House of Commons photoWon her last election, in 2006, with 39% of the vote.
Veterans Affairs November 18th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, the minister cannot hide behind a loophole. I have met with his predecessor and himself and we have talked about this.
Mr. Trotter is 79 years old. It seems that the minister is delaying until Mr. Trotter and others in his situation are no longer around.
He could make the change today. When can I tell Mr. Trotter that the cheque will finally be in the mail?
Veterans Affairs November 18th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, Lieutenant Colonel Al Trotter is a highly decorated former prisoner of war being denied his full pension by Veterans Affairs.
For over a year I have been appealing to the minister to set things right and extend benefits to this Canadian hero. The minister has told the media that his officials are reviewing the file. He has had the facts for over a year. What is left to review?
Iran November 7th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, in Iran 400 people have recently been stoned or hung, 270 of those people were women.
With 60 million Iranians at risk, I ask the minister this. Are there specific resolutions before the United Nations on human rights violations in Iran and why has the government done so little to protect those human rights?
Citizenship of Canada Act November 7th, 2002
Madam Speaker, this is going to be strange for a politician, a short answer, which is yes.
Citizenship of Canada Act November 7th, 2002
Madam Speaker, I think those are very thoughtful remarks that the member made. I would like time to think more seriously about the exact wording that he has given.
We are in agreement on one major issue. I think it is important to not only to affirm the rights that people who have become Canadian citizens have but we also have to affirm the responsibilities that becoming a Canadian citizen brings with it.
Anything we can do as a group in a non-partisan manner to improve the wording of this new legislation would be to the benefit of the minister and all new Canadians.
Citizenship of Canada Act November 7th, 2002
Madam Speaker, one of the favourite functions that I have as a member of Parliament is to attend citizenship court. Having been born in Canada myself and having come from a long line of Canadians, I never had the privilege of attending it before. It was something that I had never even thought about doing. When I became a member of Parliament and I began to go to citizenship court, I took on a new respect for my country and for the people who make up my country. I especially enjoy the look on the faces of the people who are becoming Canadian citizens for the first time.
I take some exception to some of the things that are in the bill, which I will go into in a moment, but I want to give credit to the minister for putting this forward. It has been fairly well thought out and si an improvement over the previous legislation.
Now we will go to the part that I do not like and I will tell members why. It removes the new oath of affirmation. It removes swearing allegiance to the Queen and her successors. That may seem like a very minor detail but for someone like myself who is a fifth generation Canadian, whose original ancestor came as a soldier from the Scottish regiment to defend the Crown, we are a family that is used to swearing allegiance to the Crown and I take some offence to having that part removed. It is not such a serious thing that I will get really worked up about it, but if someone has been in the country as long as my family has and has had those ties to the crown, it is a difficult thing of which to let go.
We have been in Canada since the early 1800s. When my ancestor came, he came as a soldier to quell an uprising in Canada. The first two generations were in Ontario. Their roots were very deep. I would like to take exception to what my ancestors did. They very foolishly sold the property they had for next to nothing. That right now is about 14 city blocks in the City of Toronto. If I could go back and change anything, I would change that.
Regardless of what happened, we then came to British Columbia. One of my uncles was the first motorcycle policeman for B.C. He is also used to swearing allegiance to the Crown, so it goes a long way. When I was sworn in as a member of Parliament, I too swore allegiance to the Crown, so removal of that does upset me. However I have gone on about that long enough.
Citizenship commissioners is the other thing. I really like the idea that we are now calling the people who swear in the new citizens citizenship commissioners rather than citizenship judges. I often felt at the ceremonies that we were misleading new citizens by calling the people who were swearing them in judges. They are not judges. They are political appointees. To call them judges is a misnomer and somewhat misleading.
However I wonder why we are calling them anything at all. Why do we need to have a specific person for that role? I went to the bother of finding out what we pay citizenship judges and I was shocked. We pay up to $87,100 a year for a full time appointed citizenship judge, who will now be called a citizenship commissioner.
When I was thinking about ways to save Canada money and ways that we could find the funding we were looking for the important issues in Canada such as health care, I thought as a first step we could maybe look at eliminating those kinds of positions and putting that responsibility on to the member of Parliament, for example, with no pay. The member of Parliament is the representative of the federal level of government. We are here anyway, and if we were to ask the general public, they believe we are all overpaid because they do not quite understand what we do in here. Therefore why do we not take on that responsibility and not have a commissioner per se?
We have fabulous ceremonies in the Kamloops area which is the central portion of my riding. They are put together by a lady named Trisha Chmiel out of Kelowna. She works for Citizenship and Immigration. If people have not had the pleasure of meeting this lady, they have missed something. My colleague from Kelowna knows the lady well. She is incredibly efficient and effective. Those ceremonies have meaning.
She already works for the Government of Canada and therefore the people of Canada. Why would we not put her in this position? Why would we put an extra person into this position, especially when it is a political appointment? It makes no sense to me. We could cover all of these little areas without any difficulty at all.
We could also look at the possibility of using someone who is an Order of Canada recipient to administer these functions. That would also make sense and would be much more expedient than having extra people coming in.
The other thing I was concerned about when I read this, and I read it fairly carefully, was that there was some wording I did not like. One of the words I did not like was that we are pledging our loyalty and allegiance. When I hear the word “pledge”, I think “American”. I guess I get very territorial about the difference between Canadian and American when it comes to something like this. It would be better to use a word like “swear”, “affirm” or “give”, rather than the word “pledge”. I know this sounds petty but it is all in the way I hear it. When I hear it, it sounds more American. I would like us to maintain Canada's dignity and our tradition, and so I would like that wording changed.
When we are talking to these new citizens and having them swear an oath, in that oath I would like them to affirm that they understand that when they come to Canada, they certainly have the right to maintain their language, their culture, their religion, their food, their clothing and all of the things that are dear to them, but we also have to emphasize to them that they do not have the right to maintain old hatreds that they may have brought from another country. I would like to see something in the oath that allows people to denounce openly the negative things from their country of origin and affirms how they feel about being part of Canada.
We need to make people who come here feel as though they are part of the fabric and weave of Canada. If we think of Canada as a large piece of cloth, each of us is a thread and all of the threads form one large unit. We need to make people who come here feel a part of that. Having talked to enough immigrants who have told me what they have come from, these new citizens who are looking for a new life here, I think they would welcome the opportunity to denounce some of the negative things of the countries from which they have just come.
Generally speaking, the citizenship ceremonies are wonderful. People beam from ear to ear. Children are part of them. It never ceases to amaze me from how many countries we attract new citizens. It is what makes us so diverse and so unique in the world.
I want to elaborate a little on one of the ceremonies I attended. In the last ceremony for example, Canada received the gift of people from 42 separate countries. Does that not say a lot to the world about what we have to offer? What I am trying to put into this entire discussion is how much we need to protect that. We need to protect what people who choose us as a country value so highly. In order to do that we have to be very careful about the wording.
In closing, I applaud what the minister is trying to do. It definitely is an improvement over what there was before, but I would like him to take into consideration some of the things that I have said. I do not want to lose that connection of swearing to the Queen and her successors. To me it is as meaningful as the ties that the French Canadian people feel to their heritage. There is room to leave it in. It does not hurt anyone and it certainly adds to the tradition of the ceremony.
Veterans Week November 5th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, I quote, “Veterans' Week is a chance to honour those who made the supreme sacrifice for our country”. The minister went on to say that we needed to teach our youngsters about veterans. I could not agree more.
In 1976 the Liberal government showed it cared by initiating the prisoner of war pension supplement. In 1986 the Conservatives repealed that law and wrapped the POW supplement into the pension plan. This had disastrous effects for one of my constituents.
Lieutenant-Colonel Al Trotter flew 44 missions over Europe, was shot down and interned in a POW camp for 268 days. Due to a retroactivity clause, today he finds himself neither honoured nor shown respect for his service.
I ask the minister to forget the rhetoric and do something meaningful for veterans this year, to set an example and live up to the legislation's intent. Give Mr. Trotter his due. Give him his total pension and give him the dignity of knowing that his sacrifice was not in vain.
Supply November 4th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, it was not my intention to join in this debate today. I was quite satisfied to listen, but some of the comments that have come from the other side have forced me to stand.
I have a legislative assistant in my office who is also a reservist. Not only do I invite the member, but I would actually encourage the member to come to my office and spend 15 minutes with this young man. I think he would get an earful.
The member said that the government has done all these good things for the military but as for the uniforms it gave to the military during the desert action, it might as well have painted a bull's eye on the backs of those men. As well, in many cases the wheels have fallen off the trucks and we have to rent equipment to haul the cannon up to the hill for gun salutes. One thousand men have been paid to sit because there is no funding for the training. These are all things that have not been addressed.
When I have the member across the way say to me that he does not like the word “condemn”, that he finds it very strong wording and therefore will not be able to support the motion, I have to ask why in the world he is here. The word “condemn” is strong because nothing has happened on the government side of the House for the military and those on this side of the House are very concerned about the way things are going.
You mentioned sovereignty earlier, sir. Do you not understand that sovereignty is dependent on a healthy, well funded military?
Supply November 4th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague made a very strong case that more funding for the Canadian Forces is long overdue. The Canadian Alliance has been highlighting this issue for years, contrary to what was said earlier. The Alliance is also a very strong proponent of more responsible and effective spending in all areas of government.
Could I hear my colleague's views on the need for better spending in the Department of National Defence?
Petitions November 1st, 2002
Madam Speaker, I have a petition that has been signed by literally thousands of residents of Kamloops, Thompson and Highland Valleys regarding the buoy system.
The petitioners ask that the attention of Parliament be drawn to the attempt by the Canadian Coast Guard, department of fisheries Pacific region in the electoral district of Kamloops, Thompson and Highland Valleys, to divest itself of navigational voyage systems. It is in direct conflict with the safety and well-being of the users of the water system and the river system. I am proud of the number of people who signed.