Loyola Hearn

[Infrastructure, March 24th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the government is becoming famous for its downloading. The government downloads on the provinces, the provinces download on the municipalities, and the municipalities are left with the horrendous debts.

In relation to the infrastructure program, in the recent budget we heard an announcement of $3 billion for infrastructure. It sounds like a lot of money until we are told that $1 billion goes to special projects and $2 billion is spread over ten years; ten years spread across the country does very little.

Again, it is a government of downloading and downsizing. Let us hope that the people of Canada take a lesson and start downsizing the government opposite.

[Statutory Instruments Act, March 24th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I also stand in support of the bill. It is very interesting to listen to debate on such a bill. Because the bill itself is an extremely technical one, the debate was focused on the material itself. Usually when we debate bills in the House, if we did not know specifically what we were talking about, we would never guess from the conversations and presentations that were put forth. Perhaps we should try to ensure that all bills and motions debated are technical.

The other interesting thing about this is, since the original introduction of the bill, I believe the House generally has become much more conscience of the need for change in Parliament. We have talked about parliamentary reform and a number of members are getting involved in trying to find ways to improve what goes on here and, in particular, to make government more accountable and more responsible.

In the original discussions we had a fair amount of opposition from the government. However this morning the one speaker from the government side, the formidable chair of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, spoke in favour of the bill. It does not surprise me because the gentleman certainly is a very intelligent individual who undoubtedly can understand fully the implications of such legislation, unlike perhaps some of his colleagues.

Attitudes are changing in relation to Parliament. The pettiness is starting to disappear little by little, but not quickly enough. As it does, we see much more serious debate on these issues.

In the words of a noted constitutional scholar, Eugene Forsey, a great Newfoundlander by the way, responsible government means a cabinet responsible to Parliament and a Parliament answerable to the people. I believe that says it all. There is nothing in Bill C-205 that detracts from this principle. On the contrary.

Senator Forsey was a member and joint chairman of the Standing Joint Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations. He fully supported the adoption of a general disallowance procedure binding on government. It is very doubtful that such an eminent constitutional scholar would have given his support to such a procedure if he thought it was inconsistent with our constitution. Therefore, the arguments made to that point certainly are null and void. If that had been the case, I expect Senator Forsey would have been the first to make note of that fact himself.

The reality is that far from being inconsistent with the principle of responsible government, the proposed disallowance procedure serves to reaffirm the principle by ensuring that cabinet and other regulation making authorities are fully accountable to Parliament for the regulations they make in the exercise of powers delegated by Parliament. That is basically what the people in the country ask; that the laws and rules we make here are responsible, not only to Parliament but through Parliament to the people of the country.

The opposition one sees today to the adoption of a statutory disallowance procedure flows from the same source as did the opposition to the creation of a parliamentary scrutiny committee more than 30 years ago. It is a case of the bureaucracy resisting any change seen as lessening its own control and power.

The case for statutory disallowance procedure is a simple one. The Parliament of Canada is the source of the legislative authority that is delegated not only to the governor in council and ministers but also to various other regulation making authorities such as the CRTC, the Canadian Transportation Agency, and others. That Parliament has a valid interest in overseeing the manner in which the authority is exercised cannot be doubted, and this has long been recognized in Canadian law.

For more than 30 years now regulations by these regulating authorities have been subject to parliamentary oversight and scrutiny and have stood permanently referred to the Join Committee for the Scrutiny of Regulations. Effective parliamentary scrutiny however, requires effective parliamentary control. The lack of an effective and adequate parliamentary control procedure was partly addressed in 1986 when the government accepted to be bound by standing orders providing for such a procedure.

We have heard other members talk about the McGrath Committee, which really was an extremely revolutionary committee. I should remind the House that the chairman of the committee, James McGrath, was also a great Newfoundlander.

Because of the now legislative nature of the standing orders however, that procedure could only deal with a portion of the instrument subject to parliamentary scrutiny, those made by the governor in council or by minister. That experiment has been a success, as even those opposed to Bill C-205 have acknowledged.

As we have seen, there has been opposition to this procedure in the past but as people begin to realize that we are really here to be responsible, number one to Parliament and particularly through Parliament to the people of the country, we have become much more conscious of having the proper procedures in place that will ensure this accountability exists and can be carried out.

I would like to congratulate the person who introduced the bill. The amount of work and background material that has been provided and the attempt to offset the naysayers in relation to their presentations factually says a tremendous amount for the interest and the dedication of the individual involved. In congratulating him, I want to say we support the bill and look forward to it coming to a final vote.

[Canada Pension Plan, March 21st, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I will say a few brief words on this topic in support of the motion. Why I say they will be a few brief words is that I think we talk too much about issues such as this one and we do not do enough about them. An issue such as this should not be one that we have to debate for hours, days, weeks, months or years as has been happening. It should be a cut and dried issue.

Canada is the type of country that leads to people being injured on the job because Canada is a country of very rich resources. Developing resources is always dangerous work, whether it is working in the mines, working in relation to hydro developments, working offshore or working in the fishery and I could go on and on. All of these professions cause one to be working in dangerous situations.

Even working in what we call ordinary everyday work can lead to someone slipping and falling and injuring oneself. Often people can be out of the workplace for quite some time. This means that the total amount of Canada pension down the road is diminished according to the number of years the person is out of work.

The person is still considered as an active person in the workplace, not someone who has quit or was fired or whose job ran out. The person not working in a specific position simply because he or she has been injured. The person will return to the position whenever he or she is fit and is cleared by the appropriate doctors to go back to work.

In the meantime the time off, which unfortunately sometimes can be considerable, is not factored in in relation to Canada pension. Why?

The only legitimate argument I hear is that the employer who is involved will have to hire someone else to replace the person who is off. That is understandable. It would be very unfair to ask the employer to pay Canada pension premiums for the new worker who is doing the job and pay Canada pension premiums for someone who is listed as a worker in that factory or whatever, but is unable to work or assist the employer because he or she is off on workers compensation.

The question I ask is, why should the employer have to pay? I do not think the employer should have to pay. There is no reason to double the burden of the employers who are hit by two great premiums in relation to Canada pension, and particularly in relation to employment insurance.

There are two other options if premiums must be paid. Certainly, one is the government and some will say, “Well, that is people again doubling up on it”. A proper mechanism could be put in place in consultation with the three parties involved, the employer, who I will say up front I do not think should be handed any extra burden, the government and the person who is directly involved. It would not be unreasonable with the amount of money we are talking about here to give somebody the option of having his or her time count toward possible Canada pension benefits down the road and benefiting from that provided they were willing to pay the double premium. It is basically an insurance for the future.

It is not unreasonable whatsoever. It is not a major additional burden on the individual who has been injured. What it does do is it certainly enhances the income of that person down the road when the days, months or years he or she is off on workers compensation are now counted as time toward the drawing of Canada pension benefits.

Somewhere in between there is an answer. Instead of arguing and fighting and saying yes, it is hard, why do all parties involved not sit down and find a solution? I am sure we can, and in an amount of time similar to the time we have spent discussing this here in the House, unless we bring in a pile of bureaucrats.

I solidly support this. I see a lot of people, particularly people who are working in positions that do not have great pay, who are doing very ordinary work and making a very ordinary wage and suddenly find themselves trying to live on the 80% that some provinces pay, or somewhere in that vicinity. It is difficult enough to be sick or hurt and trying to live on less money. However we cut it, it is less money. People might say that they do not have to pay any extra amount for benefits and so on, but a lot of the benefits we pay into come back to us one in way or another. If we are not paying in they are not going to come back.

It is bad enough to be in that position, but let us look at people who in 10 or 5 or maybe 2 years' time are finishing up work and looking toward their meagre Canada pensions and who find that pension reduced significantly, especially if it was in their latter years of work, because they were on workers' compensation. In reality, they were not out of work through any choice of their own, because of layoffs or because they quit or because they did not want to work. They were out of work because they were injured. In reality, they are really still on the lists of the unemployed as it affects the companies with which they would have worked.

I certainly think there is a solution here, one that could be found quickly if the will were there. Again, I and my party solidly support this suggestion provided that it is done without the extra onus on the employers, many of whom are small business people who are having it tough enough with government red tape, bureaucracy and regulations.

Maybe we could do two things here. Let us zero in on this matter and, realizing how easily something like this could be solved, maybe it will give government the incentive to look back and say to itself that maybe it could solve a lot of problems negatively affecting the people in our country if it would sit down and, with a bit of common sense, deal directly with these problems. It could change or cut out the foolish regulations in place that delay and procrastinate, or it could implement new fine-tuned regulations that can cut quickly through red tape and bureaucracy. Perhaps for a change we can get down to one-stop shopping.

An issue came up the other day. It dealt with a relatively small issue in fisheries. In order to deal with the topic, which we should be able to do with a snap of our fingers, seven different departments had to be consulted because there were seven different pieces of legislation dealing with a very minuscule topic.

For instance, in relation to the development of the offshore in Newfoundland and Labrador, and I am sure this is true in the development of other resources in other places, if we want to do some exploration, I understand, we must deal with either 13 or 14 boards, agencies and departments. From the time the first application is initiated until a permit is issued, we are looking at at least two years, if we are lucky. We can imagine the time and effort that companies have to put in for two years, whereas in Norway they deal with one organization. It is inconceivable the number of burdens that we put on our people.

Let us take a lesson from that. Let us start right here and let us get this one out of the way.

[Fisheries, March 21st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, while an all party committee from Newfoundland and Labrador was developing a plan to make sure the cod fishery in the region was maintained and enhanced, the federal government was planning also. Instead of assisting the province, the federal government, without the involvement of DFO, was having HRDC and ACOA make plans to address the fallout of another fishery closure through EI extensions and make work programs.

Why did the government go behind everybody's back and pull the rug out from under its own fisheries minister and the all party committee in Newfoundland and Labrador?

[Fisheries and Oceans, March 21st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, government giveth and government taketh away. In the budget the government bragged about all the money it was giving out for the various departments. While this was unfolding, it was asking departments to cut a billion dollars from existing programs.

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans has been asked to find between $15 million and $20 million. This means significant cuts to small crafts and harbours, the science branch and the Coast Guard, all divisions currently in dire need of funding.

This is inconceivable. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans at present cannot afford to deliver existing programs and further cuts will be devastating.

Putting money into one's pocket with one hand is always popular but taking it out with the other is only an action the government would take. Government giveth and government taketh away at its own risk.

[Transportation Amendment Act, March 18th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I listened to my colleague carefully and I am fully aware of some of the concerns he raised. I would like him to comment on transportation as it affects our own province in particular. I will mention two examples.

The first example has to do with the complete lack of infrastructure funding. The government, in its recent budget, talked about $3 billion in infrastructure funding, and everybody said that was a lot of money. One billion dollars of that will go into special projects, which will take it away from regular road work, et cetera. The other $2 billion will be spread over 10 years. In a country like Canada, $2 billion spread over 10 years will not be enough to keep the potholes filled up. I would like him to comment on that.

My second example has to do with air transportation and the cutbacks that have negatively affected eastern Canada in particular, but more particularly the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador and, even more particularly, the area of Gander. I would like him to comment on those cutbacks.

[The Budget, March 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very good point. This is the kind of political jargon that we get: “Oh, it is not our fault”. When we have a two- or three-way cost sharing, it gives the government a great out: that it is not the government's fault but the fault of the municipalities or the provinces. Let me say to the member that the provinces put what they can afford into infrastructure. So do the municipalities, despite the fact that there has never been as much downloading on municipalities as there has been in this last five or six years from the present government. What they are always waiting for is for you to come to the table.

[The Budget, March 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I would certainly love to respond to both.

The member talks about some other benefits, which I did not mention because of the timeframe, in relation to student loans and scholarships. Let me say to the member that is wonderful for those who make it to university and do very well. An increase in scholarships, and more scholarships, is great for those people who have made it. My concern is for those who cannot make it, because we have many more who cannot make it than those who can, simply because of the lack of interest by the members opposite.

In relation to infrastructure, I would suggest to the member that if he has old videos he can look at the conditions of our infrastructure 15 years ago across the country in comparison to the state of the infrastructure today. He would see that the provinces and the country in general were much better off.

The member said that the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and others across the country were looking for a long term plan so that they could address infrastructure. Let me say to him that they wanted a long term plan, and they would love to have a 10 year plan with money in it. The problem is that they have a plan with absolutely no money. The provinces are in debt. They cannot pick up their end.

We have infrastructure falling apart and it is your fault.

[The Budget, March 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Brandon—Souris.

It is a pleasure to say a few words on the budget. In relation to the budget itself, listening to part of the budget was a pleasure. In the budget there are a few measures which I would say every party in the House has been pressing to have implemented as they deal with child care and, in particular, as they deal with the cost of drugs in our country.

One of the crying needs in this country is the addressing of the concerns of seniors and people on fixed incomes. We have a tremendous amount of people in the workforce who are making slightly over the allowable wage. Under that, they would qualify for some sort of social benefits. They are trying to pay their way and yet they have no access to assistance when it comes to the cost of drugs in particular.

When it comes to our seniors, the one group in society that has built this great country of ours, the people who over the years have given us what we have and for which we are very proud and thankful, this one group, of all segments in society, is probably the one that has been the most neglected by the government opposite, and that is a shame. We have too many people trying to live on a fixed income from year to year. Everything else is increasing: the cost of living, the cost of food, the cost of transportation, the cost of heating homes, and we can go on and on. Yet for these people, the wages or the little pensions they get do not rise in comparison to the costs. Life just becomes harder for them. We owe a little more to the seniors in our country than to neglect them entirely.

Another group is neglected by the budget, despite a flash in the pan announcement which drew everyone's attention when there was talk about revamping the student aid program. What we did, and it is a credible thing, is that we made it possible for students from other countries coming to our Canadian post-secondary institutions to qualify for student loans. I have no problem with that. I praise it and I encourage it. We have to build this country, and for years it was built on the backs of people who came from other countries, and certainly we can continue to do so.

However, we have in this country millions of young students who are trying to push their way, work their way, through post-secondary education institutions, and we have many who have completed that and are trying to find work. In order for them to be able to pay off their student debt, they have to offer a lot up, a lot of recompense. The sad thing about it is that in our country many of them unfortunately cannot find employment that pays significantly enough for them to be able to exist. Many of them, our brightest and our best, head south of the border where they can make more money and can handle the tremendous millstone around their neck that is called a student loan.

We hear people talking about young people who have a degree and who are coming out of university. They say, “So what if they owe $20,000? Big deal. They will make good money. They will be able to pay off their debt.” If it were only that simple. If they come out of university with a four, five, six or seven year degree, or degrees, and owe $20,000, they are very lucky individuals. Many of them owe two, three, four or five times that much, depending on how long they were in the post-secondary institution. I have heard members say, “Why can't they pay their way through? Most of them are off during the summer. I worked and paid my tuition”. I did too, Mr. Speaker, but the thing was that tuition was a lot less and people could make a lot more.

Tuition is not all of it. If a student decides to go to university and wants to obtain a student loan to cover tuition, that is possible. Student loans will cover regular tuition, a few books and perhaps a few minor expenses. What many people do not seem to realize is that most of the young people in this country do not live within or under the shadow of a post-secondary institution. They live in the rural areas of our country and have to come into the centres where the post-secondary institutions are. Whether it be the one nearest or in some other province, it does not make any difference; they have to find board and lodging wherever they stay. It means apartments, it means furniture and it means travel costs. That in itself is much greater than the cost of tuition.

Unless students' parents are wealthy and can help them, most young people have two choices. One is to try to suffer with the economic problems, which usually leads to them dropping out because they just cannot cope financially. Even with a maximum student loan around their necks, they still cannot meet the costs of a university or post-secondary education. The other choice, which too many students are taking, is not to go at all. They ask themselves why they should go when they know they cannot make it. They say they will go out and find work. When they do that, it means they usually find menial employment, which leads to layoffs, which leads to drawing from the unemployment insurance system, which leads to welfare and higher social costs. That then leads to some of them getting into trouble, which leads to other social costs. It goes on and on.

Society pays the costs of these individuals. We pay for their unemployment insurance, welfare benefits, prison costs, health care costs and whatever. Does it not make a lot more sense to invest some money up front and educate them so that they are contributors to society rather than a drag on the system? It is a no-brainer, but the government refuses to listen. We have many young people who are not educated or cannot contribute simply because they cannot afford it, and that is a crying shame.

Other members have talked about the infrastructure program. We can talk about $3 billion going into infrastructure. An extra $1 billion of that, right off the bat, is going into the major infrastructure program, a program which we encouraged last year before it was introduced. From it we got funding to clean up the harbour in St. John's. In fact, I think if we look at the records we will see that I am the only one in the House who, on the record, recommended such a program, so I have no problem with $1 billion extra going into that program.

What I have concerns with is the $2 billion for infrastructure spread over 10 years. What it means to Newfoundland for our infrastructure needs is perhaps $5 million or $6 million a year. Everyone knows as well as I do what can be done for that kind of money in a country like ours. It is a drop in the bucket. It is perhaps the announcement in the budget that disappointed the most people in the country, and particularly our municipalities.

Mr. Speaker, one of the other things that is a crying shame, with which you would identify, is our complete lack of recognition for the athletes in our country. When we look at our population and geography, we have a country that turns out tremendous athletes. We are not putting money where we should to help those people reach the top and it is about time that issue was addressed.

We should look at the yearly basic exemption for small business, which would be a great benefit to them in encouraging students to become employed during the summer and in assisting small seasonal businesses.

I know that my time is up. I am just getting into it, but I hope my colleague from Brandon—Souris will continue.

[Question No. 127, March 17th, 2003]

How much does the government receive annually in civil aviation and airspace charges for the use of airspace over the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador?