Alexa McDonough

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I wonder if I might ask the hon. member if he could specifically address the issue regarding Sable Island and what it is, in his applauding the legislation, that would give a basis for optimism.

On the one hand, I understood the member to be saying that it is really just an organizational matter, that it is really a consolidation of the existing status quo. On the other hand, there is this desperate need for us not to maintain the status quo at Sable Island, but to recognize that there has not been an appropriate government structure.

The bill that is before us now gives the transport minister the opportunity to make appropriate administrative arrangements and regulations in that regard. Can the member shed any light on what it is we can hope for, or is it false hope on our part to think that this situation will be alleviated as a result of some specific responsibility lodged with Transport Canada?

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome the comments from the member because I think they underscore the concern.

The reason I have taken the opportunity today in this debate to spell out what I think are very serious problems, in fact a crisis with regard to the future of Sable Island, is that questions remain unanswered. By just putting in the bill responsibilities with respect to the future administration of Sable Island does not get us to where we need to go, which is to have an appropriate government structure.

I assume that part of the purpose of having this general debate before it then goes to committee is to raise the concerns that need to be addressed and to seek clarification on the extent to which those really serious problems will be addressed, how they will be addressed and, if this is not adequate legislation, to ensure that happens and then to push for the kinds of amendments or changes that are needed within the legislation or within some other purview to ensure that we do not literally fritter away and eventually destroy this wonderful ecological treasure and environmental setting.

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the parliamentary secretary for his clarification. I perhaps misunderstood, which is why it is important for us to listen to each other and raise these questions, but in the stipulation in the bill the governor in council will make regulations respecting the administration and control of Sable Island.

The reason I totally focused in on that is because I think the reason for the very crisis we have is that there are not sufficient regulations with respect to the administration and control. If I am understanding this correctly, the responsibility for the administration and control of Sable Island is more explicitly being spelled out within the context of transport.

I know I am not allowed to ask a question in response to his comments, but I hope the parliamentary secretary will take the opportunity to fully explain exactly where the responsibility will lie, because this is the problem, to finally deal with the administration of Sable Island through a governance structure that can actually get the job done.

As I said earlier, it has been effectively orphaned because everybody has a piece of the action, but nobody really takes the responsibility. There was a completely failed attempt by the Privy Council Office in the run up to the election. It was going to come up with a definitive proposal in June on how the governance of Sable Island would finally be effectively discharged.

It would be much appreciated if some light could be shed on what happened to that commitment and that investment of time and energy on the part of a lot of the partners and stakeholders to come up with an appropriate multi-partner structure. What happened? There do not seem to be any answers. It seems to have gone up in smoke and disappeared.

Perhaps some light could be shed in this debate on what the status of that initiative is and where it goes from here. Is it in fact an accurate understanding that Transport Canada will now address this subject once and for all?

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry, but I did not fully understand the hon. member's question. I heard it in French and then I changed to the interpretation channel. I am not sure I fully understood it.

I think the question had to do with adequate ongoing funding for the Coast Guard. As I indicated in my own remarks, this has been a serious problem.

We know we have aging vessels at a time when our marine safety and the various functions carried out by the Coast Guard are incredibly important. Whether they have to do with fisheries, pollution control or safety considerations, they need to be adequately funded. I do not think there is anything here that would address that fact nor would we necessarily expect that to be the case.

However, in response to the question, I am sure the hon. member is aware that my colleague, the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore, has been extremely vocal and vigilant on this topic. He was a very solid contributing member to the fisheries and oceans committee when it grappled with this and came back with a recommendation that the situation had to be changed, both with respect to the resources and to the Coast Guard being basically reinvented in terms of having the mandate that is required for it to carry it out.

If I have not addressed the question directly, I apologize for my inadequate French and the fact that I was trying to switch to the translation at the time.

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

We could call it stable island where it refers to the horses, although there are no stables for those wild horses. That is one of the reasons there are such wonderful photographs.

An appropriate management and governance structure is desperately needed to deal with this vast array of complex operations that each in their own right have tremendous value. However, if we single them out individually, they are not of great significance to any one government department.

We have had the situation where a little of what goes on Sable Island is the business of fisheries and oceans, a little is the purview of Environment Canada and some of it with respect to wildlife and parks. As a result, it is kind of everyone's business but nobody's business in terms of putting in place a government structure that works.

I do not want to dwell on this in the spirit of moving forward. I think we can say without fear of contradiction that the existing crisis with respect to a sustainable future for Sable Island is one of the most dramatic examples of the misguided decisions made at the hands of the finance minister, starting with that infamous budget in 1995. Everything possible was done to find an excuse to offload, to download, to privatize, to somehow, in the name of deficit elimination and debt reduction, shift off the public books the accounting for important functions in the Canadian government.

What happened on Sable Island, which is not the only example but one of the most dramatic examples, is that Sable Island was essentially removed from any real public accountability, with accompanying reduction in dollars and cents. The fact was that any clear departmental responsibility for the overall operation of that centre, so that it was accountable, effective, efficient and its work was known, understood and maintained on an ongoing basis, was sacrificed when the government created the Sable Island nature preservation society. I hope I have that right. I am actually a member of that society because I support its important work.

The decision to create a board in the form of that nature society, a board with no real powers and no representation on the board to link it in any effective way to the respective government departments responsible for various aspects of the functions going on at Sable Island, was absolutely misguided. I want to be fair about this, I do not mean it in a pejorative sense, but some hard-working, well-meaning volunteers have suffered the frustration of being handed over the responsibility to maintain, operate and oversee the Sable Island operation without actually having any effective tools with which to do that. I am not just talking dollars and cents.

The problem is not only that they have not been given anything like an adequate budget but they themselves say, and have said so publicly and at their annual meetings, some of which I have attended, that they have not been effectively linked in any government sense of actually managing the operation to the various government departments which have responsibilities there.

It has been an exercise in frustration. The appropriate role for that voluntary effort through a trust board would be on the public education and public awareness side of the operation. However, when it comes to the extremely important functions that go on there, it is desperately important that the government not only says that now the responsibility for the administration and control of Sable Island is effectively, if this act is implemented in this form, lodged with Transport Canada but that the governance structure created will have the appropriate representation and accountability that goes with the full range of important activity.

I do not want to dwell on the problems but the reason it is important for us to understand the problems is because what happens on that island is so important.

Recently at a public meeting called together by concerned citizens and stakeholders in the operations at Sable Island, over 250 people turned out with almost no publicity in my riding at St. Mary's University to come together and ask what was going to be done to ensure a healthy sustainable future for this environmental and scientific gem. It was rather casually indicated that the government really did not have a problem with there not being a human presence on Sable Island any more and that people could come and go as needed.

That is a financial disaster because it is incredibly inefficient to imagine trying to manage the comings and goings in a safe way. Environmentally it is a disaster because it is a very fragile ecosystem and one for which it is important to ensure that there is not just free range and free rein for people coming and going to trample across the island and jeopardize that future. In terms of economic efficiency, it makes absolutely no sense.

For value for dollar, the Sable Island operation is an incredible bargain for Canadians. My concern about the legislation is that we cannot just say that now it is Transport Canada's responsibility without ensuring that it is discharged through effective cooperation, collaboration and consultation with the many different areas of public policy in the government departments that are involved.

It was a thrill for me to actually tour the operation at Sable Island a while ago, as did my colleague, the member for Sackville—Eastern Shore. The visit cemented our view that this must be addressed as an urgent priority and I hope that will result from the decision to finally clearly indicate that it does rest with Transport.

I say with sadness that the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has been a terrible disappointment in his refusal to really address this issue. He is the political minister for Nova Scotia designated by the Liberal government but he has yet to visit the island or provide any response to the crisis that is looming there. I hope that what we will see in response to this change is a serious move at the highest government level to create an appropriate government structure.

Several excellent and comprehensive articles have been written on Sable Island that I would commend to people to read. There was a very good summation recently in the Toronto Star by reporter Kelly Toughill. There was also a very good article recently by Kevin Cox in the

Globe and Mail.

If people want to understand what an ecological gem and scientific treasury this is, it is really worth them acquainting themselves with what is going on there. I hope we can all pull together around ensuring that the job gets done for the future sustainability of that Canadian treasure, Sable Island.

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

The parliamentary secretary asks a very good question. How many constituents are there on Sable Island? That gets to the heart of the matter that I want to address in my brief comments.

At any one time there are rarely more than four persons resident on Sable Island. The human presence on Sable Island has been critically important. There has been a very important human presence on the island, literally for over a century. It is important in terms of quality. It is important in terms of the vast array of responsibilities that are discharged and projects that are managed by the tiny staff at the Sable Island operations. However, numerically we are talking about a very small number of people.

What that belies and does not adequately convey is the tremendous value that human presence on Sable Island has and the value of the wide range of scientific research projects and environmental research activity that goes on there. A synergy exists between and among the many different projects that are involved, which pulls together government departments, academicians, scientists, in some cases corporate partners, and the actual activity that goes on in the island itself.

This is an ecological gem and there is extremely important research taking place on everything from climate change to the transmission of pollutants, to very important ecological research around some rare species, plant and animal, birds and others. Of course it is best known for its horses, but there is a variety of rare species on this island. It is an ecological gem. It is an important scientific base of activity that is forward looking. However, it has essentially been orphaned by the government.

The question that arises in stipulating that Sable Island now will fall into the mandate of the transport department, respecting administration and control of Sable Island, is a very good thing, if it means the government will finally step forward and provide not just the kind of stable, ongoing funding for the operation for Sable Island--

[Canada Shipping Act, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity today to speak briefly to Bill C-3. I want to indicate at the outset that the NDP is prepared to support the bill in principle. In our view it is the proper thing for us to be referring it to committee where it is extremely important that it be given careful consideration.

It is not a bill that contains a lot of new initiatives. It appears on the fold, by and large, to be a reorganizational effort of government, one that, on the face of it, seems to be quite supportable. We believe it is important for it to be carefully analysed at committee, and my colleague, the NDP transport critic, the hard-working member for Churchill, will no doubt be her usual detailed self in applying careful scrutiny to the bill at the committee level.

We are essentially dealing with an omnibus bill, one that effectively reverses most of the changes that were made to the Departments of Fisheries and Oceans and Transport in by the Liberals in 1994. I think we are all attempting to look forward and not waste a lot of time in the House by beating up on the government for its sins and omissions in the last 10 years.

I do not disagree for a moment with the comments made by other members that one of the true fiascos in the mandate of the government over the last decade was the mishandling of the coast guard. There clearly have been serious concerns created by the erosion of the capacity of the coast guard and by the problems created around where the coast guard's mandate kicks in and where Fisheries leaves off. As a result, there have been problems with overlap and with severe gaps. Generally, the role of the coast guard has not been possible to discharge even by the hard-working men and women who are employed to carry out the coast guard's responsibilities.

It is welcomed. We see the government facing up to some of the problems that have been created. However, it remains to be seen whether in the reorganization we will see the kind of effective enforcement around marine safety, environmental protection, pollution control and so on, which is extremely important. It will be very important to ensure that these functions are discharged in a competent and effective way.

I want to go directly to what is actually the smallest part of the bill. I want to do so for a couple of reasons. I refer specifically to the reference to Sable Island. I will quickly refer to the bill itself, a tiny element in the bill, subsection 136(2) which reads:

The Governor in Council may, on the recommendation of the Minister, make regulations

(a) respecting the administration and control of Sable Island;

(b) specifying classes of persons, or appointing persons, to ensure compliance with regulations made under paragraph (a) and specifying their powers and duties; and

(c) respecting maritime search and rescue.

I take the opportunity this afternoon to hone in on that aspect of the bill for a couple of reasons. One is that it is a little known fact, but I have the privilege of representing Sable Island as part of the Halifax constituency. It does not seem particularly logical on the face of it. When we look at the map, it is not exactly immediately adjacent to Halifax.

[Post-Secondary Education, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, yet again the government underestimates the surplus, this time by $7.2 billion. The government may not know the difference between $1.9 billion and $9.1 billion, but Canadians sure do. They also know this is not the real surplus because it masks the debt burden heaped on our students and their families.

When will the government restore the billions cut from post-secondary education and reinvest sufficiently in our colleges and universities to enable tuition reductions and ease the all too real student debt burden in the country?

[Middle East, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, UN special rapporteur, Dugard, has issued a scathing assessment of Israeli government actions in reference to human rights in the occupied Palestinian territories.

On demolitions of Palestinians' homes, Dugard reports that Israeli bulldozers have destroyed homes in a “purposeless” and “wanton manner” and “savagely dug up roads including electricity, sewage and water lines”. Fifteen hundred demolitions have displaced 15,000 Palestinians.

Dugard documents the suffering of Palestinians as a result of the illegal Israeli wall and condemns Sharon's disengagement plan as one designed to allow Israel to claim its occupation of Gaza is over and, therefore, be no longer bound by the fourth Geneva convention.

Since Israel retains control of border crossings and airspace, it is an occupier, according to the report.

We deplore the loss of innocent Israeli lives as a result of Palestinian mortar attacks and we condemn suicide bomber attacks.

Our government and the international community must heed this UN report. Israel is bound by international law and must end its inhumane treatment of Palestinians in the occupied territories, indeed, end the occupation

[Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Act, October 15th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome this question because it gives me a chance to say that the hon. member's characterization of my comments is just simply not accurate. I have not said, he did not hear me say and Hansard will not indicate that I said that economic cooperation with the U.S. is to be avoided. However, there is a very big distinction between economic cooperation, collaboration and the obvious interrelationship that exists between our respective economies and the notion of total economic integration.

I am glad the member raised what is a very serious concern, certainly of the New Democratic Party, and it is no secret to anybody. Vast numbers of Canadians are concerned about the same arguments of the threats to public security leading us inevitably, unalterably into falling in line with Bush's missile defence madness, on the same line of argument that somehow because we are neighbours and we exist on the same continent, we have to sacrifice our sovereignty. We have to say we no longer have the right to make this decision based on our own values and on our own analysis of what brings lasting peace in a just world and say no to missile defence. The list of reasons for doing so is very long and we are not prepared to cave into pressures that public--