Benoît Sauvageau

[Air Canada, May 3rd, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, we have learned that the company involved in the rescue of Air Canada proposes to dispose of almost all its subsidiaries in favour of a new holding company to be called Air Canada Enterprises. As a result, these subsidiaries would be in an arms-length relationship with Air Canada and no longer required to respect its obligations, particularly the obligation to provide service in French and the one relating to the location of its headquarters.

Can the Minister of Transport confirm to us that the obligations imposed on Air Canada and its subsidiaries will continue after restructuring?

[Constitution Act, May 3rd, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I must admit very candidly and humbly that I was a little thrown for a moment.

Now that I am back on my two feet, both figuratively and literally, I want to say that the Bloc Quebecois will oppose, as the hon. member for London—Fanshawe probably expected, his Bill C-486, and I will explain why.

First, we had an opportunity to discuss this when we debated the new electoral boundaries. I agree with the hon. member for London—Fanshawe that the current system is very flawed. However, this does not mean that the proposed solution is the ideal one in this case.

If Bill C-486 was passed in its present form, it would weaken the regions of Quebec, which are less populated. I will get back to this later on in my speech.

We also think this bill would reduce the weight of Quebec as a whole within the Canadian federation, with more power going to Ontario and the western provinces. Obviously, Quebec is going to become a sovereign nation very soon, but nevertheless, we must consider the fact that as long as Quebec is part of the Canadian federation, we must pay close attention to the relative weight of Quebec. The Conservative member has mentioned the number of ridings that could be lost.

I also see that the NDP whip appears to agree with me on the fact that Quebec will soon become a country. I would be pleased to hear his comments on that subject.

Moreover, we believe that in this bill we would be giving away the vested rights of Quebec. The clause that we call the Quebec grandfather clause is removed by this bill, and that would also wipe out certain ridings in Quebec.

The Bloc is here to defend the interests and demographic weight of Quebec. Therefore we cannot support a bill that would diminish or modify this demographic weight or presence within the Canadian federation.

Concluding my list of principal points that we oppose—which I will explain in detail presently—we are not here to reform the federal institutions, either. We agree, at least, to live with the rules now imposed on us, but we do not want to be involved in reforming them.

The summary of this bill reads, and I quote:

Rule 2 of subsection 51(1) of the Constitution Act, 1867, provides that no province shall have fewer members of the House of Commons than were set after the 1981 decennial census. This could continue to force an increase in the size of the House as redistribution would have to proportionately reflect relative population changes between the provinces by increasing the number of members assigned to growing provinces.

Rule 2 was enacted by the Constitution Act, 1985 (Representation).

This enactment replaces that rule with a provision that the membership may not exceed 308, the number resulting from the 2001 decennial census.

Consequently, in 1985, the population count could be used to determine the minimum number of ridings for each province and territory. Since then, the only possibility—and what is being done at present—is to increase the number. So there will be seven ridings more at the next election, if I am not mistaken.

The bill gives us a cap on the number of representatives reflecting current demographics. Thus, with population variations, the cap having been reached, the worse that could happen is fewer representatives in certain provinces.

That is the objective of the bill before us, and I will quote from the speech by the Liberal member for London—Fanshawe when he introduced his bill on February 19, 2004.

—this private member's bill seeks to cap the size of the House of Commons at what it will become after the next election, which is 308 seats.

We do not need to be much of a mathematician to do the mathematics and realize that given our population, if we had the population of the United States, we would have some 3,000 members of Parliament. That would be patently ridiculous of course.

The member is mixing the republican system and the British parliamentary system here, but we will not argue that point. He continued by saying:

The bill proposes to accommodate any future increase in population which will surely come, as we hope, and accommodate it within the cap of 308. Obviously, by law there has to be future redistributions. They would take place on course, but there would be a changing of the distribution of seats within the cap as per the new demographics of our country.

We are one of the most over-governed countries in the world at all three levels of government, quite frankly, and this bill, if passed, would help address the over-government we have experienced at the federal level.

That was the conclusion of the member for London—Fanshawe.

It is important to remember that the Prime Minister decides the date of elections, but he does not get up one morning and decide that Quebec will have 75 seats, Prince Edward Island, four and the Northwest Territories, one. There is a mathematical formula to determine how many MPs each province or territory has. I will not lay out the whole formula—I believe you know it by heart and I do not want to be redundant—but I will give you some of the highlights.

The attribution of seats to the territories must be taken into account. The Northwest Territories, the Yukon and Nunavut have one seat each. Then one must calculate the electoral quota. To do so, one takes 279—the number of seats attributed under the 1985 Act—and divides it by the total population of the 10 provinces. The electoral quota is used to determine the number of seats for each province.

Then the seats must be distributed among the provinces. One takes the theoretical number of seats for each province. It is arrived at by dividing the total population of each province by the electoral quota calculated at the second stage. Adjustments must be made. Once the theoretical number of seats for each province has been determined, it is adjusted using the senatorial clause as well as the grandfather clause.

Since 1915, the senatorial clause has guaranteed that no province has fewer seats in the House of Commons than it has in the Senate. What does that mean? I will give a very concrete and funny example. Under this clause, Prince Edward Island, which had four senators in 1915, has four MPs now. In 1993, when I was first elected the member for Terrebonne, the population in Terrebonne, a riding geographically smaller than Prince Edward Island, was larger than that of the province, which had four MPs and four senators. That would have been different if the electoral quota had been applied. So to do the same job as I do in the riding of Terrebonne, the province of Prince Edward Island has four MPs and four senators. That is a lot of representatives indeed.

Furthermore, accepting the bill as it stands would decrease the number of MPs in Quebec by six or seven with the removal of vested rights. As a representative from Quebec, I would have a hard time supporting a bill that could diminish Quebec's representative weight in the Confederation. I think the Liberals from Quebec feel the same way.

In conclusion, we have to consider regions such as the North Shore and Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, which have already lost two seats.

I think I have explained why the Bloc Quebecois cannot support the bill as it currently stands.

[Canada Marriage Act, April 29th, 2004]

Except yours.

[Criminal Code, April 29th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the whip for having corrected this small error on our part.

I was saying that people might be surprised to see the Bloc Quebecois supporting a government bill. When it is a good piece of legislation that needs no changes because it is done properly, we can support it.

The Bloc Quebecois is in favour of the principle of Bill C-29, however we must ensure that the proposed amendments will effectively protect the rights of people suffering from mental illness, while protecting society.

To do this, we must understand why the federal government did not adopt all the recommendations of the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness.

At this point, I want to make a comment and propose that the government, through its committee on the democratic deficit, consider what happens to unanimous committee reports. We are talking about addressing the democratic deficit and increasing the role and responsibilities of members in the House; all too often, unanimous reports are written and voted on after the committee has heard from numerous witnesses and often after the members have travelled across Canada to consult lobbyists and the public.

This afternoon, we were discussing the budget for the committee dealing with prebudget consultations. After spending $100,000, $200,000 or $500,000, after working on a report for one, two or six months, when all the parties recognize that the recommendations are supported unanimously, why is the government all too often taking this committee report and shelving it? In this case, I think that the recommendations are almost totally supported.

However, I am talking in general terms, but, in the committee study on the democratic deficit, I think that we should focus on the use that we are making or not making of unanimous reports of the House. I believe this is like when there is a vote on a motion where two-thirds of members in the House are in favour—such as the motion on the Armenian genocide—and the government says: “We will not change our position on this situation or issue”. The democratic deficit is there and can be corrected. I will now return to Bill C-29 to give a little background.

On March 29, the Minister of Justice introduced BillC-29, an act to amend the Criminal Code (mental disorder) and to make consequential amendments to other acts in the House of Commons. The purpose of this bill is to modernize the Criminal Code provisions respecting persons not criminally responsible or found unfit to stand trial on account of mental disorder. This bill is in response to the recommendations made by the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, which examined the Criminal Code provisions relating to mental disorder in a report tabled in the House of Commons on June 10, 2002.

At the time, the Bloc did not produce a dissenting report. In conclusion, I want to recognize the enormous work done by the member for Charlesbourg—Jacques-Cartier on the issues examined by the Standing Committee on Justice, Human Rights, Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness and, among others, on Bill C-29.

[Criminal Code, April 29th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I too am pleased to rise on behalf of my party to speak to Bill C-29. I will say right away that the Bloc Quebecois supports Bill C-29.

Often people who listen to us, even the Conservatives, believe that the Bloc Quebecois, being in the opposition, is always opposed to everything coming from the Liberal Party or the government. Today we are proving it is not so.

[Official Languages Act, April 22nd, 2004]

Madam Speaker, before speaking specifically about Bill S-4, I would like to remind the House that I have been a member of the Standing Committee on Official Languages for a number of years and that I have heard a great deal of testimony on the relevance of making Part VII of the Official Languages Act enforceable.

At one time, I even worked with various experts, legal and constitutional experts, on the possibility of making amendments myself and introducing a bill to make Part VII of the Official Languages Act enforceable. Consequently, the Bloc Quebecois does not take the firm position of absolutely not wanting to make this part enforceable.

That having been said, I am pleased to speak to Bill S-4, which amends Part VII of the Official Languages Act. The amendments in Bill S-4 affect sections 41, 42 and 43 in particular. Senator Gauthier's bill thus is intended to make Part VII enforceable, whereas this part has until now been interpreted as a statement of government policy.

Let us take a look at the history of Bill S-4. This is the third bill introduced in the Senate by Senator Jean-Robert Gauthier during this Parliament. He proposed Bill S-32 during the first session, and then Bill S-11 in the second session. These two bills were predecessors of Bill S-4, the bill before us today, which has got this far, the two earlier bills having died on the Order Paper when Parliament was prorogued.

As the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell has done, I must also recognize the hard work by Senator Gauthier in promoting the rights of francophone minorities outside Quebec. Much to his credit, Senator Gauthier is an ardent defender of francophones outside Quebec.

Nevertheless, after reading and thoroughly examining the bill before us, we must say that we cannot accept it unless it is amended to meet the constitutional requirements for all legislation. I shall explain.

In section 41 of the Official Languages Act, we read:

The Government of Canada is committed to (a) enhancing the vitality of the English and French linguistic minority communities in Canada and supporting and assisting their development; and (b) fostering the full recognition and use of both English and French—

This last part of section 41 is important:

—in Canadian society.

It seems to me that the scope of section 41 is too broad and too vague. The reference to Canadian society should be eliminated and replaced with “in respect of provincial jurisdictions”, because we want the government to respect and implement the law within its own jurisdiction. In my view, that is the spirit of the law. That is what is understood in the law, but unfortunately not what is written.

We want the federal government to respect and apply the Official Languages Act within its own jurisdiction and not throughout Canadian society in defiance of its constitutional obligations. I am certain that Senator Gauthier intended what I just said, in other words, for the federal government to intervene in its own jurisdiction.

I am certain that this is also the intention of the hon. member who sponsored this bill, the member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, but that is not clear. That is the problem and I will explain why a little later.

In section 43 we find once again a reference to Canadian society as a whole, and I quote:

The Minister of Canadian Heritage shall take such measures as that Minister considers appropriate to advance the equality of status and use of English and French in Canadian society—

More worrisome are paragraphs ( d ) and ( f ) of subsection 43(1).

Paragraph 43(1)( d ) states:

encourage and assist provincial governments—

Paragraph 43(1)( f ) is even more worrying. It states:

—encourage and cooperate with the business community, labour organizations, voluntary organizations and other organizations or institutions to provide services in both English and French—

Here, for example, are the main reasons we can conclude that, as it stands today, Bill S-4 does not meet the laudable objectives it had set, that is, to encourage the development of minority francophone communities and protect their rights.

More worrying still is the issue of its constitutionality, as it stands today. The then justice minister, the member for Outremont, spoke to us about this. I will quote from his testimony on April 30, 2002, before the committee. I think it is important, in seeking to amend the bill, to properly heed the warnings we have been given.

However, as Minister of Justice, I must tone down the tool used, the method used. Why? Section 41 has existed for 15 years now, as we speak. Section 41 is ultimately a policy statement which has enormous scope and is binding on the government, but, at the time it was passed, it was an enormous concern for all the provinces and territories, all our Canadian partners. Why? Because, it was said, the influence of section 41 was so great that the statement enabled the Canadian government to intervene in fields outside its jurisdiction.

That is what the then justice minister said. He continued, in saying:

In my view, if we added elements to section 41 that would make this part binding, we would risk jeopardizing the important tool this section represents. I very humbly submit that court challenges would result that would jeopardize section 41. I believe that this element alone shows how important it is to address section 41 from the standpoint of its very meaning, which is that of a policy statement.

Later, he stated:

In my mind, if we proceeded with Bill S-32—

That is S-4, which is now before the House.

—we would take the risk of losing such a... tool, because some people would raise more than concern: they would start to go to court in order to declare invalid section 41 and part VII.

On March 6, 2002, Warren J. Newman, of the Department of Justice's Constitutional and Administrative Law Section, said the following at the Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs:

At the time the Official Languages Act of 1988 was introduced, certain provinces questioned the constitutional validity of Part VII, the aims of which go beyond federal legislative jurisdiction. These provinces were reassured as to the validity of Part VII by the fact that it is based on the federal spending power, and because this part of the act is not regulatory, but rather, program-oriented in nature.

I also point out that, in the view of many legal scholars, the commitment is probably not justiciable. Moreover, the Honourable Senator Beaudoin, in his excellent book on federalism in Canada, states that the court may say that the federal government must commit, but it cannot determine the amounts to be spent. That would mean getting involved in the parliamentary sphere with respect to the constitutional commitment.

What the justice minister of the time told us is that if Bill S-4 were adopted as it stood, there would be a number of bad reactions by the provinces. There would probably be a Supreme Court challenge of the constitutionality of the Official Languages Act as amended, and that most likely the provinces would be successful. As a result, the act would be weakened, and by the same token, the rights of francophone minorities.

I know that the francophones in minority situations are fed up with debates and with all the hemming and hawing, but we must not do more harm to them while intending in all good faith to help them.

One aspect we often neglect to keep in mind in a debate such as this one is that the two minority communities in Quebec and in Canada are not on an equal footing. Some francophone communities in Canada are still in a very precarious situation, and the rate of assimilation of francophones is in fact continuing to increase.

One major flaw in the Official Languages Act is that it does not recognize the asymmetry that exists at the present time in Canada as far as language minorities are concerned. The situation of the francophones outside Quebec is far more cause for concern and far more precarious than that of Quebec anglophones, and the act must acknowledge this.

And in section 41, let us eliminate the reference to “in Canadian society” and replace it with “respecting provincial areas of jurisdiction”. We must define the scope of section 41. That is very important in the legislation.

I am convinced that both Senator Gauthier and the sponsor of this bill, the hon. member for Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, were—and still are—acting in good faith when they introduced this bill, and I assure them of my complete cooperation.

Nevertheless, the Bloc Quebecois cannot support a bill that is likely to interfere in provincial areas of jurisdiction, and which would be immediately challenged before the courts and would not in any way improve respect for the rights of linguistic minorities.

The rights of francophones in Canada have been trampled for such a long time that what we need to find is an unequivocal solution to this situation, and not a law that will once again result in one court challenge after another. Francophones have waited long enough. They want real protection of their rights.

That having been said, the Bloc Quebecois would be in favour of amendments to strengthen enforcement and the presence of French in federal institutions, as long as such amendments do not weaken the status of French in Quebec.

[User Fees Act, March 26th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I will explain very briefly why we support Bill C-212, as the two colleagues who preceded me pointed out, and I will also indicate why we have a minor reservation.

We supported Bill C-212 when it was debated in the House of Commons. At the time, it was my colleague, the hon. member for Joliette, who was our spokesperson. We still support this legislation on the fees that may be imposed by regulating authorities on the various users of their services.

We have no problems with this aspect. Indeed, we think that Bill C-212 does meet the concerns and the needs of service users.

However, some amendments were made by the Senate. We deplore the fact that, because of these amendments, the power to review user fees could escape the House of Commons. Our researchers had to work really hard to find a little word. As we know, a little word can often make a world of difference in a bill.

Before, the bill provided that the power to review user fees was delegated to the House of Commons “and” to the Senate. Now, the wording provides that this review can be done by the House “or” by the Senate. This means that the House of Commons could lose its right to review user fees, simply because of the word “or”. This is a minor point about which the Bloc Quebecois is a little sensitive.

So, the minister responsible will have the choice between mandating either the Senate or the House of Commons to establish or increase user fees. We prefer the initial version of the bill, which gave the House the authority to deal with user fees.

The hon. member who presented this bill should take note of this warning to the effect that the initial bill clearly stated that the minister responsible would ask the House to review or increase user fees. Now, following the amendments made in the Senate, the House could lose, to the Senate, its right to review such fees.

This is the only thing with which the Bloc Quebecois does not agree, but it is not serious enough for us withdraw our initial support for Bill C-212.

[Sponsorship Program, March 26th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, let us get back to the main issue. Does the Prime Minister still trust his minister, now that he is aware of the existence of this e-mail, which clearly shows that the President of the Privy Council got personally involved to help Everest secure the contract?

[Sponsorship Program, March 26th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, I hope that, when the minister says they, he includes himself. The Prime Minister stated that he had questioned each of his ministers about their integrity before appointing them to cabinet and that he was satisfied with their answers.

Can the President of the Privy Council tell us whether he informed the Prime Minister that the firm he wanted to hire at the time was Everest?

[Official languages, March 26th, 2004]

Mr. Speaker, recently the Official Languages Commissioner tabled a report that confirmed what the Bloc Quebecois has been saying for years about bilingual services provided by federal institutions in the National Capital Region.

The results of the study show that in Gatineau, telephone and in-person services are exemplary. In Ottawa, however, the results are, and I quote, “disappointing and there is plenty of room for improvement”.

Yet, according to commercial tenants, providing bilingual services has business advantages because it helps increase market share and, in general, the overall advantages outweigh the cost.

The federal government, as the landlord, must comply with the requirements of the legislation and ensure that language clauses are respected in its buildings. The facts are clear. On the Quebec side we obey the law. We expect the same in Ottawa.