Loyola Hearn

[Supply, April 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague for sharing his time with me on this extremely important topic.

The last Liberal member who spoke indicated his government's position on this issue. Undoubtedly those members are very much in favour of the resolution. He talked about transparency and continuous information which he feels the government has been giving. There is no doubt about the fact that the party opposite as well as a couple of other parties on this side of the House, along with ourselves, will be supporting the resolution.

If all of us think that the government has been doing such a wonderful job, why is it that the resolution was brought forth? We do have some concerns. Perhaps in its disillusionment the government has lost sight of the fact that what it thinks is clear, continuous and transparent is not clear, continuous and transparent to the public.

We just witnessed a very interesting weekend. People who watched the happenings in Quebec looked at them from two different points of view. Maybe I should say they looked at them from three different points of view.

One group looked at the deliberations that were under way among the leaders of the various democratic countries in the western hemisphere, realizing that if there is agreement in the next four to five years for free trade among all the countries all of us will benefit.

Our party is not one to decry free trade. We were the party that introduced free trade, as my colleague mentioned, much to the chagrin of the present governing party that opposed it to the point where it convinced the people of Canada to defeat the Tory government and pass the reigns of power over to it because it was against free trade.

However we all know and history will show what happened when the Liberals took over. It was the same as when they defeated the Clark government because they did not agree with the gas tax. They failed to say that they did not agree with the amount of tax placed on gas. When they got in power they tripled the amount the Tories had suggested. Consequently they again fooled the people but were in power.

It is irrelevant where they stood at the time. Right now they are supporting free trade and pushing for an agreement with more countries than we presently deal with. That is good for us and good for my province of Newfoundland. As the statistics quoted by my colleague show, we have benefited greatly from free trade.

We sometimes wonder if in pressing for free trade we overlook some of its implications. If we asked government or many of us in the House about free trade, we would say that it eliminates a lot of barriers and creates a better economy in many of the countries involved.

That is the aim of governments such as ours. The aim of politicians such as us is to try to create a better environment in which our people should live, a better environment economically but also a better environment socially, environmentally and in every other way.

Perhaps we dwell on the economic side too much because many of the people who are heavily involved in free trade are people who benefit directly, the large conglomerates, et cetera. There is nothing wrong with that because these are the people who invest and generate dollars that improve the economy generally.

It is government's role to make sure that the economic stimulations that occur from trade benefit the other sectors we talk about in society. In Canada we have done very well, even though there are pockets throughout the country that certainly need more assistance from a social perspective, our health care, education and social needs. This is not because our economy is such that we cannot address these needs. This is because the policies of the government opposite, the lack of foresight, and the lack of ability and will to address the social concerns allow these problems to exist in society.

In the countries that are less well off than we are, where we see great social needs, free trade hopefully will generate the fiscal capacity of many of these governments to address the problems that must be met. As they speak in the House these problems perhaps will be accentuated by members of the NDP who are against free trade because they think it is a negative toward helping people.

It is great to be idealistic socially. It is great to talk about all we have to do for our people, but to be able to do anything for our people we must have the fiscal ability to be able to do so. In order to spend money on health care, education and social problems, social needs, we must generate the dollars first. We must make before we spend unless we do like NDP does quite often, which is spend and then let someone else pick up the pieces afterward.

That is not the way we operate and certainly I have to say not the way the government is operating. If in their policies, if in their moves toward a free trade state in North America they would be open and transparent, all the players could be involved. We could pass along our ideas and suggestions for improvement to the government. They will be talking to the various sectors, not only the huge conglomerates, the multinational corporations, but to the average person in the country, many of whom have some tremendous ideas.

If that had happened prior to Quebec we would not have seen what we did. I said there were three different ways of looking at what happened in Quebec. One is the from the business perspective. Another is from the social perspective as the NDP and many other concerned groups across the country would look at it. I respect their right to have concerns. We also had people who just saw what nobody wanted to see: people throwing Molotov cocktails at police, throwing bricks, throwing chunks of pavement, acting disorderly, breaking windows, tearing shutters from windows and just making a nuisance of themselves.

These were far and few between but unfortunately these things make the headlines. These are the things people saw flashed around the world. Canada is known as a tremendous country where we live together in peace and harmony and show leadership. If I were outside the country looking at what we saw on television, I would be asking if this was Canada, this running from police and throwing rocks at police, et cetera. Let me say again for the record that I thought the police did a magnificent job over the weekend.

If the government had shown leadership in the beginning, had been transparent and awake enough to know that some local issues like softwood lumber and potatoes could be addressed at the conference if we had the right people there, it would not be running at the last minute to try to get the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food through security. It should have been taken care of. There was a lack of foresight and vision.

That is why we are asking that in the future everything it does be transparent and clear so that all of us will know what is going on. If all of us in the country knew what was going on, surely if it is good for the country it is good for the people and most of us would support it. We would not need to have a fence around our leader.

“Elect me so that you can fence me off because I am afraid of you”. There is something wrong with that picture. Leaders of this country or any country should be able to walk among the people they serve, and if the people knew what they stood for they would be able to do so.

My time is up. There is much more I would like to say but hopefully in the future we will have learned from the mistakes of the past.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

Some get a lot less than that.

[Employment Insurance Act, April 4th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, we have the circle that the government draws around areas of high employment, but within these areas of supposed high employment are pockets of small communities. The residents of those communities are required to obtain the same number of qualifying hours to draw employment insurance benefits as those who are in the nucleus of the high employment centres. Perhaps they are in small fishing communities where resource dictates and have had very little work in recent years. Because their communities fall within the larger areas, consequently they require the same number of hours as the high employment centres.

Does the member think that is fair and are these people being treated fairly?

[Hepatitis Awareness Month Act, March 30th, 2001]

Madam Speaker, it is a real pleasure to support the bill brought forward by my colleague from the NDP, the member for Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore, a beautiful area of Nova Scotia that I visit quite often.

I wish to congratulate him on his initiative in bringing forward this bill and I wish to congratulate individuals such as Joey Haché and his father, who have shown great initiative in this field. I look forward to their visit to Newfoundland. Hopefully we can join the hon. member and spend some time there in the near future.

The issue of hepatitis is certainly not a new one for our party. I would like to remind the House that the Conservative Party was the leader on this issue in November 1997 when the member for New Brunswick Southwest raised the issue and debated it for quite some time, as members are aware. The file is now carried by our health critic, the member for Richmond—Arthabaska.

We in our party are proud and pleased to join in supporting the bill, which creates an awareness month for a disease that so many of our friends and neighbours have.

In my remarks I will try to concentrate on hepatitis C. We have been told today that there are many types of hepatitis, but hepatitis C is perhaps what has initiated this bill and is the type that most concerns us.

One of the major concerns we have, despite the agreement of support on the government side, is the government's slowness in reacting to the needs of people affected by hepatitis. People are affected by the government's inability to recognize that many people are outside the four year time frame, from 1986 to 1990. The government should assume responsibility for them.

While the health committee is doing a very good job of moving the file forward, all those people who were not involved in the positive side of the government decision are again facing, as many people have pointed out, great hardships in their lives. Perhaps the government should expand that file and recognize the people who are outside the minuscule time frame that it has set.

All of us have friends and relatives affected by different diseases. We recognize the pressures on them, on their families, on the communities which quite often support them, on the agencies that are directly and indirectly involved and on the country generally. If a disease limits our ability to be a contributing partner in society or within our own families and despite the fact that while we are contributors the costs of trying to deal with our afflictions are above and beyond what we can master ourselves, then the rest of society is involved and has a major concern.

That is what the country is all about. That is what confederation is all about. The rich provinces help the poor provinces, the pendulum swings every now and then and those who were helped find themselves the healthy ones.

It is the same way in society. Many of the people affected by diseases, especially a disease like hepatitis C, are some of the strongest willed individuals. They show us through their determination how to fight such afflictions and are important players in society. It is an example to the rest of us.

The government should recognize that and look for avenues where this should take place, not continue to look for ways of escapism. The word escapism as it relates to hepatitis C should not be a word used by government or by any of us. The government should recognize the fact that people need assistance, they deserve assistance and it should be there to help them. Not only should the government be there to help but to help expeditiously. That is a word the government does not recognize either.

Many people have waited too long for too little. Unfortunately, the amounts that were set aside to help them have eroded through the process, whether it be through the legal process or just by dragging it out. Let us concentrate on the fact that there is a major problem and people are being affected by that. The needs and the wants are there. As a government, let us fulfil our responsibilities, move up to the plate and address it quickly.

We wish the best for those who are involved in this initiative. I say to my hon. colleague that we certainly support the bill. We support his call to make it votable, and hopefully in turn we will see government do its part also.

[Freshwater Exports, March 30th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the premier of Newfoundland has reintroduced the bulk export of water issue. He said that even if the governments of Canada and other provincial jurisdictions think that it as not in their best interests he will do it anyway.

The premier has told the ministers of industry and trade to butt out as he has “deserted and abandoned any right to have a direct say”.

Does the government approve of the stand by the only Liberal premier? If not, how does the government plan to stop this man on a mission of self-destruction and protect our valuable water resource?

[Employment Insurance Act, March 29th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to say a few words about this bill, which I look upon as a blackmail bill, to a degree, simply because government is throwing out enough to the people involved to encourage all of us to support the bill, yet is holding back so many other changes that are so necessary we are torn between supporting the bill and voting against it.

However, our party is supporting the bill simply because we in our party know that if we do not accept the changes offered right now, small as they are, those affected may have to wait for prolonged periods, as they did during the fall, of course, when the bill was first introduced. It should have been passed before the election was called but was not and people have suffered decreased incomes throughout this winter.

I congratulate some of the members who spoke this morning. I agree with everything, I think, that was said on this side and I can appreciate exactly where these hon. members are coming from. I especially was impressed with the speech given by my colleague from the NDP who did a magnificent job in outlining some of the concerns his constituents face.

One of the rules that has not been touched at all in this new piece of legislation is the divisor rule. We ask why it has been there from the beginning. If some seasonal employee is fortunate enough to find x number of weeks of work, why should it be divided by a larger number to directly increase his income?

The bill deals with the intensity rule, again a rule that should never have been brought in. It seems the government has been looking at people who are contributing to a fund well in excess of what is required and has been taking money from employers well in excess of what is required, to the extent that we have a surplus of some $32 billion, instead of asking how we could use this money to help the people who were meant to be helped in the beginning, the people who contribute and the employers who contribute on their behalf. We say to the employers that we will not allow their advisory council to have any say in rate setting. That is how we treat them. We say to the employees that we will try to find as many ways as we can to reduce their benefits. We will increase the number of hours of employment needed to qualify. We will bring in the intensity rule which reduces their payment every year. We will bring in the divisor rule which artificially divides their income. Consequently we end up with 50% of nothing being nothing which is what an awful lot of seasonal employees have been getting over the last few years.

The intensity rule change is a positive one, and we agree with it. We also agree with assisting some people to get back into the workforce without having the heavy onus of paying in excessive hours.

In relation to the required hours, if we go back, the original changes were brought in to offset what was always referred to as the 10-42 syndrome. People would work 10 weeks, get 15 or 20 hours of work a week and get stamps, as they used to say then, to draw unemployment for the next 42 weeks. Nobody was happy with that system. However it is like everything else the government does. Once it starts swinging the pendulum, it lets it go from one end to the other and the people who suffer in this case are seasonal employees.

We have regions where the economy has been disastrous during the last few years, in particular, the ground fishery in Atlantic Canada. The bottom has fallen right out of it. This not only affects people involved in the fishery, it affects an awful lot of people who work in the processing industry, the fish plants and associated back up activities.

When there is a shortage of resource, as we have seen in recent years, and when we have demands from the market, especially the Japanese market, looking for product that requires little or no processing, the opportunity for the people working in that industry to obtain employment becomes less and less and the hours are fewer and fewer.

We have made no provision to address times of disaster. Earlier in the year I remember some of my colleagues from the Bloc Party talking about people employed in the forest industry. They were having the same problem. When the work was scarce, they had a problem finding the number of hours required.

We do not want to go back to the old 10-42 syndrome, a handful of hours and a person can draw on the employment insurance all year. That is not the case. However there has to be some special provisions made for individuals who live in areas that have been devastated by lack of resource, or slowdowns in the industry, or lack of construction, or major strikes or whatever the case might be. We do not have that flexibility and people are suffering. Ironically, they are suffering while they themselves have contributed to a fund that was supposed to look them, a fund in the amount of $32 billion which the government lumped in with general revenues.

This is not the way we are supposed to look after the people in our country. This is certainly not the way we are supposed to look after people who really need our help, people who in trying to help themselves get the door slammed in their face.

The bill needs to be amended in several ways and there are amendments on the floor. Certainly, we will be supporting many of them, and perhaps all of them. However amendments should not have been necessary. A government with a conscience, a government that is supposed to know what is going on should have brought in a full bill to deal with all the issues. It is not enough to placate a few and bribe politicians into supporting it so that these people will at least have some benefits, while completely rejecting other benefits that are necessary.

Let us talk about the EI funding and the Department of Human Resources Development. There are provinces which have a lot of seasonal workers. This in itself creates high unemployment in those areas. These people are looking for work and asking government to help out. At the same time we see the end of March approaching, which is the fiscal year end.

Some provinces use the word dump, which in this case means millions of dollars from small, poor provinces are being dumped back into government coffers because of the tight reins the government has on local offices. The flexibility is not there to deliver even the meagre amounts that are assigned to the various regions. It is amazing.

For the first half of this year and part of the previous year, most of the employees of HRDC were busy trying to correct mistakes of the past as a result of the looseness of the government. With the reduction in staff in the department, the manpower was not there to educate people on what was involved in putting forward good, solid proposals which could generate activity in the communities and create employment.

The local offices have been hammered by their own department. What happened? Through no fault of their own, they have not been able to deliver the funds available. Money has been sent back to government. It is unheard of.

It is time the government become aware of what is happening, especially in the rural areas. Somebody mentioned today that small communities adjacent to bigger ones have been lumped together. The small communities are paying the price because they live near areas of high employment.

All of these things have to be looked at. Hopefully we will see changes before the final vote and will be only too glad to see such changes occur.

[Questions On The Order Paper, March 29th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, on that point of order, I could not help listen to your suggestion to my hon. colleague about putting it on the late show. That in itself presents a problem. When we raise a question on the late show we expect the minister to be there to discuss the details of the question. However we have a parliamentary secretary sometimes—

[Education, March 28th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, my question earlier was for the minister in relation to a request from Quebec for an allocation of 6,000 metric tonnes of shrimp. I asked the minister at the time to reject the request in light of the implications. The answer I was given by the parliamentary secretary, who will undoubtedly re-answer my question this evening, was that they would look at it in light of their usual policies.

That scares me because when I asked the same minister a question last spring about whether or not he planned to give an allocation of shrimp to P.E.I., he gave me the same type of answer. The next day he gave an allocation of 1,500 metric tonnes to Prince Edward Island.

I have absolutely no problem with giving shrimp to Quebec if there were extra shrimp to give away. I would not mind giving it shrimp if it gave us some of their power. I would not mind giving it shrimp if it gave us back some of our power.

In this case the beneficiaries of any resource, especially the fishery, should be those closest to it and that is the people adjacent to it. That is why we talk about the principle of adjacency.

In this case there are the fish plants. Let us forget about the buildings. There are workers in the riding that the parliamentary secretary represents who, since the collapse of the ground fishery in our province, have been existing on meagre resources. Shrimp could enhance their employment opportunities.

There are participants in the fishery already. The larger boats that involved and that started the shrimp fishery in our province, perhaps the most viable and profitable way of harvesting shrimp in certain areas, could certainly use more of the resource to make their efforts viable.

The 65 and under fleet will tell us it is not getting enough quotas to make it worthwhile gearing up to prosecute the fishery. We have a number of small plants throughout the province that, through the moratorium crisis, kept their doors open without one cent from government. They were the only ones who received no benefit from NCARP and TAGS. These private operators stayed, along with small co-operatives, and kept their operations going on their own backs. These people have been looking for quotas and have been rejected.

There are many needs around the province adjacent to the resource and if there are extra resources that is where they should go.

We know the shrimp stocks are supposedly in good shape. We know that next year or the year after there will be undoubtedly an increased quotas. If that is the case it should go to those who are already involved to make their operations viable, and then to the others who are adjacent to the resource and who will benefit more from it. If there is more above and beyond that then we have no problems with sharing. However we have to look after ourselves first, especially in light of what we have gone through in my province over the last few years.

I hope the member when he stands to answer the question will recognize that the minister has already made a commitment. The minister had made a commitment to the union, to the minister of fisheries in Newfoundland and to the Fisheries Association of Newfoundland and Labrador that we will not see any new entrants into the industry until his present policy review has taken place.

[Education, March 28th, 2001]

The hon. member across the way says sometimes years and maybe he is correct. However, this is very unfortunate, in two ways. It is unfortunate for the professionals coming here and unfortunate for the people in the areas who are waiting for these professionals, especially medical professionals.

It is also unfortunate because, as I think the member from the NDP said, it gives the country a bad name in the sense of not being accommodating to professionals coming here.

I have absolutely no problem in supporting the suggestion, which is all it is, that the House ask the Council of Ministers of Education to look at doing a feasibility study into the standardization of education, not only as it applies to the movement from province to province but as it applies to professional people who come into the country. That is all the motion does. It is an extremely good motion. It is a timely motion. Our party certainly supports it.

[Education, March 28th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, we too support the motion put forth by the member for Surrey Central. The Bloc spokesperson expressed the concern that we were intruding into provincial jurisdiction. We all know that education is a provincial responsibility. That does not mean the federal government should not have a major concern about what is happening in the country. The provinces know that very well because, after all, the federal government funds a tremendous amount of educational costs.

That is not to say we should intrude and interfere. The resolution is not saying that we should intrude and interfere. The resolution is asking the House to suggest to the Council of Canadian Ministers of Education that it initiate the feasibility study into standardization.

I stress standardization for the right reasons, so that within the country we have free movement and recognition of the certificates or degrees individuals hold. Years ago when we graduated from university we could pick any job at all within our own province. Then it got to the point where we moved to a neighbouring province. Now not only are we moving throughout the country, we are moving around the world.

What really inhibits this movement of educated people is the fact that many of these certificates or degrees we hold are questioned as we move from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. It is bad enough when we move to another continent or another country, but when we move to a neighbouring province and our credentials are questioned, then there are some real concerns.

Canada's Council of Ministers of Education would be an excellent agency to have studying the feasibility of standardization, not only within the country but also as it relates to the standards of other educational institutions, universities, et cetera, around the world.

I was a member of that association for a four year period when I was Minister of Education in Newfoundland. I had the opportunity not only to attend all their meetings but to represent the association and the country at two world conferences, one in Geneva, the UNESCO conference, where we discussed Canada's educational programs in front of nations from all over the world.

I also represented the agency and the country at the meeting of the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization, of which Canada is an honorary member. This association has tentacles all over the world. The secretariat of that association is top-notch. The association is well aware of the standards of universities throughout the world. If, and I said if, there are universities turning out people who are not up to acceptable Canadian standards it is known beforehand. We should not have to wait months, or years in some cases, for clarification as to whether an MBA or Ph.D. or BA is acceptable and equivalent to what we would get in any of our Canadian universities.

The association has the power and the professionalism to be able to recommend a general standardization policy, which would certainly expedite, if not solve, some of the problems we face right now.

There is absolutely no need for a student coming out of Memorial University in Newfoundland to be questioned in British Columbia or vice versa. There is absolutely no need for a student coming out of McGill to be questioned by some other university. We should be well aware of the standards. In most cases that is not a problem. There is a fair amount of recognition of credits. However, we still have problems within the country. Some years ago it was a major problem. In my own case, I attended a couple of universities and had some trouble getting credits recognized from one to the other. It takes some time.

People who come into the country are facing a severe disadvantage. Professional people come to Canada, many of whom we seek out, many of whom we beg to come in, especially when we have shortages. I am thinking in particular of the medical field, of doctors, nurses and other professional people, where there is a major shortage. We beg them to come here and when they do we complicate their lives by saying we first have to check their credentials. It takes weeks and months and sometimes even longer to get clarification and acceptance.

I have been personally involved in a few cases where the professionals involved were completely and utterly frustrated. These people come to this new country which is supposed to be one that opens its arms and welcomes people from all over the world and treats them royally. In most cases we do and we are proud of that, but we also have a habit of over-complicating things, and this is certainly one area where we do that. Doctors have come to Canada, and to our province in particular, and have waited for months to get acceptance of their credentials.