Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise this morning in support of the Bloc Quebecois amendment, which is also supported by at least one other party in the House, to the effect that only voters can make contributions to political parties. This is in keeping with the Quebec law on the public funding of political parties.
Let me point out that in Quebec, until that act was adopted in 1977, many ordinary citizens felt that politics was rotten. When René Lévesque, along with others, created the Parti Quebecois, after the Mouvement souveraineté-association, he said “We will fund our party strictly and exclusively with people's contributions; we must avoid falling into the business contributions trap, as it spells corruption”.
René Lévesque knew what kind of pressure major corporations could exert when the time came to implement government projects. He had experienced such pressure at the time of taking political stands and developing projects. In his mind, democracy was incompatible with the misappropriation of funds generated by the funding of political parties by corporations, because corporations never give money with no strings attached.
Just like in The Godfather , it may be free at first, but an order or a request invariably follows. It is these orders and requests that result in policies not being designed for the general public, but often for the rich and the most affluent.
The people of Canada and Quebec, especially with this crisis in the administration of the Department of Human Resources Development—in Quebec, funding for parties in Quebec has been cleaned up—feel that politics is rotten and serves politicians and that politicians and big business are as thick as thieves in looking after their best interests.
Bill C-2 provided an opportunity for the government to say, even though it can never be said definitively, that the political process must be the prerogative of the public who become members of a party or decide to fund a party, but that the important decisions are made for purely interest considerations.
Interest may be seen in different ways, according to whether the party is the NDP, the Bloc Quebecois or the Liberal Party, but the public could at least have been assured that politics and not interests are at issue.
This is a fundamental issue, especially these days. The public will not support politics with their minds, their hearts or their membership unless politicians are above all suspicion. It may be said that that is far from the case and that the public's cynicism simply encourages individuals to stick their hand in the pot and take advantage of the situation.
I know that very many members are honest, but I also know that the temptation can be great—the opportunity, tantalizing—elections are expensive, and there are always good reasons for supporting so-and-so's project over another's, a private project over some other one, because that too can come into play.
Canada likes to say what it is and what it wants. The Economist , which is not a social democrat periodical, contained a review for Europe of what constituted democratic control of party funding. According to The Economist , whether or not citizens exercised democratic control depended on whether or not corporate funding was permitted.
As members will recall, there were scandals in France because there was no legislation requiring grassroots funding. Since 1995, the legislation has allowed only voters as contributors.
We know that Germany was rocked by a scandal that damaged the reputation of someone thought to be a great statesman, Helmut Kohl, who worked to bring about the unification of Germany and who was one of the key European architects of the Treaty of Maastricht.
Despite his brilliant career, Helmut Kohl now finds himself caught up in a political and financial scandal which is destroying his reputation in a way that no one would have wished on him or themselves, for that matter. Once again, at issue is secret corporate party funding, and many Germans—and I discussed this with members at the Council of Europe—are wondering whether they should not be considering having parties funded by voters alone.
When we look at the issue of corruption, because that is what it is, we are automatically forced to the conclusion that there is only one way: have all voters on the same footing, have all citizens on the same footing when it comes to making decisions, and have parties funded by citizens, by voters. That is democracy. Otherwise, democracy takes a back seat to interests over which there is no control. In such cases, the policies introduced generally, if not always, do not reflect the wishes of the majority of citizens.
If we want to liberate politics from what some like to call vested interests, we must ensure that parliamentary democracy is based on grassroots funding.