Paddy Torsney

[Millennium Excellence Award, June 10th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, each year the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation provides over 900 scholarships to outstanding students across Canada.

This year Burlington students Brenna Dickison, Jayde Duncombe, Shirine Usmani, Amir Ali and Andrea Gulyas won millennium excellence awards. These bright young Canadians are among the most promising of our students entering post-secondary institutions this fall.

Since its creation in 1998, the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation has recognized the achievements of Canada's top students, awarding some 3,600 millennium excellence awards. While these awards help these outstanding young people pursue their post-secondary education, at the same time the foundation is helping to ensure a bright future for Canada and Canadians.

I ask my colleagues to join me in congratulating all the recipients of this scholarship across Canada and especially Brenna, Jayde, Shirine, Amir, and Andrea from Burlington.

Way to go. Bonne chance les étudiantes.

[Juno Beach Centre, June 6th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, Canada played a vital role in the great campaigns for world peace during World War II. The most pivotal of these campaigns took place at dawn on June 6 as Canadian soldiers landed on the Normandy shore, code-named Juno Beach. This brave and historic landing was a turning point as the Allied forces moved on to liberate France.

Burlington resident, Garth Webb, a proud D-Day veteran, is president and director of the Juno Beach Association, a non-profit society working to preserve the memory of Canada's contributions to the second world war. With incredible commitment and dedication, the association members have built the Juno Beach Centre, officially opened today in Normandy. This centre commemorates Canadian veterans' contributions to the war and honours our soldiers, our heroes.

I ask that all members join me in paying tribute to those brave Canadians who fought that fateful day at Juno Beach. I wish to congratulate Garth Webb and everyone whose contributions made the Juno Beach Centre a reality.

[Habitat for Humanity, May 29th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, it gives me great pleasure to congratulate the Women Build Habitat for Humanity Brant project.

This past weekend amazing women from Brant and the surrounding communities gathered to work on the only Habitat for Humanity house to be designed and built by women in Canada, and the fifth Habitat for Humanity house built in Brant.

Local women had the opportunity to learn new skills while they worked to provide an affordable safe home for a local family. Three hundred women volunteers have been involved in this project, as well as 25 men who acted as skills coaches in building workshops.

I know all colleagues in the House celebrate and support the work of Habitat for Humanity and join me in congratulating these incredible volunteers for their initiative to learn new skills, their ability to improve and their support. Our congratulations go out to Habitat Brant.

[Ethics Counsellor, May 16th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I think all members in the House are very concerned about ethics. Members are working so that all members of Parliament are respected. The Prime Minister's ethics package will go a long way to ensuring that does occur.

Bill C-34, which is presently before a committee, is an important piece of legislation. I would urge the hon. member opposite to support the bill.

Obviously, we need ensure that confidentiality is respected when these reports are drawn up. The current ethics counsellor writes reports as an advisor to the Prime Minister that include confidential and other information. The people who give that information have every right and expectation of privacy.

In the new bill the reports will be quite a bit different. There will be an opportunity for all those reports to be made public. That is an important aspect to ensuring that people do understand how ethics work and what the process is for members of Parliament. It will be an important opportunity for people to clear their names very convincingly with the public.

One of the problems we have now is people are accused of things. There is a report and people do not always get to be fully convinced that the person was in fact in the right. The improvements are something that the member opposite should be supporting. I would encourage him and his party to support those.

The issue of confidentiality and giving of advice to the Prime Minister is important. I know that on occasion, when I was unsure about how to act on an issue, I was able to contact the ethics counsellor as a backbench MP and receive some advice. It was important to know that before I acted there was a way to check and balance with someone, especially as a new member. I see there are some new members opposite over there who may want to avail themselves of that opportunity. This is something that we can all do.

As well, the reports that the ethics counsellor has put on the website, which describe what a certain situation was and what his findings were, are very instructive to the general public. They are very instructive to other members of Parliament and ministers so they are ensuring that they are conducting themselves in the most appropriate way possible.

I cannot support the motion by the right hon. member for Calgary Centre. I encourage him to look at Bill C-34 and to put his full support behind it. I encourage him to ensure that we enhance with the general public its expectations from members of Parliament and its confidence in members of Parliament from all parties.

One thing that is very stressful for me is seeing members denigrated and hearing accusations made against people in an irresponsible manner. The front page is always the place for accusations. Unfortunately, the back page sometimes is where the clarifications are issued. I know other people of high public standing are faced with that affliction as well.

Bill C-34 will ensure that there is a better process and that there is clarity. It is an important piece of legislation, and the motion from the member opposite does not enhance the process at this time. We need to ensure that we move forward in a very progressive way. The Prime Minister has demonstrated great leadership on moving forward.

I encourage all members of Parliament from all parties to support the Prime Minister's initiative going forward. I have always had every reason to have confidence in the government and many times in other members of Parliament from other parties. I am sure the member opposite can remember when members of Parliament were not held in very high repute. Certainly some of those years were very difficult prior to the present government coming into office.

There is a need for people to have confidence. The ethics package that the Prime Minister is moving forward with, and that the Liberal Party will be moving forward with, is an important part of that process because people need to have confidence. People have a right to have confidence in their members of Parliament. We can do everything to ensure that they have that respect.

I will not be supporting the motion of the member opposite. I encourage him to support the government's bill, Bill C-34.

[Multiculturalism, May 16th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, we have heard a lot of concerns about some police forces using selective treatment of individuals based solely on their ethnic or racial characteristics. I would ask the Secretary of State for Multiculturalism and the Status of Women to tell the House if anything can be done to work on these issues to ensure that all people are treated fairly.

[World Telecommunications Day, May 16th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, tomorrow is World Telecommunications Day. Canada has a distinguished history of innovation in the telecommunications field, starting of course with the invention of the telephone by Canadian Alexander Graham Bell in 1876.

In this era of modern communications, Canada is recognized as a leader in the digital economy and information society. Our policy of connecting Canadians, our innovation agenda, ensured that Canada was the first country to connect our schools to the Internet, digitalize our national heritage, encourage e-commerce and use information and communications technologies for economic and social development.

Kofi Annan, the Secretary-General of the UN, has identified this year's theme as “Helping all of the world's people to communicate”, with a primary goal to narrow the digital divide and lay the foundation of a truly global information society.

Canada will be working with members of the UN to achieve this goal at the World Summit on the Information Society at the end of the year. All Canadians can be proud of this country's leadership in the future of world communications.

[Petitions, May 9th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I misstated what I said when I presented the petitions on stem cell research. As I did say, the petitioners are supportive of adult stem cell research. However they do not support embryonic stem cells.

It must be Friday, I am having a little difficulty. I do appreciate the spirit of the petition and the fact that they have worked so hard to get this together.

[Petitions, May 9th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I also have petitions from constituents who are very concerned about hate propaganda. They want Parliament to protect the rights of Canadians to share their religious beliefs without fear of persecution.

[Petitions, May 9th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I also have petitions from a series of constituents supporting embryonic stem cell research. They are calling upon Parliament to focus its legislative effort on adult stem cell research to find cures and therapies necessary to treat illnesses and diseases from which Canadians are suffering.

[Petitions, May 9th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I have several petitions.

I am tabling petitions for constituents calling for the outlawing of materials which promote pedophilia or sado-masochistic activities involving children. I have been working on this issue and I am pleased to know that they support our government action on that front.