House of Commons Hansard #111 of the 37th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was amendment.
Gerry Ritz Canadian Alliance Battlefords—Lloydminster, SK
For the past five years, can the government provide a breakdown of federal research funding, including research projects and infrastructure, by university, including the name of the recipient, a brief description, the type of funding and the amount?
Return tabled.
(Return tabled)
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Madam Speaker, I ask that all remaining questions be allowed to stand.
Geoff Regan LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Madam Speaker, would you be so kind as to call Notice of Motion for the Production of Papers No. P-30 in the name of the hon. member for Laurentides.
Motion No. P-30
That an Order of the House do issue for copies of the study commissioned by the Minister of Labour regarding the provisions of the Labour Code concerning pregnant or nursing women, to which the Minister of Labour referred during his presentation to the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities on May 7, 2002.
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Madam Speaker, this motion is agreeable to the government and the papers are tabled immediately.
(Motion agreed to)
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Madam Speaker, would you be so kind as to call Notice of Motion for the Production of Papers No. P-11 in the name of the hon. member for St. Albert.
Motion No. P-11
That a humble Address be presented to Her Excellency praying that she will cause to be laid before this House a copy of all agreements and related documents and/or correspondence, including reports, minutes of meetings, notes, e-mail, memos and correspondence, entered into between the government and Mr. Vito Rizzuto, as it relates to the tax case brought before the Tax Court of Canada in 2001.
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Madam Speaker, section 241 of the Income Tax Act states:
(1) Except as authorized by this section, no official shall
(a) knowingly provide, or knowingly allow to be provided, to any person any taxpayer information;
(b) knowingly allow any person to have access to any taxpayer information; or
(c) knowingly use any taxpayer information otherwise than in the course of the administration or enforcement of this act, the Canada Pension Plan, the Unemployment Insurance Act or the Employment Insurance Act or for the purpose for which it was provided under this section.
(2) Notwithstanding any other act of Parliament or other law, no official shall be required, in connection with any legal proceedings, to give or produce evidence relating to any taxpayer information.
The documents regarding Tax Court of Canada file No. 98-2497(IT)G were obtained for the purpose of the administration of the Income Tax Act, and as such, are considered exempt from production pursuant to Beauchesne's Parliamentary Rules and Forms sixth edition, citation 446(2)(k) thereof:
446(2) The following criteria are to be applied in determining if the government papers or document should be exempt from production:
(k) Papers that are excluded from disclosure by statute.
Therefore, Madam Speaker, I think you would find agreement from the Minister of Labour to have this matter transferred for debate.
Motions for PapersRoutine Proceedings
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)
The motion is transferred for debate pursuant to Standing Order 97(1).
Geoff Regan Liberal Halifax West, NS
Madam Speaker, I ask that all other Notices of Motions for the Production of Papers be allowed to stand.
The House resumed from June 3 consideration of the motion in relation to the amendment made by the Senate to Bill C-15, an act to amend the Lobbyists Registration Act.
Lobbyists Registration ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)
When we left off, the hon. member for Elk Island had unlimited time.
Ken Epp Canadian Alliance Elk Island, AB
Madam Speaker, I would like to resume my speech which was interrupted by question period yesterday.
I am not totally unaccustomed to making speeches that are interrupted and resumed later. Sometime in December four or five years ago I was giving a speech which was interrupted. When I resumed the speech the following December, a year later, I started off by saying “When I was interrupted, I was saying” and I carried on. I shall do the same thing today.
Yesterday I was speaking to the motion that has been sent to us from the Senate. I used to be an educator. I know it is important to always review what has gone on before so that it sinks in a little better, so for a quick review, I was speaking about the importance of the Senate being elected. I spoke of the fact that we know of some senators who work diligently and hard and we have respect for them, but we would like to give them more respect by having them elected.
The senators have worked on Bill C-15 and they have sent one amendment. That amendment, as I stated yesterday, is sort of a bookkeeping one. It was something that was overlooked in this place. It is that the person who is registering as a lobbyist is required also to state what the nature of his or her relationship was to the government earlier if they were a public office holder in their previous life. I talked a little bit about that.
I talked about the fact that it is not acceptable in our modern day and age that decisions as to what contract is let should be dependent in any way on a friend of the minister or deputy minister being able to schmooze, to smooth talk the person into choosing one contract over another. Those decisions should be made as objectively as possible based on the specifications for the contract and based on the value for the dollar.
We know it is not always the lowest price tendered that is the best buy for the taxpayer. Just as when anyone of us buys an appliance, we do not necessarily go only on the price.
I recently bought a microwave. I do not know what happened but my wife put something into the microwave which fried the thing. It was more expensive to fix it than to buy a new one, so I bought a new one. I did not go just on the lowest price. It would have been a little, dinky thing that would have almost been invisible in the cupboard and would not have had the features. I looked at what we wanted and what we needed and I bought the best one for the dollar.
We expect government to do that as well. Whether it is buying helicopters or computers, it needs to study the issue and make sure that it gets the best value for the dollar on behalf of the taxpayer.
I notice that there are many people on the Liberal side of the House who are listening intently. They are not objecting at all to what I am saying. They agree fully with what I am saying. There is no objection over there whatsoever. That is because they are all looking forward to a wonderful long speech by the member for Elk Island.
I have a bit of a challenge here in the sense that I have unlimited time, as you correctly stated, Madam Speaker, when you allowed me to resume. If I am going to speak longer than my colleague from Red Deer, who I think holds the record in the House for the longest speech, which I think was some 33 hours, I guess I still have another 32 and a half hours to go before I have exceeded that.
I am excited about the enthusiasm that is shown for the prospect of such a wonderful, long speech. However, I think it would probably be fair to others in the House to allow them also to make their statements, because in this particular case we are dealing with the amendment that has been sent by the Senate.
In as much as it was an oversight and the individuals in the other place detected it and have sent back an amendment to correct it, I would recommend to all members of the House that we support this particular amendment and get it into the bill. Then we have the bill to deal with and undoubtedly, we will be giving some substantial speeches on that when it is finished.
There are serious flaws with this whole lobbyists thing. I would like to see the Lobbyists Registration Act changed so that not only is there disclosure, but certain activities would be precisely defined as being not permitted.
I would encourage the government in the next revision of the Lobbyists Registration Act to strongly consider looking at some of the objections. As I said in my speech yesterday in terms of this little review that I am doing, we owe it to Canadian taxpayers and to Canadian voters to manage the affairs of government so that once again, after a dearth of 50 years or more, the people of Canada will be able to say that they are proud to be Canadians and that they are very happy with the thoroughness, the integrity and the high level of ethics with which their government business is done. That has been lacking.
That is why in 1993 the Liberal government came in with a pledge to have an independent ethics commissioner and to restore the concept of trust in our government. The Liberals ran on that platform. What have they done? Regrettably, they have not fulfilled that promise. We have, only now, some timid legislation moving us toward an independent ethics commissioner, but it still is inadequate in the sense that the individual will still be appointed by the Prime Minister. We would like to see that changed very substantially.
We see the government's record of a number of shenanigans, if we can call them that, shenanigans from Shawinigate to Chicoutimi. There are contracts that have been given for advertising, and the deals with the hotel involving the Prime Minister. That is so unfortunate. It ought not to be. We need rules and regulations in place precisely to prevent those things from happening.
If a person such as the Prime Minister or one of the ministers does not have the built-in ethical antenna to prevent that kind of behaviour, then we need rules that will impose correct behaviour on them. Unfortunately, that is necessary. I propose that we in Canada's Parliament move very quickly to have that kind of a system so that, as I said, Canadians will be able to say with sincerity “We trust our government. We know that occasionally it makes little mistakes, but the big mistakes should not happen and cannot be allowed to happen continuously”.
As members can tell, I would have very little difficulty carrying on in a further discussion, but I am aware that other members of the House are also interested in debating and therefore I will cede my time. I look forward to hearing what other members of the House have to say on this important topic.
John Bryden Liberal Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot, ON
Madam Speaker, you know how much I admire and respect the member for Elk Island and his prowess as a debater in the House, and with the regret that I must feel in telling you that he has spoken for nearly an hour on the issue before the House, this amendment, and he clearly has demonstrated he has not done any homework on the amendment.
He never addressed what the amendment was all about and regrettably missed in his speech addressing an issue that is before the House, because of Bill C-15 and this amendment, that is vitally important on two fronts, and especially important to an opposition member.
What we have before us is the Senate improving an amendment that was brought in at report stage on the Lobbyists Registration Act by a government member, against government wishes, that was put in the House to a vote. The government voted against it and backbench Liberal MPs joined with opposition MPs and passed that amendment. I believe it was the first time in possibly more than a decade, if not longer, that an unfriendly amendment passed at report stage in the House.
What is so remarkable about what we have before us now is that this amendment amended the Lobbyists Registration Act to require that in-house lobbyists, when they registered with the registrar of lobbyists, had to declare whether they were former public office holders. It addressed an extremely important issue. We are familiar with the high profile lobbyists who might have been former politicians, and they are usually obvious out there when they act as lobbyists and lobby the government.
One of the problems in the lobbying industry, one of the problems of transparency, one of the problems of fairness has been the fact that sometimes mid-level bureaucrats, people who are relatively anonymous, leave their employment and within a year, which is according to the conflict of interest guidelines, suddenly appear as lobbyists and wind up lobbying the very people who were their former colleagues. The problem that arises when this occurs is that these people obviously have significant advantage when they lobby.
One of the difficulties in the industry and among people who hire lobbyists to lobby government, because lobbying government is a legitimate enterprise, and one of the problems is that if one company hires a lobbyist and another company hires a lobbyists and that second company hires a lobbyist that includes a person who formerly worked for the department in which the company is seeking a contract, then that particular company has a tremendous advantage. In order to even the playing field it should be made possible, and this was done by my amendment, that anyone can refer to the list of lobbyists that is cut by the registrar of lobbyists to determine whether a person who is lobbying was a former office holder.
I point out that there is anecdotal evidence that this is a major problem in contracting out. It has been a problem in the Department of National Defence. Indeed, I acted on this issue because of complaints in my riding where I had a firm that was competing for a contract, a federal government defence contract, and after that contract was won by another firm, it discovered that other firm had employed a lobbyist who had been working with the very people who were deciding on the merits of which firm would get the contract and which would not. Therefore, it was an unfair playing field.
Unfortunately I was never able to bring this issue adequately before the committee. I had reasons why I was unable to bring this issue before the committee at the committee stage of debate on the lobbyist registration bill, so I introduced at the last moment a report stage amendment that would require in-house lobbyists to register as former office holders when they applied for registration to the registrar.
Anyway, the point is this, and I regret that the member did not deal with it in his speech, is that I introduced the amendment and the government circulated a note to the effect that it did not support the amendment. Nevertheless many of my colleagues on this side of the House and of course the opposition supported the amendment and it passed.
The really good news, and why the amendment that is before the House is so important from the Senate, is naturally the bill passed third reading and went to the Senate and the issue of this amendment came up. What was pointed out to the Senate committee that studied the lobbyists registration bill was that my amendment only dealt with in-house lobbyists and it did not deal with consultant lobbyists, the one being professional lobbyists and the other being people who would be hired by a firm and so employed.
The Senators listened to debate from witnesses that argued for my amendment and the expansion of my amendment to consultant lobbyists and those who argued against.
The Senators in their wisdom sided with my original intent and what they did was they composed an amendment of their own that brought in not only in-house lobbyists but included consultant lobbyists. I should add that they not only made this change and proposed this change in committee, they also convinced the minister.
The minister appeared before the committee, and we can read the Senate Hansard to see this. The Minister of Industry, having first opposed the amendment when I introduced it in the House, told the Senators that on reflection and based on the evidence that the Senators had heard from the various witnesses they dealt with, he now supported it.
What we have now before the House is an amendment to the Lobbyists Registration Act that builds on the initiative of a backbench MP who used his opportunity, his privilege in the House to move an amendment, and got the support of his colleagues, got the support of the Senate and now it is before the House and will undoubtedly pass.
I think what is so important to bear in mind here is the demonstration that backbench MPs on the government side and opposition MPs when they have a good amendment and can get the support of the House can get it into law.
Even more important than that I think, is the story I have just told is a fine demonstration of how the Senate, that other place, can work effectively. If we read the Senate Hansard , we will see that the Senators did due diligence and in one sense they did better due diligence on this issue than was done in this House. The result is an amendment that is before the House which increases the transparency and levels the playing field among lobbyists.
I say only one other thing. In fairness to my friend, the member for Elk Island, I share his feelings that much more work has to be done with the Lobbyists Registration Act. It is a very imperfect piece of legislation even as it stands.
One of the reasons why I felt obligated to move an amendment of my own was because I did not feel that enough was being done to the legislation to strengthen it, to increase the level of transparency, to actually improve our ability as members of Parliament, as the media and as ordinary citizens to see not only who the lobbyists are but to see who are being lobbied.
Really lobbying is a legitimate enterprise as long as it is done openly, above board and with transparency. However what we also need very badly is to be able to see who, particularly in the lower levels of the bureaucracy, are being wined and dined with the intent to influence them.
I feel that while the lobbyists registration changes that are the entire package of Bill C-15 are an advancement, there is still a long way to go. In that sense I agree wholeheartedly with the member for Elk Island and some of the criticisms he presented in his speech. I only wish that he had dealt a little b with the amendments at hand because really, as they say in the media, it was truly a good news story.
Dick Harris Canadian Alliance Prince George—Bulkley Valley, BC
Madam Speaker, I could not wait to get to my feet and point out to the hon. member that he was in error when he indicated the member for Elk Island spoke for an hour. In fact he spoke for 30 minutes. I know it is kind of hard when one is a Liberal sitting on the other side of the House, hearing some reasoned opinions and some very logical and common sense opinions coming from the official opposition. The member for Elk Island is eminently equipped to make such pronouncements and statements.
In support of that, the hon. member just spent the last 10 minutes basically concurring with what the member for Elk Island said. He talked about how the government had to start to make a concerted effort to get the best value for the money it was spending overall. That is what the member just said and that is what the member for Elk Island said.
Therefore, I want to thank the hon. member across the way for concurring with my colleague. We certainly wish that member had a ton of influence on his own party that type of attitude toward government procurement would prevail in that party. Unfortunately it does not and that gives my colleagues, particularly the member for Elk Island, ample material to be critical of how the government runs its operations.
I want to thank the member opposite for supporting my colleague. I also want to thank my colleague for pointing out some very reasoned and logical opportunities for the government. We trust that the member opposite will aggressively encourage the government, his party, to adopt a lot or all the recommendations about which my colleague from Elk Island talked.
John Bryden Liberal Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot, ON
I stand corrected, Madam Speaker, about the time the member for Elk Island spoke. He spoke for half an hour. I can assure him it certainly felt like an hour. I would suggest that the reason why it felt like an hour was that there was very little in his speech that was actually substantial. Try as I might, I cannot remember, and I did listen the entire time, a single, clear suggestion that he made on how to improve the Lobbyists Registration Act.
I put to him that he could have said, for example, as I did in committee when I proposed to the ethics counsellor, that mid-level bureaucrats keep a telephone log of all the lobbyists who make representations to them, and that telephone log would be available through access to information or any other means that would be available for the public to see who precisely, what lobbyists and what individuals in the bureaucracy, are being approached.
Now, we well know that deputy ministers and assistant deputy ministers are approached by lobbyists and we well know that there are senior politicians and senior bureaucrats who become lobbyists. What we do not know is those people who are in the lower levels of bureaucracy, who are, shall we say, the nameless policy-makers, who may be approached by their colleagues who have become in-house lobbyists, who are also nameless. They get together and it is sort of a little old boys' school.
I have proposed that change. I think the first time I did it was in 1994. It was rejected by the government at the time and by the committee, I regret to say. I proposed it again when the bill came up for review recently. You know, Madam Speaker, you have to take the bones that are available to you, and I do believe that the government heard the message of the amendment, heard my colleagues who supported it, because the backbench MPs, the soldiers, shall we say, of democracy, are very aware that there is a problem in the lower levels of the bureaucracy, in the lower levels of the lobbying firms, and that it needs to be corrected.
Our job here is to make those suggestions. The member for Elk Island had an opportunity to make a very clear suggestion like that, and I really regret I did not hear it. I am sure he has some other ideas of his own and maybe we will get a question from him.
Ken Epp Canadian Alliance Elk Island, AB
Madam Speaker, he should have listened. Instead of repeating all the points I made, I simply invite him to read about a page and a half in Hansard. He will see that in fact I did make a number of suggestions, including among other things that certain lobbyists' activities should not only be made transparent, they should actually be made illegal. It is wrong for an ex-MP to come in here and smooth-talk the minister or the deputy minister with whom he has had intimate relationships, if we can say that, in terms of communication and so on, and to then use that relationship in order to bend the decision making. That should actually be against the rules, in my view. It is not useful to getting the taxpayers their money's worth.
I also believe, if I myself am not mistaken in my recollection of what I said, that I made other suggestions. I also gave the hon. member, indirectly at least, some accolades for having put forward this motion, and I did say that the Senate had done something that should have been done on this side, precisely the same as he just mentioned.
While the hon. member on one hand said that the member for Elk Island did not say anything substantial in his speech, he said a lot of the exact same things, so should I now say his speech was not substantial? I would not want to do that. He is an honourable member, I like him, I like what he said, and I would encourage him to continue the good work over there. I know he is very lonesome over there with the Liberals, trying to bring more integrity into government operations, so I wish him well in that continued work. He will not be out of a job for quite a while.
John Bryden Liberal Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot, ON
Madam Speaker, I thank the member and again I stand corrected. Obviously there was a lot of content in what the member said, but I regret that it was, shall we say, spread out in such a long period of time that perhaps it was just somewhat difficult to grasp all of his tremendous points as readily as I might have.
It is simply my failure. I realize that he is a very well qualified speaker in this place, but try as I might, it is hard to recover the content of his speech of the other day. I will return to Hansard, look up exactly what he said and take note of it, but I suspect it will not be a page and a half of Hansard. I suspect it will be about four pages of
Hansard.
Dick Harris Canadian Alliance Prince George—Bulkley Valley, BC
Madam Speaker, all rhetoric aside, the fact remains that these Liberals unfortunately have been in power now for almost 10 years. When they arrived, this mess was predominant. The very same situation we are talking about today in which we are trying to make some changes was predominant and in fact it was overwhelming the system. That was almost 10 years ago.
The government has had 10 years to clean up the deficiencies in the system. In spending the taxpayers' money, the Government of Canada and the people in the bureaucracies who have the power to make decisions and make purchases have had 10 years to clean up the deficiencies in that process and they have not done it. That is what is so upsetting. It is as if the government has considered it a very low priority while all over the country taxpayers have been crying out for years for the governments of the day to recognize taxpayers' money not as their money but as a sacred trust, money that belongs to the taxpayers of Canada, and saying that governments had a responsibility to provide the most fiscally responsible management of that money that they possibly could.
In 10 years we have not seen that. That is why we in the opposition and my colleague from Elk Island welcome opportunities like today's to be critical of the government but at the same time to search out members opposite, like the member from Ancaster, who such a long riding name I cannot remember all of it, and to encourage him and members who think like he does and like we do, to put as much possible pressure on their government and the powers that be in the cabinet that they possibly can. I want to commend the member for his aggressiveness and I hope it will be infectious throughout the backbench members of the Liberal government.
John Bryden Liberal Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot, ON
I will just point out in reply, Madam Speaker, that I know the opposition made no effort to make amendments in committee and made no effort to make amendments at report stage. In fact, Bill C-15 breezed through committee with hardly any comments or obstacles.
So I would say to the member opposite that I am willing to serve, I am willing to do the role of the opposition, but it is lonely here when it takes a Liberal backbench MP to criticize his government and the opposition is silent.
Claude Bachand Bloc Saint-Jean, QC
Madam Speaker, I simply wanted to say that I found the discussion between my colleagues from the Canadian Alliance and the Liberal party over the last 30 minutes very interesting.
The member for Ancaster—Dundas—Flamborough—Aldershot just said that the opposition did not propose any amendments. He must have meant that the Canadian Alliance did not propose any amendments, because the Bloc Quebecois moved a number of them. He should be careful not to generalize when using the word opposition.
We did some very serious work on Bill C-15. I also wanted to come back to an idea raised by the member for Elk Island. He mentioned that it might be important for senators to be elected. I would like to use this opportunity to say that one way we could significantly limit the influence of lobbyists on Parliament Hill, and this brings me to the position of the Bloc Quebecois on the Senate, is to simply abolish the institution. That is what we propose. I think that that would put about a hundred lobbyists out of work.
Senators have direct access to ministers and members of Parliament. There have been blatant examples over the years. Senators are often called in to move issues forward with the government.
What we have before us today is a simple amendment that comes to us courtesy of the Senate, an amendment we support. However, with respect to Bill C-15 as a whole, we are pretty dissatisfied with how things have turned out.
We proposed amendments and we provided solid arguments to support them. The members opposite often tells us, “Propose amendments, that is the procedure, that is how we proceed in the House”. However, what we have often seen is systematic rejection of all amendments . In fact, the government always has a majority in committee. When the word comes from on high, even if an amendment is excellent and even if we provide solid arguments to support it, the dice are often loaded and the amendments are rejected.
First, I would like to clarify my longstanding view, one that I continue to hold, about the parliamentary system, and how a society has to work in terms of elections, and how elected officials must work, once they have been elected.
Everyone is somewhat familiar with how an election campaign works. The various parties that are contending for power present their platforms. There are people on a team, under a same banner, led by someone that everyone knows, who is the leader of the party. These people present their vision for society to the voters.
The campaign lasts a certain amount of time and in the end a government is elected. This government tries to stick to its platform, which does not always happen and is why there is such cynicism among the public. The government often has to say, “I am dropping this, I am giving up that. I have looked at the state of public finances and I have to say that at this time I can no longer do what I promised.” This is often what happens and what causes people to become cynical.
However, there is more to it than that. If we look at the truly positive side of those who are in power, those who have been elected in our society, in my view they have very important responsibilities. They represent the public. They are the ones who have been chosen by the public to run the nation, to manage taxes and to make sure that bills are introduced and that society progresses.
Everyone is somewhat familiar with the composition of the government. There is the cabinet—commonly referred to as the executive—that has the responsibility of planning, through its bills, how it will adhere to its platform and how it wants to move society forward, since it was elected by the public. This is a very important first level.
If these people can be influenced, they can decide how and in what order bills are introduced. There is a lot at stake. One must never lose sight of the fact that the government, whether at the executive or legislative level, is there to serve the public.
If that were the case with the current government, things might be okay, but as we exercise our profession of member here, we realize that it is not the case.
Thus, the executive is very important. In this respect, the Prime Minister's Office is very important, too, because it gives some impetus to the cabinet and it is often the PMO that will say to the government House leader, “We would like you to introduce these types of bills in the following order”. After that, the House leader does his or her work.
Now, we come to the legislative branch. Once the executive, the cabinet, has decided on the content and order of introduction of the bills, the bills go through various readings in the House: first, second and third. There is an intermission between second and third reading, at which time a committee studies the bill more thoroughly.
In that stage, too, the legislator can be a victim or can have contact with all kinds of people. Sometimes he or she is in contact with people who appear as witnesses before the committees, and who defend a certain point of view. In this regard, we, the legislators, must have a clear idea of the kind of services we want for society. We also have to learn how to handle the various representations made to us.
Everyone knows the judicial authority. It has a special power in a society. After the executive and legislative have legislated, if there are any grey areas, the judiciary must intervene. Its representatives are better protected than we are because of judicial restraint. I think a lobbyist would have a big problem if he went to a Supreme Court Justice and said, “I want to meet with you to convince you to render a decision in a particular way”. In principle, this is not done. It is impossible, because of judicial restraint, and that is a good thing.
There is also the whole question of the power of the media.
Madam Speaker, I believe the alarm has just gone off.
Lobbyists Registration ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Bakopanos)
Yes. We will suspend.
(The sitting of the House was suspended at 4:31 p.m.)
The House resumed at 4:52 p.m.