Art Hanger

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I believe that every effort should be pursued diplomatically while the issue of this attack is ongoing. Diplomatically it is incumbent upon our government to pursue it at great length. I applaud the member for taking that initiative. I will tell him personally that I will support the initiative to see that it does go to the UN as one more step in attempting to bring a reasonable resolution to the crisis in Kosovo.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the question from the member, up to a point. I think he has been rather unduly critical of our party; in fact, very much so in his statements. I believe that nothing is comic in the House, including our opposition day motion.

However, the issue of the vote is clear. We asked for unanimous consent to have a vote on this issue the day it was debated in the House. We had an all-night debate on the issue. What happened? The Liberal side said no. The next day it was the same thing; the Liberal side said no. We asked for that vote and they would not agree to it.

I encourage the hon. member not to hurl these kinds of statements back to the opposition.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

My apologies, Mr. Speaker, for not letting you know earlier.

Obviously the government does not want votes on important issues, even if it means having to send ground troops into Kosovo and place the lives of men and women in the military in possible danger. It does not want to vote on it.

That is the history. We could go through a list of other things like hepatitis C compensation. There was no vote on that issue and it was an important issue. The issue of APEC funding consumed much debate in the House. There were many questions from the official opposition and other opposition parties to the government, but there was no debate.

We could also talk about the issue that brought some infamy to the secretary of state for financial institutions, which is the taxing of single parents or single income families. It is shameful. We could talk about the banning of kiddie porn. The list goes on and on. That is the real reason this government does not want to have a vote on the issue of Kosovo.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

I am.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Yes, as my hon. colleague said, it means that one person does not make all the decisions. That is what seems to be the point of greatest fear on the other side of the House and the government has clear support, if a vote is taken, even from the opposition members.

In this case I inform the other side of the House that the Reform Party, the official opposition, supports the government's role and the troops in NATO thus far.

The hon. member for Mississauga West made a very accurate statement about our leader and his position, that we did in fact support the government. He could have continued on to inform the House and those viewing the debate that our leader also advised the Prime Minister and the House that if any escalation were contemplated which might require ground troops being sent in, the Leader of the Opposition clearly stated that we would seek to have a vote in the House on the matter and another debate. That is the conclusion of the opposition leader's statement.

There was also a statement from the Liberal side relating to the issue of the vote, that to vote on this issue would put the troops at risk. Can anyone on the other side of the House tell me how a vote would put our troops at risk? I cannot understand that.

How would we be jeopardizing their safety by having a vote on this issue? I would like to be shown how we would place our troops at risk by the mere fact that we would debating and voting on the issue.

I can tell members that our troops would feel very supported if the majority of members in the House rose in support of their action over there. I believe they deserve our support.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of National Defence brought forward a statement accusing the opposition of political jockeying. What are we jockeying for? The majority of opposition members support our role and the government's role in this NATO crisis. Where is the political jockeying?

All we are seeking is to have a vote on the issue in parliament. It is that simple. There is no political jockeying involved. It is a simple declaration that we support this initiative but we want a vote on it in the House. That is democracy.

All these matters have been raised in the last few minutes. Another statement was directed from the Liberal side toward the opposition, that the opposition was using this issue and this motion for political statements and posturing. Is this the actual view of the Liberal government of the opposition that has claimed time and time again that we are supporting the action over there just because we are asking for a vote?

There are some other underlying reasons the Liberal government is accusing the opposition of all these things. The parliamentary secretary to the foreign affairs minister stated, as reported in Hansard , that historically successive Canadian governments had maintained that it was best to present unanimity from all sides of the House on a decision of this gravity and magnitude.

How would it even know that? Since when has the government side been speaking for every member in the House? It is not speaking for every member in the House. There is an opposition here which has a role to play in the parliamentary system. It is not speaking for every member in the House, in spite of what the foreign affairs parliamentary secretary had to say.

Those are all the reasons brought forward in the last two hours of the debate. The accusations have been plentiful on that side trying to discredit or put down the opposition.

I am not speaking for every party but I certainly am speaking for our own. We support the government action in NATO on the Kosovo crisis. Why would the government side continually want to shut down the issue of a vote? There is only one reason I can think of. It does not want votes on important issues to take place. It does not want the democratic process to actually—

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to address the motion proposed by the Bloc Quebecois. It does not happen often on this side of the House that the Bloc would receive congratulations from the official opposition.

I believe the debate is certainly well timed. It could be carried a bit further, but so be it. The fact of the matter is that it is before the House for debate and actually for a vote to encourage, if nothing else, the government to take the right steps, that is to take a vote on the issue of entering or escalating our presence in the Kosovo crisis.

I have been listening to some of the comments on the issue of voting on this motion. I will read the motion again for anyone who may be viewing or listening:

That this House demand that the government submit to a debate and a vote in the House—

I also include the amendment of the hon. member for Beauharnois—Salaberry: “prior to the possibility of”.

—the sending of Canadian soldiers to the Balkans who may be involved in military or peacekeeping operations on the ground in Kosovo and the Balkan region.

Over the short time I have been sitting in the House listening to the debate, the comments from that side of the House toward the opposition or toward anyone seeking to have a vote on the issue are amazing. It has nothing to do per se with the events happening over there.

First, alarm bells have been sent out: “We will not have time for a debate in the House on this issue because it could be an emergency”. It is not an emergency. There is ample time to debate the topic about sending ground forces in. There is plenty of time for the government to prepare and for the opposition to receive pertinent information so that all hon. members of the House could be well informed about a vote. As well there would be a substantial show of support throughout. There is no way out once members stand in the House to take a vote on an issue as important as this one.

The opposition has again been accused of trying to turn the House into a congressional system. What on earth does that mean? To have a democratic process involved in the sending of troops, or whether or not one supports sending troops or escalating our presence in the Kosovo crisis, what on earth does that have to do with turning the House into a congressional system?

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.

The matter before the House and part of the debate of course centres around the vote as the Bloc motion clearly indicates. It has nothing to do with what question period information was brought forward about troops burying some—

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I find the words of the parliamentary secretary interesting when it comes to pointing a finger at the opposition. When I say the opposition, from one party to the other, they are actually supporting the government on this issue. They are actually supporting the government on this Kosovo crisis and our involvement with NATO.

The accusation coming from the parliamentary secretary is accusing the opposition of political jockeying. Because the opposition has basically unanimously sought to have a vote on a very important issue it is being accused of political manoeuvring or political jockeying.

I believe it is incumbent upon this House to show unanimously that Canadian troops have our total support, that we stand behind them morally and that they know this from their elected representatives right across the country. What is happening now is that the Liberal government is accusing the opposition of the very opposite, which is not true.

I am curious as to why the parliamentary secretary would use such damaging words about the opposition and its support for our troops.

[Kosovo, April 16th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, we are asking about the cost of the munitions. How much money is being spent on munitions and how much more has been assigned? It is a very simple question and one that the government should have addressed some time ago but refuses to do so.

Again I ask the parliamentary secretary: How much additional money, new money, is being addressed to the issue in Kosovo?

[Kosovo, April 16th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the minister knows full well that he has the support of the Reform Party when it comes to the issue of Kosovo.

I am simply asking this question of the defence minister. The budget for defence is about $9.5 billion. New money has to be found for this war effort. Where is it coming from and how much has been assigned?