Robert Thibault

[Pearson Peacekeeping Centre, May 7th, 2007]

moved:

That, in the opinion of the House, the government should fully fund the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre to assure that it continues to operate in Nova Scotia.

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in this House to speak on a issue that is extremely important not only for Canada, but for Canada's international reputation, for our allies—the people who work with us on peacekeeping missions abroad—and for the people who work for the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre in Nova Scotia, Ottawa and Montreal. The centre, which has been in existence since 1994, is doing an outstanding job and continuing to evolve. However, staff never know from one year to the next where the centre's funding will come from or how it will keep on providing good services.

My motion asks the government to provide ongoing funding for the Pearson Centre so that it has the financial stability necessary to reassure everyone we work with in this area that the centre will continue to operate in Canada and abroad in the coming years. The motion also aims to guarantee to the people of Nova Scotia and the Kespuwick Industrial Park that the Pearson Centre will continue to be there, providing jobs and services. The centre is in dire straits at present. Not only is the government refusing to provide ongoing funding, limiting its commitment to the next three years and indicating that they will be the final years of funding, but it is also refusing to honour past funding agreements for operations in Nova Scotia.

Often, the government refuses to support regional operations, and officials find all sorts of reasons why it is very hard to operate in the regions and preferable to do so in Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto or Vancouver—and they even find reasons not to operate in Vancouver. The government prefers to operate in the major cities in central Canada. I encourage the government and invite the members of this House to look at this issue and consider what the role of the Government of Canada is, if it is not to promote regional development.

The situation we now find ourselves in with the Pearson centre is troubling. It is very troubling for our allies, but is also troubling for all the Canadians working in peacekeeping operations and especially the people working In Kespuwick Park in Cornwallis or in Deep Brook, Nova Scotia.

The Pearson Peacekeeping Centre was established in 1994. At that time, we saw the closure of CFB Cornwallis, the major employer in that area. There was some restructuring within the military. There were some cutbacks at the federal level because we had a huge deficit at the time. For my part of the country, the loss of 700 jobs in that area was very difficult.

A group of volunteers and civic leaders got together and formed the Cornwallis Park Development Agency. They received some funding from the federal government through various departments, a lot of it through ACOA but a lot through DND and the external affairs department, to see how we could turn the negative story of a base closure into a positive economic story for western Nova Scotia. It has been a tremendous success because a lot of players have come together. One of the things the federal government did was create the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre and establish its operations out of the former CFB Greenwood.

Ken Ozmon, president of St. Mary's University at the time, was chairman of the board. A lot of good people went to work there. They offered courses internationally. They brought together people from the military, non-governmental organizations, policing outfits and the Red Cross and things like that and trained them in peacekeeping operations. Nationals from many countries were brought there and they looked at how to apply the three Ds principle of peacekeeping and peacemaking: defence, diplomacy and development.

Also, extramural activities were started by the staff of Pearson, with organized training sessions in other countries, in over 30 countries and in three languages. Those courses were offered out of the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre where training sessions were held.

The first level of funding was supposed to be for five years. Then it was to be self-supporting from the sale of services. That did not quite happen, so we had to come in again with some new funding, which we did. We refunded the project and the Pearson centre made some changes. It moved the marketing officers at the beginning in Montreal and Ottawa and established a presence on the campus of Carleton University.

Then, in the dying days of the last government, we came to an agreement in working with the Annapolis Basin Conference Centre, which was established on the base. Its purpose was to use the hospitality facilities on the base to create a conference centre whereby it could sell rooms to and organize conference training sessions for the general Canadian public and internationals alongside what the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre was doing.

The Pearson Peacekeeping Centre reached a deal, financed by the federal government through ACOA and DND, and I believe there was some funding from the external affairs department, whereby the Annapolis Basin Conference Centre purchased the facilities of the Pearson centre and upgraded them and then was to sell the services to the Pearson centre. It is a marvellous deal. The facilities would be operated more efficiently and used for more purposes, such as international schools and all sorts of things.

Then what the federal government did to ensure the success of the story was guarantee the purchase of services and the purchase of seats from the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre. Everybody wins in this story. The Annapolis Basin Conference Centre becomes self-financing and has better facilities, while the Pearson centre concentrates on what it does best, which is programming, and we keep those valuable jobs in the area, jobs that can support other things. That base also has the Acadia cadet camp, Camp Acadia, which we financed for the long term, and these same people sell services, so it was a very good deal.

Now we learn that the government has withdrawn from that. My motion intends to re-establish that relationship.

I want to take the House back to Kespuwick Park and what CF Cornwallis Base became. What were the other things that we were able to establish there? They include the Annapolis Basin Conference Centre, which I mentioned, Camp Acadia, which I mentioned, and also the military museum. I was at the museum on the weekend for the Battle of the Atlantic ceremonies and the rededication of the stained glass windows honouring the 24 Canadian vessels lost in the Battle of the Atlantic.

We also have, of course, the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre, and Discovery Toys, with 80 jobs, manufacturing out of homes and selling internationally. There is also Acadian Seaplants, a local company but international in perspective, doing high end research and development, funded from its own resources but participating in the Atlantic investment partnership program. There is a fibreglass business doing very complex structures and shapes and providing many jobs.

There was also Shaw Wood, which unfortunately had to close after I believe five years of operation selling solely to the Ikea market, leaving behind a very good facility for which we hope we can find an entrepreneur to take over where Shaw Wood left off. There is the Convergys Call Centre. I should have checked on the number of jobs there, but I believe it is over 600, and it is still looking for employees. There also are quite a few smaller businesses and public institutions.

The success story is quite good for that park. There are more jobs in that park now than there were when the military was operating. Also, all the residential facilities have been turned into retirement homes and summer residences, thus adding to the economy.

As well, the federal government, through ACOA, participated in funding the LIFEPLEX Wellness Centre that is operating there now. It has very good health facilities, with a swimming pool, running track, weight rooms, exercise rooms and physio facilities. It is a very good project. We funded phase one of it. However, the president of its board thought he was smarter than the federal government and thought he should do both phases before he had the full funding, so the municipality had to step in and take over the debt left behind by the president of that organization.

Luckily, the municipality did that and the population now has access to it, but it was a huge debt. However, this is not unknown to that gentleman. He was minister of finance for Nova Scotia where I believe he left behind an $8.5 million debt. He will be running for the Conservatives in the next federal election and trying to continue his great tradition.

Thus, that part has been a very good success story, and an anchorstone within that park is Pearson. As I mentioned, there is the relationship with the Annapolis Basin Conference Centre. When we look at the synergy created there, we see that it means over 100 jobs for rural Canada, for western Nova Scotia.

Bureaucrats will tell us that they would prefer to be doing that training in Ottawa because people find it difficult to get to the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre. Let me tell members something. The people we are training there are going to be serving in Afghanistan. They are going to be serving in Haiti. They are going to be serving in Darfur. They are going to be serving in hot spots all over the world, so I have difficulty in understanding why they cannot take a one and one-half hour flight and a two and one-half hour ride in an air conditioned van to get to the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre. That concept escapes me, but I am not a highly educated civil servant.

I believe the role of government is to ensure that we give potential to the regions. When we look at what the volunteers have done there and at what the personnel of Pearson Peacekeeping Centre have built there over the last 13 years, we can see that it is very regrettable that the federal government now would withdraw from it. It is not acceptable. I certainly hope that I will have support from all parties for this motion to reinstitute full funding for Pearson, including its activities in western Nova Scotia.

Let us look at what the current government has been doing to rural Canada and to Nova Scotia in particular. I do not have to remind anybody of the Atlantic accord. I think we see seven editorials a day calling the government pure and outright liars in having failed Nova Scotians on the accord.

The withdrawal of the Coast Guard is not unrelated. Right after the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans got in trouble in his home province because of the Atlantic accord due to the fact that the Canada-Newfoundland and Labrador agreement was broken just like the Canada-Nova Scotia agreement, two icebreaking vessels were moved from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland.

The argument is that this is more economical, more efficient and a better business plan. It so happens that the icebreakers were sent to two different ports and, lo and behold, the two ports are represented by two Conservative members. Coincidence or economics? I would say politics. My belief is that the Coast Guard is out there to protect mariners, not save seats for ministers.

There are research vessels, DFO and the port of Digby. It is the same story. The member for Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley made accusations, serious allegations, and he had a right to do that because we all have concerns about how the money was being used by the organization that removed the port of Digby. Everybody had serious concerns. Everybody made some enquiries that ended up at arbitration.

The arbitrator reported during the last election that while the Maritime Harbour Society had not done anything counter to the agreement, had not done anything illegal, the agreement itself was very weak. It was terrible. It had a loophole so big that we could drive a truck through it, to paraphrase the report. That agreement was written by Transport Canada.

For 16 months now Transport Canada has had that report. The Conservatives, when they were in opposition, were saying how we should come to the assistance of Digby, and I agreed with them then and I agree with them now. But 16 months later the port of Digby has not been remediated, the government has not taken ownership. It is not under DFO as it should be and the facilities are not being repaired. That is not acceptable.

We could look at small craft harbours generally and the reduction of funding. The Minister of Fisheries and Oceans who was on the fisheries committee as an opposition member spoke of increasing funding and is now presiding over the reduction of funding. For the port of Digby this is serious. It is like Pearson and I want this government to act.

We had people last week, in the storm, leaning over a wharf, untrained for that type of thing, having to strap the bumpers so that they would not fall on their vessel. The minister must act. This motion speaks to Cornwallis and to the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre. I ask for the support of all members in this House.

[The Budget, May 1st, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, while Rome burns under the watch of the defence, environment and foreign affairs ministers, let us not forget the domestic discontent still bubbling over the budget.

The government's fiscal plan has opened up wounds that were painstakingly stitched together with the surgical removal of the letter P from Canada's once proud Progressive Conservative Party.

Atlantic Conservative members are feeling the heat over the government's punishment of the region in its latest budget.

The foreign affairs minister has blindly decided to follow his leader, but many of his Atlantic caucus colleagues are flirting with principle. They might even do the right thing. They might vote against their own government's budget. This would send a message, a message that Atlantic Canadians are dying to hear.

The Conservative caucus must be left wondering how the Prime Minister can narrow the widening chasm between Progressive Conservative and his Reform Party.

[April 30th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, the member opened her remarks by saying that I doubted whether the budget respected the offshore agreement. I do not doubt it. I know it did not and that is confirmed by Professor Hobson of Acadia University, who said the cost to Nova Scotia was $1 billion by his estimate.

I read a letter to the editor in the Chronicle Herald in Nova Scotia in which Hugh Roddis, president of the Kings--Hants Conservative Riding Association, was saying that Hobson was a Liberal and that he was just fighting the government. Then I saw the response that Hobson was a Conservative, and the last time he got politically involved was by giving a donation to this Conservative Party.

Premier MacDonald agrees that the government is not respecting the accord. The minister of finance of Nova Scotia agrees that it is not respecting the accord, so if I doubt, I am certainly in good company.

It extended for one year the decision or the poison pill that the premier has to take, and I understand that there is some negotiating of maybe some little side deals, more politics of division to isolate the Premier of Newfoundland and--

[April 30th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise before the House to ask the government a question in regard to the Atlantic accord. In particular, I am interested in the Canada-Nova Scotia agreement.

The agreement was negotiated after long discussion. I remember Premier John Hamm travelling around the country. I met with him a number of times, as did many colleagues. He had many meetings with finance officials, his officials and the prime minister to discuss a way we could take the offshore resources of Nova Scotia and maximum the revenue to Nova Scotians of those resources. Newfoundland and Labrador was doing the same thing at the same time.

Previous to these agreements, 75% of the revenues would directly benefit Nova Scotians, but the other percentages would go against equalization. The argument raised in Nova Scotia was that these amounts of money, which lowered our equalization, should be invested in the long term benefit to Nova Scotians.

We know Nova Scotia had a long stint of Conservative government, leaving them with huge debt, over $8.5 billion in debt. I remember Greg Kerr, the minister of finance, spending money on everything, leaving Nova Scotians with this huge debt. Finally, there was an opportunity to lower that debt and give Nova Scotians the services they needed and they deserved.

We had critical discussions in the House. I remember a first agreement was proposed. The Premier of Nova Scotia and the Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador did not agree with it. Members of the opposition, the Conservative Party at the time, told us that everybody should be fighting for their provinces. I remember the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans saying that sometimes we had to put politics and partisanship aside and fight for our province.

Lo and behold we had an agreement. What it said was that Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador would keep 100% of their revenues from non-renewable resources for an eight year period, renegotiable for another eight year period. An interim cheque was given to Nova Scotia, an initial payment of $840 million, as I recall.

That money was paid against the provincial debt of Nova Scotia. That means Nova Scotia would get $40 million or $50 million of services a year for which it would otherwise have to be taxed, or from which it would have to borrow money, money that it saved by not having to make interest payments abroad on that money.

That was good news and we saw it was progressing. Then we had a change in government. The same Conservatives had fought for that accord. Remember the debate in the House. They said that we should even break it off from the other budget measures, that we should vote for it independently because they were so supportive of it.

In the first budget the Conservatives came out with there was a little line in the budget saying that the accord was not selling so well across the country, that it was a benefit to Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador that the others did not have. Then in the next budget, all of a sudden Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador lost the Atlantic accord. They lost the provision in the accord that made the it independent of any other programs. If Nova Scotia's equalization went up, revenues from the accord would continue to flow. If there were other programs, such as child care, as had been done under the previous government, it would not affect the offshore accord. That extra money would come into Nova Scotia. Any money for infrastructure would be independent of the accord.

Then in the recent budget the premier was told he would have to make a choice. He had to decide if he would go with the new equalization formula, which would give him roughly $70 million more a year, or stick with his Atlantic accord. It was a poison pill to the premier.

Will the government reverse its decisions? Will it protect the entire intent of the Canada-Nova Scotia offshore accord?

[April 30th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for her speech on the court challenges program, which has been so essential to linguistic minority groups.

She used Saskatchewan as an example. Her family lived in a community where there was no opportunity to receive an education or training in French, the family's mother tongue.

My grandfather was elected for the first time in 1907, in Nova Scotia. It was against the law in Nova Scotia to teach Acadians in their mother tongue. Thus, he had to appoint a inspector of francophone schools who would turn a blind eye when French-language textbooks were used. French-language textbooks did exist. One hundred years later, after the year 2000, there were still court challenges before the Supreme Court of Canada. Those cases were funded by the court challenges program, thereby giving us francophone schools and allowing us to run our schools.

The Conservatives say they support the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They say they want to ensure that federal programs are beyond dispute. However, they seem to ignore the fact that we must also live with provincial programs and that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms applies to all those programs. I think it is fair to say that they want to destroy the charter by destroying resources.

[Business of Supply, April 26th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, on the contrary, the New Democrats are not proposing any solution. They are saying simply that we should suddenly and immediately pull out of this mission in the Kandahar region of Afghanistan—goodbye, we are leaving—without any replacements.

We are not giving the Conservatives carte blanche. We are talking about a withdrawal in 2009, as voted in this House. That is the will of the House and therefore must be respected.

We predict that in February 2009, we, the Liberals, will form the government. At that time, we will make the decisions and take action as the government. We are in no way giving carte blanche to the Conservatives, who will then be on the opposition benches.

[Business of Supply, April 26th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I do not think the member understood the motion that was put before the House by the Liberal Party on an opposition day motion.

The motion was not saying that the Government of Canada would remove its troops from Afghanistan. The motion was that we advise our partners within NATO that we would be withdrawing from the mission in Kandahar in February 2009, as per a previous vote of the House, that we would maintain that commitment in that time, and that we would give a lot of time for our allies to find a replacement nation to carry on that role in that area.

We did not say that we would bring out all our military. We did not say we would stop the diplomatic or developmental work. All we are saying is that within that one region, that one mission, perhaps it is time for another one. Perhaps we should be telling our men and women that one rotation is enough.

When we hear the minister saying that 2009 is the limit, which is what the minister stated in the House, that 2009 is the limit for now, but we hear that he has made some orders for tanks to be delivered in that area after February 2009, our men and women in the service are nervous. They remember that not too long ago he thought about extending terms of service within the rotation. He talked about cross-training from other services, that perhaps the navy or--

[Business of Supply, April 26th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this motion which I cannot support.

I look at this motion and I remember the debate last year or maybe the year before when NDP members were saying that our troops should not be in Afghanistan but that they should all be in Kandahar. I do not know what they thought they would do in Kandahar. Maybe they thought they would have a marshmallow and a weenie roast. I think the bullets pierce the skin there also. It is just as dangerous.

I was part of the government that, in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001, had to come to grips with a brand new international situation. The West went through something it had never experienced before: a major terrorist attack at home. A NATO member country, a Canadian partner, was attacked by an organization sponsored by a country. An attack on one NATO member country is an attack on all member countries, and they must respond. That is what Canada did. We made a commitment, along with other NATO partners, to oust the Taliban regime, which had planned the attack with al-Qaeda. We knew that we were not setting out on a quick, three to six month-long international mission. We knew that our soldiers would not be coming home soon.

As a member of this House and a minister at the time, I knew in my heart that it would be a long mission. We were going into a country in trouble, and if we ousted the regime, we would create a period of total instability, which is what we have now. NATO asked us to play a very demanding role: to go into Kandahar, probably the most difficult region in all Afghanistan. We agreed.

The current Conservative government introduced a motion in this House to increase our involvement and guarantee to NATO member countries that we would remain in Afghanistan until 2009 at least. I voted in favour of that motion, not because I agreed with it, because I was opposed to it in principle. But I maintain that this is a decision by the government. The government has to explain it to Canadians and suffer the consequences. The decision cannot be made in the House of Commons after only three hours of debate and without all the information we need to come to a decision about something like this.

The decision was imposed on me, and I voted in favour of the motion, which supported our men and women serving in Afghanistan or preparing to leave for duty there. The motion also supported the other NATO member countries which, like us, are taking risks.

I believe that it is quite reasonable to tell the other member countries that we are going to put an end to this situation, where we are most at risk. I do not believe that we need to tell NATO right away when we are going to withdraw completely from Afghanistan. Our party proposed a motion saying that we would withdraw from the Kandahar region in February 2009, which would have given the other NATO members plenty of time to find a replacement to take over our role in that region.

That is not what is being asked here. The New Democrats voted against our motion and today they are asking us to say so long to the member states of NATO, to say we are leaving, we are gone. They want us to say the same thing to the Afghans whom we are currently protecting and who, like us, had hopes for a better country. We have to tell them that we are no longer there to protect them, to help with their development, and that they can be massacred by internal factions in Afghanistan that want to go back to the days of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, and all that. They want us to leave these people behind. I cannot accept that.

I attended a conference organized by the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre from my riding, at the building across the street, the National Press Club in Ottawa. I listened to soldiers who served over there. Some sergeants said that Canadians had won all the battles in Kandahar—all of them. I also listened to representatives from the Red Cross and the RCMP who told us that if we withdraw, it would be game over. We want there to be to assist in development and bring in diplomacy. The Liberal Party, and everyone else, wants the 3D system. We cannot have development and diplomacy without security, and that is what our troops are there for. This is a difficult role that they are fulfilling wonderfully, and I commend them for that.

However, we must protect them. We have to let them know how much longer they will be there and what their involvement will be. We have to assure these troops, these young men and women, that there will be one rotation, not two or three. They are not going to be in that region for 10 or 15 years because there is going to be one rotation and they will no longer be there.

What I should absolutely mention, and what I think is important for Canadians to understand if they are questioning the decision of whether or not we should be in Afghanistan, is what our military stands for, and that is the right to debate the decisions of the government. That is what freedom is.

It is not an absence of support for our troops when Canadians say we should or should not be there, or when they have their discussions or we have them here in the House. When I hear the government say that people who question the role are not supporting the troops, I find that completely idiotic and completely counterproductive. I support the role they are playing. Others may not. They have a right to that opinion. That is democracy.

The other question that I think is very important to raise at this time is the question that we have been debating on the Geneva convention. If we members of the opposition in this House are so strong in support of the Geneva convention and making sure that we are not contravening it by turning our prisoners of war over to people who may be contravening it, it is in defence of our fighting women and fighting men.

Either in this conflict or future conflicts 50 years down the line, our fighting women and fighting men may be prisoners of war. Their protection of not being abused and tortured is that all countries live with the agreement of the Geneva convention. They live within its boundaries and its restrictions. If we knowingly or unknowingly break the convention, we are ultimately putting at risk our soldiers, our fighting women and men, in the future.

Therefore, I hope and I ask that the Prime Minister will take this question seriously, that he recognize that his government has been unable to do that at present, that his minister has been unable to have the confidence of Canadians, of our allies and of our military. He has the ability to do that.

It is not the fault of the military. We do not blame the military. The members of the military do their role in the field and they turn prisoners over in accordance to the instructions that are given. The instructions have been to turn them over to the Afghani authorities rather than create prisons.

There are serious questions, questions brought forth at many levels by Canadian organizations, the foreign affairs department and Corrections Canada, and by the Afghani government and international organizations that say these prisoners may be at risk.

I am not going to give absolutes as to whether or not they were tortured because I do not know, but they may be at risk. That in itself is a contravention. If we are turning them over in a situation where we are not sure, where even our Department of Foreign Affairs tells us that it is not sure, that it cannot guarantee they are being handled properly and in accordance with the Geneva convention, I would not accept that for a moment if a combatant country, an enemy of Canada, was doing that with our soldiers in a conflict.

I would not accept it for a moment if a country that kept prisoners, rather than treating them in accordance with the convention, turned them over to another country where they might be at risk. I think it is what we talked about in the Arar case, where the Americans turned over to Syria a person they had in their possession. We know about the rest of that case.

I think it is important to take this matter seriously. I think it would be the wrong message to send to our partners and to Canadians and to our military if we did not. I went to three funerals of soldiers who died in Afghanistan. I have seen their families.

There is a soldier in the last incident who is from the Yarmouth area, whose legs were severely damaged. Six of his colleagues were lost. He supports the mission. To tell him today, without any resolution to the conflict, without any security for the Afghanis, that his six colleagues were lost for nothing, for no resolution, for no future for this, and that he will have difficulties with his legs for the rest of his life and it was all for naught, it would be completely irresponsible.

To tell Jim Davis of Bridgewater, whose son died there, that his son was lost for nothing, that it was a mistake, that in one resolution of the House without fully considering the repercussions on those people for whom he lost his life to improve their situation, to do that with one vote, it would be completely irresponsible.

To tell the Thibodeaus in my riding, whose son took a year off university with the reserves and is now in Afghanistan, that his risk is all for naught, it would be completely irresponsible.

I cannot support the motion.

[Points of Order, April 26th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, what is important to note for the record, in support of the member for Wascana, is that if this side stands in support of the Geneva convention, it does so on behalf and for the purpose and benefit of our fighting women and men, who in this conflict or future conflicts could be prisoners of war. We would expect that they be treated in accordance with the Geneva convention. The best way to do that is to—

[Afghanistan, April 26th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, the Conservative government claims it had no knowledge of detainee abuse and yet we now know that foreign affairs knew, the Afghan government knew, and Correctional Service Canada knew. The defence minister continued his strategy until he panicked and pulled out his so-called new arrangement out of the air yesterday.

Does the minister honestly think Canadians are buying any of this? Why should Canadians trust anything the government tells them about this mission?