Roger Gallaway

[Kyoto Protocol, December 2nd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the fact is there is no rush. The rush is self-imposed in that we are going to ratify it apparently by Christmas, or else.

What is clear is that we are asking provincial governments to pay part of the costs for this. We can imagine in this place if a provincial government in particular, or if collectively the provincial governments, were to pass uniform individual laws which imposed a financial burden on the federal government, it would go to court in about 39 seconds. There would be a challenge.

We do have treaty making powers at the federal level. In my opinion, we are heaping abuse on that process by saying that we have this power, and because convention demands that we seek the consensus of provincial governments, and I stress not the unanimity, but the consensus, and because we do not have that consensus, we really do not have anything, but we are going to use our power in a way which was never contemplated. In fact most legal observers would deem it to be unconstitutional. It is unfair to abuse a given power and that is what we are doing.

[Kyoto Protocol, December 2nd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on the motion regarding the Kyoto accord and to raise my concerns and, in fact, my dismay and opposition to the circumstances surrounding this motion.

First, by this motion, the government is asking the House to call upon it to ratify this treaty. Under present national circumstances that is a most peculiar and, dare I say, unusual procedure in a parliamentary system. What we have heard repeatedly, and know to be unquestionably true, is that cabinet can ratify, that is to say recommend to Her Majesty that it be signed. Therefore the motion is in a form which seeks to have the House tell the executive branch to commit an act which the executive branch can do without any advice or direction from the chamber. This is, therefore, a take note debate which for reasons of political misdirection has attached to it a vote which is unnecessary and meaningless. It is unnecessary because the signing or ratification of a treaty is an exclusive prerogative of the Crown and it is misleading because the House can never give orders to the Crown on its exclusive rights or prerogatives.

Second, Kyoto is, once ratified, an irrevocable accord among nations. Once signed, the executive is bound. It is obligated to do all necessary to implement it. That is why our system, the Westminster model, demands that certain conditions precedent be met before signing it. There is good reason for this. It is, if we consider the popular term, the due diligence of our form of government. It exacts an extremely high standard of assessment by the executive, that is the cabinet, be met before advice to proceed, that is to say ratify, is given to Her Majesty to sign. A treaty is, above all, an agreement between or among sovereign states.

Approximately 85 years ago, a Liberal justice minister and attorney general, the Hon. David Mills, a member of both the Mackenzie and Laurier cabinets, wrote and later lectured on the subject of treaties and their implementation in Canada. He stressed that when a treaty would have direct impact on provincial governments, whether there be a cost or an impact on existing provincial laws, the federal government should not proceed to ratify until consensus be reached. I stress consensus not unanimity. We have heard both inside and outside the chamber that the federal cabinet has the unquestioned legal right in every way to sign and therefore the provinces will be required to live with it.

As I speak in this place today, eight provinces are not in agreement with the federal plan. These provinces, as represented by their cabinets and premiers as first ministers, are opposed to that which is proposed here. Today they are saying that they do not wish to be bound by this accord and at least one, if press reports are correct, will take concerted legislative steps to counter the effects of the so-called implementation plan.

I therefore ask and wonder where is the due diligence of this chamber in proceeding when there is clearly and unequivocally no consensus.

I would point out that on September 2 in Johannesburg the Prime Minister in his speech said that he would obtain consensus among the provinces before he proceeded, yet here we are proceeding.

We have, as we know, inherited a British style of treaty making. It is clear that country, Great Britain, had great global influence and interests around the world at one time which necessitated that the art, that is to say the steps to be taken before a treaty be signed, of necessity be fastidiously followed. This stress of due diligence had good reason. It recognized that the federal cabinet, giving advice to the Crown on the subject of ratifying a treaty, should not put itself in a spot or position whereby it would be in conflict or clash with itself, realizing that provincial governments gave advice to the Crown also as to their sentiments or agreement in adhering to the direct effects the treaty would have on it.

In brief, provincial consensus is absolutely necessary because it is they who will shoulder some of the costs and today there is no provincial agreement to do so. Today we see a state of profound disagreement, a fundamental dissonance between the federal crown and eight provincial crowns which is a most disturbing and peculiar embarkation on treaty ratification by the federal cabinet. I do not believe as a member of the House that I should abet this very real, and I would suggest, legitimate concern by provincial governments.

This is, in the absence of consensus among provincial premiers, a step which the late Liberal Justice Minister Mills warned against. He said it could not proceed because to do so brings this pact into disrepute. In brief, it is imprudent, the test of due diligence is not met and it flouts the federal cabinet powers to advise Her Majesty to sign. Quite simply, it is the wrong step to take at this time.

A third point to be considered requires, if and only if consensus exists, that the cabinet bring to the House as soon as possible upon signing, the estimates, what will be required from the public purse or cost, as well as any bills necessary to amend the existing legal framework to ensure the objectives and demands of the treaty be carried out. It is only at this stage that the accord, that agreement among sovereign states, will be in fact Canadian law.

I would only say on this point, when the treaty is ratified it will not change one iota of anything in the country, perhaps with the exception of a louder outcry from provincial capitals and other federal-provincial litigation.

In this short period of debate on this treaty it is easy to characterize the views as being strongly held and polarized. My observation is that there is a concerted attempt to fashion this debate around virtue, that is to say those who support the ratification and are the true and exclusive environmentalists and it is only they who really truly care for the country's environment. There will be this vast and perceptible change in air quality, rivers will flow clean and lung disease will become an ailment of the past. Their commitment to their grandchildren and unknown future generations is often raised. A new economy will spring up.

Conversely, others say certain industries will be inordinately impacted with job and future investment opportunities will be lost. They say this is an exercise premised on uncertain science which will have negligible environmental but dire economic consequences.

Certainly today's stories concerning the 190 member Investment Dealers Association's report, if true, are most disturbing.

We are by this unnecessary motion being asked to choose which side is correct.

Let me return to Justice Minister Mills' words on this. He said:

The matter of making treaties is a most serious business and one in which dilettantes should not engage. After all, a treaty is irrevocable.

I will state and openly confess that on this subject I am a dilettante since I possess neither the scientific acumen nor the economic insight to know who is correct. In such case I listen closely to those in my riding who have greater insights and understanding than I could possibly possess. They tell me Kyoto will cast uncertainty on industrial investment in many sectors. It will have a chilling effect that will be negative. Is that a matter to which I should pay attention and be concerned?

As a border community in southwestern Ontario will it have any effect on air quality? The answer is no, because 90% of airborne particulates and greenhouse gases come from the United States, a mere 400 metres away.

Will it lead to an explosion of new jobs? The answer is no one knows for certain. It is in fact less than clear. Some call it a leap of faith.

Therefore, in the presence of an apparent federal-provincial disagreement of considerable proportions on this agreement, in the face of an economic downturn or bad economic prospects with no environmental upturn, I as a dilettante am being asked to say, I support Kyoto.

I have seen nothing of the cost or the extent of the legislative agenda to implement it. I have heard the bravado of the polar extremes of those who love the environment and future Canadians while the others purport to speak for the economy.

I speak for the clear message received away from this place which is that there are too many uncertainties, too much risk, no due diligence, do not support it, and I do not. It is, I fear, a leap of faith one should not be asked to take.

[Pipelines, November 21st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, pipelines have been abandoned throughout southwestern Ontario and other parts of Canada yet the National Energy Board has no rules to protect landowners when their use stops.

I would like to ask the Minister of Natural Resources whether after 10 years of consultation would he now tell the NEB and his officials to create rules that ensure the safe removal of these pipelines from privately owned lands?

[Pension Benefits Standards Act, 1985, November 5th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, one of the most important issues facing consumers in the province of Ontario these days is the cost of hydro. As a result of that, a few weeks ago I posed to the Minister of Finance the question, why are Ontario consumers paying goods and services tax on what is called the debt reduction charge on their hydro bill?

The debt reduction charge is a device of the provincial government that is based upon a percentage of consumption. It is money which is extracted from hydro users in Ontario. It flows directly from their bill through their local utility to a corporation called the Ontario Electricity Financial Corporation which pays off the debt of the former Ontario Hydro.

GST is a rather innocuous thing; we pay 5¢ here or 7¢ there. Let us consider that Ontario residents are going to repay a debt which is in excess of $17 billion. On that amount, they have the pleasure of paying GST at the rate of 7% which amounts to more than $1.2 billion.

We are in the remarkable scenario where one level of government has written up a very large debt and another level of government will benefit because the other was incompetent. Let me give an example of how this whole scenario is so outrageous. If one were to borrow $1,000 from a bank at 10% and agreed to repay it in one year, one would pay $1,100 and would be done with it. If the bank were to call and say it wanted another $77 in GST, the person would be outraged.

People in Ontario are outraged because the finance department is saying the GST is fixed in, that there are a lot of reasons and it is all very technical, but it gets to collect more than $1.2 billion. The finance department is the beneficiary of the misfortune of the consumers in Ontario.

It is fine to say that Mr. Eves should change his position and should restructure his bill. That is easy to say in this place also. However the end result is that Ontario consumers are going to shell out $1.2 billion which we are going to receive here and we have delivered neither goods nor services. It comes as a great surprise to people who understood that the GST was to be paid if they received some tangible good or service. Neither apply in this case. The end result is that people are outraged.

We are now in a scenario where we should come around to something called equity, and I am referring to equity as being fairness. It is incumbent upon the finance department to think about the fairness of this. The finance department should think about Ontario consumers. Those who are hard pressed to pay their hydro bills are now enriching the finance department by more than $1 billion simply because they have the misfortune of living in Ontario where Ontario Hydro ran up a debt.

[Ontario Hydro, October 8th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the finance minister.

The finance minister will know that Ontario residents are paying off more than $17 billion of Ontario Hydro's bank loans through a debt retirement charge on their hydro bills.

Why will the finance department collect more than a billion dollars in GST simply because Ontario Hydro went into debt?

[Sutherland Cup, May 1st, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, hockey is everywhere these days. As we slowly slide toward the end of spring it is a great national preoccupation. No matter what one does or where one goes the game cannot be avoided.

With that fact in mind I am pleased to inform the House that the Sutherland Cup, representative of Ontario Junior B supremacy, was decided and ended last night in the old Sarnia arena in my riding. For the players and coaches of the Sarnia Blast, game seven of the final series against Elmira allowed them to truly be number one in the province.

First presented in 1919, the Sutherland Cup, named after pioneer hockey coach Tom Sutherland, is dedicated as a memorial to our young men who died in the first great war. On this the 83rd year of the Sutherland Cup presentation I congratulate players, coaches and fans of this Sarnia team for a championship year. They have achieved a win and become part of Sutherland Cup history and the heritage of our national preoccupation: hockey.

[Divorce Act, April 29th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Justice. Canadians embroiled in divorce proceedings have been waiting for more than three years for some sign that a fairer law with respect to their children will be submitted to the Chamber. Despite a half million dollar joint committee report calling for change, a $1.5 million bureaucratic manoeuvre and promises of something, nothing has happened.

Could the minister tell us when he will move on the special joint committee recommendations or are we to disregard the former minister's acceptance of the report and its recommendations?

[Privilege, April 15th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to the notice delivered to you on Friday past, I rise on a question of privilege. I will begin with the contextual background.

On May 10 of last year, by news release, the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage of this House announced the launch of an 18 month study on the state of the Canadian broadcasting system. Prior to this, in a series of letters between the committee chair, the Minister of Canadian Heritage and the deputy minister of Canadian Heritage, starting on March 16 of last year and ending on January 22 of this year, the department, under the signature of the deputy minister, agreed to pay for two expert advisers to assist the committee.

A memorandum of understanding between the Department of Canadian Heritage and the House of Commons was signed by the director general of broadcasting policy and innovation and the clerk assistant to the committees directorate settling the amount to be paid at about $75,000 and the term of the agreement being from December 10, 2001 to March 31 of this year. In accordance with the memorandum, the expert advisers entered the standard form contracts of the House.

On February 11 of this year a news release was issued announcing the hiring of these two expert advisers.

On this point I want to be brief. By allowing the department to provide funding for committee advisers, I would suggest that a number of principles have been violated, however innocently, which affect my privilege as a member of the House through the committee operations of which I am a member.

First, there is the principle of comity between parliament and the executive or, in today's words, the relationship between the cabinet and ordinary members of parliament.

Comity, as I understand it, is the deference or courtesy that the House extends to the cabinet and vice versa so each may fulfil its constitutional role without interference or encroachment by each on the other. It is said the separate relationship between the House and the executive is a jealous one which must be studiously and scrupulously protected and guarded.

It is my suggestion that, once again, however innocently, the hiring of advisers using Department of Canadian Heritage funds violates the principle of comity and that jealous relationship between this House, as represented by the committee and the cabinet.

As author and political scientist Donald Savoie noted recently, “Questions of accountability and how public servants relate to their ministers and to Parliament are fundamental issues of governance. When you pull one lever, a whole series of issues, some unforeseen, can surface”.

By providing money to hire these advisers the nature of a House committee has undergone unforeseen consequences in House operations.

Let me suggest a committee using departmental funds ought properly to be called a task force or a joint department/House of Commons study. In funding these advisers there is a clear erosion of the doctrine and practice of passive ministers and their respective departments in the operations and affairs of committees as part of the work of the House. In fact it is a clear encroachment in my opinion on the operations of the House by the department.

If a committee were to accept funding from an industry association or a lobby group to fund expert advice to a committee, the minimum consequence would be public derision and the rejection of any findings, conclusions or recommendations, it being obvious that such advice would not and could not be neutral and objective.

As a committee member I am entitled to advice from sources which are absolutely free from department ties. If the House is too poor or cares not to provide the funding from the inception of a study, let us say so. However this monetary contribution by the department violates my privileges to have advisers who are absolutely free from the executive in every respect, direct or indirect, to any ties to the Minister of Canadian Heritage and that department. I suggest that no written memoranda of operations or understanding can change that fundamental principle.

The second point I wish to make involves the written mandate for the expert advisers as part of the standard contract of this place and appended as schedule 1 to the contract.

The final paragraph states:

The Contractor shall not comment in public on the Committee's deliberations relating to the broadcasting study...However, the foregoing does not prohibit the experts from writing or speaking on broadcasting issues generally, such as would be the case in the normal conduct of their professional duties.

That agreement was signed on February 18 of this year. On April 11, less than a week ago, one of the two special advisers, professor David Taras, was quoted on page A3 of the Calgary Herald . In that article, which was titled “Who will be voted off the Hill next?”, he referred to certain members of the House, his analogy being to the television program Survivor . It is impossible to construe any of his comments as related to communications, as set out in his contract. It is clearly about party politics and certain specifically named members of the House. An expert adviser cannot offer opinion on the political fate of certain members of this Chamber.

As well, an Internet search turns up about 54 press quotes by the special adviser concerning members of the House and political events, such quotes being made approximately during the last 30 days .

No committee member can expect and receive neutral and objective policy advice from a committee adviser who holds and publicly states opinions on members of this Chamber and affairs directly related and emanating to and from this Chamber.

As a member of the House and a member of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage I submit that such remarks violate my privileges.

I believe the foregoing raises a prima facie case of privilege. To assist you, Mr. Speaker, I would ask for consent of the House to table the documents and materials which I have referred to and would be prepared to move a motion at the time of your decision should you find a prima facie question of privilege to have been made.

[National Remembrance Day, February 20th, 2002]

moved:

Motion No. 298

That the Standing Committee on National Defence and Veterans Affairs be instructed, in accordance with Standing Order 68(4)(b), to prepare and bring in a bill in order to provide for the establishment of November 11th as a national holiday to be known as Remembrance Day.

Mr. Speaker, as the motion is non-votable, members will have one hour to discuss making November 11 a national holiday knowing full well that we will not have an opportunity to vote on it and pass judgment on it.

One might reasonably ask: Is Remembrance Day not already a national holiday? I should start by saying that in the great Canadian tradition holidays are a shared jurisdiction, and this is always confusing. Statutory holidays may be declared by provinces, as is the case with the province of Quebec which celebrates Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day on June 24.

Another example of a provincial holiday is the civic holiday held on the first weekend of August. This is a hybrid statutory holiday because the provinces and the federal government have declared it to be holiday. If someone is a federal worker they have a holiday. If someone follows the provincial labour law, they also have a holiday.

Two national holidays fall within the purview of the federal government, one being July 1, Canada Day, and the second being May 24, Victoria Day, or Fête de la reine in Quebec. Those are holidays which have been declared by the federal government.

This leads to the question: What is the status of November 11? It is a mishmash, a hybrid. The federal government has proclaimed it to be a federal holiday which means that all employees under federal labour legislation, such as civil servants, bank employees, airline employees, and so on, get the holiday. November 11 has been declared a holiday in certain provinces but not in all. For example, it is not a holiday in the province of Ontario. In other words, federal workers have a holiday but other people do not.

The purpose of my motion was to ensure that November 11 became a national holiday, such as May 24, which is the day we celebrate the birthday of a Queen who has been dead for more than 100 years, and July 1, which is the day when we celebrate Canada Day, 1867.

There are a lot of reasons for making November 11 a national holiday. I must confess that I brought forward the motion because there were some people in Canada who believed this should be a national holiday. A constituent of mine has been battling with this question for 13 years but she has not had great success.

During the Battle of Vimy Ridge in April 1917, which raged on for almost one month, 3,598 Canadians died, 7,000 Canadians were wounded and some 3,000 to 4,000 Canadians were permanently injured as a result of mustard gas. If we juxtapose that against the population of Canada, which was eight million or thereabouts at the time, we have some idea of the significance of the contribution of Canadian soldiers in the evolution of this country and in our place in the world.

There are those who say that December 12 is actually Canada Day because on December 12, 1931 the statute of Westminster was passed. It is interesting to note that on every December 12 the British Union Jack flies on all federal flag poles in Ottawa, including the flag pole here on Parliament Hill, because December 12 is deemed to be the day Canada obtained powers from the British parliament, one of those powers being the right to declare war. That right was used by this parliament in 1939 when the second great war began.

It is an obvious question then. Why is it not a national holiday as opposed to a mishmash of holidays?

This matter has been considered by the House in the past. In 1992 the then MP for the riding of Dartmouth, Mr. Ron MacDonald, had a bill before the House which was deemed to be votable but never made it to a vote on third reading, so it became academic. At that time the Conservative government opposed it. It said it would cost too much money.

Let me refer to comments from the then minister of the treasury board. In a letter dated May 17, the treasury board indicated that government members could not support the bill because it had collective bargaining implications that would cost too much.

Interestingly, at the same time the then leader of the opposition, the Prime Minister, wrote a letter saying that the Liberals felt this was petty reasoning and that the Liberals would continue to press the government to pass what was then Bill C-289 which would have made Remembrance Day a national holiday.

The only other time the House passed judgment on Remembrance Day was in 1931 when the name of Remembrance Day was changed by a private member's bill, ironically, from Armistice Day to what we now call Remembrance Day.

Last year the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, at its annual general meeting, passed a resolution calling on the government to make Remembrance Day a national holiday. Last year the Young Liberals of Canada, the youth wing of the party, passed a similar resolution. In fact that group has launched a petition drive to achieve that end. Jean Charest, the leader of the Liberals in Quebec, has signed a petition in recent months to the same objective.

This motion was declared non-votable and I have reason to believe that the committee was concerned about a couple of things. It was concerned about the expressed view of the Department of Canadian Heritage and the Department of Veterans Affairs that it was a cost factor and they could not do it. However it is already a holiday for federal employees, so that argument is somewhat specious.

We also know that the provinces, with a couple of exceptions, Ontario being one, already have a holiday. In terms of cost, the cost is in the province of Ontario, which used to have it as a provincial holiday.

The second issue is there is a belief that the Royal Canadian Legion is opposed to it. That is an interesting belief but it is only that because the Royal Canadian Legion has never at its annual general meeting or its convention put a motion forward to determine what its membership thought. Therefore, if anyone believes that certain service or ex-military organizations are opposed to it that is simply conjecture because those organizations have never had a motion, had a debate or taken a vote on it.

It would be interesting if indeed the committee, and this is simply conjecture, or if anyone were to say that this could never be a holiday because service organizations were opposed to it. I would just like to put on the record that that is not the case because there has never been a debate within any Canadian service organization on this point.

The final point is why should it be a national holiday? What is the underlying principle of this?

In the last century 100,000 Canadians died in wars fought in the name of this country and in the name of freedom. In the last century and into the 21st century, 125,000 Canadian soldiers have served not in war but in peacekeeping. Making November 11 a national holiday would give all Canadians an opportunity to reflect on the contributions in the past and more contemporary, the present, to the achievement of peace and freedom.

Today there are about 3,000 Canadian soldiers who are serving in Bosnia and Eritrea. An additional 750 to 800 are serving in Afghanistan. Despite comments made in the country and in the House, our military is still an integral part of our country's identity and its values of foreign policy both past and present.

I noted at the beginning that Victoria Day is a national holiday, a federal holiday declared by this parliament. It is interesting that we continue to celebrate the birthday of a queen who has been dead for about 100 years, yet we have studiously avoided a day to honour and remember those who served this country and those who continue to serve this country.

In conclusion, I submit that this is an issue which has increased in importance in this post-September 11 world. Many members of the House who were present at cenotaphs last November 11 will have noticed significant increases in attendance. The importance of Remembrance Day is not fading in Canada; rather it has become in one sense more important to us.

It is said that the purpose of war is to obtain peace. We are living in an era of limited peace because we have peacekeepers in areas that are wartorn. We have soldiers in areas that are wartorn. Our military is an integral part of our history. It is an institution of our country. It is for that reason I am supporting those who would say Remembrance Day, November 11 ought to be a national holiday.

[Anti-terrorism Act, October 16th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very interesting question. The corollary is that if we had previously apprehended the 19 who commandeered those planes and killed those hundreds of people and said that we were returning them to their country of origin, that would not have been a deterrent, as I see it.

What do we say to people who are capable of overriding the very natural instinct to live and survive by committing mass suicide among themselves? There is an element in all of this that is relative and that is that any kind of punishment, whether it is in Canada or in some other country, is of no consequence to them whatsoever.

The bill aims not only to address those who commit the acts but also those who support the network people. Obviously the 19 did not act as a collective of 19 or as 19 solo acts. There was some cohesion to that group which meant there were support operatives either in the United States or, as has been suggested, in Europe. It is to get at those people who are the real threat.

What do we do with people who are willing to commit suicide? No number of threats of any kind will prevent that.