Gurmant Grewal

[Canada Small Business Financing Act, November 17th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I am happy to speak on Bill C-53. I oppose this bill, which I spoke to at second reading.

Government members have talked about bank mergers and the Reform Party opposing the bill for the sake of opposing. That is garbage. We are not opposing the bill for the sake of opposing. My party's leader was accused of something he did not do. That is normal practice for them. The media used to do that but have learned a lot and do not do it anymore. Canadians have learned about that and my colleagues from the other opposition parties are learning that. However, the Liberals are slow to learn. Some of the members will never learn, but let us forget about that and talk about the bill.

Motion No. 1 was put forward by the Bloc member for Mercier. The motion is similar to the motion proposed by the Bloc in committee during clause by clause consideration of the bill. The Liberal MPs in committee saw it as a friendly amendment but they voted against it anyway. We also voted against it, not because we are against increasing access to financing for small businesses but because we do not believe the way to do it is through taxpayer funded programs.

The bill is entitled an act to increase the availability of financing for the establishment, expansion, modernization and improvement of small businesses, but that is not what the bill is about. The Liberals have failed to change the bill to suit market needs. The official opposition would support the modernization of the Small Business Loans Act, the precursor of this bill, the Canada small business financing act.

We would like to support improvements in financing for small businesses because we recognize that small businesses are the backbone of our economy. They are the ones that are creating 96% of the jobs in this country. However, the Liberals are proposing something which is not good enough. I will give the reasons why the official opposition is not supporting this bill.

The objective of the bill is to increase the availability of loans to small businesses. We mean incremental loans. This bill does not provide significant additional loans to what is already being provided by the financial institutions.

In 1996 a study showed that 46% of the beneficiaries would obtain loans anyway even if the SBLA was not there.

This bill does not address the lack of working capital availability for small businesses. We are talking about equity of the businesses not debt financing. We need better tools for small businesses. The Canadian economy has evolved significantly since 1961 and essentially this legislation remains unchanged regarding types of assets eligible for financing.

The service sector, knowledge based sector and information sector form a much greater part of our economy today and have a high net employment growth. Their needs are not addressed in this bill.

Motion No. 1 does not address those needs. These questions require careful consideration in reviewing this legislation.

The bill does not provide for capital leasing which is important for small business. The bill does not provide adequate review of risk analysis. There is no provision for losses. The borrowers are not guaranteed. The financial institutions are guaranteed; even if they make bad decisions their decisions are guaranteed, but small businesses are not.

Another reason our party is not supporting the bill is because of the job creation record which is very bad. According to the auditor general the displacement effect is negative. The government is boasting that the Small Businesses Loans Act creates jobs but that is not true.

The bill does not put a mechanism in place to control the financial institutions not to charge an administrative fee, which they are not entitled to. They have been charging the administrative fee when the loans have been provided under the Small Businesses Loans Act.

Another important check should be that related borrowers do not abuse the system. The larger companies will form smaller companies or subsidiaries and will abuse the system because of the threshold limit. The auditor general has found 23 examples where related parties will collaborate and abuse the system. The act targets small businesses. It is meant to support small businesses, not large businesses.

Information on results provided to parliamentarians is not adequate. It is not sufficient. We cannot monitor the output. We cannot look at the results of the implementation of the act.

Industry Canada does not audit any accounts until a file becomes a claim file. When the file is a claim file it will be audited, but before that no one cares about it. No one looks into it.

Those are a number of the reasons that the official opposition will oppose this motion.

The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has been saying that if the current abuses of the Small Business Loans Act were curbed and if the parameters of the program were restricted, this program would require less of an allocation of funds while being effective in meeting the program's objectives.

The thresholds for financing are too high. The legislation defines small businesses as those firms that have up to $5 million in sales. What kind of small businesses are we talking about here? We are talking about medium size businesses. The Small Business Loans Act is targeted. Its objectives are to finance small businesses, not medium size businesses and not the large businesses.

Large businesses are getting enough subsidies from this government. Twenty-five million dollars was given interest free to Bombardier, a firm in Quebec. Does the government give interest free loans to small businesses? No. Canadians know that.

The job creation record and so many other things I mentioned will make sure that the official opposition is firm in its decision not to support this motion. I will not go into more detail. That is enough for members to learn something and to look into it.

Until suggested amendments are addressed, how can any member in this House support the bill? The department needs to clarify expectations and develop indicators of the program's performance in establishing, expanding, modernizing and improving small businesses.

The official opposition is for small businesses but in the true sense. We do not want to have legislation in place that has no teeth. We do not want legislation in place just to give the opportunity to pat the government on the back when it is not doing anything good for small businesses. Small businesses already pay high taxes. We know how employment insurance and CPP premiums are killing jobs and killing small businesses.

Those are the reasons the official opposition and I in particular will not support Motion No. 1.

[Lumber Industry, November 6th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, every day B.C. loses many jobs due to the closure of lumber mills. This is driving B.C. into a recession. This do nothing Liberal government caved in to the U.S. when it negotiated the softwood lumber agreement. Will the government fix the quota system or will it continue watching the British Columbia lumber industry being hit with two by fours?

[Points Of Order, November 5th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I will be brief. Since the one I described is not a government initiative but a report drafted and adopted independently by members of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs and subsequently adopted independently by the House, the onus to implement these rules changes is on Mr. Speaker.

Last June the House asked the Clerk to draft new rules regarding changes to the supply process. When the House returned in September these rules were in place. There was no need for a second step since the request was clear and the House order was in place.

The circumstances today are identical. We are coming up to a break week. I would like to know if the rules recommended in the 13th report that require standing order drafting could be in place by the time the House resumes on November 16.

I would also like Mr. Speaker to confirm my observations as to which rules are now in place and do not need a standing order change.

I suggest that when these rules are drafted, you solicit the support from private members and avoid the usual solicitation from the party leadership, particularly the cabinet. The cabinet has absolutely no say in this matter of Private Members' Business.

[Points Of Order, November 5th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order regarding a motion that was passed yesterday evening. The motion adopted the 13th report of the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

The report had all-party agreement at the committee level and yesterday was adopted unanimously in the House. The report recommended standing order changes regarding Private Members' Business.

Mr. Speaker plays a very important role in this matter. You are the protector of the private member and the keeper of our rules.

In my point of order I will argue that some of the recommendations in the report could clearly be implemented now and some may require the assistance of your clerks to draft standing order changes.

I argue that recommendations Nos. 3, 5, 7 and 8 should be implemented immediately. These changes are very briefly as follows.

When a division is taken on a private member's item, the calling of the vote will begin with the sponsor and will then proceed beginning with the back row on the sponsor side of the House and then the back row on the other side of the House. This recommendation is intended to protect private members from being intimidated by the front benches.

There is now a process in place whereby a law clerk and a parliamentary counsel of the House of Commons will be appointed to be responsible for the provision of legislative drafting services for members. That person or persons will be provided with sufficient staff.

Priority will now be given to the drafting of private members' bills and motions for members who have not previously had a bill drafted during that session of parliament.

Recommendations Nos. 1, 2, 4 and 6 would require standing order changes. I will comment briefly on these changes.

An item outside the order of precedence that has been jointly seconded by 100 members will be placed at the bottom of the order of precedence. If a bill or motion has merit, it will now move forward instead of being subjected to the lottery draw which is often frustrating and humiliating for the sponsor.

There is protection from the threat of prorogation. A private member can now reintroduce a bill at this stage.

[Business Of The House, November 5th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, as deputy opposition House leader I rise on behalf of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition to ask the government House leader the agenda for the next sitting week and the remainder of this week.

[Apec Inquiry, November 5th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, first the Prime Minister directed police involvement at APEC. Then he refused to answer any questions about it. He set up a toothless commission without real court powers to look into it. The solicitor general allegedly prejudges the commission and the Prime Minister refuses to release any key evidence. He refuses to pay the students' lawyers. Finally, the commission chair may have jeopardized the outcome of the inquiry.

When are we going to get an independent judicial inquiry from this government?

[Apec Inquiry, November 5th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the APEC commission has turned into an expensive joke.

Yesterday lawyers for the RCMP announced that they are going to ask a judge to remove the commission's chairman because he is biased.

The RCMP believes the commission is biased. The students believe it is biased. The public believes it is biased. The Prime Minister and his government are the only people happy with the commission because it is covering the Prime Minister's tracks.

Why will the Prime Minister not appoint an independent judicial inquiry to look into his involvement at APEC?

[Foreign Aid, October 30th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, apparently CIDA has suspended its foreign aid to Jamaica because $18 million of foreign aid is unaccounted for. Jamaican officials refuse to answer questions and turn over the files. In fact they shredded those files.

Why will the government not take the money previously earmarked for Jamaica and spend it in British Columbia on the RCMP which is fighting the drug trade and drug abuse? Why not use the money instead of wasting it?

[Military Missions Beyond Canadian Boundaries, October 29th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured indeed to rise to speak in support of my colleague's Motion No. 380. The motion brought forward by the official opposition's chief critic on foreign affairs, the hon. member for Red Deer, asks this House to seek majority support through an official vote in the House before Canadian military personnel are committed to an active military mission outside the country.

All members of the House should support this motion. This is a motion that would strengthen our democracy and make the executive branch of government more accountable to Canadians. This motion attempts to balance the requirements of ruling with the argument of accountability. It is a step forward in redefining responsible government as we enter the 21st century.

It seems only just and right that we should always debate and vote to support our troops before we agree to send them overseas. Our troops can then embark on their mission knowing that a majority of elected representatives from every part of Canada approve and support that mission as they go off to foreign destinations to protect freedom and democracy and defend defenceless people in so many parts of the world.

If passed, this motion will help inform Canadians. This motion will help make the foreign policy process more transparent and therefore more legitimate.

In the foreign policy paper “Canada in the World” the government claims it wants a new and broader process for foreign policy formulation, but when it comes to practising it the government fails.

By making decisions to commit our troops without debate in this House, the government is attempting to prevent itself from being held accountable for the lack of equipment and the poor grade of equipment our troops are asked to use despite year after year defence budget cuts.

Motion No. 380 asks for a debate to take place in the House every time the Liberals want to risk the lives of those who have pledged to die for our country so we can compare the capability of our armed forces to what the Liberals are asking them to do. This House is the very place where Canadians should be consulted. Canadians want the days of secret decision making to be gone.

Take note debate takes place only after a decision to dispatch our troops has already been made by the Prime Minister while on the telephone with another world leader. That is not democratic. It is autocratic and shameful.

Recently in the House we debated military action in Kosovo. Did the Liberal government have any long term plan for dealing with Kosovo? No. Did we simply have a phony emergency debate to affirm the knee-jerk decision made by the Prime Minister?

What plan does the government have to prevent a Kosovo type conflict in the future? What leadership role is this government willing to play to handle such a situation in the future in a better, more efficient and visionary manner? The government has the habit of inappropriately addressing various issues, whether taxes, the economy, justice, national unity and so on. The take note debate regarding the Kosovo decision was all the Liberal government allowed members of parliament and Canadians.

In order to deal with such problems there should be two plans. According to plan A diplomatic initiatives should be aggressively pursued at the first signs of a problem. Kosovo was an example of a too little, too late initiative by this Liberal government and other world governments. The government did not pursue plan A aggressively.

When we know plan A has failed we can go to plan B which is military action. That is where Motion No. 380 kicks in. Before we prescribe this bitter medicine Canadians will need answers to many questions. Why are we choosing a military situation over a diplomatic situation? What are the actions the government has taken? What other possible solutions can we pursue? What are the possibilities of finding a long term solution? How are we dealing with the long term persistent hatred in the minds of ethnic people? How much involvement are we asking from the other affected and related countries to deal with an issue that is in their backyards?

Canadians want to know whether we are creating more victims by sending troops. They want to know how far we will go, how much it will cost, who is paying and what share we will pay. Did the government assess the degree of risk before it committed the men and women of the Canadian Armed Forces? Do they have enough equipment and facilities? What strategy do we have to deal with the original security situation? We look forward to the answers as do Canadian forces personnel. These decisions are made before we get the answers to these questions from this government. Motion No. 380 would make the information available in a timely fashion before the decision is made.

There have repeatedly been serious situations in the world, in Rwanda, Somalia, Nigeria, Bosnia, Haiti, Iraq, and the list goes on. Such situations will happen again somewhere, someday. We are not prepared to address international conflict situations in their infancies. We should be. We should be able to monitor and perhaps predict when economic, social, cultural, political or other factors are creating conflict in different parts of the world and we should address the conflicts before we have to use costly military force anywhere in the world.

Canadians are proud of their tradition of caring and intervention for the sake of peace but the world cannot continue to merely react to these situations. We have sent many peacekeeping missions around the world. I ask the foreign minister to look into the possibility of peacemaking missions rather than peacekeeping missions.

I cannot understand how we can keep peace when it is not even made yet. How can we keep something that does not exist? Let me give an analogy. When a pressure cooker is heated, steam is produced. To contain that steam we put pressure on the pressure cooker. Suppressing the steam under weight might cause the whole thing to explode and create another mess. The best thing would be to remove the heat under the pressure cooker. No steam would be produced and we would not have to put any pressure on it.

Why do we always use military pressure to contain the steam of conflict in the world? Have we ever taken action to remove the heat under the pressure cooker? No. Would it not be easier to address the root cause of the problem? Why can we not prevent problems before they happen? That is the key question. Unfortunately this government has not taken this sort of action.

Our peacekeeping forces were stationed in Cypress for 29 years. Still peace was not made when we withdrew. We should focus on peacemaking before peacekeeping.

Conflict resolution is a precursor to peacemaking. Ethnic tensions in many parts of the world can be resolved by equitable, democratic and better governance. Pilferage and smuggling of weapons can be stopped. Child armies can be banned. Foreign aid should be tied to transparency and accountability of recipient governments. Corruption, poverty, illiteracy and education needs can and should be addressed.

The weak Liberal government lacks a proactive leadership role. It is just reactive because it is used to making knee-jerk decisions. Often a humanitarian crisis is the consequence of what is fundamentally a political problem.

For example, in the Palestine and Israel conflict in the Middle East, to help the refugees we committed $55 million in 1995. But we had already spent more than $136 million and the refugees were still be produced the day I was there in 1998. We tried to resolve political problems with financial solutions through foreign aid. This was absolutely wrong.

We need to meet these problems head on. We should make educated and democratic decisions. One of the best things to do is debate it in the House before the decision is made. I urge all members of the House to support Motion No. 380.

[Business Of The House, October 29th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, as deputy opposition House leader today is my first question to the government House leader. I am sure he will give me a good answer and not disappoint me.

What is the agenda of the House for next week and the remainder of this week that Canadians should be looking forward to?