Debates of April 3rd, 2000

Crown Corporations

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

Mr. Speaker, I do not know what risk is involved in being the president of Canada Post. I do not know if a risk is involved. I have no idea. It is a monopoly, or almost.

On the subject of performance, last week we raised a problem. The Canada Lands Company lost $3 million in a single transaction, which was not really investigated. We asked for a copy of the report. The current president is going to get a $20,000 increase, if you can imagine that.

Could the President of the Treasury Board explain the performance?

[Lucienne Robillard, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for Infrastructure]

Mr. Speaker, I hope the member realizes that we mandated an outside committee, comprised of people from the private sector specializing in human resources management, to make recommendations to the government.

This committee, the Strong committee, reported to the government and in its report proposed that crown corporations be placed in ten categories according to size, complexity of the job and mandates given them.

It is standard practice, for each crown corporation, to assign specific objectives to the senior executives, which serve as the basis for their year end appraisal by the Treasury—

[The Speaker]

The hon. member for Fraser Valley.

Atlantic Canada

[Chuck Strahl, Reform, Fraser Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, at least now it is out in the open. On the weekend the Prime Minister was singing the praises of what? Patronage. He called a $13 million grant to a call centre in Cape Breton patronage at its best.

But that is not what he and his Liberal friends called ACOA in 1988. I can remember reading in Hansard the Minister of Veterans Affairs said that we should call ACOA the Atlantic Canada overblown agency. And David Dingwall went on to say that ACOA was an unmitigated disaster. What were they worried about? They were worried about patronage.

Why was patronage so bad back then but it tastes so good now?

[George Baker, Liberal, Minister of Veterans Affairs and Secretary of State (Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency)]

Mr. Speaker, under that party's philosophy the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Those members have said no to the unemployed in Cape Breton. They have said no to assistance for farmers, fishermen and miners. But the Liberal MPs on this side of the House say yes when Canadians are in trouble and that is why Canadians will say yes to Liberal MPs in the next election.

[Chuck Strahl, Reform, Fraser Valley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, we wonder if the Prime Minister is looking for a new title, maybe the patronage saint of Cape Breton. Or perhaps he wants to be the godfather of Atlantic Canada. We can read between the lines pretty easily. He is telling the people of Atlantic Canada, “This is the way it works. You do things my way or get nothing”. It is like a feudal lord flicking the crumbs off the table, asking people to stand and applaud and they get to eat a couple of them.

Why is he belittling the people of Atlantic Canada by saying that when something happens in Atlantic Canada, that it is just patronage at its best?

[George Baker, Liberal, Minister of Veterans Affairs and Secretary of State (Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency)]

Mr. Speaker, for the unemployed and the poor, the difference between this government and that political party is glaring. This political party says yes to job creation in Cape Breton Island. That party says no to the poor and the unemployed. It does not even say, “Let them eat cake”. It says, “Let them starve”.

Health

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC]

Mr. Speaker, once again, the federal-provincial health ministers' meeting did not lead to any progress on the important issue of the restoring of transfer payments.

Is the federal government's stubbornness concerning the health sector not the best example of arrogant federalism and the ultimate in pretentiousness, since it wants to tell the provinces what to do in the health sector when it has no expertise in the provision of direct services to the public?

[Allan Rock, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, the ministers of health met in Markham, last week.

We discussed money, but we went beyond the money necessary to save and to strengthen our health care system.

Bernard Landry said a few weeks ago that “The problem in health is not a problem of money, but a problem of planning, of management”. We proposed that governments work together to ensure greater planning.

[Réal Ménard, Bloc, Hochelaga—Maisonneuve, QC]

Mr. Speaker, is this dispute between the provinces and the federal Minister of Health not simply part of a strategy for the next election campaign, to allow the minister to present himself as the one who will save our health system? This is shameful.

[Allan Rock, Liberal, Minister of Health]

Mr. Speaker, we are only trying to improve the quality of health care everywhere in Canada, including in Quebec.

Atlantic Canada

[Diane Ablonczy, Reform, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, after presiding over the Devco debacle, the Liberals are clearly desperate to win political points in Cape Breton. Using his control over the public purse, the Prime Minister personally travelled to Cape Breton to reap due gratitude for the $13 million handout to buy jobs for this hard-pressed region.

Why does the government think it can spend other people's money and then brag about patronage at its best?

[George Baker, Liberal, Minister of Veterans Affairs and Secretary of State (Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency)]

Mr. Speaker, if the jobs are not created, the company does not get the money. It does get money, which amounts to 12% of the total wages over a period of five years, if there are full time jobs. A full time job is defined as 40 hours a week for 52 weeks of the year and the wage is 20% higher than the average wage in Cape Breton Island.

That political party should be praising the Prime Minister for the innovative and positive way of creating jobs.

[Diane Ablonczy, Reform, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I think the Prime Minister needs a lesson in whose money this really is.

Today in the House he referred to this as government money. I have news for the Prime Minister. This is not the government's money. It is Canadians' money and they worked darn hard for it too. Yet we saw the Prime Minister milk this latest grant for all it was worth.

Was this weekend's announcement really about jobs for Cape Breton, or was it about votes for the Liberals?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to quote for the hon. member someone who will tell her which way he will vote next time. “New jobs and new economic opportunities in a new industry have been too long in coming to this part of Nova Scotia. The people of industrial Cape Breton will turn their economy around, given a chance. This announcement today is a good first step in providing that chance”. This is from the premier of Nova Scotia, Premier John Hamm.

Someone else said, “I am a happy man today. Cape Breton really needs this. I have nothing bad to say”. The member for—

[The Speaker]

The hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot.

Gasoline Pricing

[Yvan Loubier, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Mr. Speaker, thanks to the tax on oil companies, the excise tax and the GST, the government is deriving huge revenues from the sale of gas in Canada. Recent price hikes have pushed these revenues even higher.

How can the Minister of Finance decently hide behind the provinces when he has everything needed to take action now?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the member must know that only the GST is tied to price increases. The other taxes remain the same.

Furthermore, as I have already suggested, the provinces are welcome to sit down with us—and it was Quebec's Minister of Finance who said that it takes two governments working together to lower prices substantially.

[Yvan Loubier, Bloc, Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC]

Mr. Speaker, there was no mention of that. Furthermore, the GST is not the only factor; taxes paid by oil companies are also going up.

The Minister of Finance should know, as should the member, that the government's surpluses this year could top $25 billion. So, it has the money to take action immediately.

What is it waiting for to give taxpayers a break and immediately reduce the excise tax on fuel?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, members on this side, including the member for Pickering—Ajax—Uxbridge who raised the point, have been studying this issue closely for months now. And now, suddenly, the Bloc Quebecois finance critic discovers that there is a problem. We have known for a very long time that there is a problem and we are in the process of doing something about it.

Human Resources Development

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the mismanagement of public money in the HRDC billion dollar boondoggle has Treasury Board officials desperately trying to cover their backsides. It turns out that the senior government department responsible for the good management of our money had no idea how that money was being doled out.

Why is it that the proper control of public money is a priority for the government only after the billion dollar boondoggle hits the newspapers?

[Lucienne Robillard, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for Infrastructure]

Mr. Speaker, that is simply not the case. The government has not suddenly started to take an interest in the proper financial management of its programs—it has always done so.

There are policies, and the departments must implement them. Treasury Board is working closely with the departments to help them improve their administrative practices.

[Monte Solberg, Reform, Medicine Hat, AB]

Mr. Speaker, if they were following these procedures before, then why did the boondoggle occur in the first place? Rather obviously, that simply is not the case.

The minister has had a long time to address these problems. People in HRDC have known about them for many months. Treasury Board is supposed to oversee the financial control of government money.

Why did the minister wait again until this HRDC scandal hit the newspapers before she did anything? Why the wait? Why now?

[Lucienne Robillard, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for Infrastructure]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, internal audits are conducted at Human Resources Development Canada. They are an essential feature of any good management program.

It is as a direct result of this practice of conducting internal audits that the department detected serious program management problems, following which it put in place a plan of action approved by the auditor general. There is every reason to believe that we will correct the existing problems.

Cloning Of Human Embryos

[Pauline Picard, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Mr. Speaker, with the public announcement that the Government of Great Britain was to give the green light to the cloning of human embryos for medical research purposes, we realize that we still do not know the federal government's intended orientation on this important issue.

Can the Minister of Health tell us if he has made any progress in his reflection on this matter, and when he will be in a position to inform us of his position on this vital issue, which is a threat to human dignity?