Charlie Penson

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 12th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, it is a matter of whether the public will still like us on election day in 1997. That is the challenge I am throwing out to members opposite: bring in a realistic pension plan and I think the Canadian public will have some faith in the whole process, but if we continue to set our standards higher than those of ordinary Canadians they will have no faith.

We have heard the debate in the House that takes place on old age security and Canada pension. We know those two programs are under heavy pressure and it may not be possible to sustain them. There has even been talk about moving the age limit back to 67 for people to receive old age security. That suggestion was made because we are in such serious financial difficulty in the country that the interest on the debt is consuming more and more of these very, very important programs.

That is the kind of pressure the public is going to face: a Canada pension plan that may not be sustainable, old age security that may not be sustainable. At the same time, in what direction are MPs going? We are going with a gold plated pension plan-not as much as before, but significantly higher than the public and private sector.

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 12th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased for the opportunity to speak on this important bill that has consumed the House for quite some time. It has actually consumed debate in the country for several years prior to the lead up to the past election.

When I campaigned and even prior to my campaign in the election of 1993 this was a very important issue in my riding of Peace River. It caught people's attention because they think there is a double standard with politicians doing one thing and then asking the Canadian public to do another. Politicians were writing the rules for their own pension plan which is overly generous. It was up to six times more generous than any private or public sector plan. I heard it many times.

I did not hear any debate about MPs' salaries, but at every meeting I went to in the riding I heard about the issue of the MPs pension plan and how it was overly generous. It is a matter the Canadian people want us to clear up. It is not good enough to bring in a revised plan that is twice or three times more generous than the Canadian average. They want a plan that is on an equivalent basis.

Members opposite who are shaking their heads will find, if they ram the plan through, that they face the consequences when they go to the electorate the next time around.

Our alternative has been to say that we need a pension plan that is fair, honest and open with Canadians, but if we cannot achieve it at this point we will opt out. That is what Reform members have done.

I have received a lot of feedback in my riding about the matter. People have said: "At least you are honest with us and are saying that you will not jump into a plan that is two and one-half or three times more generous than any other pension plan in the country".

When we discuss the issue and as we talk back and forth across this place members on the other side consider the salary and the MPs pension plan to be one package. That is a big mistake. It has led to the idea that we can have career politicians in Canada. People have said they want a pension plan that does not encourage career politicians. That is another point people in the Peace River riding told me about. They want people to run for office who have done something with their lives before coming to the Chamber so that they can bring some real life experiences to the job. They do not want people elected at 22 years of age who plan to be here for their entire lives.

My understanding is the President of the Treasury Board brought forward a pretty good plan to his Liberal caucus in December. It was a lot more reflective of the current mood in the country and the current average. What happened to it? Who led the charge against it? It was the rat pack of 1984 and 1988. The rat pack has become the fat cat pack. They are the ones who could not accept the revised pension plan. Some members sitting over there will know what I am talking about because they led the charge against it. The President of the Treasury Board had to withdraw. I understand he was almost dismembered in caucus by the Liberal Party. What did he do? He could do nothing except bring forward a plan that was somewhat lower than the pension plan they had previously but was still not good enough.

We see members opposite arguing day in and day out that we have to accept the plan or our option in the Reform Party is to opt out. We will take that challenge and we have taken it. It is not that we can afford to do it any more than anyone else, but we have to identify with the Canadian people. We have to set an example. We have to lead by example in the Chamber and that is exactly what we are doing.

My understanding is that one Liberal member has also done it. I think we will see a few more once they get some feedback. If this issue were allowed to go until the summer recess some other Liberal members would come back to the House and say: "I am going to opt out of the plan as well".

I take this opportunity to deal with another issue. The gist of what is going on across the floor right now is what I want to talk about. The member for Calgary Centre rose in the House to talk about the issue. At least he was honest. He told the Canadian public that we had to put the matter into perspective, that if we factored in MPs salary, expense allowance which is tax free and housing allowance, in terms of actual dollars before taxes they would total about $120,000. If we threw in a reasonable pension plan it would be up to $150,000. That is what he was saying. He was trying to put the matter into perspective. He was trying to tell Canadians exactly what politicians are getting right now. I welcomed his addition to the debate.

What happened? The people on the other side of the House totally misrepresented that. All we expect from over there is honesty and openness with the Canadian public. That is exactly what the member for Calgary Centre said. He said: "If you were honest you would say this is the value of the pension plan and the salary at the moment". That is the kind of debate we need.

He threw out the challenge to put it to the Canadian public to decide what the MPs salary should be. I think they would find that it should be higher. If they do not, I am prepared to live with the results. When we set our own salary and our own pension we start to get into trouble. It does not show leadership by example. We had better throw it out to a panel that will cross the country, hold hearings and talk to ordinary Canadians before we talk

about raising any MPs salary. The member for Calgary Centre is just giving the reality of today, what is actually in place.

As I was travelling in my riding I heard over and over again that MP's have put themselves in a class above the Canadian people. I believe there is a lot of cynicism out there about politics right now. I ran into that myself. One person said: "Charlie, I wish I would have met you before you went into politics because I think I would have liked you". It is a little slam against the profession. What he was saying was that the job as an MP is falling into disrepute.

Why is that happening? One of the reasons is that we have double standards. We have a standard for MPs and we have a standard for ordinary Canadians. That is not good enough. It is something that has to be changed.

Because of the misunderstanding and misrepresentation on the other side of the House of the member for Calgary Centre on the issue when he was honest and open with discussion in the Chamber, I move:

That the member for Calgary Centre be now heard.

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 4th, 1995]

Madam Speaker, one of the comments by the member for Winnipeg-St. James was that year in and year out he has heard the Reform Party being cynical and talking about how bad politicians are in this country. It seems to me that we have not been around for all that long, but the Canadian public has had some cynicism with regard to politicians for quite a while. Probably a lot of that was during the time he was on this side of the House.

The hon. member has a reputation for being one of the worst members in terms of attack, yet he is talking about the Reform Party. We hear personal attacks every day from him. I think he is totally out of line.

If he did not want to run for office, nobody forced him. He can retire.

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 4th, 1995]

Let us examine the rhetoric from this side of the House when the members who are over on the government side now were over here. We had the famous rat pack. I think we all know who they are. They enjoy some of the front benches over there now. What did they say? They called for a change to the MP pension plan. My understanding is that when the President of the Treasury Board brought in what was a reasonable plan in December to the Liberal caucus, they were the ones who led the charge against it. So the rat pack it seems has become the fat cat pack these days. We see this every day.

Who is going to be the judge of this MP pension plan? It is not me as the member for Peace River, in the final analysis. It is not going to be the member for St. Boniface. It is going to be the Canadian public, the voters, our constituents.

The member for St. Boniface said that we should carefully consider and consult our family members when and if we decide to opt out. He would seem to suggest that we have not been doing that. Well I do not believe that other members of the Reform Party caucus did not consult their families. I know I certainly did, and it was a joint decision. However, it becomes more than consulting family. I also consulted constituents. I have been doing it for a long time. And constituents tell us that this plan is still far too generous.

The member also seemed to lump the business of pay and salary into the MP pension plan. It is all part and parcel as far as he is concerned. I do not believe it is. I believe that if we have a problem or we do not believe the pay is high enough for a member of Parliament, we should deal with that issue up front and involve the Canadian public in that discussion. This is a separate matter altogether, and it has to be dealt with that way.

The member for St. Boniface also talked about the RRSP. He suggested that the Canadian taxpayer would be on the hook for more money through a loss in taxes if we went the route of all members opting out and using the RRSP. There is certainly some merit in what he says, but it is not making special rules; it is following rules under the RRSP program that other Canadians are under. So we are all in the same category. That is talking about having the same standard for everybody.

I know that many members of our caucus intend to use that route once we are able to access our money that is being currently collected under the MP pension plan, the 11 per cent that is being deducted, to put it into RRSPs. Many of us have been doing that for a long time. I think it shows leadership in the fact that we are willing to look after our own retirement. That is what a lot of Canadians are going to have to do in the future, because the old age security plan and Canada pension plan are not sustainable. The reason they are not sustainable is that this country is in very serious financial problems.

I know the Minister of Finance recognized that to some degree in his budget when he suggested that we need to cut $4 billion in services to Canadians. He also said we should raise a billion dollars in taxes. It was very interesting that in doing so we would almost expect the federal budget for this year to be decreased by $5 billion, the amount of those cuts and the extra money that is being raised. In fact, the budget is going to be higher by almost half a billion dollars. Why is that? It is because the interest on the debt is starting to be a very serious problem in this country. It is taking a larger and larger portion of our government budget.

It is eating into those necessary services we are talking about, both the Canada pension plan and old age security. We need to encourage people to look after themselves through their own retirement savings. That does not mean the Government of

Canada is doing it for them, such as the MPs. It means that they look after themselves through RRSPs and any other private plan they can put in place.

I am going to wrap up here. To me, the most important thing is that the Canadian public will be the final judge of this plan. If cautions are going to be issued by members across the way in regard to the seriousness of opting out, we should also be cognizant that the Canadian public is watching very closely what is happening in this Chamber today during this debate on the MPs pension plan.

The public wants a plan that is reasonable, that is consistent with national standards for both the public and private sectors, not anything MPs give themselves over and above what is the norm in Canadian society. The public will be the final judge next election day. I throw that out as a caution to members opposite.

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 4th, 1995]

I think we have to examine the past plan. Let us do a comparison. As I said, we only had to be in the House for two terms or six years to be eligible for the MP pension plan under the previous plan, which is five or six times more generous than the average Canadian private sector or public sector plan.

So what is introduced in the new pension plan, the one that is going to correct the problem? We have a pension plan where we are still eligible at age 55. That does not seem to fit with most public and private plans. It certainly is not the case with the old age security. In fact, we are talking about moving that to age 67, since the plan cannot be sustained.

What else do we have? We still have a plan that is two and a half or three times more generous than the average public or private sector plan. It does not fit. It is not acceptable.

What about the future? We know there is an opting out formula in the plan of 60 days for those members who wish to opt out. I am one of the members who wants to, and I certainly will. But that will not apply to future MPs. They do not have that option. Why not? It would seem to me it is a reasonable option to put in there. Anybody who wants to look after their own retirement should be able to do so, but not under this plan as far as future MPs are concerned. They will be obliged to belong. There again is a problem.

We had the minister and some other members stand in this House this morning trying to justify the new plan that is being brought forward. As I said, there are many reasons why the Canadian public is not going to accept this.

All of this is happening at a time when politicians need to show strong leadership in this country. It is a time when we have a record federal debt: $550 billion and growing at the rate of $120 million a day. It is time for MPs to stand up and show leadership. What would that mean? It would mean accepting a plan that is the average of what most Canadians have. Is that too much to expect from leadership in this country? I do not believe it is.

We have Canada's official loyal opposition-what do those members intend to do with this plan? It seems very ironic that those members, with the expressed goal of wanting to opt out of Canada, as they tell us every day in this House, want to opt into the new MPs' pension plan. I do not understand the logic. It must mean that they plan on staying longer than they originally had intended. It seems to me that is a real contradiction. I cannot understand why they would not want to take the opt out formula along with the rest of us in the Reform Party.

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 4th, 1995]

Madam Speaker, today we are here to debate an act to amend the Members of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act. Canadians know this as the MP pension plan. That is what we are really talking about today. I am happy to rise and make some comments about the MP pension plan that is being introduced.

Unfortunately, it is not as good as the model that was brought forward by the President of the Treasury Board in December. But he was not able to sell that plan to his Liberal caucus, and now we see the results: an MPs' pension plan that is being introduced today that is still obscene because it is twice as rich as any public sector or private sector pension plan.

During the run up to the election of 1993, when I was seeking the nomination and I was out campaigning I heard from my constituents in Peace River over and over and over again on this. It was the issue that captured my attention and the attention of all other politicians from all other parties who were campaigning there. They heard from the Canadian public and the public in Peace River that MPs have a pension plan that is a double standard with what most Canadians can receive, either in the public or private sector.

That to me has developed a very cynical electorate out there. There were a number of new members elected to the House in the election. One reason they were elected is because the public is very cynical about politicians. This used to be a noble calling. That is not the way the Canadian public regards it any more.

I have to tell members a story about one of the first meetings I attended as a politician after my nomination. It said a lot about how people regard politicians and politics and the reason for it. I was speaking at a small community meeting of about 40 people. I had spoken for about 10 or 15 minutes and then we stopped to have coffee. I was circulating and talking to different members of the audience. One fellow about 75 years old, a rancher type who had spent a lot of time outdoors, a weathered and very interesting fellow, came up to me and we had a very interesting conversation for about four or five minutes. Finally, he was going to take his leave and wish me well and say goodbye. The comments he made I thought were very relevant. He said: "You know, Charlie, I wish I had met you before you went into politics. I think I would have liked you".

That says a lot about how people regard politicians these days. One reason for that degree of cynicism about politicians is that they see we have double standards. The double standard that is most obvious, I believe, is the MP pension plan.

During the course of the campaign I think I heard only one comment about MPs' salaries. It was not an issue. People think that MPs should be paid well. But they do not believe they should get a pension plan that is five or six times more generous than that of the average person in the public. And that is what we are addressing here today.

This pension plan is a step in the right direction. Like so much of the legislation the party across brings forward, this is a step in the right direction but it is not far enough.

[Members Of Parliament Retiring Allowances Act, May 4th, 1995]

Like most Canadians have to do.

[Lobbyists Registration Act, May 3rd, 1995]

To whom does he report?

[Substance Abuse In Prisons, April 28th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, over the Easter break I visited the Edmonton maximum security prison to get a better understanding of how this institution operates. I was shocked to learn that there is an enormous substance abuse problem among prisoners. When I inquired how this could possibly be the case, I was told that drugs are smuggled in by visitors during visitation periods.

My immediate reaction was that visitation in maximum security prisons should be stopped. The warden agreed that this was his preferred solution. If prisoners want visitation they should earn the right through good behaviour and self-improvement. They could then be transferred to medium security institutions.

What is Corrections Canada's solution to this problem? It is to provide inmates with bleach to clean their needles in response to this substance abuse. That sounds like sheer lunacy to me. Why do they not stop visitation rights and clean up this problem?

[Budget Implementation Act, 1995, April 26th, 1995]

Did you run your farm like that?