Bob Mills

[Criminal Code, December 10th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, on November 18 I rose in the House to ask a question of the government about the $1 billion deal which was being proposed with the Iraqi government. This deal was proposed by Mr. Zed, who had gone to Iraq and supposedly signed a deal at a time when we were at a very critical point in dealing with Iraq. It was refusing people access to various sites in the country. It was a time when the United Nations was proposing other action.

The timing could not have been worse. In my estimation, it greatly undermined Canadian foreign policy that this, in fact, was being pushed under the carpet by this government.

Basically this shows a real lack of foreign affairs initiative and policy by this government. It makes you wonder who is in charge of the foreign affairs department when a company, Summa Strategies, directed by ex-Liberal MPs Doug Young and Paul Zed, can in fact put forward a deal like this at such a critical time.

Shortly after the 1997 election these two gentlemen set up Summa Strategies as an Ottawa lobbying group. Obviously they are now taking great advantage of their contacts within the government. Mr. Young is acting for Canadian National Railways, a crown corporation he helped to privatize when he was minister of transport. No wonder Canadians are so skeptical of government and ex-ministers when they are involved in this sort of lobbying activities.

We need to tighten up these arrangements dramatically. Just imagine proposing to deal with a government like that of Saddam Hussein. While all the time arguing that this was a humanitarian deal for trucks and a number of items which were not listed, they went further to invite the foreign affairs minister, Tariq Aziz, to visit Canada, to visit the Prime Minister of New Brunswick, for which he claimed he had an invitation.

We in this House get tired of the government standing up, beating its chest and saying how wonderful it is. It talks about standing up to Saddam Hussein, yet we let this billion dollar deal to go ahead. Maybe the UN will scuttle it. We talk about how great we are in saving the world with land mines, meanwhile we are selling nuclear plants to India, Romania, China, Turkey and Korea, to name a few.

We talk about how we have solved all the financial problems, when in reality we have a $600 billion debt. We talk about a Zaire mission which we championed because the Prime Minister saw it on television. Then we found out that the day before the President of the United States called and suggested that that is what Canada should do.

We get tired of this sort of double standard and double talk. I question who is in charge over there? Doug Young, Paul Zed and Summa Strategies or the foreign affairs minister.

[Petitions, December 10th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure today to present a petition signed by 1,106 people from Toronto and surrounding area.

The individuals who are Korean Canadians do not want the Canadian government to support Japan in its effort to gain a seat on the UN Security Council and feel that it should be morally disqualified for such a position.

Therefore, the petitioners request that Japan should make an official apology about the grave violation of international human rights and pay official government compensation to the victims who were sent to the war zone as sex slaves.

[Alberta Winter Games, December 4th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, the spirit of youth will be celebrated in Red Deer from February 19 to 22 during the 1998 Alberta winter games. More than 3,000 athletes and coaches, more than 3,000 volunteers, as well as parents and spectators will fill the city.

Alberta is divided into eight zones. Participants in the 21 sports must qualify to represent their zone at this premier provincial sporting event. Provincial success could be the beginning of national and international achievement.

The games are more than a biannual sporting event. They started in 1974 as a provincial movement to provide opportunities for amateur sports. They also motivate Albertans to aim for a higher level of physical fitness.

While winning is important, sometimes achieving a personal best or fulfilling a dream is an even more important achievement.

We welcome everyone to come to Red Deer, the Alberta capital of volunteerism, to watch these young athletes achieve their goals.

[Haiti, December 2nd, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, finally our troops are coming home from Haiti after being on mission impossible.

After we spent $500 million on this mission, we have not achieved a democratic Parliament. We have not achieved hospitals or schools. We do not have a working judiciary or a police force.

While our troops and police have done the very best job they could, how can this minister call this mission a success?

[Aids, December 1st, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, today is World AIDS Day. As the official opposition foreign affairs critic I would like to take this opportunity to bring to the attention of the House the serious ongoing destruction this disease has on human beings worldwide.

A United Nations report released last week states that 30 million people worldwide are infected with HIV or have AIDS itself. An alarming statistic is that 90% of these people infected live in developing countries. By the year 2000 this report predicts that 40 million people will be infected with this horrible disease.

The continent of Africa is home to more than half of the known HIV cases. This, however, is quickly changing as the disease is spreading rampant in the countries of Asia, especially in India where as many as 5 million HIV infected persons live.

The Reform Party and I urge all countries to work together so that we will be able to find a cure for this terrible disease.

[Division No. 33, December 1st, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, as has just been pointed out, I too think that the group 6 motions drive the cost way beyond what Canadians can bear.

I want to go back a little bit into the history of this whole thing and also use a few quotes from some of my constituents that might give a better focus on where grassroot Canadians really stand.

In 1966 government made a contract with Canadians basically stating that it would provide a pension when a person reached age 65. We believed that, went along with it and everybody dutifully paid their 3% or whatever it was and thought that government would take care of them. Obviously mismanagement and a poorly designed plan caused the situation that the government finally realized it was in last year. It found out that it had an underfunded liability and had a real problem. Obviously some of the amendments we are speaking about here would make that problem even that much worse.

I think Canadians realized this problem much sooner. They knew this plan was not working and could not work. They were not dreamers but, as often happens, the people are so much ahead of government that we are only now catching up. The only solution that the government has put forward is a 73% increase in the premium tax which is going to be collected.

There are a lot of other ways to solve this problem and I will try to touch on some of those briefly. Basically, when you talk to the people on the street, they will tell you that this is an extremely important bill. They know what is happening. They know about it and can talk very intelligently about the changes to the Canada pension. They will tell you that it is a $10 billion tax grab. They will tell you that they are already taxed at the highest rate in the G-7 and just cannot afford any more taxation. They will tell you that the self-employed person is just going to buckle under this sort of an increase. They will tell you that this is going to cost jobs and probably more jobs than even some of the critics of this would point out.

They are also extremely concerned about the setting up of an investment board with 12 political friends being appointed to this and the potential abuse that this could create. Remember, people do not have all that much respect for political choices in our past history.

For the young people who are looking at this plan, the message is pretty well standard. They do not believe they are really going to get any Canada pension plan. They do not really believe it is going to be there for them. In fact, if the government is going to collect an extra $700 from them and their employer and only give them $8,800 some 30 years from now, that is just not realistic. It will not sell and is not acceptable to the Canadian public.

They look at the other options of what they can do with that same amount of money if they were to invest it privately. I believe that this change in CPP can be equivalent to what the GST was to the PC Party. I believe this is its Achilles heel and the public will react when they find out what the politicians have done to them.

Let me give a summary of some 4,000 letters received in my riding. First, “My husband and I are very concerned about the proposed CPP hike. We are a young couple expecting our first child and we feel that it will be very difficult for us and many people of our age to pay the proposed tax increases. We also feel that it is unfair that we be forced to pay this seeing as we have no hope of ever receiving the Canada pension plan ourselves”. I believe that summarizes what young people are saying.

The amendments that we are talking about here that say we are going to increase those premiums even more are even that much less acceptable for the Canadian public.

Middle aged people are saying “What about our children? Our children are having a tough enough time as it is”. They are concerned about the killing of jobs. They are concerned about what this means. They still feel they have time under an optional plan to that being proposed by the Liberals.

The seniors are saying “We also are concerned about our children and our grandchildren and what it might mean for them”.

I believe that we have across the range of ages genuine concern about Canada pension and what the future of this is going to be. The sad part is that the government will not even look at the options. It has made no attempt to look at other countries to see what they have done.

The list is quite long but if we take a look at countries that have adopted a different kind of a pension plan, in that list we would include Chile, Australia, Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, El Salvador, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Uruguay, Great Britain. All of these countries have gone to a different form of Canada pension.

Surely this government owes it to Canadians to look at the other options. It should take a look, see how they work, find out what happens. When it was suggested in the committee that the committee bring the designer of the plan in Chile, who 16 years ago put their plan together, the committee was refused to have this person come and testify before it.

This is letting down Canadians. Canadians have the right to find out what all the options are and to have open discussion. Of course, the use of closure on this sort of debate also is not accepted very well by the Canadian people. Again, I remind the members on the other side that this is not going to be looked on any more kindly than was the GST.

We have a lot of misrepresentation. We have a finance minister who says “Feel good, be happy, everything is fine now”. We all know that is not the case. We know that we have a $600 billion debt. We know that we are paying $50 billion in interest payments in a year. Just think what we could do with that $50 billion in terms of pensions, in terms of our social services. All of those are there but they are not accessible to us because of mismanagement of the previous two governments.

In conclusion, the Liberals are taxing the soul out of Canadians. They are going too far. This Canada pension is going to be for some the final straw. It is going to drive the economy underground. It is going to cause small businesses to close. The government is going to use this as another tax increase to opt out of the system.

The Liberals are taxing our food, they are taxing our homes, they are taxing our savings, they are clawing back from senior citizens and people are losing patience with them. That is the message we have to get out.

These amendments simply go one step further in that tax and spend philosophy that seems to be so common or possibly the disease which people get when they come into this place.

It is time to say no. Canadians need to speak out and let the government know what they think about Canada pension.

[Petitions, November 26th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to present a petition signed by 312 people from my riding of Red Deer.

Parliament's recent amendments to the Criminal Code in response to the Daviault and Seaboyer cases, as well as amendments to deal with stalking and harassing conduct, reflect public policies underlying the law which requires males to take responsibility for their violent behaviour toward women.

Therefore the petitioners request that parliament review and change relevant provisions of the Criminal Code to ensure that individuals take responsibility for their violent behaviour toward others.

I met with these people and certainly believe this law must be changed.

[Anti-Personnel Mines Convention Implementation Act, November 24th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I am sorry for not mentioning that at the outset.

We have to be sure we will put ourselves into the enforcement of the legislation and continue to promote it even though it will be difficult at times.

We also have to talk about the huge problem of de-mining that exists around the world. We have figures like 200 million or 300 million mines being out there. The numbers are huge. We need to help people to help themselves in that area. Our Canadian troops are doing the job by helping children to know where the mines are, to alert the authorities and to actually do something about it. Those are the kinds of commitments that do not cost a lot but are important if we are to rid the world of this serious problem.

We must understand some of the reasons some countries will not sign initially. We heard Mr. Clinton in Vancouver yesterday say that the reason they could not give up land mines was for the protection of their own soldiers. We may or may not agree with that reason, but we need to encourage them to come up with alternatives to the use of regular land mines. There are alternatives. As science progresses I am sure these alternatives will be used by countries like the U.S.

We also have to look at renegade states and their potential use of land mines. I am a firm believer, as I have said in this House many times, that in the 21st century terrorism is probably going to be one of our biggest threats as citizens of this world. Of course we have to be concerned about the presence of land mines, the use of land mines and the use of different types of explosive devices. We could talk about plutonium being sent to Canada from Russia. We could talk about that whole area.

It is important for us to put a diplomatic and organizational pressure on the world which we are in an excellent position to do. I think of our membership in organizations such as the Francophonie, the Commonwealth and APEC. Through those organizations we can bring a lot of pressure to bear on countries to consider signing this treaty and getting rid of land mines.

The point that we need to make in the House is that we are not just going to talk about it. We are not simply going to pass this bill, pat ourselves on the back and move on to something else. We have to be sure that this is an ongoing process and one which will last a long time.

I know that a number of members of the House have experienced firsthand what it means to see people living under the fear of land mines. We in Canada are lucky. When we come back from places like Bosnia, Cambodia or Laos we realize how lucky we are to live in this country. Our children do not have to worry about running out and playing in the field because there are no land mines. Let us never let there be land mines in this country and let us try to remove them from the world.

It is important that we broaden this to look at UN reform. The minister made reference to this. Certainly the streamlining of the UN is something that will help us all to achieve what we want in the 21st century. Changes within the UN are desperately needed. We must work with the NGOs and other countries to make sure they are not so busy fighting turf wars and fighting over what they are going to do that we have this this terrible duplication of services and the terrible bureaucracy which ties up so much of what they do.

I should mention the foreign affairs committee. Many people do not know what we do in that committee. There are several members in the Chamber who are a part of that committee, as well as others. It is important for us to deal with issues such as this and that we deal with current issues that are of concern to the Canadian public. So often we get hung up on writing big reports. The big reports basically end up consuming a lot of time and expertise. They cost a lot of money. Ultimately they end up being put on the shelf.

This is an example of a case where there is an issue that is real. We can put a face on it. It is something which people care about. It is something that the committee can get involved in.

A lot of members have urged the government to make committees relevant. We have urged the government to let the committees deal directly with the minister. We want the committees to talk about the issues, be they slavery in the Sudan, the terrible problems in Nigeria and Iraq, the kidnapping of Canadian children or terrorism. Let us talk about those issues which are real to Canadians and real to members of this House for which we can, hopefully, have the same sort of conclusion as we have seen today.

That is something to work toward. Some of it will be a dream. We have seen this sort of presentation before. We all know about the failures which have happened. However, it is time for us to look at what we are doing and try to make things better.

That is why it is a privilege to stand and to co-operate on the implementation of this piece of legislation.

[Anti-Personnel Mines Convention Implementation Act, November 24th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, it is a privilege to stand before the House and speak to Bill C-22. I will try to keep my remarks as brief as possible so that as many speakers as possible can speak to this important piece of legislation.

Just in starting off, as the member for Rosedale said, Canadians are pleased to see that parliamentarians can take issues like this one and through co-operation come up with a solution and move it quickly through the House. Particularly in the area of foreign affairs they want to see that sort of diplomacy being demonstrated even in these premises, something we do not have a lot of, but certainly this is the opportunity for us to do that.

It is my pleasure to congratulate the minister on his co-operation and on his achievement in pushing the matter through and on to the international scene. All this started off in the last House with one of our members putting forward legislation.

I congratulate the NGOs, Jody Williams and all the others who appeared before committee and had so much to do with the legislation.

It serves us well as Canadians that our legislation, the legislation that we are now passing in the House, will be used as an example for some of the other 40-odd countries that have agreed to sign next week. It will hopefully provide motivation for other countries to come on side.

I have to admit that initially I was not very familiar with what mines were all about. I certainly did not realize the significance of them. We saw the map of Bosnia. We saw pink all over the map. We saw how the entire country was covered in mines. We saw people in some of the border towns, perhaps half of the population, who literally did not have an arm, a hand or a leg. That brought it home for all of us as to just how serious the problem was.

We found out that under the bark of trees there could be land mines, and that land mines were not something that were sticking out so that everybody could see but were hidden. They were in bricks with a little hair coming out that could trigger an explosion. They were underneath what appeared to be full coke tins sitting on a table with a plastic explosive underneath it. A young child could come along and grab that tin of coke and be maimed or killed. Then one realizes just how serious the problem was and how it was something that could not be accepted by anyone in the human race.

It was pretty easy for us to say we would co-operate on the issue and that we were proud Canadians to lead an initiative that would have an impact around the world.

There are areas of the legislation where the government has been given power within our country to encroach on some of our rights. However, in looking at it, most of us would agree that is an encroachment we can accept.

We have to be somewhat cautious in being too much of a boy scout when it comes to how we appear internationally. We have to be sure that we are not just talking, that we really mean what we saying and that we really are committed to helping countries de-mine their fields, their riverbeds, their roadways and so on.

It is often easy for us to pass legislation. I think back to when we talked about youth prostitution in foreign countries. I cannot imagine how we would ever enforce that kind of legislation. We feel good passing it and we agree with it but how would we enforce it?

We have talked about the Hague convention, something a subcommittee is working on, and kidnapped kids. All of us realize how emotional and difficult that is. It is easy to say we are against it but it is difficult to do something about it.

I should have mentioned at the start that I will be sharing my time with the member for Calgary East.

[Anti-Personnel Mines Convention Implementation Act, November 24th, 1997]

Mr. Chairman, I have a question about clause 15(4). Basically it talks about not getting a warrant. We did have legal counsel explain to us that this is when mines are being rushed out the back door and we want to apprehend people. I guess that is all right. The only thing is it seems there is room for abuse. Is there any way to fix that or tighten it up?