Mr. Speaker, I am rising today to intervene in terms of the Senate amendments to Bill C-7 presently before the House.
In his speech yesterday, the member for Provencher said that the new youth justice legislation contained little, if anything, that would address the ineffectiveness of the Young Offenders Act. In some ways it is indeed less desirable than the old act and is more cumbersome and more administratively complex.
The problems with the Young Offenders Act have been around since the days when I was still running as a candidate for nomination to this place. Before the 1990s the Canadian public was expressing dissatisfaction with the Young Offenders Act. Young people today still express dissatisfaction with the Young Offenders Act because they tend to be the victims of most youth crimes. There is still public pressure to get this fixed and yet the government brings us little tinkerings around the edges. The Senate amendment really complicates the situation by bringing in a race based element to the whole formula.
As was also mentioned by my colleague from Provencher yesterday, the second part of the amendment requires youth court judges to pay particular attention to the circumstances of aboriginal youth at the time of their sentencing. That is similar to subsection 718.2( e ) of the criminal code. Like my colleague, I cannot support legislation that is based on race. My colleague said that it was government sponsored racism, and I tend to agree with him.
We recently gave honours to Mr. Mandela for his work against apartheid in South Africa, and yet the government constantly introduces legislation in this place that is race based. An example that is worth mentioning is the employment equity bill that was brought in by this government in 1994. At the time that bill was brought into the House we warned this place that the race based provisions in that employment equity legislation would cause distortions and problems in the future. In fact the pigeons came home to roost.
I want to read into the record a statement I made in the House in the year 2000.
In 1995 the government passed its so-called employment equity bill which Reform MPs warned would result in employers being forced to unfairly discriminate against job applicants based entirely on their race. The chickens are coming home to roost. The Public Service Commission has admitted that it rejected a job application from one of my constituents because she was a white woman.
In addition to legislating exactly the type of discrimination it was supposed to prevent, the bill was badly flawed because compliance could only be accurately measured if minorities were willing to voluntarily self-identify. Therefore a department could be 100% composed of visible minorities but if the employees identified themselves as Canadian, the department would be registered as non-compliant and would have to hire more visible minorities.
The government should put a stop to this appalling program of state sponsored discrimination based on race yet it is continually popping up in government legislation.
There was a time when some members opposite claimed that we had racist tendencies. We have always fought against racism and have demanded that there be equality in legislation. We have the example again here where built into the amendment to Bill C-7 is special discrimination. This discrimination will not fix the underlying problems of youth crime. All it does is attempt to disguise the real problems.
I just mentioned the employment equity bill. I can give some examples of how that bill has distorted employment based on race. For example, in 2000 the Government of Canada placed some ads in newspapers across the country for job openings. A $45,900 per year job was advertised for an advisor on Canadian identity for Heritage Canada.
The advertisement was almost amusing in that it asked for an adviser on Canadian identity to be based in Montreal and was open only to persons identifying themselves as being members of a visible minority employment equity group.
Common sense makes one ask what qualifications someone identified as being a member of a visible minority employment equity group would have to make them authoritative in terms of Canadian heritage.
Another advertisement was for a regional director in the B.C. and Yukon region. Health Canada was offering from $74,300 to $87,400 for a person to manage a group of about 30 highly dedicated professional staff in the innovative delivery of the full range of branch programs and services in B.C. and Yukon. However the job was open only to applicants who were self-identified as a member of a visible minority group. This is another example of discrimination based upon race. If people did not fit a particular racial profile, they were not entitled to a government job. How is that different from anything happening in South Africa? It is government sponsored racism.
Another advertisement was for a service delivery representative. Under the heading “who can apply”, Human Resources Canada was offering a salary of $34,200 to persons who self-identified as visible minorities living or residing in the greater Vancouver regional district. The job involved handling EI applications over the telephone. The main qualification for handling EI applications over the telephone was to be able to say that one belonged to a particular racial group. This is appalling, disgusting behaviour by the government.
Another advertisement was for an income tax, excise tax auditor. It was open only to visible minority persons, aboriginal peoples and persons with disabilities working or residing in Nova Scotia and surrounding areas. This job was offering $38,900 with the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency. An interesting sentence appeared in a lengthy paragraph under the heading of “who can apply”. It read
Individuals who consider themselves to be a Member of the Visible Minority Persons of Canada, Aboriginal Peoples of Canada and Persons with Disabilities are invited to apply...
The interesting words in there are “consider themselves to be”. It illustrates a folly in the employment and equity legislation because it is illegal in Canada to ask people what their race is. Everything depends upon self-identification.
I know the government and the Senate are well-intentioned in bringing forward these types of provisions where they make special rules to apply to aboriginals or visible minorities, but it is not the way to fix the problem. The way to fix the problem is to apply equal rules to everyone. There is a difference between equal outcome and equal opportunity, and that is a key difference that the government is unwilling to recognize.
While we are talking about native issues, in my riding of North Vancouver there are two native reserves, the Squamish reserve and the Burrard reserve. Over my period as a MP, I have received numerous letters and petitions, and have had meetings in my office with people from those reserves demanding and pleading that I do something about the lack of democracy on the reserves and the way that people on reserves are treated by their own unelected, unaccountable chiefs.
All the government does is perpetuate the problems on those reserve with the types of legislation that it constantly passes in this place.
I am holding in my hand an article from the North Shore News with a picture of one of the band members from North Vancouver on the front page. The headline reads “Meeting leaves Band questions unanswered, upset Squamish seek information on Band spending”. The entire article deals with another problem of racial discrimination whereby the band leaders are not required to disclose the way they spend money from the taxpayers of Canada.
The taxpayers of Canada provide the reserve in North Vancouver with at least $20 million a year, yet we have no accountability for that spending either to the taxpayers of Canada or even to the band members themselves.
As long as we continue to pass in this place legislation which provides special rules based on race, there will be no equality and that is wrong. We must vote against the Senate amendment, if only for the reason that it provides special rules based on race.