Mr. Speaker, once again, I welcome the opportunity to rise in the House to defend the interests of those I represent. Today we are discussing Bill C-96, an act to establish the Department of Human Resources Development and to amend and repeal certain related acts. At first glance there is nothing to be worried about.
According to the minister, the bill merely brings together elements of various departments under the single name: Department of Human Resources Development. The stated purpose of this reorganization, to improve management of various services, is entirely praiseworthy, but unfortunately, we must point out that such bills are being used by the federal government to continue its
attempts to encroach on the jurisdictions of Quebec and the other provinces. Unfortunately, these attempts are often successful.
Less than a week ago, I rose to condemn another bill, C-95, which also turned out to be a direct attack on the prerogatives of the Government of Quebec. I strongly condemned this approach, and I must say that the situation today calls for much the same treatment.
When we analyse Bill C-96, we see it is typical of a government that is discreetly trying to extend its powers, a government for whom provincial prerogatives are far from sacrosanct. In this respect, my colleague the hon. member for Mercier pointed out that coming hard on the heels of a vote in which Quebecers gave Canada a brief respite to shape up, Bill C-96 is an insult. How right she was. With this bill, the government is trying to legislate powers it never had under the constitution.
For instance, in clause 6 we read that the powers of the minister are to be exercised with the objective "of enhancing employment, encouraging equality and promoting social security". Never mind the minister: encouraging equality and promoting social security were not part of the original legislation. Similarly, what about clauses 7 and 13, the former providing that the minister may "co-operate with provincial authorities with a view to the co-ordination of efforts made or proposed for preserving and improving human resources development"? Now that is a good example of the government's attitude to co-operation with the provinces.
When we see what it does with the suggestions and the consensus there, it is easy enough to believe. Clause 20 provides that the minister may, as part of his duties: "-enter into agreements with a province or group of provinces, agencies of provinces, financial institutions and such other persons or bodies as the Minister considers appropriate". This is what the government is calling decentralization, this circumventing of provincial jurisdiction and going directly to persons or bodies. This is what they call decentralization.
Once again, despite what the Minister of Human Resources Development says, this clause enables him to enter into agreements with, as I have just indicated, a number of bodies and institutions and even with individuals. With this clause, the minister is giving himself the power to go over the heads of the provinces-this cannot be said often enough-and enter into agreements with whomever he deems appropriate.
Do I need to point out that this does not appear in the original legislation? No clause in this bill provides that the government should respect provincial jurisdiction. Bill C-95, which a number of my colleagues and I strongly criticized recently, to its credit, at least attempts to respect the provincial governments by precluding the possibility of its exercising "any jurisdiction or control over any health authority operating under the laws of any province".
When we see the extent of the federal government's encroachment, even when it says it wants to respect areas of jurisdiction, we can easily imagine the situation had it not expressed its desire to do so.
This bill definitely confirms the federal government's involvement in social and job programs. This fact is all the more obvious in the area of manpower training.
The minister talks of a whole other sort of decentralization. He intimates that his aim is to give communities and individuals more manoeuvring room. It is clear, however, that Bill C-96 is a way to get around what the provinces and Quebec want in order to deal directly with the groups and individuals the minister considers appropriate, who will, of course, be subject to whatever standards he may wish to impose.
The minister also talks of a single window. In this regard, the Quebec minister of employment, Louise Harel, said recently that Bill C-96 was the antithesis of the single window Quebec would like to establish by making the Société québécoise de développement de la main-d'oeuvre the primary intervenor in training matters. The SQDM is the embodiment of Quebec's consensus on the need for the Government of Quebec to be given full powers in manpower matters.
Despite this, according to the federal documents Le Devoir cites in its November 10 issue, the federal government is apparently preparing to end its co-operation with the Société québécoise de développement de la main-d'oeuvre in order to deal directly with community organizations and private institutions that it will finance and that will be subject to its eligibility criteria.
At a time when only the present Prime Minister and Pierre Trudeau still believe that further centralization is the solution to the multiple problems of federalism, it is not surprising that Bill C-96, although long ready, was not debated before the referendum.
This government has a very disappointing record with employment and social services; more than two years have passed and there is as much unemployment and even more people on welfare, and the coming unemployment insurance reform, also long ready and also kept hidden to keep Quebecers from knowing the true intentions of the government, will only make its record even worse.
Recently, in response to questions from the Leader of the Opposition on Bill C-96, the Minister of Human Resources Development replied that "obviously the Leader of the Opposition has not taken the time to read the bill". To counter this pretentious
statement, I would like to refer to a number of Quebec reactions to the federal announcement of its intent.
The Société québécoise de développement de la main-d'oeuvre under Claude Béland and Ghislain Dufour has unanimously adopted a resolution calling for the federal government to transfer all of its manpower training budgets to Quebec.
The Quebec Minister of Employment, Louise Harel, described Bill C-96 as "the blunt rejection of the unanimous consensus in Quebec-".
We might add the reactions of the Canada Labour Congress and the Canadian Institute of Adult Education, both denouncing Bill C-96, one calling it "an attempt to bypass the provinces" and the other "a flagrant lack of respect for the aspirations of the provinces, Quebec in particular, in matters of education, training and manpower development".
For his part, the secretary general of the FTQ, the largest labour federation in Quebec, deplored the federal government's thumbing its nose at areas of provincial jurisdiction, and the Quebec consensus, in order to put into place a parallel structure to what is already there. He added "Even the Conseil du patronat sides with the unions on this. And even Robert Bourassa's Liberal government opposed a similar attempt by Ottawa in 1991. Anyone who still harbours any illusions about Canadian federalism ought to think twice before voting in the referendum".
These comments were made three weeks prior to the referendum, but they hold as true today as they did then.
For all these reasons, it is obvious that we in the Bloc Quebecois share the opinion of the majority of Quebecers and would be unable to vote in favour of such a bill.
