Benoît Sauvageau

[Publishing Industry, May 31st, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, last week a senior American official stated that the United States could go to the WTO if American publishers were denied access to the Canadian subsidy program. This was confirmed on Friday by a spokesperson for the Department of International Trade.

Does the Minister of International Trade confirm that a subsidy program reserved exclusively for Canadian publishers could infringe upon Canada's international commitments under what is called the national treatment principle?

[Publishing Industry, May 27th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, that is very reassuring for Canadian publishers.

Speaking of reassurance, what assurance does the Minister of National Defence have that none of the other WTO member countries will ever contest his compensation program when one of them considers there is unfair competition with its own publishers who export their magazines to Canada?

[Publishing Industry, May 27th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the government has made a commitment to help Canadian publishers with a program, the costs of which, I might point out, are unknown even to it. The government contends that it has the assurance of the Americans that they would not contest this policy under NAFTA, the WTO or American trade legislation.

My question is for the Minister of National Defence, who seems to be the closest to this matter. Can he tell us under what legal principle the American government would not be obliged to submit to WTO or NAFTA regulatory authorities any complaints from American publishers who felt that their rights were being infringed upon by Bill C-55?

[International Trade, April 21st, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, how can Canada claim to be properly defending the interests of Quebec, when no one in Quebec was aware that the Americans were preparing to impose such trade restrictions, while in Ottawa the matter had been being discussed with Washington for some months?

Is this Ottawa's philosophy has for defending Quebec: What they don't know won't hurt them?

[International Trade, April 21st, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the Americans are thinking of withdrawing Canada's defence and aerospace export privileges.

The Minister of International Trade learned this from the newspapers, but the Minister of Foreign Affairs was aware that his departmental staff had been discussing this with Washington for some months.

My question is for the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who appears to know what is going on. Since the planned restrictions even affect contracts with no connection to military secrecy, how does the government plan to defend itself against these new attempts by Washington to do harm to the trade between the two countries?

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, indeed, the Minister of Foreign Affairs has told us that 130 members have spoken on the issue of Kosovo. I do not believe that constitutes explicit consent on the part of members of parliament. The consent must take the form of a well informed vote, taken after meetings with the main stakeholders, that is the Minister of National Defence and the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Too often, they announce at the last minute that a briefing has been postponed or cancelled and, as my colleague from Beauharnois—Salaberry said earlier, now these briefings will last only 30 minutes. With all the small talk, we will not even have time to ask questions.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Joliette for his question.

In 1993, the Liberals' red book talked about restoring public confidence in the institution of parliament. One of the ways to achieve that is precisely to respect this historic right, the right to vote. It is difficult to understand why the Liberals want to violate such an important right as the right to vote.

In every riding, there are voters who are fed up with politics. They often tell us “Canada is a dictatorship elected every four years. We vote for a prime minister and a parliament, but after that we have no decisions to make. Everything is decided by the prime minister and his cabinet”.

Unfortunately and ironically, with the example it is giving to Canadians, this government is proving these voters right.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Vancouver Quadra, a leading constitutional and international relations expert, is probably at least partly right.

However, I can say that his colleague, the foreign affairs minister, when he was sitting on the opposition benches, did ask for a vote on the sending of troops.

Moreover, a vote has been held on this in the House. I was not referring to the United States.

Furthermore, as late as last year or two years ago, Bob McNamara, a former adviser to John F. Kennedy, apologized for the tragic mistake of the Vietnam war.

Do we want the Minister of Foreign Affairs or the Prime Minister to be in a position, after the conflict, of having to apologize to the Canadian people? We are asking that members of parliament be allowed to exercise their responsibilities and to vote in the House.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Yes, one of many. There are others, including asking the Minister of Foreign Affairs to take advantage of Canada's position as chair of the security council to co-sponsor the peace plan presented by Germany. The response we got was: “We do not know. We will look into it. We are waiting”. Just like the answers on the aircraft and the budget.

In a speech, the leader of the Bloc Quebecois proposed that a conference of the European Union be held in order to define the future of small nations, those in the Balkans in particular. The Liberal side turned a deaf ear.

My colleague from Joliette ironically referred just now to the fact that, if we want to send a parliamentary mission of 5, 6 or 7 MPs outside the country, to Geneva for instance, in order to discuss the future of the WTO, we need unanimous consent in order to free up a budget of $25,000, $30,000 or $40,000. That is a rule currently in force in the House.

Yet if they want to send 2,000 or 3,000 soldiers to fight in Kosovo, there will be no vote in the House because parliament wants this to be decided by the PMO and the cabinet, while 9 years ago we were told that was not the right way to make a decision.

We have perhaps half or three-quarters of an hour left, and I beg my Liberal colleagues to open their minds, to think things through properly, to look at precedent and to support this motion by the Bloc Quebecois.

[Supply, April 19th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the foreign affairs minister for being in the House to listen to my speech. I know that he came straight from his office specially to listen to me. I am glad he did because I will remind him of some of his famous statements. I quoted one a few minutes ago but I will repeat it for him.

I ask the hon. members to identify who made the following statements. The first statement from the minister that I would like to quote was made on September 24, 1990:

As we now stand in the present situation, we are looking at very long, protracted sanctions in the gulf which could take months—

He was talking about the gulf war.

—We are looking at a very major military build-up ... We are looking at a potential military option.

And most importantly, this last comment:

We would like to get some assurance specifically from the government—the Progressive Conservatives were in office at the time—that we will not engage in any offensive action in this region unless there is a consent of Parliament.

That is what the present minister stated.

The same minister, who was in opposition at the time, also wanted—I will quote him, if I may, and he can say so if he disagrees—to propose an amendment to have the House reconvene earlier than it was supposed to after the Christmas break. He said:

This is a way in which parliament will be allowed to present itself as the forum for decision making, not the Cabinet, the ministers or the Prime Minister but the people of Canada, through their elected representatives.

The present minister of Foreign Affairs introduced that motion on January 15 1991.

Further, speaking of Canadians, he said:

They know that there are no decisions more crucial for a government than those concerning war and peace. It is up to each state to make its own decisions. They want to make sure these decisions are made by all Canadians and that this forum, the Parliament of Canada, is respected.

The distinguished author of this quote is the current foreign affairs minister.

I will go on as the members opposite had some good ones. On January 15, 1991, they said, still concerning the Persian gulf war:

I maintain that the government does not, in the circumstances, have the moral authority to put this country into a war situation.

It is not the foreign affairs minister who said that, but the current Prime Minister of this country.

Still regarding members of this House, and chastizing the government for recalling the House too late, that is two days before the beginning of air strikes, and for asking the wrong questions, a Liberal member said:

However, just like the voters, I was entitled to being consulted on this fundamental question, which would have enabled all us to vote on the issue.

It was the current government House leader, a member with a lot of experience, who asked in 1991 for the right to vote on the issue.

My last quote concerns a Liberal amendment to the government motion.

This support shall not be interpreted as approval of the use of Canadian Forces for offensive action without further consultation with and approval by this House.

In particular, can we get assurances from the minister in the spirit with which we have been approaching this to have Parliament consulted before any final decisions are made as to these plans relating to our forces in the gulf area?

This was a question asked by the current Minister of External Affairs on October 23, 1990, which was before the start of the conflict.

Whether it is the Prime Minister, the Minister of External Affairs, the government House leader or other members who unanimously supported a report from the national defence and veterans affairs committee, they were all requesting, when they were in the opposition and even before the start of the conflict, that members be allowed to vote. How can we explain this about-face in the Liberals' position?

We heard a lot of nonsense. I will quote a few of those comments. One of the last Liberal speakers before the Minister of External Affairs was saying “We will vote against the Bloc's motion because, for example, if we want to send a cook to Kosovo to prepare food for the soldiers sent there as peacekeepers, we will have to submit the question to a vote in the House”.

They also said “We will vote against this motion because if CF-18 pilots are killed, we will need a vote to send a rescuer to retrieve their bodies”.

The Liberals said “We will vote against this motion from the Bloc because we have to act quickly to send ground troops to Kosovo to fight for us, without the proper training”. They might decide during the night that 1,000 soldiers will leave for Kosovo tomorrow morning at 5.15 a.m. Nobody will have been able to vote then.

The Liberal government has not given any good reason to oppose the motion. It has not given any good reason that would invalidate the position taken by the Minister of External Affairs when he was in the opposition. It has not given any good reason that would invalidate what the present Prime Minister said when he was the Leader of the Opposition.

We can ask why the government absolutely refuses to vote for this motion. We were also told that no vote was ever taken in the House concerning the deployment of ground troops. However, we know that a vote was taken in the case of the gulf war, another during the 1970s and yet another during the 1960s.

The minister mentioned earlier a few countries where no vote was taken. I answered that votes have been taken in Germany, and that two votes have been taken in the Czech Republic to determine whether the country ought to get involved in such a conflict.

A vote was taken this afternoon in the United States for the granting of several billion dollars to continue to defend the interests of Kosovars in this conflict. It is interesting to recall that a vote was held today in the United States concerning the budget.

Twice, last week and this week, we have asked the Minister of National Defence to say what the estimates are, what it would cost Canada, at this time, to take part in this conflict.

At the time when the U.S. Congress is voting on a budget that could amount to $4 billion or $6 billion, the two answers that my colleague for Joliette got from the Minister of National Defence were the same “We do not know”. We asked how many planes have been kept in reserve. At present, we have 18 planes over there. How many do we have left, if NATO calls for more? We were given the following answer “We do not know”.

We are entitled to wonder about the apparent improvization by the Liberal government with respect to this conflict. How much is it costing? We do not know. How many more planes can we send? We do not know. Are these state secrets? Is it a secret for national defence not to know, not to disclose, a budget like this one? That would be surprising, however, when at the same time the Clinton administration is voting on a budget for this same conflict, while the Minister of National Defence and the Prime Minister are telling us “It is a national secret, whether this will cost Canadians $40 million, $50 million, $100 million or $200 million”. We ask these questions but we cannot get any answers.

The opposition parties are unanimous, a rarity in the House, on the Bloc Quebecois motion concerning a vote in the House. This is one of the constructive and positive things the Bloc Quebecois has undertaken. We asked—