House of Commons Hansard #52 of the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was companies.
Fisheries and OceansOral Questions
St. John's South—Mount Pearl Newfoundland & Labrador
Conservative
Loyola Hearn ConservativeMinister of Fisheries and Oceans
Mr. Speaker, the Canadian delegation went to the NAFO meetings in Dartmouth last week with an inflexible mandate to not only reform the NAFO convention but also the monitoring, control and surveillance areas. This will establish a management regime on the continental shelf outside the 200 mile limit, the same as it has inside the 200 mile limit.
We said we could do it, we said we would do it and we did it.
Joe Comartin NDP Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Mr. Speaker, yesterday 60 Canadian border guards were forced to walk off four Canadian border crossings because an armed and dangerous criminal was approaching the border.
Joe Comartin NDP Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Mr. Speaker, 10 years ago guards requested the right to be armed to protect themselves and Canada's borders. Now the government has said it is going to take an unbelievable 10 more years to accomplish this.
We need to stop the tide of illegal guns coming into this country and our guards at the border need the tools to do this.
Will the government today commit to having every single guard armed in five years or less?
Stockwell Day ConservativeMinister of Public Safety
Mr. Speaker, as far as the 10 year comment, my hon. colleague is quite correct. For about 10 years border officers were asking that they be armed so they could deal with situations as happened yesterday. For 10 years they were ignored by the former government.
We have taken the step to announce $101 million to begin the process of arming those border officers. There is training involved. Storage facilities have to be built. We are looking forward to as early as this coming summer to see those first armed border officers arriving in key border locations from coast to coast.
Joe Comartin NDP Windsor—Tecumseh, ON
Mr. Speaker, it is not necessary for it to take 10 years. I know the government likes following the Bush agenda and it took 10 years to do it in the U.S. but it does not take that long in Canada.
It will take five more unnecessary years, if the government does not do it in five, where more guns will be smuggled into this country, five more years with dangerous criminals crossing our borders.
There are alternatives. There is another way of doing this. Why not have the government come forward with enough resources for the RCMP and provincial police forces to increase our capacity to train our guards and get them on line in five years, not ten?
Stockwell Day ConservativeMinister of Public Safety
Mr. Speaker, I will not suggest that my hon. colleague is trying to mislead people by continuing to say it is going to be 10 years until we have armed border officers. If the member will listen carefully, by next summer we are going to see armed border officers at the key locations across the country and that training is going to continue.
This is not something we can do quickly. There are staffing arrangements that have to go into play. There is a three week time period to do the actual training. We want to train the trainers so we are not subject to extra cost. It is going to be carefully done. It is going to be well done. Security and prosperity at our borders is always the goal.
Wayne Easter Liberal Malpeque, PE
Mr. Speaker, the minority government continues to fail the farmers of Canada.
It has failed to provide immediate cash to farmers as promised. It has failed to hold the U.S. to account in terms of BSE. It has failed to implement a GATT article XXVIII dairy tariff line as mandated by the House. It has failed through its options program to address commodity price shortfalls and it has failed at the WTO.
Will the minister live up to his responsibilities and provide the needed cash assistance that farmers so dearly need?
Chuck Strahl ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, during the election campaign, we promised $500 million but we just could not deliver. Instead, we gave $1.5 billion.
For 13 years, the Liberals stood on their hind legs and said, “Just another year. Maybe next year farmers will get a buck from the government”. However, 13 years went by, 13 years of broken promises.
This government is delivering the goods for Canadian farmers.
Wayne Easter Liberal Malpeque, PE
Mr. Speaker, the minister, as does his boss, continues to play the politics of deception. He knows full well that the Conservatives, even in the budget, have not got anywhere close to where the Liberals were in terms of supporting farmers.
Farmers are concerned. In fact, a farm rally at the farm of one of the Prime Minister's former supporters was headlined “Prime Minister Betrays Farmers”.
Will the minister just do the right thing and live up to the promises that the party had made during the campaign and put--
Agriculture and Agri-FoodOral Questions
Chuck Strahl ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, there will be $2 billion coming into the hands of farmers between now and the end of the year. This is much needed cash that the Liberal Party could never deliver. Here is what the Liberal task force said in its own report last week:
Unfortunately, over the past 13 years, there has also been a growing disconnect between the Liberal Party and Canada’s rural and agricultural population.
When it comes to getting advice on agriculture from Liberals, it is like getting firefighting advice from a pyromaniac.
Jean-Claude D'Amours Liberal Madawaska—Restigouche, NB
Mr. Speaker, the minority Conservative government continues to betray the trust of Canadian farmers. We all know that the WTO negotiations are at a standstill. The Cairns Group met last week to try to resume talks. Other countries realized the importance and attended the meeting, while our Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food stayed in Ottawa.
Could the Prime Minister explain why his Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food did not attend this important meeting for the future of Canadian agriculture?
Chuck Strahl ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, we continue to work with our allies on liberalizing trade. We continue to push Pascal Lamy and others who are involved, whether it is through the Cairns Group, which happened last week in Australia, or in our continuing negotiations with our trading partners. Canada wants liberalized trade on farm trade, generally. We are moving ahead, wherever possible, with our allies to push that agenda forward.
Jean-Claude D'Amours Liberal Madawaska—Restigouche, NB
Mr. Speaker, Canadian farmers want more than words; they want action.
When we were in government the WTO organizations were going well. Today, the Liberal opposition announced its new agriculture plan to help Canadian producers face the new reality. We want to strengthen the role of the Canadian Wheat Board. We want to protect supply management and consult with agricultural stakeholders.
The Prime Minister owes Canadian producers some answers. When will he implement the Liberal agriculture plan?
Chuck Strahl ConservativeMinister of Agriculture and Agri-Food and Minister for the Canadian Wheat Board
Mr. Speaker, we want to give some hope to farmers, so we sure will not be implementing a Liberal plan any time soon.
It is interesting that in the past government, when the member for Malpeque was critic for this, he voted against giving money to Canada's farm families in March 2000. He voted against giving money to farmers hit by the mad cow crisis. He voted against standing up to U.S. protectionist policies in 2002. He voted against sending a delegation to the States to open the border again.
We are fighting for farmers; we are not just talking about it.
Raynald Blais Bloc Gaspésie—Îles-de-la-Madeleine, QC
Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has arbitrarily allowed fishers in Newfoundland and Labrador to take an additional 7,000 tonnes of shrimp, causing prices in Quebec to tumble. In 2001, the minister said that Quebec should not be allowed additional fish quotas until the hydroelectricity dispute between Newfoundland and Labrador and Quebec had been settled.
Is the minister's incomprehensible decision not based on the same half-baked strategy he quoted in 2001?
Fisheries and OceansOral Questions
September 25th, 2006 / 2:50 p.m.
St. John's South—Mount Pearl Newfoundland & Labrador
Conservative
Loyola Hearn ConservativeMinister of Fisheries and Oceans
Mr. Speaker, the member has been around long enough to know that when we set quotas, it is usually done in consultation with all the parties that are involved. At no time is any special attention given to any province. The industries in each area get together, decide upon quotas, provide the best advice they can to us and we make that decision.
Let me assure the member. If he thinks his area has been treated unfairly, talk to me, and we will make sure he understands that they will be treated the same as anybody else.
Johanne Deschamps Bloc Laurentides—Labelle, QC
Mr. Speaker, today, the foreign affairs minister of Colombia is in Ottawa to meet with various ministers and agencies, including CIDA.
Will the Minister of Foreign Affairs take advantage of his meeting with his counterpart to pressure the Colombian government to honour the judgment by the Colombian constitutional court recognizing that CIDA-funded humanitarian groups are not terrorist groups?
Canadian International Development AgencyOral Questions
Central Nova Nova Scotia
Conservative
Peter MacKay ConservativeMinister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency
Mr. Speaker, I will tell my hon. colleague that I have a meeting today with the Colombian foreign affairs minister.
I am certain that we will have good discussions about a number of issues. I intend to raise this issue along with many others.
I am also certain that the new foreign affairs minister will have many issues to discuss with me. I am sure that we will have an opportunity for a good talk.
I welcome the minister of foreign affairs of Colombia.
Karen Redman Liberal Kitchener Centre, ON
Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister is sharpening his axe to make $1 billion in cuts to programs right across the board. They are going to be deep cuts. The minority Conservative government has already signalled that women and aboriginals, to name just two groups, are going to be targeted.
What other vital social programs will be gutted by the Prime Minister?
John Baird ConservativePresident of the Treasury Board
Mr. Speaker, it was the former prime minister, the member for LaSalle—Émard, who said, “looking over spending should occur annually”. We agree. We will be announcing some changes shortcoming.
Ed Fast Conservative Abbotsford, BC
Mr. Speaker, this past weekend in B.C.'s Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley 60 border guards walked off the job, claiming a threat to their personal security. Shockingly, the Liberals have claimed that the arming of border guards was unnecessary. However, George Scott, who is the vice-president of the Customs and Excise Union, which represents these agents, said that the border agents would not have walked off the job if they had been armed.
Could the Minister of Public Safety please explain to the House the importance of strengthening border security?
Stockwell Day ConservativeMinister of Public Safety
Mr. Speaker, as I was addressing this question just a few minutes ago, I was grieved and shocked to hear the Liberal member for Scarborough—Rouge River, accompanied by his friends, refer to our border officers as “wimps”. Yesterday he stood on Parliament Hill commemorating the deaths of 10 peace officers from across the country.
Our border officers are not wimps. Every day and every night they are on the line for us unarmed because they never received support from the Liberals. I want to hear an apology to our border officers. They are not wimps. They are brave and courageous men and women.
Alex Atamanenko NDP British Columbia Southern Interior, BC
Mr. Speaker, the Canadian Wheat Board is under attack. The minister has begun the systematic destruction of an internationally recognized Canadian success story. His parliamentary secretary has already told farmers it is their right to have a vote, but “the final decision will be made by the minister”. The legislation clearly states that changes to the structure of the Board must be approved by the farmers.
Will the minister allow the 85,000 farmers, who use the Wheat Board, to vote on its future, or does he intend to break the law?
