Monte Solberg

[Gun Control, November 15th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the justice minister makes our case. The emphasis should be on controlling smuggling and that type of thing.

Professor Gary Mauser of Simon Fraser University has released a report estimating that universal firearms registration in Canada will cost a minimum of half a billion dollars and could be as high as a billion dollars.

Given the failure of present registration programs to stem crime and the disastrous fiscal situation of the country, how can the minister justify even considering this major new spending initiative?

[Gun Control, November 15th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, last weekend the justice minister again expressed his desire for the universal registration of firearms in Canada.

Will the minister acknowledge that since the introduction of the universal registration of hand guns in the country, the criminal misuse of hand guns has actually increased? Will he acknowledge this irony?

[Ethics, October 31st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I guess it is kind of like the ethics guidelines themselves. They are not written down either.

I listened to the Prime Minister's statement this afternoon very carefully but found nothing in it to assure Canadians that this will not happen again. The ethics lapdog is still subject to the whims of the Prime Minister's office.

Will the Prime Minister now do what he should have done in his statement and replace the current ethics counsellor with an independent one responsible to Parliament and not the Prime Minister's office?

[Ethics, October 31st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, last week the Prime Minister said that initially he had contacted the ethics councillor. Then he changed his story and said that someone on his staff had contacted the ethics counsellor but only at the last moment.

Can the Prime Minister tell us who exactly contacted the ethics counsellor and will he provide the House with a transcript of those conversations?

[Department Of Canadian Heritage Act, October 27th, 1994]

"At least they were in a line" the hon. member says. This was also art work.

If these people want to do this for their own pleasure, fine. If they want to put some underlay in the middle of their living room floor and marvel at it, that is great. We support that. On the other hand, if they expect Canadian taxpayers to shell out money so this can be displayed in the National Gallery it is crazy. The people are fed up with the waste in government. If it wants some areas where it can cut it can start with Canadian heritage. There is no end of waste in that department.

I remember reading about Charles Dickens. In England in those days there was no support from the government for artists. One fall that great writer was pressed to come up with a new book because he had a large family to support. Christmas was coming and he needed some revenue. Therefore, this prolific writer, who was prolific probably because he knew that if he wanted to survive he had to produce these works of art, was facing this Christmas deadline and knew he had to get something out so he could have an income. Faced with those pressures and faced with the fact that he had to be excellent in what he produced if he wished to sell his book to have some money, he produced one of the great classics of all time "A Christmas Carol".

I do not see why the principles of that time cannot apply today. Why do we have to have the Canada Council involved at every step of the way? People who have no business publishing a book because their work is not worthy are getting grants from the Canadian taxpayer to do it. That is crazy. I again urge the government to look at all these areas where it intervenes into the artistic community, to get out of there and allow real artists to blossom and do their thing.

We have great artists in the country from every area of the artistic community. They will prosper irrespective of whether or not they get grants from the Canada Council or protection from the Ministry of Canadian Heritage. We do not need to worry about them. We do not need to feel that we are somehow inferior. We have shown time and again that we have people who can compete in the international community with respect to the whole Department of Canadian Heritage and artistic accomplishments.

We have a deficit of $40 billion a year, a debt of $535 billion a year and the high taxes that go with that. Canadians used to have some disposable income to spend on art. By running up the deficit because of this ridiculous boondoggle of handing out grants, now they have less disposable income to go out and buy the art that we would all like to see produced. The government across the way is therefore cutting off access that Canadian people have to art.

I urge the government not only to reorganize the department but to cut spending dramatically and reorganize it right at the top starting today with the minister.

[Department Of Canadian Heritage Act, October 27th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, how ironic that today is the day we are looking at the reorganization of this department, particularly in light of the allegations that have been made against the minister of this department. I once had a boss who told me that a fish always rots from the head down. Today we should see a reorganization of the department starting at the top.

Last spring I sat in on the committee on Canadian heritage. I sat 10 feet away from the minister when he told us that agencies like the CRTC are to be at arm's length from the government. He has said it on countless occasions and now we are going to make him live up to his words.

Implicit in that letter he sent no matter what he says because he is a minister of the crown is the fact that he is the one who approves along with cabinet orders in council for the positions on the CRTC. His department sets the guidelines. His department sets the budget for the CRTC.

I remind the minister and the members across the way that it was not long ago when the hon. member for Sherbrooke was facing the same sort of situation. The leader of the Conservative Party was facing the same situation and Liberals across the way screamed for his head. They got it. They should have. Now they should hold themselves to the same standards at least of the Mulroney government, a government that did not have very high standards.

I encourage members across the way to get to their feet and tell the Prime Minister in no uncertain terms that this is absolutely not acceptable. I encourage them to move today while they still have a chance to cut their losses and ensure that no more damage is done to the credibility of the government.

That is at the top of the department. I want to move through the department now and talk about some other issues. When we look at all the issues that are within that department; multiculturalism, CBC, status of women, the Canadian Heritage Languages Institute, the National Film Board, there are so many targets. It is an embarrassment of riches. So many boondoggles, so much waste, so little time.

I want to talk in general about Canadian heritage and how it protects Canadian artists and the whole idea of government intervention in the artistic community. This is a relatively new occurrence in western civilization, to have a government involved in protecting particular artists, choosing some and saying they are worthy of the support of the government while others are not. In ancient times when patrons regularly supported artists, those artists were at least accountable to that patron. If they did not produce art work it was guaranteed they would not be supported again by that particular patron. Such is not the case in Canada.

For instance, the Canada Council uses peer juries to select which artists should be worthy of support by the government. This is a closed system. It is like a bell jar, the jar they use in scientific experiments. There is no accountability to the public, the people who are paying the money. At the risk of repeating what I said the other day in a member's statement, they "breathe each other's air". We do not get input from regular people about what constitutes real art.

It is well and fine for artists to produce art for their own pleasure but it should be at their own expense, not the expense of Canadian taxpayers.

Who does not stop and wonder about the huge distortion that government intervention in the arts community has had after they tour the National Gallery. I have talked on this issue before

but I must repeat what I have stated because it is so utterly unbelievable.

I remember distinctly the first time I went to the National Gallery. I was impressed with some of the art work. There were pieces of art work from classical artists which are universally accepted as great art. That rightfully belongs in a national gallery.

I remember like it was yesterday walking into a huge room and seeing in the corner boxes of Brillo pads stacked to the ceiling. This was not a supply room. This was a display of art, believe it or not, in a corner, brightly coloured boxes of Brillo pads.

In another room there was what I thought was some construction in progress. It was carpet underlay lying in the middle of the floor. This was a work of art according to the National Gallery. It was paid for by Canadian taxpayers. This piece of art, if you want to call it that, was called "256 pieces of felt" and it was a pile in the middle of the floor.

Another room had bricks lying on the floor in a line coming out from the wall-

[Bankruptcy Act, October 25th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise today speak to Bill C-237, an act to amend the Bankruptcy Act.

When I review the intent of the bill a couple of things strike me. First, the intention behind it is certainly good. It says something about the person who has moved the bill, that they want to protect the employees of a business that has gone bankrupt. Certainly all Canadians sympathize with people who would be denied their wages because a business has gone

bankrupt and they are not at the top of the list of the secured creditors but are well down the list.

Having said that, I am also struck by another concept that I read about some time ago and recently reread. It just really impressed upon my mind how often we get away from this whole idea in government when we are making important decisions that can affect individuals and businesses across the country.

I remember reading in a book by an economist by the name of Henry Hazlitt about how often one of the greatest failures of economists and people who are making decisions that affect economies is to not foresee the secondary and unseen effects of the measures they are proposing. With respect to my hon. friend in the Bloc I think that is what we have done in Bill C-237, an act to amend the Bankruptcy Act.

One of the unseen effects of the legislation-and other members have referred to it-is the kind of incentive there would be for banks and providers of capital to continue to provide that capital to businesses.

Banks are already very reluctant to provide capital to businesses for a number of reasons. My hon. friend from Kootenay West went through a litany of the things that banks require before they will lend a business money. Now the amendment to Bill C-237 is proposing to put one more impediment in place that would cause banks to think twice about funding a business.

That is a great concern to me. It is a great concern to the government across the way and I believe to the Bloc. As has been referred to many times in the House, the great engine of the economy in Canada is small business. Small business creates 85 per cent of all jobs in the country.

On one hand the bill appears to be protecting employees. On the other hand we do not see all the jobs it would prevent from being created because banks and other providers of capital would be reluctant to lend the money knowing their loan is not secured under the proposal.

That is something we have to be conscious of, particularly in the competitive environment we have today not only within Canada but within North America and certainly around the world. There are all kinds of different advantages that other countries have and will try to use against us to get their share of the market.

We are a relatively wealthy country. We can attribute that to the small and medium sized business to a great degree. We have to be conscious of the types of burdens we impose upon them when we propose to do what seems on the surface to be a very good thing. Canadian businesses, small business in particular, are the creators of jobs and all that wealth out there.

I am not certain the hon. member has really taken that into consideration. Banks and anybody else who provides capital have many options when they think about where they want to invest their money. Capital is very fluid. It flows to where it gets the highest return and where the risk is the least. One thing that may happen if the bill were passed would be that banks would start saying that they do not want to fund small businesses because they are not going to be a secured creditor. Another thing that could happen is that they would fund them but raise interest rates. They would put on a risk premium because they are concerned about losing their money.

We already have a problem in the country where we have some of the highest real interest rates in the world, which again hurts our competitive position. We have to think long and hard about the repercussions. If we are in that position where businesses are forced to pay higher interest rates then we will have a situation where there will be less jobs created.

Those are the things we never see and are never reported in the newspapers: the jobs that are not created and the businesses that are not started because of legislation. It is very easy to point to a plant closing somewhere and say: "Is it not a shame those people did not get their two weeks' pay?"

Is it not also a shame when people do not go into business because they know the bank is going to turn them down? The bank is not confident it will get its money back because it is not at the highest level on the list of claims; it is not a secured claim.

We can take a look at what the government is proposing in many areas. Infrastructure would be a good example. Any time the government prepares to intervene in the economy we have to think about the secondary and unseen effects.

There is another aspect that I would ask hon members in the House to consider. What if a supplier to a business is barely hanging on and has a lot of employees who are trying to keep their jobs? They do not want to end up on the unemployment or welfare rolls, yet all of a sudden the position of the struggling business is not secure any more. The government has extended the misery a little further down the line. The next guy down the line is in a position where he may be forced into bankruptcy and people may be out of a job because of the situation the government has imposed by approving Bill C-237.

There are effects that go beyond the banks and interest rates. There are also the effects on suppliers. Suppliers may be very reluctant to extend supplies or inventory to anybody but the most secure businesses.

In this environment in this day and age we know that no such businesses can be completely guaranteed against failure. Over the last recession we saw businesses fail that were in operation for not only tens of years but in some cases over a hundred years. That speaks volumes about the competitiveness of the environment and perhaps a bit about the instability of the business environment. Even in the best of times businesses cannot be counted upon to survive because they always have more and more competition.

I know members of the Bloc are supporters of free trade. We now have trade deals with the United States and Mexico. I am not aware of any such legislation in either the United States or Mexico that would parallel this legislation. In other words, we would be putting a burden on Canadian businesses, Canadian suppliers and Canadian providers of capital that does not exist in some other countries around the world, in this case particularly the United States and Mexico.

A couple of things could happen. First, businesses in the other countries will have a competitive advantage over Canadian businesses. Entrepreneurs from this country and Quebec can go south of the border. Perhaps they can go to Mexico if they have any type of business idea that will prosper no matter where it starts up. They can go there to escape the type of legislation we are talking about here.

Another thing that can happen is that capital can flow out of this country to more friendly environments where capital is treated with a little more respect. Maybe another way to put it is that the business environment is a lot more friendly. As I pointed out a minute ago, capital always flows to where it can get the best return and where there is the least risk.

In this day and age in this environment in Canada we have a $535 billion debt and we are going into debt at a rate of $40 billion a year or perhaps even more than that. We have some of the highest interest rates in the world. We have some of the highest taxes in the world. We have all kinds of competitive disadvantages. We have hot competition because of free trade with the United States and Mexico. Through GATT we have more trade pressures from around the world. Given all these factors I think it would be foolhardy to support the legislation. Therefore I will be voting against it.

[Reform Party, October 25th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, one year ago today Reform defied the odds, confounded our critics and thrilled our supporters as 52 of us were elected to the House of Commons.

Canadians saw in Reform the fresh wind of change. They saw men and women just like themselves who believed in what they believe in. Live within your means. Protect honest citizens. Listen to the people. In short, use common sense. That is exactly what they told us.

That is exactly what we intend to do. While the government wrestles with change and fights it every step of the way, we embrace it. While it takes tiny steps and as my hon. friend says, sets the hurdle very low, we stride ahead. While it breathes each other's air, we say: "Crack open the doors and let the fresh breeze of Reform blow in".

[Supply, October 25th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I am curious about a couple of comments made by the hon. member. One was with respect to business subsidies. He said that in many cases subsidies are made to businesses that are uncompetitive.

I guess he is implying that it is okay to make subsidies to businesses that are competitive. In that case, it is kind of redundant in my judgment. I have to wonder whether the member, given his remarks, can justify any subsidies to business at all.

Is the hon. member so committed to deficit reduction that he would give up his MP's pension, should he ever be lucky enough to get that far, given the Bloc's stand? Would he go on record today saying that he is opposed to MPs pensions as they stand now, especially considering his stand on things like family trusts which he would argue confer special privilege?

Obviously that is what MP pensions do. Let us hear what the member has to say on that issue.

[Old Age Security Act, October 20th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I apologize to the hon. member. I missed the first part of what he was saying but he spoke largely on the aspect of confidentiality. There is no question in my mind that is something we have to be careful of.

Obviously this country has a long history of trying to keep records of a personal nature confidential. I point to the problems that can occur when those things get out. In fact if memory serves, in Ontario a provincial minister resigned over that issue. There is no question that is something we have to be cautious of. It is an area I think the hon. member knows more about than I do. Having said those things I will leave it at that.