Debates of April 3rd, 2001

Prime Minister

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think so.

On the contrary, I myself have created a precedent, because this is the first time a Prime Minister has tabled personal documents in the House of Commons, and I did so last week at the request of the opposition.

Eighty-one per cent or 82% of the people in Canada want the opposition to get on with real business. There are problems in this country, but their only aim is to destroy a reputation rather than deal with the real problems of the country, which the government is attending to quite well.

[Stéphane Bergeron, Bloc, Verchères—Les Patriotes, QC]

Mr. Speaker, when things are not going well, the members opposite usually rise and give thunderous applause.

The Prime Minister can talk about his integrity as he will, but can he not understand that the time has come to stop talking about it and prove it?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, all the members of this House should be attending to the nation's real problems.

Trade

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, the government is deliberately spinning fear and insecurity around the FTAA summit and it is having terrible consequences.

Police officers are contacting bus company owners to dissuade them from transporting citizens to Quebec. Police are knocking on doors to discourage citizens from billeting visitors. Police are even investigating Canadians on the basis of their opinion.

The government cannot be unaware of this intimidation. I ask the Prime Minister, what instructions has the government given about security at the Quebec summit and what measures are being taken to ensure that citizens can exercise their democratic rights at the people's summit?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the leader for her question. The government wants people to express themselves. Many discussions have been held for months with all sorts of groups in the nation. We will have organizations in Quebec City to permit the people to demonstrate peacefully.

However, the police have the responsibility of ensuring that the security of citizens and visitors to Quebec City is assured. I know that the federal police, the RCMP, the provincial police and the—

[Alexa McDonough, NDP, Halifax, NS]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians do not think interrogation and intimidation is the job of the police.

Professor Anthony Hall at the University of Lethbridge is a fair trade advocate. He has researched the FTAA and he has shared his analysis with his university community and on the Internet. Last Thursday Dr. Hall was stunned to receive a visit from a national security officer. RCMP Sergeant Cramer interrogated Dr. Hall on his FTAA views and his role in the people's summit. He also pressed him for the identity of others who would be involved in the people's summit.

Such intimidation—

[Lawrence MacAulay, Liberal, Solicitor General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, the government clearly recognizes that Canadians have a right to peacefully protest. I am sure the leader would not be asking me or the government to tell the RCMP or other police forces how to provide public safety for the people of Canada. I would hope not.

Prime Minister

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, on March 28 the Minister of Industry told the House:

—we know the Prime Minister actually lost money on the sale as it was disposed by his trustee.

Could the Prime Minister tell the House how much money he originally paid for the golf club shares in 1988? Did he make a capital gains declaration or a capital loss declaration on his income tax respecting those transactions? If he did that, in what year was that done?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, what a fishing expedition. I have to say to the House of Commons that when this member became the leader of his party the party was in debt and he refused to be paid by the party.

That leader paid himself $200,000 from a party that was $10 million in debt. He does not want to tell the Canadian public how much he is still being paid. This money is subsidized money because every contribution to a political party receives a tax credit. Three-quarters of it is government money.

Canadian International Development Agency

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I can—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh.

[The Speaker]

Order, please. The right hon. member for Calgary Centre has the floor and the Chair has to be able to hear the question.

[Joe Clark, Progressive Conservative, Calgary Centre, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I have another question for the Prime Minister. It has to do with the $6.3 million contract awarded by CIDA to one of Claude Gauthier's companies to install an electrical distribution system in Mali.

Could the Prime Minister tell the House if he or one of his ministers made any kind of representations to CIDA in favour of Claude Gauthier or one of his companies regarding this issue?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Absolutely not, Mr. Speaker. The contract was awarded to this gentleman because his bid was the lowest one by $2.5 million. In other words, thanks to Mr. Gauthier the Canadian government saved $2.5 million.

[Deborah Grey, Canadian Alliance, Edmonton North, AB]

Mr. Speaker, the bill of sale that I asked for recently should have been enough. It could have been enough. It would have been enough except that it was handwritten. It was unwitnessed. It was unnotarized. There was no deposit mentioned and there was no corporate seal.

It was also later repudiated by the other signatory. It is unbelievable that the Prime Minister would think that this is terribly official. Who was there at the signing of that registry and in what province was it signed?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, any lawyer knows that a contract is an extension of the will of people.

We know one thing. She campaigned in Canada in two elections and told everyone in Edmonton that she would never take a pension. A few weeks after the election, after she called everyone else in the House a pig, she signed and hid it from her electors.

[Deborah Grey, Canadian Alliance, Edmonton North, AB]

Mr. Speaker, it is interesting that the Prime Minister will attack anyone else when he knows his back is up against the wall.

The question was very simple and I would like to repeat it. Who was there at the signing and in what province did they sign it?

[Jean Chrétien, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, she is reaching very far. I recognize my name on that. It was my name. I had signed it a long time ago. I signed this contract. I was probably in Ottawa because it was the day after we defeated the Tories and I was forming a very good government for the people of Canada.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister refuses to order a public inquiry into the Auberge Grand-Mère affair. Moreover, the government is doing all it can to prevent us from having access to information on this case.

How can the government justify that, 13 months after we submitted our request, CIDA still refuses to give us any information on Claude Gauthier, this other friend of the Prime Minister who is also involved in the Grand-Mère golf club?

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Minister for International Cooperation]

Mr. Speaker, as I said many times in the House, there were seven companies sent to the minister at the time by the officials of the department.

Of those seven companies three went to bid. Transelec was one of the bidders. It bid 30% below, $2.5 million less than all the other bidders, and it saved the country that much money. Those are the facts.

[Michel Gauthier, Bloc, Roberval, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we have been asking for the documents for 13 months. CIDA is violating the Access to Information Act. That is the issue. The minister did not understand at all.

In 1996 Claude Gauthier was the one who bought some of the land adjacent to the Grand-Mère golf club, at the much inflated price of $525,000. The connections between Gauthier, the golf club, Placeteco, Transelec and the Prime Minister are most obvious.

Should CIDA's refusal for the past 13 months to give us the information not be perceived as another attempt by the government to cover tracks to prevent us from finding out what really went on in the golf club affair?

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Minister for International Cooperation]

Mr. Speaker, as I have said before in the House many times, the information on that file is very clear. There were seven companies that were sent to the minister's office. That was the procedure at the time.

As a matter of fact we now have an open bid system. That was the old system which we inherited from the Conservative Party.

Prime Minister

[Val Meredith, Canadian Alliance, South Surrey—White Rock—Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister and his apologists claim that he had absolutely no interest in the golf course after November 1993. Yet in the same breath they admit that his lawyer was actively trying to sell the shares up until 1999.

That in itself indicates that the Prime Minister did in fact have financial interest in the shares. Is it not true that unless the Prime Minister found new buyers he would not get paid?

[Brian Tobin, Liberal, Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister ceased to be a director of 161341 Canada Inc. effective October 25, 1993, as per a notice of change of directors, form 6, dated March 8, 1994, and filed with the director of corporations and made publicly available on March 14, 1994.

[Val Meredith, Canadian Alliance, South Surrey—White Rock—Langley, BC]

Mr. Speaker, Jonas Prince was able to sell his hotel chain to Canadian Pacific for $90 million. We can bet that sale or deal was not on a handwritten single piece of paper.

Mr. Prince certainly knew how to buy and sell property without the help of the Prime Minister or his lawyer. Is it not true that Mr. Prince told the Prime Minister that if he wanted to get paid for his shares he had better find another buyer?