Darrel Stinson

[Softwood Lumber, November 2nd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for International Trade explained to the House that the U.S. is tying softwood lumber to progress on other files. The parliamentary secretary said that President Bush “needs to work with that congress for certain other initiatives he wants to take” before progress can be made on softwood.

Will the acting prime minister confirm that the Americans are waiting for us to take action on a North American security perimeter and other pressing issues before they move forward on softwood lumber?

[Forest Industry, October 29th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the pine beetle infestation in British Columbia can easily be classified as a natural disaster. One would think the federal Liberals are concerned about the economic impact on B.C.'s forest industry, which provides thousands of jobs and produces billions of tax revenue for the federal coffers.

The federal Liberals have known about this problem for years now but have done absolutely nothing to help the people of British Columbia in the face of this disaster.

In a recent publication entitled “The State of Canada's Forests” Natural Resources Canada devotes a precious three sentences to the pine beetle disaster out of 112 pages, and even then grossly underestimates the magnitude of the problem.

Today I again call on the federal Liberals to drop their historic disdain for British Columbians and give us some of our forest industry tax dollars back to help us in our time of crisis.

[Customs Act, October 19th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to rise here today to speak to not only the amendments but also the bill.

We all know that since the attack on the United States on September 11 the world has changed. Most important, North America has changed. We have to look at many areas not only to tighten up Canada's security but also to address the fact that through some of these measures our trade routes might be impacted.

Canada is a nation of trade. It was built on trade. Our biggest trading partner is the United States which we depend mostly upon. In order to achieve the goals that are needed in Canada and the United States, it is necessary for all government employees to address this concern. It impacts on our daily lives, particularly on the lives of those who are trying to move trade back and forth. We already have some information that companies are looking at moving their operations south of the 49th parallel because of some of these concerns.

Bill S-23 will address some of those concerns. That is why I say here today that I give qualified support to it. I still have many concerns with regard to what has not taken place, what has not been introduced in this bill, and the speed with which this has taken place, which in my opinion has not been fast enough on a number of issues.

There are concerns expressed by the public, not only here in Canada but also in the United States. One of the big concerns we hear is that here in Canada many people think that through co-operation with the United States we will lose some of our sovereignty, that we will lose what we take to be wholly Canadian. That is not true. That part of it is a myth.

Americans have concerns that Canada will not implement a lot of what it has been talking about with regard to our borders. That has grown over the years. Even as the ministers have stated in the House, we have been very lax. We have allowed a lot of our laws and policies to be abused. That can be addressed. All of those concerns can be addressed.

What we have to understand first is that it is only a border and we are dealing with a continent. In order to achieve that, we should be harmonizing as close as possible with the allies we trade with. That becomes the most important thing. We have to be able to move our goods back and forth. We have to look at ways of speeding up the movement of the legitimate people that come to Canada.

I will quote something by Gordon Giffin who was the U.S. ambassador to Canada until last April. He talks about harmonizing, but there is another issue he discusses. “We have talked about a perimeter of defence to try and offset some of the concerns that are happening at the border and I am strongly in favour of that”.

He goes on to mention: “Perimeter policy does not imply unilateral action. Actually, it offers an opportunity for Canada to define the agenda for this dialogue”. Here is the interesting part: “Since the 1950s we have jointly defended North American airspace through NORAD, American and Canadian military personnel working together with seamless binational command authorities. Both procedures were not unilaterally imposed by the U.S. and Canada is not less sovereign for its role in that initiative. Surely if we can have a military perimeter policy, we can find better ways to collaborate on the civilian side as well. Canada and the United States share much more than geography as our shared goals that provide the foundation for this task”.

The good news is that there are people here in Canada and the United States that are working toward achieving those goals. If Europe can figure out how to simply enact legislation that allows goods to flow freely, surely we can do no less here in Canada and the United States. It becomes mandatory.

In order to achieve that, we have to look at our customs agency. Most people in Canada have the mistaken impression that the customs agents are our first line of defence. In some aspects it is true on the inspection part. A real strange thing is that our customs agency is basically underneath the revenue department and not the justice system. The citizens of our country are depending upon those customs agents out there to stop the flow across our borders of certain goods or people yet they have no power to detain them nor the equipment to stop them.

I find that very strange as do the people in the United States and other countries. If we are going to base customs strictly on revenue and taxation, then at least give our customs officers calculators and let them know that is their mandate.

If we are going to do what is necessary in order to secure our borders, then let us properly equip our customs officers. Let us train them to be officers and not tax collectors. Let us put our first line of defence back where it should be, at our borders.

Today if a customs officer has a problem with people coming into Canada, if somebody coming across the border threatens a customs officer, if a customs officer feels that he is being threatened, if he or she feels that the people coming in are armed or dangerous, they are supposed to let them cross our border unimpeded and phone the RCMP. Coming from a province where some of our customs officers may be an hour to an hour and a half away from the closest RCMP detachment, I find that very strange. In a province like British Columbia, within an hour to an hour and a half people can disappear awfully fast. They can also swap any goods being brought across the border illegally without being noticed. That is a major concern. We hear this across the board regarding our custom agents and also the American agents.

Another area of concern is the sharing of information. This must be mandatory. As we receive information about safety concerns regarding the flow of people across our borders, we should be obligated to share those concerns not just with one or two, but with all law enforcement agencies in Canada and the United States. Until we are able to harmonize that information and finally come to the realization that we are no longer innocent people in the world and can no longer live underneath the old rules that we were used to, that we must tighten our security, we will always have these concerns.

To do that we have to implement some of the amendments that are put forward in this bill and hope that the government will listen and act upon them. That becomes of primary importance. If we are to have free travel and trade routes and keep that trade flowing to eliminate hours of backlog at the border, we must address not only the concerns of the American people but also the concerns of Canadians who have come forward so strongly since September 11.

[Anti-Terrorism Act, October 17th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I say with hesitation that I will be supporting Bill C-36.

I am going to go back in history a little to the period 1993 to 1995. When I first came to the House, I said then what I say today, that the foremost responsibility of any government is the safety and well-being of its legal law-abiding citizens. Today I listen to some of the talk on both sides of the House. I can well remember standing in the House and warning about the flaws in our immigration policy, the flaws in our refugee system and how it had to be tightened up. I can well remember being called a racist. I can well remember being called a bigot. I certainly can well remember being called a fearmonger for stating exactly what happened.

A member asks what has changed now. A Liberal member still has the audacity and stupidity to ask that question. It is more rhetoric from a jackass, pure and simple. September 11 changed the minds of those on that side of the House too yet we still hear the same thing from them. It is unbelievable. They will say anything to try and change what they never addressed in the first place. They were well warned, not only by us but by their organizations. CSIS warned them. The RCMP warned them. We read from the reports and they still never accepted it. They laughed them off. It was a joke. Well it is no longer a joke.

Today I hear the talk, the worry and the concern about human rights. It is a legitimate concern but is it concern about human rights or should it be about human lives? I for one would sooner have the RCMP rounding up and detaining suspected terrorists than rounding up and taking the families of victims of terrorists to the morgues. I think the families, relatives and friends of the people who died on September 11 would have the same feelings. We do not even have to ask. That is the feeling.

Why do I have concerns? We know about Assam Raheem. We have stood in the House and asked the questions about Raheem. The minister stood and said that they knew about it, that they worked hand in hand with the American intelligence services and police forces to capture this man, that the Canadian government was well aware this man came into Canada with a false French passport. They say they were following his activities, tracking him and helping the RCMP so they must have known this man was building a bomb in the city of Vancouver. The minister was watching him. That is what was said in the House.

They know then that he also loaded this unstable bomb into the trunk of a car, drove past some of our schools and hospitals, drove past the public and drove onto one of our ferries that was loaded with people. He was allowed to transport the bomb down to the States. The minister knew what he was doing. Again they are just trying to cover their mistakes. If they did know about this and allowed a terrorist to build a bomb in the city of Vancouver and transport it on our highway system, they should be held accountable. That is why I have concerns.

I have grave concerns about what they will do with Bill C-36. When it goes to committee will some of the recommendations and concerns put forward not only by this party but by other parties in the House be heard? Will the government finally listen and implement them?

The concerns we are addressing here are not our individual concerns. They are the concerns of our constituents. In my constituency a great number of people who voted for me and who are members in our party are first and second generation immigrants. They left their countries because of the terrorist acts that go on there. They come to us with their problems and the threats they receive from some of these organizations. Yet when we bring them up in the House, the government turns a deaf ear. It tries to label us. I find that disgusting.

They say we should all work together on this and I agree. But some of us have long memories. Some of us well remember what was said to us when we brought these issues before the House. Some of us well remember what was said during the election campaign. I remember what the minister of immigration said. Has there ever been an apology? No.

I hear concerns now that we cannot harmonize with the Americans because we are likely to lose part of our identity, that the Americans would want to control our immigration if we were to harmonize with them. I hear concerns not only from the government side but from other members in the House. I want to remind people that the United States of America was built on immigration, just as our country was. Legal law-abiding immigrants came to Canada but they also went to the United States and made that a great nation, the same way they helped to make Canada a great nation. I find those questions very distasteful.

Members must remember what the great country of France sent to the United States of America: the Statue of Liberty. There are words on the Statue of Liberty that welcome all immigrants to that country. We welcome immigrants too and proudly so. But does that mean we should not have concerns? Does that mean we should not tighten up the system? It does not. We have been reminded of that in an extreme way.

Yes, we will work with the government. However no one should think for one minute that the memory of some of the things that were said is ever going to go away, things that were said about individual members on this side of the House and also about our party. This is not the time. For the right of law-abiding citizens of this country it is time we did the right thing. We cannot hesitate. We have to get rid of that idea. If members think bin Laden is the only terrorist in the world, I have news for them. There are a lot more out there who are just as dangerous.

It is time we started to crack down. It is time for the public to demand the House to have an open and honest debate on capital punishment with regard to some of these issues. It is time to have a debate on deportation issues. We still do not deport people from Canada for murders they committed in another country. I do not understand that. We want other countries to respect our laws, why should we not respect theirs?

[National Security, October 16th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, customs agents do not have the ability to defuse potentially dangerous situations. They are advised to allow people they feel who are of high risk to enter our country. Then they are supposed to call the RCMP or the police afterward.

Will the minister give customs agents the authority of peace officers to allow them to protect our Canadian citizens more efficiently?

[Customs Act, September 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I wish to state that the prayers and concerns from the people of Okanagan--Shuswap with regard to the September 11 terrorist activities in the United States have been overwhelming. Support in my office has also been overwhelming. In regard to Bill S-23 and more important the amendment, it states:

this House declines to give second reading to Bill S-23, an act to amend the Customs Act and to make related amendments to other acts, since the principle of the bill fails to specifically and adequately address national security at Canada's borders with respect to terrorist activities.

I want everyone to be assured that I do not think there is anyone in the House who is against streamlining the border if we could.

The bill was drafted before the September 11 tragedy, and I believe that it is outdated. The government's first and foremost priority in any country has to be to the safety and well-being of its law-abiding citizens. We have not achieved that goal since my coming to the House in 1993.

Countermeasures against terrorist and gang related activities were mentioned in the form of bills over the course of the past two years. However time and again the government refused to act.

It is not nice to talk about this in hindsight. If we had enacted legislation that was put before the House when the concerns were first raised, maybe we would not be trying to get the government to act on legislation that all of North America is in very dire straits to have. The 2000 CSIS report states:

Individuals with links to international terrorist groups use foreign countries, including Canada, as a base to plan terrorist acts and provide logistical support for terrorist activities in their country of origin or against other target nations. In Canada, supporters of terrorism engage in fundraising, planning operations, and transferring money and materiel overseas...Canada belongs to international institutions and bodies, participates in peacekeeping missions and hosts major international events, all of which are potential targets for terrorists. Canada remains a world leader in accepting refugees and immigrants, and will continue to receive a steady flow of people from regions of strife. Some will bring the politics of conflict with them. For Canada, politically motivated violence remains largely an extension of overseas discord. Individuals with links to international terrorist groups use Canada primarily as a base from which to orchestrate terrorist activities abroad. The intelligence services of certain foreign governments continue to be active in Canada--

Martin Collacott, a former Canadian ambassador to Asia and the Middle East, said that Americans had genuine concerns about the ease with which international terrorists entered and remained in Canada with the intent of mounting attacks on the U.S. He also said that Canada gave a low priority to identifying, tracking and removing suspected terrorists.

Travel and commerce across the U.S.-Canada border is important to both countries. There is no doubt about that. No one wants to disrupt these flows, yet a crackdown on terrorists will be meaningless without a serious push in Canada toward greater security regarding immigrants and refugees.

Canada shares vulnerability to terrorist infiltration. All open societies pay a price for tolerance and civil liberties. According to John Thompson, director of the Toronto Mackenzie Institute specializing in organized crime and political instability, the thing that makes Canada different from the British, French and Americans is that we tend to be more politically immature. We have a political culture that does not go to war. We have had a view since the 1930s that we are in a fireproof house. We are supposed to be the international boy scouts who are trusted by all other countries.

He went on to say that it has coloured Canadian attitudes toward security. He noted that until this week the largest terrorist strike was the downing of the Air India jet in 1985 where more than 330 people were killed. He goes on to say that the fundamentalists who drove a truckful of explosives over the Washington border in 1990 was one such arrival.

Mr. Ressam arrived in Canada and was caught with a fake French passport. He claimed refugee status and then renounced his claim. He had a history of associations with terrorists and yet the government did nothing about deporting him.

Mr. Collacott said the Ressam case brought out the fact that terrorist suspects could enter the country easily and that there were problems that were still not removed.

Do our brothers in the states have concerns about what is going on in Canada? After reading these CSIS reports they certainly do. Not only the Americans have concerns but people in Canada have the same concerns. They want to know what the government will do to address the problems. It has done nothing. Instead it has decided to study the issue.

Terrorists do not study the issue; they act. While we are in the House I guarantee that they are already making plans. The British foreign secretary said:

We come together and we work out how they face that choice, but one thing is very, very clear. As soon as we know, or have a very good idea as to who is responsible for this action, those states which harbour terrorist activity, in the words of the United Nations Security Council Resolution, have to be held to account and cannot any longer have the kind of easy ride they have had in the past.

I could not agree more. If any country allows terrorist organizations to raise funds to be taken out or used within that country and use funds to make bombs and killing devices, that country has to be held accountable.

We have overwhelming evidence, not only from CSIS but from other reports that the government knows, that there are over 50 terrorist organizations actively working in Canada and yet nothing is being done.

I question the wisdom of the government when last Tuesday it voted against a motion brought before the House by the official opposition. It stated:

That this House call upon the government to introduce anti-terrorism legislation similar in principle to the United Kingdom's Terrorism Act, 2000, and that such legislation provide for:

the naming of all known international terrorist organizations operating in Canada;

a complete ban on fundraising activities in support of terrorism, and provisions for the seizure of assets belonging to terrorists or terrorist organizations;

the immediate ratification of the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism;

the creation of specific crimes for engaging in terrorist training activities in Canada or inciting terrorist acts from Canada;

the prompt extradition of foreign nationals charged with acts of terrorism, even if the charges are capital offences; and

the detention and deportation to their country of origin of any people illegally in Canada or failed refugee claimants who have been linked to terrorist organizations.

I have to question, if the government's first and foremost priority is to the safety and well-being of its law-abiding citizens, why it voted against the motion. I do not understand it.

I see I am out of time, although I have a lot more information I would like to share with the House.

[Customs Act, September 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member said we are now victims. We were victims the day the acts of terrorism took place. It was not only Americans who died but a large number of people of other nationalities including Canadians. When it comes to trade with the Americans we must realize that this is where Canada's bread and butter is.

If we do not live up to our obligations as the Americans see them they will curtail our trade quite substantially. The Americans have set up what is called homeland defence, a special committee or organization to address the security of their nation.

Should the government not be looking along the same lines? Should it not be working hand in hand with our American brothers and sisters on the issue instead of taking a different avenue? That is my question for the member.

[Terrorism, September 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, while grieving over thousands of individuals tragically murdered in terrorist attacks September 11, Canadians also feel some economic insecurity.

North Americans finally seem aware that security at our borders must be tightened and terrorists and their fronts already within our borders must be stopped.

One major company has said it will build in the U.S. and not in Canada due to new difficulties of getting people and goods across the Canada-U.S. border. Trucks carrying freight commercially in Canada now face very long lineups at the border. Since trucks haul about 64% by value of Canada's total trade with the U.S., such delays are already causing plant closings.

To improve public safety and preserve Canadian jobs, it is imperative that Canada, in co-operation with our U.S. neighbours, immediately increase our border security resources in manpower and technology and move toward the North American perimeter approach as advocated by U.S. ambassador Paul Cellucci.

[Customs Act, September 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. On an issue of this importance I find it very strange that the House does not have quorum.

[Customs Act, September 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member's speech with great interest. I have been to the border numerous times. One of the things I find very troubling when I am there is that it is almost like our people are not equipped to handle any type of emergency there. I would like the member to comment on that if he could, please.

Also, there is some talk basically from the American side of the border with regard to creating a perimeter. I look at that very favourably. I would like to know the member 's views on that.