Debates of Sept. 21st, 2006

Access to Information

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, how will we put a stop to the practices of the former Liberal government? Today we were astonished to discover that it was a regular practice of the previous government to take private information and ask public servants to send the private information of Canadians to political staff in the offices of the Prime Minister and other ministers.

The Minister of Public Safety and the President of Treasury Board have already taken action. As in all matters, we are going to put a stop to the corruption and law-breaking of the Liberals.

[Bill Graham, Liberal, Leader of the Official Opposition]

Mr. Speaker, as we said earlier, this goes to the heart of the free press in our country. What we want is an assurance from the government and the Prime Minister that this information and ATIP information is not used by his office to screen questions that are asked of him by our free press in this country, has never been used and will never be used in the future. That is the question.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, we can provide an unqualified commitment that such information will not be used for any such purposes because we are going to put a stop to the Liberal practice of bureaucrats sending such information to political staff. It should never have happened in the first place.

Let us be clear. In fact, the email in question was deleted from the inboxes of the political staff, who did not request the information, who did not read the information and who now wonder why it was sent to them. Now we know why: because it was a long-standing practice of the Liberals that we today are putting an end to.

Maher Arar

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the House has unanimously passed the Bloc Québécois motion calling for an official apology to be offered to Maher Arar. Outside this House, the Minister of Transport, Infrastructure and Communities stated that the government was not bound by that motion, because government ministers had voted as members and not as ministers. A kind of split personality.

Has the government not reached the height of hypocrisy with that distinction, and does it not have a duty to apologize immediately, as all members of this House, including the government’s own party, called on it yesterday to do?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, we as the Conservative caucus were happy to join with all members in offering the House’s apologies to Mr. Arar.

The government has already stated that it accepts all of the recommendations in Justice O’Connor’s report. Government counsel are—I hope—in the process of concluding talks with counsel for Mr. Arar in order to achieve a dignified result for Mr. Arar. We are going to act quickly in this regard because it is clear that Mr. Arar was the victim of a serious injustice. I would just note that this occurred under the previous government.

[Gilles Duceppe, Bloc, Laurier—Sainte-Marie, QC]

Mr. Speaker, lawyers may well meet to decide on the amount of compensation Mr. Arar should receive, that is fine by me, but I do not think they need to write to the Prime Minister asking him to apologize. He should do so immediately. Ordinarily he makes quick decisions.

The Prime Minister believes, for example, and rightly so, that what Jan Wong wrote was unacceptable. He is seeking an apology from the Globe and Mail. The O’Connor report explains that the way Maher Arar was treated was unacceptable, and the Prime Minister refuses to apologize.

How can the Prime Minister justify saying that an apology is warranted in both cases, but that he refuses to offer one because it is the government? A bad example is being set for the Globe and Mail.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I was mistaken yesterday when I said that we had just received a report—

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Yes, it is true. It happens sometimes. I said that the report was 800 pages long, but in fact it is 1,400 pages long. We have just received that report. The Minister of Public Safety has demonstrated this government’s good faith by accepting all of the recommendations. We are going to act on those recommendations quickly. However, in order to achieve a dignified result for Mr. Arar, we must act within the framework of talks with Mr. Arar’s counsel. We are going to act quickly.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the government said it agreed with the recommendations in the O'Connor report on the Arar affair and, therefore, with recommendation 22, which calls on the Government of Canada to file an official complaint with the American and Syrian governments about their treatment of Mr. Arar.

Since the Prime Minister happens to be at the UN, could his parliamentary secretary tell us whether he intends to take advantage of this trip to file such official complaint with Syria and the United States?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister delivered a very important speech today, his inaugural speech at the UN, in New York City. This speech emphasized Canadian values around the world. It was a very important speech. Obviously, as far as the recommendations in Justice O'Connor's report are concerned, I repeat that we will be acting on them promptly. It is true that, in similar cases, the previous government failed to offer any apologies. We, on the other hand, will take action, as we did yesterday in this House, together with all parties.

[Serge Ménard, Bloc, Marc-Aurèle-Fortin, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I think that this non-answer really means no.

The Maher Arar file is currently being debated not only in Canada, but also in the United States, where political figures are questioning the handling of this affair by the U.S. government.

In the Arar affair, human rights have been trampled by both the U.S. and Syrian governments. Justice O'Connor recommended that an official complaint be filed. The Prime Minister is in the United States right now. Why would he refuse to stand on his own feet and file an official complaint, as is expected of him?

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, Minister of Public Safety]

Mr. Speaker, I have recently sent a communication to U.S. Secretary Chertoff, indicating that Justice O'Connor found that there was no evidence against Mr. Arar, that any reference to Mr. Arar on our security lists have been removed, and that I hoped the U.S. government could do the same.

Afghanistan

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

Mr. Speaker, Canadians have sensed that the mission in Afghanistan is unbalanced and not working. Documents obtained by the NDP recently show just how unbalanced this mission actually is. In fact, it turns out, and we have learned this, that for every dollar spent on aid and reconstruction development, $9 is spent on war fighting. That is a staggering 9 to 1 ratio.

How can the government justify such a completely unbalanced approach to a mission that even it says is not winnable militarily?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, the naïveté of the leader of the NDP never ceases to amaze.

Let us be clear. Aid workers cannot operate in places like Kandahar province in the face of suicide bombs and the attacks of the Taliban, who seek to burn down schools where girls are being educated and who are quite willing to kill aid workers, without establishing security first. That is what our soldiers are there to do.

They are there to establish the necessary conditions of security precisely so that we can proceed with civil reconstruction and with the aid work that we are there to do. That is why this government has increased our total commitment in aid to Afghanistan to a billion dollars.

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

Mr. Speaker, President Karzai told the UN yesterday that there are 200,000 fewer children in school today than there were before this war started, so let us get our facts straight.

According to the government's own documents, Canada is spending $141 on combat for every man, woman and child in Afghanistan and only $16 per person on aid and reconstruction.

Today we see the Prime Minister at the United Nations asking the world to help with reconstruction in Afghanistan even though we are spending nine times more on war than we are on aid. Why does the Prime Minister not start to put some balance into his own approach right here in Canada instead--

[The Speaker, Peter Milliken]

The hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, let us be clear. If there is war in Afghanistan today, it is not because the United Nations mandated an international mission there. It is not because NATO and 36 countries are trying to establish security. It is not because the democratic government of Afghanistan invited Canada and 35 other countries to participate in that process. It is because the Taliban are there trying to totally undermine the democratic process and the reconstruction of that society, and now the leader of the NDP cites the education statistics of the Taliban regime as a model.

I do not understand where that member is coming from, but I will tell this House that we are going to stand by the democratically elected government of Afghanistan and the United Nations.

Political Financing

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, today we learn that the Conservative $1.7 million donation scam goes all the way to the top. Last year the Prime Minister made $4,860 in donations to the Conservative Party, but his delegate fee of at least $540 puts him over the legal limit of what individuals could donate in that year.

To whoever will stand and defend this growing scandal, how can we believe the Prime Minister will respect the $1,000 donation limit in the so-called accountability act if he cannot even respect the existing law?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, let us imagine a Liberal giving lectures on respecting the law. That is rich.

Let us be clear what this is really all about. The Liberals are desperate to hold up the federal accountability act because they want taxpayers, through the tax credit, to subsidize their upcoming leadership convention to the tune of $1.7 million for their delegate fees.

That is not good enough. To cover their own tracks, they want to go back to 2005 and charge taxpayers nearly a million dollars for the delegate fees at our convention. We do not think taxpayers should be subsidizing delegate fees, not for the Liberals and not for the Conservatives.

[Mark Holland, Liberal, Ajax—Pickering, ON]

Mr. Speaker, from the way he said desperate, we know who is desperate.

The Prime Minister of our country may well have been elected thanks to illegal donations that are blatantly contrary to Canada's election laws. The Prime Minister himself seems to have violated these same laws. These revelations shake the very foundation of this chamber.

When will the sanctimonious Conservative Party end this million dollar cover-up, repay any illegal money they snuck into their pockets and admit they are the biggest hypocrites in Canadian government history? Will they turn over the list of illegal donations, yes or no?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime Minister]

Mr. Speaker, I am delighted that the member continues to ask questions about this matter because it gives us another opportunity to express the pride of the Conservative Party in our long-standing policy and our long-standing position that we will not force taxpayers, through the tax credit, to pay for our delegate fees, unlike the Liberals. They only know one thing and that is how to soak taxpayers.

It was not enough to take millions out of the kitty through the ad scam to finance the operations of the Liberal Party. They also want to soak the taxpayer for the cost of their delegate fees. They want their fees and our fees and all of the fees to be covered by the taxpayer. We do not agree.

Maher Arar Inquiry

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the current Minister of Public Safety is on record on July 29, 2003 as accusing the previous Liberal government of “defending a man suspected of links to al-Qaeda” in reference to Mr. Maher Arar.

In light of Judge O'Connor's report, will the same minister now rise in his place to provide a personal apology to Mr. Arar for his harmful, prejudicial and inaccurate rush to judgment or, as I am hearing from the Conservative members, does saying sorry never mean really, truly being sorry?

[Stockwell Day, Conservative, Minister of Public Safety]

Mr. Speaker, I wish the member had quoted the entire document and the number of times which I requested, as an opposition member, that there be a public investigation, an inquiry, into the Arar affair. I wish he would have quoted the number of times I raised issues. I wish he would have quoted from the foreign affairs committee meeting when I asked why the then foreign affairs minister continued to have different opinions on the Arar affair. In pursuing that line of questioning, I was ruled out of order by the chairman of the committee at that time.

We raised this question in opposition. We were the ones who asked for the inquiry. They were the ones who were not performing on this issue.

[Dan McTeague, Liberal, Pickering—Scarborough East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, by his own words, the words of the Prime Minister, by the words of the member for Calgary—Nose Hill, who repeated that same scurrilous accusation against Mr. Arar, the record is very clear. This is absolute proof that the Conservatives really practise the belief that being sorry never really means having to say it.

Could the Minister of Public Safety confirm that, due to criticism of the RCMP in Justice O'Connor's report concerning Mr. Maher Arar, the commissioner of the RCMP offered his resignation to the Prime Minister and the resignation was not accepted?

Mr. Speaker, will the minister confirm to the House whether or not, following Justice O'Connor's report concerning the Maher Arar affair, the Commissioner of the RCMP—