Debates of March 29th, 2000

Privilege

[The Deputy Speaker]

The House will now proceed to the taking of the recorded division on the motion of the hon. member for London North Centre in relation to privilege.

(The House divided on the motion, which was negatived on the following division:)

Division No. 1255

[The Deputy Speaker]

I declare the motion lost.

Before I put the next question to the House, might I remind hon. members, in light of the disturbance we witnessed, of Standing Order 16(1) which states:

When the Speaker is putting a question, no Member shall enter, walk out of or across the House, or make any noise or disturbance.

I know hon. members love to hear the rules.

The House resumed from March 28 consideration of the motion that Bill C-13, an act to establish the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, to repeal the Medical Research Council Act and to make consequential amendments to other acts, be read the third time and passed.

Canadian Institutes Of Health Research Act

[The Deputy Speaker]

Pursuant to order made on Tuesday, March 28, the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at the third reading stage of Bill C-13.

[Bob Kilger, Liberal, Stormont—Dundas, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. If the House would agree, I would propose that you seek unanimous consent that members who voted on the ways and means motion, with the exclusion of the member for Saint-Maurice and the member for Scarborough—Rouge River, be recorded as having voted on the motion now before the House with Liberal members voting yea.

[The Deputy Speaker]

Is there unanimous consent to proceed in this fashion?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[Jay Hill, Reform, Prince George—Peace River, BC]

Mr. Speaker, Canadian Alliance members present this evening will be voting in favour of this bill, unless instructed otherwise by their constituents.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Verchères, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Bloc Quebecois members oppose this motion.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, NDP members present will be voting against the motion.

[André Harvey, Progressive Conservative, Chicoutimi, QC]

Mr. Speaker, Progressive Conservative members will be voting in favour of the motion.

[Jake Hoeppner, Reform, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I have to vote yea.

(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)

Division No. 1256

[The Deputy Speaker]

I declare the motion carried.

(Bill read the third time and passed)

The House resumed from March 28 consideration of the motion that Bill C-213, an act to promote shipbuilding, 1999, be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Shipbuilding Act, 1999

[The Deputy Speaker]

Pursuant to order made on Tuesday, March 28, the House will now proceed to the taking of the deferred recorded division on the motion at second reading stage of Bill C-213 under Private Members' Business.

The vote will take place row by row, beginning with the sponsor of the bill. Then, I will ask the other members who are in favour of the motion to please rise, beginning with the last row, on the side where the sponsor of the bill sits.

(The House divided on the motion, which was agreed to on the following division:)

Division No. 1257

[Raymond Lavigne, Liberal, Verdun—Saint-Henri, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to make sure the hon. member for Lévis-et-Chutes-de-la-Chaudière noticed that the Liberal members from Quebec voted in favour of his motion.

[John Herron, Progressive Conservative, Fundy Royal, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. My seat may not have the best perspective from over here and I believe I may have been counted as a yes and a no. Everybody knows that this country needs a national shipbuilding policy, so I categorically voted yes and only yes.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I want to know what you are going to do as the Speaker about the hon. member for Calgary West getting up in the House with a sign every time. Is he going to respect the House of Commons, yes or no?

[The Deputy Speaker]

I declare the motion carried.

(Bill read the second time and referred to a committee)

A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 38 deemed to have been moved.

[Gordon Earle, NDP, Halifax West, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I was appalled by the Liberal government's answer to the question I raised in the House of Commons on December 3, 1999. The answer, or rather lack thereof, provided by the Liberal government makes me wonder if it really has control of government or not.

My question was a simple one: Given that the auditor general commended in-house bids for military contracts for meeting all the criteria of being good business cases, would the Liberal government ensure that an in-house bid would be welcomed and considered?

Incredibly, the Liberal government refused to answer this question, spouting generalities instead.

I then became more specific, indicating savings projected in supply chain business cases. My figures showed that the Liberal government's projected savings from contracting out through alternative service delivery may have been overstated. When I asked the government to clarify the matter, the response I received again did not answer the question at hand.

This leaves me very concerned indeed about who is in control of contracts and expenditures in our military. I received a letter from a constituent dated March 16 of this year which stated:

We have had to fight tooth and nail to keep our jobs from going out to contractors who charge the government ridiculous amounts for the tasks we used to do and these contractors pay employees just above the minimum wage. They (meaning the contractors) are paid huge amounts for nothing and some of them have been fired before completely their contract. We have a large battle ahead of us just to keep our jobs from going to the private sector even though we are the most cost effective organization.

I am concerned that this whole contracting out process is a waste of taxpayers' hard earned money. It makes me wonder if the Minister of National Defence was out of town during the human resources department scandal.

Another constituent wrote to me on February 17 stating:

The only people who are walking to the bank are the consulting firms and military brass who are walking out one door in military dress and walking back in with suit and tie working for these big conglomerates. We were the guinea pigs for their first trial run with Alternative Service Delivery, we cut our workforce by more than half. We told these consultants we are the best bang for the taxpayers dollars, but off they went to the bank.

I would like to direct the Liberals' attention to a report produced by their own defence department and the comments made therein concerning ASD:

Had the management of this Montreal-based CF supply and maintenance infrastructure been turned over to the private sector under the ASD program, it is doubtful whether the military could have transformed it so quickly into such an effective third line support organization.

When civilian military workers successfully beat the ASD contract bids of private companies, the government abruptly changed the rules of engagement to favour large corporations. The bundling of bids provides for the awarding of contracts on a national basis, not only a cheap shot at our military, but a slap in the face to small business throughout the country.

What is the Liberal government's real agenda? An efficient military or a privatized and gutted military with enough funds for huge capital purchases but not enough to sustain the dedicated men and women serving Canada in both civilian and military roles?

Before rushing blindly into a minefield, will the government not take time and fully explore what continued contracting out will mean to the people of Halifax and elsewhere?

On behalf of the many Canadians who work hard and efficiently for our Canadian forces and on behalf of all taxpayers eager not to see their hard earned money wasted, will the Liberal government review its contracting out policy within our military? Will the government involve all of those affected in this review and will it make the findings public?

Once and for all I ask for a direct answer instead of a sales pitch from the Liberals about how wonderful and rosy things are in the military.

[Robert Bertrand, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Defence]

Madam Speaker, the Department of National Defence and the Canadian forces remain very determined to maintain a multipurpose combat ready force. They are, however, obliged to run the defence program as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible.

The department remains firmly in favour of ASD, alternative service delivery, which is an important tool in improving the efficiency of the organization by freeing up resources and putting them to work where the need is greatest, that is operational readiness.

In simple terms, the department and the Canadian forces must devote their limited resources to the functions that they alone can perform. To date, annual savings from ASD initiatives are estimated at around $62 million. However, the department expects these annual savings to increase to approximately $175 million in the years to come.

Given the complexity of managing the supply chain for an organization as broad as DND and the Canadian forces, the department believes that the only feasible option is to pursue a commercial approach through a competitive process. These savings resulting from the supply chain project are expected to be between 20% and 30%. Its aim is to improve the efficiency of supply activities by introducing a competitive process and using private sector expertise. The supply chain project will allow DND and the Canadian forces to get access to critical logistics expertise, innovation and leading edge technologies.

I can assure the House that the Department of National Defence continues to make progress on various ASD initiatives. It will continue to consult closely with all stakeholders, including unions and employees.

The department is committed to proceeding in a way that is as fair and as—

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

The hon. member's time has expired.

[Greg Thompson, Progressive Conservative, Charlotte, NB]

Madam Speaker, I am following up on a question I had for the health minister on March 17 in regard to the compensation package for hepatitis C victims.

It is no secret that all of us on this side of the House are very disappointed with this package. To begin with, it only covers the victims between the years 1986 and 1990. Victims prior to 1986 are not included in the package. Victims after 1990 are not included.

To add insult to injury, aside from leaving out those innocent victims prior to 1986 and after 1990, not one victim has received a nickel of compensation from the federal government. Not one single person.

Adding insult to injury once again, the only people who have been paid by the federal government are the lawyers who are handling this case. The legal nightmare that we envisioned has evolved in the way we said it would. Only the lawyers have been paid. There is something wrong with a package that only pays the lawyers.

I asked the minister to take some leadership on this issue and do something. For example, do what the province of Ontario and the province of Quebec have done, which is to introduce a no fault compensation scheme.

To conclude, I want to quote from Justice Krever's report. He recommended without delay that the government, the provinces and territories devise statutory no fault schemes for compensating persons who suffer serious adverse consequences as a result of the administration of blood components and blood products.

The federal government has simply not done that. We are asking it to get on with the business of compensating those innocent victims. We want action.

[Robert Bertrand, Liberal, Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of National Defence]

Madam Speaker, the Government of Canada met the provincial and territorial representatives and, in March 1998, the Minister of Health announced a plan to provide financial assistance of $1.1 billion to the thousands of victims.

By working collaboratively with the lawyers for the class action plaintiffs, we reached a settlement agreement which was approved by the Ontario, B.C. and Quebec courts in December 1999. This was only possible because the Government of Canada went to the provinces and to the claimants and proposed a solution to spare everyone the potential of even longer litigation.

Immediately following approval of the settlement, the Government of Canada transferred some $855 million into a trust fund in order to compensate the complainants. In doing so, the Government of Canada met all its obligations under the settlement.

The federal government is very anxious that the administrator begin processing claims and make payments as soon as possible.

Rest assured that our government is committed to helping all Canadians infected by the hepatitis C virus.

[The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)]

The motion to adjourn the House is now deemed to have been adopted. Accordingly the House stands adjourned until tomorrow at 10 a.m. pursuant to Standing Order 24(1).

(The House adjourned at 6.48 p.m.)