Madam Speaker, I too am pleased to rise on this debate. I certainly want to express concern that after all these years and all the opportunities the government has had to get it right, it has missed so much of the fundamental importance of what the bill actually could have done for families in the country.
My friend who spoke just a few minutes ago talked about being a child of divorced parents. He seemed to be lecturing the Alliance on what it was like to come from a divorced home. I do not know whether he would find this as a surprise or not but even some of us in the Alliance come from divorced families.
I can tell just by looking at him that I have a few years on him but when my parents were divorced in Vancouver in the very early 1960s, there were precious few community programs. When he talked about being the child of divorced parents and how there were great community supports, that is terrific too, but in the early 1960s there were precious few community supports.
There are church groups, community groups, Alcoholics Anonymous and Al-Anon which are very important groups. It may be a surprise to him to know that even some of them do not get government funding, yet they do tremendous work. I know that in our family we really appreciated that.
The member talked about both parents working these days. The answer to that is, no wonder because taxes are so high. Many of us know families where it is essential for both parents to work because taxes are so high. It seems there is such a social stigma attached to both parents working that if they do want to try to get by on one income, it makes it very difficult for them because things are expensive and people want to have as many things as possible.
The most frustrating part about the bill is it does not include shared parenting. When the crew travelled around the country, and Madam Speaker, you know about that all too well, they heard any number of presentations from parents who were having their maintenance enforcement enacted but it was tied to access to their kids. I think shared parenting came up a great deal. They saw many men in lots of instances--generally the custodial parent is the woman; that is not always the case but I think in large measure it is--where if they did not do this, they would not have access to their kids and the pain that is attached to that is unbelievable.
We heard real life stories. It is so easy to talk in here about numbers and statistics and all that but we saw the names and faces of real people who came to the hearings across the country. I attended the one in Edmonton. I did not go all over the country on the hearings but I think there were many similarities.
Men often were not allowed to see their kids. When one spouse, the custodial parent, is able to use that as a tool, that seems certainly unhealthy at best and vindictive at worst. It uses the kids as pawns. Surely all of us would agree that is not the best way.
Members of Parliament spoke today saying that they have had access to their kids, that they have been very blessed by that and very grateful. I had some access with my father in the 1960s when my parents split up but my dad is an alcoholic. We have worked on that publicly together. My father Mansell is sober now. We have tried to work hard and make sure that we always talk about drinking and driving and how important it is for people to go after sobriety and to work with Alcoholics Anonymous.
I am really proud of my dad. I am grateful to God for my dad who has been sober for several years now. We are glad to “have him back” because there were too many years when we were growing up and when his grandkids were growing up that he just was not able to see much of it.
We can think about how important it is for kids and the non-custodial parent to spend time together. In our situation many times it was physically dangerous because if my dad was drinking, obviously we did not want to be out in the car with him. We were taught from a very young age that if my dad picked us up and took us to Stanley Park or wherever, although we enjoyed seeing him, we knew that we had 10¢ or 25¢ in our pocket to get on a bus to go home. We were trained to be wise enough that if we were in a dangerous situation, to get the heck out of it.
As I think back on my years as a child of a broken home, I am concerned and somewhat knowledgeable about how painful it is and how difficult it would have been for me not to see my dad even though we had all kinds of problems.
Divorce happens and it happens all too much in our generation. At the same time, I do not know how anyone on the government side could think that parenting ends or, unless of course there is serious alcoholism or abuse issues or whatever, that it is wise that someone cannot see their kids.
There is this glaring omission in these proposed reforms which the minister says are going to be absolutely terrific and will make everybody's family life happy even though it has been very difficult. I know kids are resilient but at the same time there is no provision for a shared parenting role. How is that going to solve the problem?
We are just going to keep the wrangle going and Madam Speaker, you may be unlucky enough to be put on another committee that will traipse all over God's half acre. You would say no way, José, and who could blame you? Surely enough has been done here that we could say we figured out what people had to say and we should reflect that in the legislation.
There are families that break down by divorce and there are parents who have dysfunctional relationships with their kids because the kids do not have opportunities to see their parents. We see dreadful situations all too often when kids or the non-custodial parent take a very difficult way out, some by suicide, some with mental illness, some who just give up on it and say forget it.
Surely we need to do better than that. That is one thing the government could certainly do to make it strong.