:

“payable under this Part to a surviving spouse or child,” b ) by replacing line 24 on page 40 with the following:

“surviving spouse has become entitled under this Part to” c ) by replacing lines 33 and 34 on page 41 with the following: b ) a benefit to which a contributor, surviving spouse or child is entitled under this Part or Part”

Motion No. 19

That Bill C-78, in Clause 64, be amended a ) by replacing line 38 on page 42 with the following:

“annuity or an annual allowance, the surviving spouse” b ) by replacing line 4 on page 43 with the following: a ) in the case of the surviving spouse, an immediate” c ) by replacing lines 10 and 11 on page 43 with the following:

“without leaving a surviving spouse, the surviving spouse is dead or the surviving spouse is not entitled to receive” d ) by replacing lines 17 and 18 on page 43 with the following:

“died without leaving a surviving spouse, the surviving spouse is dead or the surviving spouse is not entitled to receive” e ) by replacing line 26 on page 43 with the following:

“(2)( a ) or ( b ), the surviving spouse and children of the” f ) by replacing line 42 on page 43 with the following:

“1967 of less than five years, the surviving spouse and” g ) by replacing lines 15 to 17 on page 44 with the following:

“service, the surviving spouse and children of the contributor, in any case where the contributor died leaving a surviving spouse or a child less than”

Motion No. 20

That Bill C-78, in Clause 65, be amended a ) by replacing line 29 on page 46 with the following:

“the surviving spouse and children of the contributor” b ) by replacing lines 37 and 38 on page 46 with the following:

“more years of pensionable service, the surviving spouse and children of the contributor are entitled”

Motion No. 21

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended a ) by replacing line 4 on page 50 with the following:

“the surviving spouse and children of a contributor are” b ) by replacing line 7 on page 50 with the following:

“surviving spouse except that” c ) by replacing line 11 on page 50 with the following:

“payment is to be made the surviving spouse is dead” d ) by replacing lines 17 and 18 on page 50 with the following:

“for died without leaving a surviving spouse or at the time payment is to be made the surviving spouse” e ) by replacing lines 27 to 29 on page 50 with the following:

“surviving spouse at the time payment is to be made, the total amount shall be paid to the surviving spouse and the children so living apart in” f ) by replacing line 32 on page 50 with the following:

“stances, or to the surviving spouse or any of the” g ) by replacing line 37 on page 50 with the following:

“to be made the surviving spouse is dead or cannot be” h ) by replacing line 39 on page 50 with the following:

“leaving a surviving spouse and at the time the”

Motion No. 22

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended a ) by replacing lines 8 to 14 on page 51 with the following:

“(2) If there are two surviving spouses of a contributor, the share of the total amount to be paid to surviving spouse referred to in paragraph ( a ) of the definition “surviving spouse” in subsection 3(1) and the share to be paid to the surviving spouse referred to in paragraph ( b ) of that definition shall be paid as the Minister may direct.” b ) by replacing line 17 on page 51 with the following:

“the share of one or other of the surviving spouses under”

Motion No. 23

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended by replacing lines 27 to 42 on page 51 with the following:

“(4) For the purposes of this Part, where a contributor dies and the contributor had been, for a period of not less than one year immediately before the contributor's death, residing with a person of the opposite sex to whom the contributor was not married, the Treasury Board may deem that person to be the surviving spouse of the contributor if, during that period, that person had been publicly represented by the contributor to be the spouse of the contributor, and may deem that person to have become married to the contributor on the day established by that person to the satisfaction of the Treasury Board as being the day on which the representation began.

(4.1) For the purposes of this Part, where a contributor dies and, at the time of death, the contributor was married to a person with whom the contributor had been residing for a period immediately before the marriage and who, during that period, had been publicly represented by the contributor to be the spouse of the contributor, the Treasury Board may deem that person to have become married to the contributor on the day established by that person to the satisfaction of the Treasury Board as being the day on which the representation began.”

[Tom Wappel, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

moved:

Motion No. 24

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended by replacing lines 28 to 30 on page 51 with the following:

“person establishes that he or she was residing in a relationship of mutual dependency and companionship with the contributor that has been publicly acknowledged by both the person and the contributor for at least one year immedi-”

Motion No. 25

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended a ) by replacing lines 37 and 38 on page 51 with the following:

“whom the contributor had been residing in a relationship of mutual dependency and companionship for a period” b ) by replacing line 42 on page 51 with the following:

“day on which that person began to so reside with the contributor.”

[Eric C. Lowther, Reform, Calgary Centre, AB]

moved:

Motion No. 26

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended a ) by replacing lines 1 and 2 on page 52 with the following:

“(5) A surviving spouse is not entitled to receive an annual allowance if the surviving spouse makes an” b ) by replacing line 4 on page 52 with the following:

“(6) A surviving spouse may make an irrevocable” c ) by replacing line 10 on page 52 with the following:

“three months after the surviving spouse is notified of” d ) by replacing line 14 on page 52 with the following:

“(8) A surviving spouse is not entitled to receive any” e ) by replacing, in the English version, line 17 on page 52 with the following:

“surviving spouse is found criminally responsible for” f ) by replacing line 19 on page 52 with the following:

“(9) A surviving spouse is not entitled to receive an” g ) by replacing, in the English version, line 22 on page 52 with the following:

“Minister that the surviving spouse cannot be found.” h ) by replacing line 25 on page 52 with the following:

“and there are two surviving spouses of the contributor,” i ) by replacing lines 28 and 29 on page 52 with the following: a ) the surviving spouse referred to in paragraph ( a ) of the definition “surviving spouse” in subsection” j ) by replacing lines 34 to 39 on page 52 with the following:

“contributor or since having been deemed under subsection (4.1) to have become married to the contributor bears to the total number of years that the contributor so cohabited with the surviving spouses; and ( b ) the surviving spouse referred to in paragraph ( b )” k ) by replacing lines 2 and 3 on page 53 with the following:

“with the contributor since having been deemed under subsection (4) to have become married to the contributor bears to the total number of” l ) by replacing lines 5 and 6 on page 53 with the following:

“surviving spouses, either while married or while having been deemed to have been married.” m ) by replacing line 12 on page 53 with the following:

“(12) When one of the surviving spouses referred to” n ) by replacing lines 17 and 18 on page 53 with the following:

“surviving spouse who died or is not entitled shall be paid to the remaining surviving spouse in addition to”

[Tom Wappel, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

moved:

Motion No. 27

That Bill C-78, in Clause 75, be amended a ) by replacing line 32 on page 52 with the following:

“number of years that he or she resided in a relationship of mutual dependency and companionship” b ) by replacing lines 35 to 38 on page 52 with the following:

“or she resided with the contributor in a relationship described in subsection (4) bears to the total number of years that the contributor so resided with the survivors; and” c ) by replacing lines 1 to 6 on page 53 with the following:

“number of years that he or she resided with the contributor in a relationship described in subsection (4) bears to the total number of years that the contributor resided with the survivors, either while married or while in a relationship described in subsection (4).”

[Eric C. Lowther, Reform, Calgary Centre, AB]

moved:

Motion No. 28

That Bill C-78, in Clause 76, be amended a ) by replacing lines 24 to 32 on page 53 with the following:

“surviving spouse of a contributor is not entitled to an annual allowance in respect of the contributor under this Part if that contributor married the surviving spouse or was deemed under subsection 25(4) to have become married to the surviving spouse after having become entitled under this Part to an annuity or annual allowance, unless, after the marriage, or after having been so deemed to have become married, the contributor became or” b ) by replacing line 39 on page 53 with the following:

“the surviving spouse of the contributor or the children” c ) by replacing line 5 on page 54 with the following:

“Part by virtue of being the surviving spouse of a female” d ) by replacing line 16 on page 54 with the following:

“Part by virtue of being the surviving spouse of a female”

[Tom Wappel, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

moved:

Motion No. 29

That Bill C-78, in Clause 76, be amended a ) by replacing lines 27 and 28 on page 53 with the following:

“survivor or began to reside with the survivor in a relationship described in subsection 25(4) after” b ) by replacing, in the English version, line 32 on page 53 with the following:

“of so residing, the contributor became or”

[Eric C. Lowther, Reform, Calgary Centre, AB]

moved:

Motion No. 30

That Bill C-78, in Clause 81, be amended a ) by replacing line 26 on page 57 with the following:

“nor the contributor's surviving spouse or children” b ) by replacing line 41 on page 57 with the following:

“sion Act, all surviving spouses within the meaning of”

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the question to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment is as follows: the hon. member for Cumberland—Colchester, Air Safety.

[Eric C. Lowther, Reform, Calgary Centre, AB]

Madam Speaker, I appreciate the thoroughness with which you have gone through the motions for us today on this section of the bill and the Group No. 2 amendments. This is an important group of amendments and I would like to take a minute to detail why they are important and to point out some of the grievous shortcomings in this section of the bill.

The amendments I put forward and ones other members have put forward, but particularly mine, are designed to return the act to where it was prior to this current piece of legislation. There is a very good reason to bring it back to where it was.

This government bill before us affects the pension plans of public service employees. Bill C-78 makes a significant change in the determination of who will be eligible for survivor benefits.

The bill changes the test. Prior to this bill the test was fairly clear. With this bill if the contributor is married and the contributor dies, the surviving spouse, a party to the marriage, is eligible for the benefits. There are a few other minor tests such as living together at the time of death and that kind of thing. Basically a person who is married to a contributor who has died is eligible for the benefits.

There is another group that is eligible. The sole test for this other group for the benefits from the contributor is cohabitation for a year and having a relationship of a conjugal nature. This terminology is new to law. We have had the phrase “having a conjugal relationship” but in this bill it is “having a relationship of a conjugal nature”. It may seem like a small point but it is not. Let me explain why.

The word conjugal usually applies to some sort of physical intimacy or sexual activity within the confines of a marriage type of relationship. Bill C-78 is basically saying that the private intimacies between two people will be the determining factor as to whether or not one is going to receive a benefit.

Think about that for a minute. The private intimacies between two people will determine whether or not they receive benefits. How will anybody know about these private intimacies? And whose business is it anyway? That is where this bill is taking us. Prior to this bill, in the legislation that is being amended, that was not a required test for the extension of benefits, nor should it be.

This bill is being proposed by a government that once had a prime minister who said the government has no place in the bedrooms of the nation. Now it is putting forward legislation which says that someone who has physical intimacies with a person will receive survivor benefits. It seems unworkable to me. How will anyone know? What are we going to set it up? Will we have some sort of inquisition of people's personal intimacies? That is a scary thought but it seems that is where this bill is taking us.

Beyond that, the bill does not in any way define what a relationship of a conjugal nature is. What is that doing? It is leaving it to the courts. People will be in the courts arguing whether or not they had a relationship of a conjugal nature. This is after the contributor has died. Who knows what was going on and again, what business is it of the government anyway to make that the key factor for determining benefits? It does not make sense. Where could this take us?

The bill does not say a relationship of a conjugal nature with one person. What about three people living together? Does that mean that both of those people have a relationship of a conjugal nature with the contributor? Are they both eligible? Nowhere in this legislation is it defined or addressed. It is wide open. This is a significant cause for concern. It makes the legislation unworkable.

On the other side of the coin, why is this test of a conjugal nature the key? If we want to extend benefits under Bill C-78 to people who had some sort of relationship, does that mean we are going to exclude certain people? If two people have a close relationship, share expenses, have lived together for years, are more than just average friends but they do not have any intimate physical relations, are they out or are they in? Who is going to decide that? The courts again? Certainly not this legislation because it gives absolutely no direction in that area. It is a recipe for confusion and litigation. It is very poorly drafted and very poorly thought out.

We had an opportunity in committee to ask the minister about this very issue. I thought surely the minister would have thought this out and would have an answer for me. Here is the answer I got and I am paraphrasing but it can be seen in the committee Hansard . He basically told me that the lawyers made them do it. I could not believe it.

The courts had made some decisions and I think he was referring to the Rosenberg case where the courts ruled a redefinition of the term “spouse”. The justice minister said she was going to appeal that decision and defend the current Canadian law and never did. Now the courts have redefined a section in one act in government legislation.

The President of the Treasury Board said that the courts made them do this and the lawyers told them to write it this way. Is this how the Liberal government governs? The courts made them do it. The lawyers told them to do it. What are they doing? They are setting this up for a test of physical intimacy for the determination of benefits. It just does not make sense. It is a poor approach to the serving of the people.

What kind of a bureaucracy are we going to have to establish to assess who qualifies and who does not? I hesitate to use the term as I do not want to offend anyone, but we can envision some sort of sex police or something like that who would determine the regulations on this, who is included and who is excluded.

I am attempting to point out to the House and to those who are listening today that if we are going to go down this road, surely we have to keep it independent from the government invading in the physical intimacies between two people. I concur with the statement of the Liberal prime minister of some years back. Mr. Trudeau said the government has no business in the bedrooms of the nation, yet this very piece of legislation is driving it right in there. For that reason we proposed the amendments.

I am hoping my talk today and talks I have given on this before will cause us to rethink this. I believe the hon. member from Scarborough has some points to make on this as well. I hope that we can look at these amendments to bring the act back to where it was before, where the government was not intruding in the private affairs of people. If the government wants to go down this road, rethink it and come up with something that works a lot better than this.

Of course we are told that this change is not going to impact on costs at all. It is going to be a very minor cost. How can we know that when we do not know who qualifies and who does not qualify? I do not buy the argument that this change is going to be very minor cost because we do not know who is in or out. That just does not wash.

Finally, the amendments I have proposed today were only some of the amendments that were needed. There are 249 times in the 200 pages of this bill where any mention of wife or spouse or widow or any of those kinds of terms has been replaced with one word, the word survivor. Of course, survivor is subject to the conjugality test.

We went to the legislative counsel for assistance in bringing this act back to where it was before. Because of the rush and the way the government has pushed Bill C-78 through the House without a good airing of all the issues, the government has made it impossible for the legislative counsel to make the appropriate amendments to all sections of the bill. Many sections of the bill need amending to bring it back to where it was before. I have not had an opportunity to bring them to the House because of time constraints.

Having said all that, I think I have shed some light on this. There is a very serious concern to which we all need to pay attention. I hope that when the vote comes we see some reason and accept these amendments and have another look at the bill and come forward with more appropriate legislation.

[Tom Wappel, Liberal, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have four amendments in this grouping. I appreciate the opportunity to have 10 minutes to explain to the House some of the concerns I have with respect to the sections I wish to speak on.

I want to echo a number of the comments of the speaker before me. I commend him for some of the motions he brought forward, in particular Motion No. 23.

Motion No. 23 will bring clause 25 at page 51 back to the way it was. In other words it will be a return to status quo. That being the case I say outright that I will be supporting the motion. I agree that the matter has proceeded in undue haste and I think the motion is appropriate.

My motion, as I will explain in a moment, is a compromise to the motion put forward by the member for Calgary Centre on the chance that the House chooses to reject that motion and perhaps chooses to consider in some way my compromise. I will explain that.

I am concerned about clause 75 found at page 51 of the bill. I want to read it into the record. It refers to section 25 of the act to be amended. I pity the people watching on television who are trying to follow the clauses. However I hope to explain to the House my main concern. It reads:

(4) For the purposes of this Part, when a person establishes that he or she was cohabiting in a relationship of a conjugal nature with the contributor for at least one year immediately before the death of the contributor, the person is considered to be the survivor of the contributor.

As a lawyer I know that lawyers do not use language indiscriminately. They use language very carefully. I disagree with the hon. member for Calgary Centre who thinks that this section was drafted in haste and drafted poorly.

My view is that it was drafted very carefully and very insidiously by the justice department to continue its objective, that is its drive eventually down the road to force Canadians to accept same sex marriages and to change the law to require same sex marriages.

This is a very significant step down the road. Why? Let us look at the word conjugal. It has an ordinary English dictionary meaning. If we are speaking the English language as we do as one of the official languages in the House, we have to look at the ordinary meaning of the word conjugal. It is very simple. By the way I have checked it in French. It has the same meaning in French as it has in English:

Conjugal, of marriage; the right of sexual intercourse with a spouse; of the mutual relation of husband and wife.

That is its definition in the Oxford English Dictionary .

This is the section used by the government to provide for same sex benefits. Yet the word conjugal is known in the English language as pertaining to marriage and pertaining to the right of sexual intercourse with a spouse. Therefore it is an oxymoron to say that it deals with same sex couples because that is not a husband and a wife and it is not the sexual intercourse between spouses. Yet the word is used. It can only be used as the first step toward trying to ensure that the federal law is changed to permit same sex people to marry, which is federal jurisdiction.

What about the legal definition? Is there a difference? As it happens there is no difference, but I went to a very well known source, Black's Law Dictionary which deals with definitions of the terms and phrases of American and English jurisprudence, ancient and modern.

The definition of the word conjugal in Black's Law Dictionary reads as follows:

Of or belonging to marriage or the married state; suitable or appropriate to the married state or to married persons; matrimonial; connubial.

Then it provides legal citations for that definition. What does that mean? It means that both the ordinary English Oxford Dictionary definition and the legal definition of conjugal mean of marriage. It means relations between a husband and wife.

Why are the lawyers in the justice department using a word with such a clear English and legal meaning to justify the extension of same sex benefits to homosexual couples? There can be only one reason. That is to further the agenda and to push us down the road to the recognition of same sex marriages.

The allegation made by my own party is that we are simply keeping federal pensions in line with court decisions. I have three things to say to that. That is bunk. That is baloney. That is balderdash.

All we have to do is look at the Supreme Court of Canada decision in Egan and Nesbit which the government has ignored purposefully and which the Ontario Court of Appeal in Rosenberg grossly ignored and in my opinion improperly ignored since it was a higher court. Egan and Nesbit was a case in which the court was called upon to decide whether or not same sex partners could get old age security benefits. That is right on point with same sex survivors benefits here.

What was the decision of that court? It could not have been closer, which is rather interesting. It was a 5:4 split decision. Five of the nine judges were of the view that the definition of spouse in the Old Age Security Act contravened section 15(1). Four of the judges felt that it was perfectly acceptable. One of the five who felt that it contravened was prepared to use section 1 to permit the contravention. Why? Because, he said, the “government must be accorded some flexibility in extending social benefits and does not have to be proactive in recognizing new social relationships”.

Couple that with the majority decision, that is to say the decision of four of the nine judges. There were no other groupings of judges in the Supreme Court of Canada in that case where four of the nine were agreed. They said:

Marriage has from time immemorial been firmly grounded in our legal tradition, one that is itself a reflection of longstanding philosophical and religious traditions. But its ultimate raison d'être transcends all of these and is firmly anchored in the biological and social realities that heterosexual couples have the unique ability to procreate, that most children are the product of these relationships, and that they are generally cared for and nurtured by those who live in that relationship. In this sense, marriage is by nature heterosexual. It would be possible to legally define marriage to include homosexual couples, but this would not change the biological and social realities that underlie the traditional marriage.

They went on to say:

The singling out of legally married and common law couples as the recipients of benefits necessarily excludes all sorts of other couples living together, whatever reasons these other couples may have for doing so and whatever their sexual orientation. What Parliament clearly had in mind was to accord support to married couples who were aged and elderly, for the advancement of public policy central to society—

The advancement of public policy central to society is to sustain the traditional definition of marriage, and this will erode it.

On Egan and Nesbit the Supreme Court of Canada has spoken. Activist judges in lower courts did not like the decision so Rosenberg in Ontario chose to ignore it and went right ahead and decided their own way, ignoring a higher court.

The government examined the Rosenberg decision, realized that it was more in thinking with what it wanted to do with its agenda and with the agenda of the justice department and chose not to appeal it, thereby legitimizing what I would argue is a questionable decision.

I urge members of the House to consider rejecting the paragraph as it now is for no other reason than the legally improper use of the word conjugal. It will open up a Pandora's box of nightmares.

[Claude Bachand, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Mr. Speaker, it is rather odd that in debating a bill regarding the public service pension fund surplus we have to address the issue of same sex partners. Sometimes things are hard to explain, but this being said, we are going to have to address it.

I believe the government should have settled the issue in a different way. It should have introduced a separate piece of legislation to settle the issue once and for all; otherwise there will always be a risk. No matter what kind of bills will be introduced in the House of Commons, someone could always introduce an amendment to clarify the same sex couple issue.

In my mind it would have been a lot simpler for the government to settle this issue once and for all, and to proceed with the necessary changes following debate and discussions in the House. But instead it chose to take a piecemeal approach, which creates some distortions.

I am going to give you another example I am more familiar with as Indian affairs critic. It was found that in the area of matrimonial property division in case of divorce there is no protection whatsoever for women living on reserve. So we wondered what to do about it. What happened is that we started seeing bills regarding native people being introduced in the House of Commons; Bill C-49 is a case in point.

Native women lobbied hard and managed to convince us, in the Bloc Quebecois, as well as other members who supported us, to add to Bill C-49 a new chapter dealing with the division of matrimonial property. We told the government “You would be well advised to introduce a specific bill to settle this problem regarding native women once and for all”.

There is a risk for the House. No matter what kind of bill concerning native people will come before the House, native women will want to add a section dealing with the problem they want to solve.

The same applies to the bill before us today. It does not matter what bill is introduced in the House, there will always be someone who will want to debate indirectly the issue of same sex spouses and manage to introduce amendments to rectify the situation. So there is a problem.

I believe a great deal of debate would be saved if, once in a while, the government took the bull by the horns and resolved these problems once and for all.

We are beginning to hear legalistic talk about the supreme court having ruled this, that or the other way. This shows some lack of courage on the part of governments. Instead of settling important issues through legislation, and through elected representatives, they often dictate our conduct by giving us lessons in common law or referring to the superior court, the provincial appeal courts or the supreme court.

This shows a lack of courage on the part of the government, which avoids dealing openly with important issues, which drag on and will continue to drag on, despite all the debates we will have in this House. Yet, a specific bill would have allowed us to settle the issue once and for all.

Debate on a specific bill would probably have lasted quite a while, until the government decided to gag us. However, I believe that in the future it should be an option. If we want to bring a substantive solution to the issue of same sex spouses, the government should introduce a bill and amend the whole legislation in a way that would allow the House to apply a final solution instead of taking a piecemeal approach.

Now, what is the situation today? As I said earlier, there are distortions.

For instance, the member for Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, who openly admitted he is gay, will probably be forced to vote against the bill. I cannot speak in his place, but when he spoke earlier on the motions in Group No. 1, he said this legislation was unacceptable. He tried to find a word to describe it that could be used in the House. All day long, words were used in debate like “abduction”, “piracy”, “raiding”, “misappropriation”.

We have been trying to avoid unparliamentary language. Still, this bill is unacceptable to the Bloc Quebecois, and I think it is unacceptable to all opposition parties.

Even my colleague for Hochelaga—Maisonneuve intends to vote against this bill. The hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas said he would have voted against it too, if he had been here, but he is away on a mission.

We also have the opposite situation. There are government members who find this bill acceptable and will vote for it, but they do not necessarily like the new definition of spouse and their only way out is to move amendments.

I do not know what the outcome of our discussion on the second group of motions will be, and I do not know how the vote will turn out. However, after listening to the previous speaker, I get the impression that this issue will more or less be considered a moral issue, and that we will have free votes. In our party, we are thinking about having a free vote on Group No. 2, so that members can express their own views, because this is a moral issue.

Personally, I did not choose homosexuality, but heterosexuality. Yet I am open-minded enough to understand there are other things that are important besides my own feelings. It is part of politics that our ideals and ideas may not prevail. In the end, we must sometimes recognize that certain things that are different from our own lifestyle can be accepted.

I am one of the people who accept this. Some of my good friends are homosexuals. I have, in fact, made an effort to invite them over for a meal so that we could discuss these matters in depth. I am now perfectly capable of understanding that someone can have a life partner for 10, 15, 20, even 30 years. There have been recent court decisions on a couple who had been together 25 years, two people who loved each other deeply. I feel that the surviving partner of a person who has worked in the public service is entitled to survivor benefits, even if he or she is a same sex partner. That is, however, a completely personal opinion.

I would have liked to see—and I shall close on this point—the federal government follow Quebec's example. As recently as last week, Quebec announced that it would be introducing a bill to amend all of its legislation as far as this very issue of same sex partners is concerned. That would avoid a great deal of debate, as I said at the start of my speech. Then there would not have to be debate on each piece of legislation, as to whether to introduce a new definition of spouse or to stick to the traditional one.

I salute the Government of Quebec for having had the courage to do this. The courts are not going to be the ones to decide whether the definition, as it stands, is legal or not. The government will be undertaking a major change and a major cleanup of all its laws and regulations. It will be holding a debate on whether we, as a society, are in favour of recognizing same sex spouses. It will adjust the whole parliamentary mechanism, regulations and laws, after the debate.

Naturally, people will be able to have their say, and I hope that in Quebec City, as in Ottawa, if such a bill is ever introduced, the debate will go on as long as possible. I think this is the sort of discussion where people should speak up, and the definition may be decided once and for all.

If there is such a debate, I would be pleased to rise and say something of what I have said today and we would thus avoid having to rise with each bill and say “The definition in the bill is not traditional, I object and move an amendment”. That would save us a lot of discussion.

I would ask the federal government to follow the example of Quebec and to settle once and for all the question on the merits, not only for same sex couples but, as I mentioned earlier, for native women who are living on reserves, and for the division of property. We would do well to resolve this matter once and for all.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have another opportunity to speak to Bill C-78. We have had precious few opportunities, given that the debate was shut down at second reading after only four hours and the committee hearings were stifled and curtailed to the point where we entertained very few witnesses, even though all of the opposition parties advocated hearing 40 to 50 witnesses and even taking the show on the road.

We believe that this bill is so important we should be touring the country with it so that seniors would have an opportunity to make representation and to research it, as happened when the government tried to make changes to the seniors benefit when the guaranteed income supplement and the old age security were to be merged into one seniors benefit. That was a huge, fundamental change in the way we deal with retirees and senior citizens in this country. To its credit, the government went on the road. There was a huge touring task force which heard from people from all walks of life.

The reaction and the very predictable consequence was that seniors mobilized. They got active and they mobilized their opposition to a huge degree and the government had to back off. Presumably the reason the government is closing debate on this bill is because it does not want the same thing to happen again. The Liberals know they are on shaky ground and they know that the public outrage is only starting to build momentum. In the last few weeks the public has had time to start to research the bill and to send newsletters to the memberships of their organizations to get seniors motivated and active in opposition to this bill. I predict that had they let democracy take its course, we would have seen a huge backlash, a huge outcry.

I think any government should be very cautious about taking on senior citizens. A government would have to be crazy to mobilize a fair fight against the seniors' movement because seniors are well informed, they are well read and they are well organized. We cross them at our peril if we are fighting a fair fight. However, the government clearly is not because it has taken away any opportunity for seniors or their elected representatives to raise all of the issues that are necessary.

From day one I have maintained—

[Tony Ianno, Liberal, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I know that the CLC convention was very important, but the committee was available and hearing witnesses while the member—

[Peter Stoffer, NDP, Sackville—Eastern Shore, NS]

Mr. Speaker, that is not a point of order.

[The Acting Speaker (Mr. McClelland)]

That certainly is not a point of order.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, thank you for that ruling.

I have said from day one that Bill C-78 is an extremely complicated bill that has profound and precedent setting public policy implications. The debate we have heard in the last hour and the amendments we have been debating point out that this bill is not only about the pension plan or the new public sector pension investment board, it goes far beyond that. The government, in a cynical way I would argue, has tried to introduce the concept of same sex spousal benefits. That is something I am personally in favour of and have lobbied long and hard for, but the government slipped it in with another package which makes it very difficult for people who are interested in both issues. They are finding a bit of a contradiction in terms of being able to support the bill.

One member of our caucus has dedicated half of his life to fight for same sex benefits and all of those rights and he is being put in the uncomfortable position of having to vote against this bill because he is so obviously against the financial aspects of it.

Some of the debate we have heard dealing with the group 2 amendments mystifies me because we are hearing from a group of people who seem to feel somehow that by giving rights to one group of people that will diminish their rights, as if rights were a finite pie and if one group has too many they are going to have to take less. I disagree with that point of view. It has always been my position that if we give full rights to everyone, all of our rights are enhanced, not diminished.

I am very concerned that many of the amendments in group 2 find their origins in some not too thinly veiled homophobia. I am not comfortable at all with some of the things that we have heard in this room today. I wish people would take a more generous point of view.

However, some of the issues that were raised are quite legitimate. Using the word conjugal as the test for cohabitation, or whether one will be able to give survivor's benefits to another person, has to be looked at a lot more seriously. We will not have time to do that. I will have three or four minutes to speak about it and then I presume the House leader on the other side will come rushing in to move closure on the debate and the whole thing will be put to bed, if you will excuse the pun.

I do not think conjugal is any kind of a test. There are other living arrangements that come up from time to time when people cohabit and do not have a conjugal relationship and we should be able to assign survivor's benefits to that partner as well, whether it is to a brother or a sister who might share the same home and so on. There are many aspects to it that we need to investigate. Again it is sad that we will not have time to debate properly this important, precedent setting public policy issue.

Had the government come in through the front door, honestly, with a bill dealing with the thorny issue which has been surfacing year after year of same sex benefits, we could have had an honest debate and really dealt with it in the way that it deserves to be dealt with.

I spoke about seniors groups. One of the groups that was most disappointed about closure and not having an opportunity to deal with this at committee properly was the largest group of retirees and senior citizens involved with the public sector, the federal superannuates national association.

That group was notified the night before the committee hearing. It represents hundreds of thousands of superannuates. The night before it was to appear it was given the 200 page tome. Even the clerk of the committee, when he gave me my copy of Bill C-78, said it was weighty tome. Those were the terms he used. We could hardly lift it. It is the size of the Manhattan phone book. Those people had 12 hours to prepare their remarks on behalf of all of the people they represent.

The parliamentary secretary thinks there was adequate time. The whole committee, on the Liberal side at least, made it clear that they did not really need to hear a lot of witnesses; two or three unions maybe, two or three actuaries and a couple of people involved in public sector pension plans would be adequate for this huge, precedent setting piece of legislation. I cannot say strongly enough how much I disagree.

We did not get a chance to go into some of the jurisprudence involved with public sector pension plans which are silent on the issue of what to do with a surplus. We never got a chance to wrestle with that issue or even to look at recent cases.

One example comes to mind, that being when Ontario Hydro wanted to take a contribution holiday because it had a surplus and CUPE, the union representing the workers, to its credit, took Ontario Hydro to court. The courts backed up the union's position that the employer did not have an exclusive right to the surplus of the plan, even it is a defined benefit plan. The money, in this case, was split evenly. The employer received some money and some of the money went to increase benefits. That kind of an equitable settlement, whether by arbitration or by some court ruling, is something that would have satisfied the people involved in this case.

One of the amendments that has been put forward argues quite capably that the government should live up to its own legislation, which would be the federal Pension Benefits Standards Act. Under that act any plans operating under federal jurisdiction would require two-thirds of the members of the plan to vote in favour of using any of the pension surplus for anything at all. The government's own bill, which recently received royal assent in 1998, calls for the beneficiaries of the plan to have a say in the allocation of any surplus. I would hope that at least that amendment would carry when this comes to a vote.

We will not have enough time to adequately go through the many, many issues in this complex piece of legislation because the government will move closure again. It is a disservice to all the people who are involved in the plan and all the survivors who collect benefits.

[Scott Brison, Progressive Conservative, Kings—Hants, NS]

Madam Speaker, I regret that we again do not have enough time allocated to debate a very important piece of public policy, Bill C-78, which deals with several issues that are of great importance to Canadians, including the ones we are dealing with in this group of amendments.

The issue of same sex benefits, whether it is in the public service or the private sector, has been an issue that has developed over a period of years. I would remind members of the House that the supreme court has been consistent in its interpretation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms which protects the rights of all Canadians. That is very important.

It is also important to remind ourselves as members of the House that we were elected to represent and defend the rights of all our constituent and to protect the rights of all Canadians. That is not simply the groups of Canadians that we tend to agree with or the groups of Canadians that we feel live in a lifestyle that we happen to support. We were elected to support and represent all Canadians.

As some suggest, this is not an issue of the redefinition of the family. This is not about the redefinition of marriage. This is simply an issue of fairness.

There are some people who use the phraseology “family values”. Family values should be an intrinsically positive phrase. I think every member of the House believes very strongly in the benefits of a supportive, close-knit family, a nurturing family that provides support and encouragement throughout one's life.

If we are serious about defending the family, defending family values, defending the principles of support and that type of important nuclear relationship that can exist within a family, we should be encouraging all Canadians to live in the types of unions that provide them with that level of support throughout their lives. If we are serious about it, we should be encouraging not discouraging Canadians to live in those types of relationships.

Unfortunately, family values is used by some members of the House as a euphemism for discriminatory policy against one group or another. Although some would argue that when we extend rights or protect the rights of some we diminish the rights of others, there is absolutely no precedent in history to that effect. A significant number of precendents have been set throughout history showing that when we fail to protect the rights of one group we imperil the rights of all groups collectively. It is very important for all of us in the House to defend the rights of all the people we represent and all Canadians.

Seventy-five per cent of Canadians support human rights legislation to protect gays and lesbians from discrimination based on sexual orientation. The supreme court has been consistent in its interpretation of the charter of rights. There is currently a federal legal challenge that was initiated in January 1999 to force the federal government to recognize same sex benefits within the public service. The PSAC union has represented the interests of its members in this case in support of the extension of same sex benefits, particularly relative to survivors.

This debate is not dissimilar to the debate that I believe existed at some point relative to common law spouses and an extension of survivor benefits to common law spouses that has taken place in the House. We have seen how that has evolved. The family has evolved and there is a more flexible definition of the family in that regard.

We can have two individuals working for the public service who perhaps work in the same job category or even in the same office with desks next to each other. One person is in a heterosexual marriage, works for the government for 10 years and then dies. The survivor benefits, based on what he or she has paid into the pension plan, will be there for his or her survivor.

In the other case, the second individual could be gay or lesbian and living in a long term supportive relationship with dependants. He or she may also have worked in the same job over a period of 10 years. However, if something happens to this person, the spouse will be denied benefits despite the fact that both the first individual and the second individual paid taxes and both paid identically into the public service pension plan. This is a clear case of where the government needs to ensure that this discriminatory policy is not permitted. Canadians do not want a discriminatory policy to be part of our public service.

Corporations, not just government, have been proactive in terms of providing these types of benefits. I will list a few of the corporations, universities and provincial governments that have moved in this direction: 3M; A & W Canada; Air Canada; Air Ontario; BC Telecom; Bank of Nova Scotia; Bank of Montreal; IBM Canada; Chrysler Canada; General Electric; Levis Strauss; London Life; McMillan Bloedel; Sears; Stentor Resources; and Toronto-Dominion Bank. I think part of the reason for this move is from the legal perspective that there is no choice. We do have a charter of rights and freedoms in Canada that was put in place to protect the rights of all Canadians. The supreme court has been consistent in its interpretation of that charter of rights.

I do resent the fact that the government has not allowed proper debate and discussion on this very important issue and has slipped this into another piece of legislation. The government has pitted members of parliament, whose views on these issues have been very clear for some time, against something they believe in. It is unfortunate because this is a fundamental issue of fairness. Fairness is a tenet of Canadian policy, not just Canadian social policy but of what it means to be a Canadian, our determination as Canadians to stand up and defend the rights of minorities and of those who are being persecuted, not just within Canada, but anywhere in the world.

We are known around the world through our peacekeepers and through our foreign policy initiatives as a country that stands up to defend the rights of all peoples. Yet within our own country we still have intrinsically discriminatory policy within the legislative framework. The government has moved to address this, but I do not believe that it has acted appropriately in terms of providing this as part of a very comprehensive piece of legislation that will effectively pit members of parliament, who may agree with some elements, against the legislation.

Polling is supportive of the extension of same sex benefits. However, I would never argue that we should use polls to determine policies on minority rights. Populism is not the proper means through which to develop minority rights. If in the U.S. polling had dictated what the leaders were going to do during the civil rights movement, the civil rights movement would not have moved forward. Black Americans probably would not have been given the vote if polling had determined what the government was going to do.

What defines the difference between politicians and political leaders is that politicians do what the polls tell them to do and political leaders do what is right.

The government is not doing what is right by being dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century avoiding debates on very important issues like this one and denying proper debate in parliament on issues that are important to all Canadians.

Committees Of The House

[Peter Adams, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Leader of the Government in the House of Commons]

Madam Speaker, there have been consultations between the parties, including at the meeting of the House leaders this afternoon, and I think you will find unanimous consent for the following motion. I move:

That the Subcommittee on the Corrections and Conditional Release Act be granted authority to travel to Saskatoon from September 26 to 29, 1999 to attend the Canadian Institute for Administration of Justice Conference, and that the necessary staff accompany it.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

Is there unanimous agreement?