Paul Forseth

[Justice, April 23rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, a fundamental of the direction is the legal concept of shared parenting that does away with terms such as custody. The research concluded the need for legal equality and mutual parental responsibility in divorce.

Does the minister agree with the principle of shared parenting as recommended by the Senate-Commons committee report? Is shared parenting the accepted principle?

[Justice, April 23rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Justice. In the last two speeches from the throne there was a reference to Divorce Act amendments for the sake of the children.

Does the minister agree with the recommendations of the Senate-Commons committee report? When will the minister implement those conclusions with a bill instead of just trying to find a way to avoid through endless deliberations?

[Supply, April 3rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, what I was trying to point out was that what appears to be surrounding the Prime Minister's riding is just the tip of the iceberg, a part of a longstanding pattern of Liberal governments going back many years. It is just the old style of politics.

It is also obvious, I think, that the average Canadian understands that if all the government money from various departments and programs did not come into the riding by various means, the Prime Minister would not get paid. He stood in the House, put his hand over his chest and admitted how much of a desire and a motivation he had to get paid. Certainly he moved all of government to make sure he did get paid. That is what the appearance is.

However, in the context of British Columbia, I would also say that if this whole scenario were being played out in the legislature of British Columbia we would not be debating this today. This would have been dealt with, because the standards in British Columbia for apparent conflict of interest are much higher than those of the House of Commons.

[Supply, April 3rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, it is a sad day to have to rise and give reflection on, what so many in my riding are concerned about, ethics, truth and basic standards of governance.

I know the Liberal members opposite just do not want to look down into the abyss and contemplate what their leader has done and what they have done along with him. Recoil, deflect and excuse as they may, and uncomfortable as it is, we must go there, for the good of the country, to defend the credibility of parliament and preserve the basic idea of what Canada as a nation is all about.

The motion before us says:

That this House calls for the establishment of an independent judicial inquiry to determine if the Prime Minister is in breach of conflict of interest rules regarding his involvement with the Grand-Mère Golf Club and the Grand-Mère Inn: and that the inquiry should have broad terms of reference with the power to subpoena all relevant documents and witnesses.

Sadly, for parliamentary leaders and even previous prime ministers, the problem was often money, combined with opportunity, greed and apparent need which was their eventual undoing. By the Prime Minister's own statements in the House, it appears he had all those elements.

It was thought that we as a nation had to overcome the old style behaviour of arm twisting for one's own riding, using favouritism and personal clout rather than rational program criteria at arm's length from officeholders, but not for the old style Liberals.

By the way, Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time.

What did the Prime Minister do to get money into his riding? The experience seems to suggest that the first thing for getting hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars in federal money is to be under criminal investigation. Followers of Shawinigate may disagree and say that having a questionable business record worked better. Others might insist that making the right political contribution is the key. However, in reviewing those who got the money, it looks like having a criminal record, moving to Shawinigan and offering to buy any of the Prime Minister's assets made a lot of tax dollars just appear.

Take the case of the Grand-Mère hotel owner Yvon Duhaime. He has a number of criminal convictions, ranging from drunk driving to threatening fellow constituents. His previously failed venture with the L'Hotel des Chutes, for which at one point left him owing $150,000 in unpaid taxes as well as other bills, had to be a help to get him the Business Development Bank loan. plus another $189,000 in transitional job fund grants from the federal government.

Pierre Thibault, a recent immigrant from Belgium, who received $700,000 in TJF grants and another $925,000 in federal loan guarantees for Shawinigan's Auberge des Gouverneurs, could have secured federal funding for sure when he made an admission in writing to fiddling away nearly $1 million from his former business partners in Belgium.

If we wanted a ticket to ride on the Liberal gravy train perhaps it was example set by Paul Lemire and Mario Pépin, two Prime Minister supporters in Shawinigan who ran Groupe Force, a federal business development agency.

Lemire's credentials included being convicted for tax dealings and cheques, but then he and his partner were charged with theft and fraud for systematically diverting millions of dollars in federal development money into their own pockets.

I do not know if the Prime Minister's political friend, René Fugère, would find it more difficult to get federal funds when the police investigation into his affairs yielded no actual charges. However, maybe it is the fact that on some occasions he is the representative of the Prime Minister, which allowed him to get a stipend of 5% to 10% off the top of federal grants, of those it looked like he was able to secure for his business buddies.

Maybe we should follow the lead of Claude Gauthier who was fortunate enough in 1996 to buy some land from the Grand-Mère Golf Club, of which the Prime Minister may or may not have been an owner, but in which he admitted he had a financial interest. Mr. Gauthier paid $525,000 for the land, which help the golf course retire a $300,000 debt. In 1997 he was also the largest single contributor to the Prime Minister's re-election fund.

The following year, one of Gauthier's companies, Placeteco Inc., received $1.2 million in transitional job funds, although it apparently did not create a single lasting job but instead skipped the federal guidelines and just paid off an existing loan. However, in this case the pattern was broken and the Prime Minister's office worked for Gauthier to get his tax money, despite the fact that he had no known criminal record.

It is old style political parties that just have no shame. What values are the Liberals showing? During the last election the Prime Minister declared that the Liberal Party of Canada represented Canadian values. What Liberal values was the Prime Minister demonstrating when he refused to tell about being involved in securing a loan from the Business Development Bank for the man who bought the Grand-Mère hotel for him?

The Shawinigan affair also has a basic economic aspect. Even if we take the Prime Minister at his word, what was the rationale for giving $615,000 of our tax dollars to a perennial losing venture? The Prime Minister and his defenders declared that it was for economic development, but even if we allowed that charade to go unchallenged, did the Grand-Mère hotel have the greatest potential for long term economic benefit for the region? The Business Development Bank had already turned down the loan for good reason.

Can anyone be surprised that a hotel, which consistently had financial problems and could not pay its bills, would be unable to meet new debt obligations? We must remember that the Grand-Mère never made a single interest payment on the Business Development Bank loan that the Prime Minister lobbied so hard to get.

How little financial sense would one need to go to bat for such a program? Is this really what passes for economic development? I am afraid of the answer, in far too many cases for the government, has been yes. I am afraid that this whole episode gets us to the heart of Liberal values. When one peels back the layers of the white onion, we discover that it is rotten black in the core.

This is not an isolated incident. The auditor general made it clear in October that there is a secret group of unelected Liberal insiders who vet and determine every grant in Quebec. There are four other RCMP investigations into federal grants in this riding.

In the past decade billions of dollars have been handed out solely for political purposes under the guise of economic development. It is crude vote buying with public funds and it does not even cross the Prime Minister's mind that all this is wrong.

This is old time Liberal political values in action. The more important question is how closely these values reflect the values of average Canadians.

A reasonable person looking at the facts would conclude that a conflict of interest is not in doubt at all and basically is no longer even denied. The Prime Minister boasted of what he did and admitted that he had a great personal motive in that he wanted to get paid and that he needed the money as he did not get a top up salary like the Conservative leader does.

The outstanding debt for his shares meant that the Prime Minister had a financial interest in the golf club, yet he was pouring public funds into the adjoining inn. After a halfhearted attempt to explain away the conflict by claiming that the inn had no business ties with the golf club, shown to be utterly false by the way, the Prime Minister and his defenders have reverted to simply reciting balderdash.

Beyond Shawinigan there stretches the great, uncharted wasteland of the Human Resources Development Department and its programs, a billion dollar money pot whose disbursal was overseen not just by Liberal MPs but by unelected party hacks.

Maybe it could be said that the Grand-Mère Golf Club is ground zero for a much larger phenomenon of the government: the politicization of public spending and of public institutions, such as the Business Development Bank and other crown corporations whose boards are packed with Liberal Party friends to the corruption of their legal purpose and to the detriment of the public interest.

What cannot be denied is the historical pattern over the years of sleaze from both the Liberal and Conservative governments in the past, and this one does not disappoint us at all; it is just business as usual.

The Prime Minister, by his conduct, sets the tone, just as Mulroney did. No one is accusing the Prime Minister of a crime, yet. Nevertheless, rather than compare the Prime Minister's behaviour to that of a criminal, a better yardstick to measure is: What would an ethical leader have done?

When Duhaime approached the Prime Minister, he should have kicked him out of his office and told him that he could not intervene as their business interests were intertwined. An ethical person, indeed a lawyer, would have gone out of his way to even avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest, especially when he was the Prime Minister and had an extra duty to lead by example. Indeed, public office holders are obliged to do so by the conflict of interest code.

However, an educated person would not need such instructions or rules. In a position of public trust, they would know that it is not another person's role to maintain standards and values. It is his job alone to keep himself above suspicion.

The Prime Minister may claim, trying to cover his tracks, that his conduct did not technically violate the code, that the issue involves many grey areas and that maybe he was sloppy as a lawyer and as leader of the country.

However, an ethical person does not need to seek refuge in grey areas and fuzziness. A real leader insists that there should be no clouds over his integrity by behaving properly. A worthy Prime Minister takes the steps that are needed to be sure of standing in the light so he could never be called a crook.

I would ask the Prime Minister, for the sake of the country, to accept today's motion before the House.

[Federal-Provincial Fiscal Arrangements Act, March 22nd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I would ask the member to carefully reflect on what he is saying and explain the underlying principle of what he is talking about.

Is there a perverse incentive to equalization? What is the long term goal? Should it not be to eventually get off such supports? Is he talking about more transfers rather than self-sufficiency? Should equalization not be gradually reduced, as, for example, offshore revenues greatly increase? If in future years a province like Newfoundland receives tremendous more revenue benefits, should its reliance on the formula of transfers be gradually reduced? What would be his formula to achieve that self-reliance? Does the member also still believe that it is always just the rights of the receiver and not necessarily the rights and benefits of the payer?

[Criminal Code, March 19th, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-304, an act to amend the Criminal Code (prostitution).

Mr. Speaker, under this enactment offences related to prostitution that are provided for in section 213 of the criminal code from now on would be either indictable offences or summary conviction offences, commonly known as a hybrid offence.

It is a small technical point that has huge resourcing implications to keep juveniles from entering into the street trade. It has been a subject of federal-provincial attorneys general in the past.

All parties should see the wisdom of this minor but pivotal improvement.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Criminal Code, March 19th, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-303, an act to amend the Criminal Code (proceeds of crime).

Mr. Speaker, this enactment amends the criminal code and designates several offences under the Immigration Act as proceeds of crime offences. The offences so designated concern persons who induce, encourage or aid in organizing the unlawful entry of persons into Canada.

Under the criminal code, where an offender has been convicted of an enterprise crime offence and the court imposing sentence on the offender upon application of the attorney general is satisfied that any property is proceeds of crime and that the enterprise crime offence was committed in relation to that property, the court shall order that the property be forfeited to Her Majesty. In other words, it takes the profit motive out of international people smuggling.

It is a general government objective that remains undone and the bill would fix it.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Supply, March 15th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the member for Burnaby—Douglas talks a great game. I think that both he and I would agree that we certainly want to support our local industries and that from what we see in the larger context the results are not fair.

Besides calling the U.S. some names and not hiding his anti-Americanism and philosophical opposition to trade deals and processes that were not particularly his party's ideas, I am pleased that, first of all, he agrees with the Canadian Alliance that a return to the old formula, the old SLA, is not a preferred course.

To try to clarify his options, what is he really suggesting? Is it more socialism? He says the market is not God. Then who is? Is he saying that a wise bureaucrat somewhere in a ministry is going to solve it? Who will decide? Will it be top down government control in the name of these laudable objectives? Let him spell out how the old style of bureaucratic control, the failures of the past, would work in today's reality. He talks about fair and open access. Is that through a socialist bureaucracy, through departmental mandarins, through replacing markets with edicts and decrees from the czar? Is that what he is talking about?

He talks about standards and sovereignty. We do not get those things through coercion. We get them through co-operation and negotiation. We can make friendly deals and put limits on our behaviour. When we make a trade deal with someone we may decide not to go to war with someone. That means we are limiting our sovereignty or our choice not to go to war because it is of mutual benefit to both of us.

His solution is old style socialism, which is a failure and will not bring us the results he is talking about.

[Species At Risk Act, February 28th, 2001]

Madam Speaker, the problem with endangered species legislation, and it was certainly the problem in the American experience which was litigated through the courts, is that the good intentions of a law can wind up having a perverse purpose or a perverse consequence. We have heard of the tendency of the three esses from a previous speaker.

The main problem is that in order to further a protection regime some intended use of someone's land could be prohibited, or perhaps the land currently in fallow may require a future plan for planting crop. Landowners, especially in rural Canada, are already doing myriad things to preserve endangered species and the characters of wildness and habitat. The bill must recognize the wonderful things that are ongoing.

In the example cited, maybe some limits would have to be placed on the watering of cattle. Maybe there would have to be some mitigation factors such as a small amount of fencing to keep the cattle from destroying the shoreline of the stream or ensuring they only have access to the stream at a specific spot.

Perhaps there are other fields where the cattle would not be allowed during the early part of the year or they would be not allowed to go into a section until later in the year, after nesting has been completed. There are some costs involved. Perhaps the cattle would have to be trucked to another field or fed in a feedlot. The principle of that is that if there is a national or international objective there must be fair compensation for the willing landowner who wants to co-operate but does not want to pay the total social or environmental cost specifically by himself when the nation wants this objective accomplished. The problem is that in the bill there is no formula.

Professor Pearse was asked to do a consultation paper for the government but rumour has it that the minister is not predisposed to accept that formula.

We will have to look at regulation in the future. I suggested in my speech that perhaps we could look to the body of law and jurisprudence that is already there and learn from the expropriation principles. However we are not talking about expropriation. The cost could mean a limit on use at a particular time of the year or maybe putting up a new kind of fence in an area to protect some nests.

The problem with the bill is always cost. The administration has difficulty putting in legislation something that has open ended cost into the future. I can understand the government being very careful to stay away from that.

[Species At Risk Act, February 28th, 2001]

Madam Speaker, I am splitting my time. I am pleased to address the topic of endangered species again in the House of Commons. My party supports the government bringing in this bill early in the legislative calendar. Our party members from coast to coast have repeatedly voted at national assemblies for the creation of such legislation if it works in a pragmatic way to find the balances needed to be a viable law.

The specific purposes of the enactment are to prevent Canadian indigenous species, sub-species and distinct populations of wildlife from becoming extirpated or extinct, to provide for the recovery of endangered or threatened species and to encourage the management of other species to prevent them from becoming at risk.

The committee on the status of endangered wildlife in Canada, commonly known as COSEWIC, is an independent body of experts responsible for assessing and identifying species at risk. COSEWIC's assessments are to be reported to the Minister of the Environment and to the Canadian Endangered Species Conservation Council. It authorizes the governor in council to establish by regulation the official list of species as risk based on that process.

The legislation requires that the best available knowledge be used to define long and short term objectives in a recovery strategy for endangered and threatened species. It provides for action plans to identify specific actions. It creates prohibitions to protect listed, threatened or endangered species and their critical habitats. It recognizes that compensation may be needed to ensure fairness following the imposition of the critical habitat prohibitions. It creates a public registry to assist in making documents under the act more accessible to the public.

The government claims it is consistent with the aboriginal and treaty rights and that it respects the authority of other federal ministers and provincial governments, as the legislation has a shared federal-provincial jurisdiction.

Our party has a principled approach to the bill. The written constitution of the Canadian Alliance, under point no. 10 in the addendum under statement of principles, states:

We believe that government must act for the benefit of future generations as much as for the present, maintaining policies that will nurture and develop the people's knowledge and skills, preserve a stable, healthy and productive society, and ensure the responsible development and conservation of our environment and natural heritage.

Further in the party's published declaration of policy about the balance between environmental protection and economic and social development, paragraph 44 states:

We are committed to protecting and preserving Canada's natural environment and endangered species, and to sustainable development of our abundant natural resources for the use of current and future generations. Therefore we will strike a balance between environmental preservation and economic development. This includes creating partnerships with provincial governments, private industry, educational institutions, and the public, to promote meaningful progress in the area of environmental protection.

Paragraph 45 states:

We believe responsible exploration, development, conservation and renewal of our environment is vital to our continued well-being as a nation and as individuals. We will establish a unified and timely “single-window” approval process, and will vigorously enforce environmental regulations with meaningful penalties.

Paragraph 46 states:

Canada's water is an especially precious resource over which we must maintain complete sovereignty. Any federal legislation dealing with this resource will respect that jurisdiction is shared with the provinces.

My assertion is that the Canadian Alliance is a lot greener in character than portrayed in the media.

Significantly, we temper our environmentalism with responsible attention for the pragmatic. We will not be tempted to propose things that cannot be realistically delivered, unlike what all the other parties have done from time to time. The government talks a great line but has done little in substance on the environmental front since 1993. Certainly its accomplishments do not match up to its overreaching rhetoric.

A sticking point with the bill will be cost. When action is taken to change human behaviour for the national and international good, we must organize ourselves so these broad objectives are indeed broadly shared in cost. We can probably look to the case law around expropriations for guidance rather than the current suggested formulas. Certainly the mechanics must be placed in the bill rather than left to uncertainties and the changeableness of regulation. In my view, it is the major shortcoming of the bill.

The government is to be commended for again attempting the bill. However if there is no receptivity to amendments at the upcoming committee and report stage, then the whole world will know that what is important to Liberals is the name of the bill. They can then say that they actually have a bill, rather than putting in place a workable set of rules that will actually save species. I do not think the current form of the bill will do it.

There is also a huge body of additional expertise available to find a better balance which must be incorporated if we as a society are going to save anything.

In conclusion, I am claiming that a Canadian Alliance government would be proactive on environmental issues in a responsible way. While being a leader, we would work most diligently at the international level to bring our neighbour states along because in many respects protecting endangered species knows no borders.

The government has not told the truth to Canadians about the ramifications of the Kyoto agreement. Therefore I am not so sure that it is entirely sincere with its endangered species bill either. That remains to be seen.

We will work to make the bill more effective in a pragmatic way, for the earth is our home for now and we have stewardship responsibilities for all it contains. The public will is there to do good things. Let us hope that the government will also find it.