Debates of Sept. 28th, 2005

Justice

[Peter MacKay, Conservative, Central Nova, NS]

Mr. Speaker, we thank the professor of justice for that little lecture, but he is wrong. The Liberal government's legacy will be leniency on drugs in Canada, soft on drugs and soft on crime generally.

Crystal meth labs are proliferating around the country. This highly available and addictive drug is having a devastating impact on the lives of Canadians. Just this week, a $2.5 million crystal meth lab was shut down, and B.C. municipal leaders are calling for more drug laws as well.

The Prime Minister knows Bill C-17 can actually increase drug use. When will the Prime Minister show some leadership for a change and introduce mandatory minimum sentences for—

[The Speaker]

The hon. Minister of Justice.

[Irwin Cotler, Liberal, Minister of Justice and Attorney General of Canada]

Mr. Speaker, maybe the hon. member was not paying attention this summer. We moved to reschedule crystal meth. This now increases the penalty from 10 years to life imprisonment with regard to the production and distribution of crystal meth.

The opposition ought to look at what the law is rather than speak in ignorance of the law.

Gasoline Prices

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, after unremitting pressure from the Bloc Québécois, the federal government is finally showing more openness to creating a petroleum monitoring agency and giving the Competition Bureau more power.

With the cost of heating and groceries constantly going up because of the price of oil, will the Prime Minister promise, as the Bloc Québécois has proposed, to implement a refundable tax credit to help low-income families cope with this crisis right away?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the leader of the Bloc Québécois should know that the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Foreign Affairs submitted to this House a clear study on this matter ages ago. The government is basing its decisions on that study.

We are now in the process of monitoring the prices. Yesterday you heard from the Minister of Finance and the Minister of Industry, who are currently working on other options. I want to commend the minister's parliamentary secretary, because he was the one who took the initiative, not the Bloc Québécois.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I will let that comment pass.

Taxi drivers are also being hit by the spike in gas prices. In order to mitigate this situation, the Bloc Québécois has proposed a tax credit, much like the one already introduced by the Government of Quebec.

Will the Prime Minister promise to do his part and move forward with this measure that would greatly help taxi drivers? Perhaps there is a parliamentary secretary who has already thought of that as well. Then he should say so and we will support him.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, of course in the case of all small businesses there is a full rebate of the GST that operates through the normal GST system.

I am interested that the leader of the Bloc Québécois says that he has been on this and various other issues for the past three years. I would point out that the report filed in this House by the member for Pickering—Scarborough East is dated June 1998, so he has been on this issue for a lot longer.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Rivière-Du-Loup—Montmagny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I hope the government will not wait another two years before implementing the solutions proposed by the Bloc Québécois. People need these initiatives now. One of these measures would create a tax credit for independent truckers equal to 6% of their operating costs.

Will the government finally acknowledge that this is a serious problem and act on our proposal?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the government is looking at all the ways in which to deal with the situation fairly and in the public interest, including transparency and competitiveness in the marketplace. This includes actions related to energy conservation and energy efficiency, and also measures that will try, as well as we can, to assist with the burden on the lowest income people in the country.

[Paul Crête, Bloc, Rivière-Du-Loup—Montmagny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the increase is also affecting people who live in remote areas far from major urban centres and who must travel long distances in order to access services and go to work.

Does the government intend to implement another of the Bloc Québécois' solutions and ensure more people qualify for the current tax deduction of $3.75 per day for individuals in very remote regions? Will the government do the right thing for people in the regions who are suffering from the effects of the increase in gasoline prices?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Minister of Finance]

Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada will take into account the very best interests of all Canadians, wherever they may be in this wonderful country.

David Dingwall

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, last year, David Dingwall, a former colleague of the Prime Minister in the Chrétien cabinet, spent over $1 million of taxpayers' money. He has resigned, and good riddance. However, the problem goes much further than Mr. Dingwall.

What happened? After the spendthrift ways of André Ouellet at Canada Post, why did the Prime Minister do nothing to stop wasteful spending by his old cronies?

[Paul Martin, Liberal, Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I have already answered that question, but I will answer it again.

As I just said, Mr. Dingwall has dedicated his life to the public service. He has been a member of Parliament and a minister and, until today, President of the Royal Canadian Mint. He has just resigned, at a time when the Mint is making a profit. He has just resigned, in part so that he can respond to these allegations.

[Jack Layton, NDP, Toronto—Danforth, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Dingwall has redefined the whole concept of loose change, that is for sure.

Let us look at the facts. The Prime Minister has not tightened the rules, even after David Dingwall lobbied the government when he was an unregistered lobbyist. Every penny wasted by David Dingwall happened on the Prime Minister's watch. Even after André Ouellet resigned from Canada Post, no rules were changed whatsoever. I guess the deal is: do not get caught.

Ten million dollars went to the Prime Minister's friends over at Earnscliffe, and then he appointed more friends to the Senate. Is this muck really Jean Chrétien's fault?

[Reg Alcock, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board]

Mr. Speaker, I simply point out to the hon. member that he might want to go back to last spring and read the report that we tabled in the House and the new instructions to the crown corporations on how they handle their governance in these matters. Each one of them has appointed an audit committee, has strengthened their internal audit functions and the overall policy has been described as leading corporate governance in the country.

[Brian Pallister, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, in 2004, Liberal patronage appointee David Dingwall spent over three-quarters of a million dollars on numerous lavish dinners, excessive international travel, a free car and a swanky limousine, and let us not forget the exclusive golf club to which taxpayers paid for him to belong.

The Prime Minister cannot defend this unbelievable further episode in the Liberal pork opera that his administration has become. By becoming an apologist for Mr. Dingwall and condoning this misconduct, when will he admit that he is encouraging more of the same?

[Reg Alcock, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board]

Mr. Speaker, I encourage the member to be a little cautious in the words that he uses. Every expense that Mr. Dingwall incurred was reported to his board and was consistent with the guidelines. The corporation that he heads does not receive taxpayer funding. In fact, the corporation that he heads and that he turned around so it reported a profit pays a dividend to the Government of Canada.

[Brian Pallister, Conservative, Portage—Lisgar, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thought former porkmaster general André Ouellet, who spent $2 million of taxpayer money without receipt, was the prince of pork, but the new undisputed king of swining and dining is absolutely David Dingwall.

The Prime Minister seems totally incapable of reining in the profligate spending of he and his colleagues and this is just the lastest in a serious of blatant abuses perpetrated by the government against Canadian taxpayers. Dingwall's spending spree took place under the Prime Minister's watch. When did he know or is he going to use the wilful blindness defence again?

[Reg Alcock, Liberal, President of the Treasury Board and Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board]

Mr. Speaker, the way that member accounts for things, I could take his office and travel expenses and I could say he is a $600,000 member.

The reality is every expense that was incurred was incurred within the policy of the Mint, was vetted by its senior financial officer and was approved by its board. If he thinks there is something improper there, he should write to the Mint, take it outside of the House and have this discussion with Mr. Dingwall who is now free to do so.

Technology Partnerships Canada

[James Rajotte, Conservative, Edmonton—Leduc, AB]

Mr. Speaker, here is something more about former minister David Dingwall. It had been reported that he had received $350,000 to help Bioniche obtain a grant through Technology Partnerships Canada. This is expressly forbidden by the government's own rules.

Yesterday we learned, however, that Bioniche has in fact paid back $460,000 to the government for violating its agreement. That is more than $100,000 difference.

Will the industry minister come clean on this issue and tell us how much money was paid to that former Liberal cabinet minister?

[David Emerson, Liberal, Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada has a contractual relationship with the companies that are in receipt of contributions under Technology Partnerships Canada. We have audited those programs and we have found breaches in those contracts. We are remedying those breaches and recoveries are being made to taxpayers.

Of the $2.8 billion in TPC funds that have been put out, we have got back $14 billion when we consider the amount that private sector companies have spent on innovation in Canada.

[James Rajotte, Conservative, Edmonton—Leduc, AB]

Mr. Speaker, $2.8 billion, 5% repayment, that is the truth about what the government has recovered. The fact about any proprietary information is that this is taxpayer money and taxpayers deserve an answer to these questions.

There is a discrepancy here between $350,000 and $460,000. Why does the government continue to hide how much money former Liberal cabinet minister David Dingwall received?

[David Emerson, Liberal, Minister of Industry]

Mr. Speaker, as I said before, the government's relationship, under the technology partnerships program, is defined in contracts with business. We are dealing with those contracts, we are remedying the situation and the Canadian economy is benefiting. It is nearly 90% small business that benefits from these programs.

Gasoline Prices

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Mr. Speaker, because of the rise in fuel prices, farmers have to pay more to heat their homes and greenhouses, dry their grain and run their machinery.

UPA president Laurent Pellerin is urging the federal government to help out farmers who were already having a hard time before fuel prices started to spiral upward.

Does the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food intend to pressure the Prime Minister to introduce some concrete measures to help the farmers cope with the rise in fuel costs?

[Andy Mitchell, Liberal, Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister of State (Federal Economic Development Initiative for Northern Ontario)]

Mr. Speaker, that is exactly why we had business risk management programs in place so we could deal with things like increased input costs. In fact, the CAIS program is there to do that. To date that program has paid out to producers over $2.2 billion.

I point out that in the first six months of this year, our governments have paid to producers some $3.3 billion.