Andy Burton

[Aboriginal Affairs, March 11th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the recent writ filed in the B.C. supreme court by the Council of the Haida Nation brings to the forefront the uncertainty that unsettled land claims foster.

The future of resource based industries in B.C. is in jeopardy. No doubt this case will ultimately proceed to the Supreme Court of Canada effectively tying up economic development until it is resolved. Without certainty of tenure, companies in the mining, logging, oil and gas, even agriculture and fishing industries will not proceed with new development or expansion plans.

While we do not necessarily agree with the Haida claim we can understand the frustration over the failed treaty process. It is a process that does not bring finality, affordability, respect and agreement with rights supported under the Canadian constitution, nor does it respect the protection of private property rights for all Canadians.

This is a prime example of the failure of the treaty process in B.C., a process in which the federal government does play a significant role.

[Supply, February 28th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, obviously this issue is of concern to all Canadians and people all around the world. My party, like all other parties, believes in a strong family unit. I think that the best way to build and strengthen that unit and work toward eradicating poverty is to provide an economic base, a tax regime whereby the economy can expand, where jobs are created for people.

We put people to work and one thing leads to another. They have pride in themselves and the family's pride grows. When people are working the tax base is there to provide a good, strong educational system. It costs money to do this. The way we do it is by creating employment and a regime that would allow people to work and to keep the dollars they earn, not have them all taxed back. We allow them to put those dollars into the economy, to spend those dollars, and in that way create the tax base required to support our systems of education and health care and to help those who need it.

[Supply, February 28th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, that is a large number of questions. On the issue of polling, it is very clear that my party did very well in the last election. We certainly have a lot more seats in the House than the party down at the other end of the House. We strived very hard for reform in the House, for giving a stronger voice to the members in the House, which I think is the way to deal with reform and get the voices of Canadians out there. We represent the Canadian people. Reform in the House would go a long way toward creating a much fairer situation in Canada. I think the member very clearly knows that and understands that.

[Supply, February 28th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the NDP supply day motion reads:

That, in response to Canadians' desire to save Canada as a sovereign nation and strengthen our distinctive contribution in the world, this House calls upon the government to reflect in its budgetary policy the New Democratic Party 12-Point Plan to Save Canada.

The first of those illustrious 12 points is on the Kyoto protocol. Specifically it states:

Enhance Canada's environment, including a national implementation plan for reducing greenhouse gases and ratification of the Kyoto protocol in 2002.

Although the goal of protecting the environment is one most Canadians, including myself, are certainly very interested in achieving, a few simple questions come to mind.

First, how can this be achieved in a society so dependent on fossil fuels? Second, how can Canada, and in particular certain provinces with economies largely built on the sale of that fuel to other countries like the U.S., still function successfully without that income generator? Furthermore, if the U.S. does not sign on, it creates even larger problems for Canada.

The simple answer is we need to work toward a balance between the interests of the environment and that of industry and the economy. To consider the merits of one without the other is not only disrespectful to stakeholders, but it is also foolhardy in the long run.

Point number 2 on the list states:

Strengthen the role of aboriginal, Metis and Inuit people in the Canadian family.

This is doublespeak by polished NDP spin doctors. What do they mean by strengthen their role? Their role is the same as the role we expect all Canadians to try their best to play. That is the role of nation builder through earning an income to support the family, by contributing to society, to community involvement and volunteerism and to use their creativity and initiative to make their individual lives better in any way possible in their particular situation. This is what society expects from anyone in Canada.

We all strive to be better people, better citizens and better stewards of our environment. That ethic is present in everyday life in Canada.

What I find frustrating is that this particular point suggests that unless the government and therefore society forcefully and intentionally intervenes on behalf of aboriginal, Metis and Inuit to a larger extent than for everyone else in the country, these groups of Canadians cannot make it on their own merits. This is a premise which I do not believe. They have the ability that we all have. I am quite sure they are capable of implementing it.

Point number 3 states:

Reaffirm Canada's international peacekeeping role and rehabilitate Canada's reputation as respected internationalists.

This is something to which I would give my conditional support. To elaborate further, most Canadians agree that we should continue Canada's international peacekeeping efforts. It has been a proud tradition and strong role we have played for generations. However, the reality today is that our armed forces are so poorly equipped, underpaid, understaffed and overused that we simply cannot keep up our traditional level of assistance around the world.

We have three distinct choices in my view. First, we limit ourselves to the peacekeeping role and reduce our commitments. Our second option could be to focus on becoming a special force military. To do so we would need to reduce, if not eliminate, our current peacekeeping commitments abroad and ensure we are very well equipped to handle the special forces missions we are asked to take part in.

Our third option is one which I believe for a country of our size and stature in the world we should strive to achieve. It would be both options one and two. To do so we need to begin to respect our armed forces by providing them with adequate funding to achieve their goals. We cannot continue to fake support for our military through, quite frankly, such ambiguous statements as the third point by the NDP.

Point number 4 deals with the important topic of health care funding and reads as follows:

Re-establish the federal government as full partner in funding health care and post-secondary education as public, not for profit systems.

This is a frequent topic of heated debate not only in the House but in the media as well as around the dinner tables of many Canadian families. Everyone seems to have their own theory on how to fix the ailing public health care system. It seems the NDP theory is to throw more money at what most people agree is a dysfunctional and unsustainable health care system.

The NDP members are living in the past, what they themselves would likely call the good old days of purely socialized medicare.

However the reality today is that the system is bloated and in desperate need of repair. Our population is aging and the stress we see today on an already overused public system will only increase exponentially as time goes by. Throwing more money at the system is an outdated socialistic view of solving everything, and that, quite frankly, is what is expected from a solution provided by the NDP.

Therefore I would say that the premise outlined in this point of the NDP's 12 point plan to save Canada is false and that although I certainly agree that stable funding for provinces to provide health care is necessary to fix the problem, it is not the only avenue we need to explore. Again, the NDP was never known for thinking outside the box. Although its members have to tried to re-brand themselves, their ideas are still the same old tired ideas of the socialist days of the past.

The second part of point number 4 deals with post-secondary education. Of course once again from the NDP's perspective the quick fix is to throw more money at the system. Just the other day CBC talked about how in the next 10 years Canada will face a critical shortage of university professors. This has little or nothing to do with poor funding and everything to do with the realities of an aging population and, quite frankly, poor planning. Many graduates have stated publicly that the tenure system imposed by universities, which protects the jobs of professors, acts as a disincentive to new graduates because of the need to go through several hoops and spend several years waiting for tenure positions to open up to become an accredited professor. Once again, the system needs an overhaul, yet the NDP would prefer to ignore the details of the problem and throw money at it instead.

Point number 5 calls on the government to “implement a comprehensive strategy for the eradication of child poverty”. This is something everyone wants to see. While we are at it, why not strive to eliminate world poverty too? These are good goals and all governments around the world should strive toward this ideal state. However, I would like to know how the NDP proposes to eliminate poverty. That is the question. The NDP has a unique opportunity to be all things to all people without ever facing the responsibility of implementing those promises.

Point number 6 deals with trade agreements and labour standards. The NDP wants to “ensure all trade agreements include adequate protection for labour standards, and for human rights and the environment”. We are living in a global village and trade is a mainstay of our Canadian economy of which a significantly large percentage is with the United States. The Canadian Alliance supports free trade and as such is certainly concerned with the current softwood lumber dispute with our largest trading partner. We also agree that we need to take down interprovincial trade barriers and reduce government red tape.

The proposal from the NDP would ensure more red tape and regulation without regard for their economic impact. Canada already faces a huge regulatory burden, and higher regulatory costs mean a less competitive economy. Since its inception the Canadian Alliance has stood up for Canadian farmers both in the House and around the country. It is a main plank of our principles and an area of the economy we are very concerned about.

Point number 7 of the NDP plan deals with the family farm. Specifically it states that the government should “enable primary producers and Canadian farm families to compete with foreign subsidies, and reject continental energy and water policies that endanger Canadian control over our natural resources”.

First I would like to remind the House that the Canadian Alliance stands firmly behind the Canadian farm family. Farmers need a level playing field. Rather than engaging in an endless subsidy war, the Canadian Alliance would focus on ending foreign subsidies.

I am short on time so I will jump to point number 11 which speaks to the NDP concern that control in the media has become more centralized. Specifically this point calls on the government to “strengthen pluralistic and democratic discourse”. I cannot understand what the NDP is talking about here, but it would seem that the NDP is concerned that the Liberal left leaning print media is not on its side. I would say they are not on our side either but no one sees us wanting to create more government owned propaganda machines. What we need to do is encourage more competition within the media.

I will conclude by saying that the NDP has a luxury that it shares only with the Bloc, that is, it will never form a government and therefore it can promise everyone everything without ever having to implement any of it. A poll recently found that of all professions Canadians least trust politicians, because they believe we make all kinds of promises and never deliver. The NDP perpetuates this concern and this 12 point plan is a prime example of pie in the sky ideas with no real plan for or hope of implementation.

[Species at Risk Act, February 26th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise again in the House at the report stage of Bill C-5, the species at risk act, and to speak to my amendment in Group No. 3.

Interestingly, as opposed to some of the other groupings of amendments at report stage of the bill, quite a range of topics have been covered in Group No. 3. Of course the main discussion area in this grouping deals with the need to consider the socioeconomic implications of the legislation or, for that matter, of any action plans or recovery plans as a result of placing a species on the legal list. Some of the amendments also deal with the composition of COSEWIC and its determination of a legal list of species at risk.

Motion No. 79 would amend how the minister deals with national standards, and his counterparts of the Canadian Endangered Species Conservation Council. Motion No. 120 deals with criminal offences. Several other motions in this grouping deal with public consultation.

Of these five very distinct topics within this one grouping, I will begin by commenting on the need for socioeconomic interests to be taken into account when determining the action plans needed to recover a species and its habitat.

More specifically, I would like to address my amendment, Motion No. 15, which seeks to adjust the purpose of the act to reflect what I believe should be the necessary goal of any endangered species legislation, that is to strike a balance between fostering sustainable development while ensuring the creation of a safe environment for those species at risk.

Specifically my Motion No. 15 states:

That Bill C-5, in Clause 6, be amended by adding after line 12 on page 8 the following:

“(2) The purposes of this Act, outlined in subsection (1), shall be pursued and accomplished in a manner consistent with the goals of sustainable development.”

I believe this is not only an important amendment to the bill, one which I would encourage all my colleagues in the House to support, but I believe it reflects the spirit of the discussions in the House of Commons environmental committee meetings.

In my opinion, Motion No. 15 strives to strike the balance that we all want in the legislation, the balance between the interests of industry and those of the environmentalists. The amendment would require that a balance be struck between the environmental goals of the bill and the needs of taxpayers whose dollars would go to the fund the environmental work mandated by the bill. I believe that without considering sustainable development, environmental laws would quickly kill the goose that lays the golden egg, as they say.

It is my opinion that worrying about endangered species is something only prosperous economies can afford to do because, quite frankly, someone has to pay for it. Economic depression is no friend to species at risk. One just has to look at some of the environmental problems prevalent in second and third world countries. It is certainly no coincidence.

I believe it is essential that we know the cost on industry and property users, as well as the cost on government in terms of enforcement resources before the government introduces legislation with such vast implications as Bill C-5. In particular, we need to know how the legislation would affect farmers, fishermen, miners, loggers, ranchers, and the list goes on. We need to understand what the socioeconomic costs will be of such legislation before we agree to it. Without this essential information, how can landowners or land users plan?

I believe the reason the government has not made these costs public is that it does not know what the socioeconomic implications of the legislation will be.

I would like to read a quote from the minister's information supplement of October 2001 which explains how little the government and the minister know of the cost of the legislation. In particular, the quote refers to the costs of compensation, which I believe is a necessary part of any legislation that plans to adversely affect the market value of a property. It states:

Environment Canada is aware that compensation for restrictions on the use of land is a complex issue that requires careful consideration and innovative thinking. We will need several years of practical experience in implementing the stewardship and recovery provisions of the Species at Risk Act...before we can be precise in prescribing eligibility and thresholds for compensation.

I would like to read another quote, this time by the Minister of the Environment who was answering questions posed to him by members of the standing committee on environment on October 3, 2001. The committee members wanted the minister to explain why he could not guarantee compensation in Bill C-5.

The quote reads:

We then got deeper and deeper into this and it became more and more the proverbial swamp, more and more difficult to do, partly because governments...should not, pass legislation that is open-ended in terms of funding. We have fiscal responsibilities that, as you can well imagine, are fairly strict on us—$45 million a year is what we've been given to run the process. That's what we can expect, and that's it.

I know the quote is long but the minister has essentially said that he does not know how much the implication of this bill will cost but he knows that it cannot cost more than $45 million because that is all he has. This is absolutely ridiculous. By admitting that he does not know the cost, the minister is admitting that he does not know the implications of his own legislation. If a minister does not know the bill's implications, then how can he expect landowners and land users to plan for the future? Has the minister done studies? Can he give any idea of the cost? What about socioeconomic impact assessments for protecting or recovering certain species?

Furthermore, the minister said that he did not want to undertake open-ended spending commitments but that as far as he knew Bill C-5 was open-ended in terms of its implications for Canadian property owners. The minister said that he would not pay for the costs of his legislation but that he had no problem forcing others to absorb those costs.

Although the bill was probably well-intentioned, it certainly has some very major flaws. Only if the government decides to fix them will I support the bill. I and my party, the Canadian Alliance, support the need to protect endangered species but we believe that compensation and socioeconomic impact assessments of recovery plans are essential to preserving a species and essential to good endangered species legislation. This is not good legislation.

I would urge members to support the Canadian Alliance motions on compensation and, in particular, my Motion No. 15 from this grouping which would ensure that the purpose of the legislation, which is to protect species at risk, is accomplished in a manner that is consistent with sustainable development.

I truly believe we cannot have one without the other. To illustrate this point, I would like to tell the House about my home of Skeena, B.C., where I have several large national and provincial parks.

One example I can think of is the Tatshenshini UNESCO world heritage site in the northwest corner of Skeena riding. It is a place of towering mountains, wild rivers and strong and vibrant wildlife. This area was a national park and now, through the United Nations world heritage site program, it is a chunk of land that will forever be set aside for wildlife. Does this not sound like a beautiful success story? What I have not mentioned is that within the boundaries of that site was one of the largest mineral deposits ever found in the world. It had enough ore to put British Columbia back on the map with billions of dollars worth of copper, cobalt and gold.

In the late 1990s, I believe during the 35th parliament, a mining company with legal rights to that area was in the planning stage of developing a mine when the then NDP provincial government and the current federal Liberal government did everything in their power to stop all development in the Tatshenshini in its tracks. Gone were the promises of hundreds of long term, well paying jobs. Gone were the taxes that could have been generated in the form of royalties to the government. The government said that we should not despair as the northwest was protected once again, but at what cost?

The picture I am trying to paint here is not one of perpetual naturalistic bliss but a one-sided victory for the environmental lobby groups that make their homes and live their lives in the grey cement and black asphalt of downtown urban cities like Vancouver, Toronto and New York. Yes, the Tatshenshini is now protected forever, but life goes on in unemployment ridden northwestern British Columbia which would have thrived if only the development of the mine had been allowed. Thirty years of employment was lost in that one mine alone, let alone all the spinoff jobs, as was the potential development of numerous other mining properties.

What I am getting at is the need for balance. Yes, we should have parks and we should do what is needed to protect species at risk from being endangered or extirpated, but we need to do so with balance in mind or it just will not work.

Governments get the money they need to put into place recovery plans and to pay for ecologists, biologists and other scientists to help these species recover. Money is needed to rebuild habitats and to monitor success rates.

Without industry paying taxes, without people working and paying taxes, without goods being sold, being bought and being taxed, we just do not have the ability to protect what is in need of protecting.

In closing, this is why of all the topics Group No. 3 covers, I have chosen to bring to the attention of the House the need for sustainable development. As such, I mean that we need to bring balance to this legislation by including mandatory compensation for landowners and by ensuring the overriding goal of this legislation as set out in its purposes section reflects the need to respect sustainable development. Without it, the economic realities are that as a country we will not be able to afford to protect our wildlife and endangered species.

[Committees of the House, February 26th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, these types of allegations do not help Canada's reputation abroad in terms of the strength of the dollar and our general reputation. I believe it is important to Canadians and to our reputation to clear up these types of allegations and get to the bottom of the matter one way or the other.

Would the hon. member expand a little on what sort of process he feels should take place, in what sort of timeframe, and how we could resolve this quickly and improve Canada's reputation?

[Species at Risk Act, February 25th, 2002]

moved:

Motion No. 15

That Bill C-5, in Clause 6, be amended by adding after line 12 on page 8 the following:

“(2) The purposes of this Act, outlined in subsection (1), shall be pursued and accomplished in a manner consistent with the goals of sustainable development.”.

[Species at Risk Act, February 25th, 2002]

moved:

Motion No. 5

That Bill C-5, in Clause 2, be amended by replacing lines 19 to 21 on page 5 with the following:

“processes; and”.

[Correctional Service Canada, February 25th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, that is of little consolation to victims of those criminals.

The commissioner of CSC has ordered a review of the prison system but it will not be complete until this fall.

I ask the solicitor general: Why is his department putting the cart before the horse? Why is he not waiting until that review is complete before committing to huge prison infrastructure expenditures?

[Correctional Service Canada, February 25th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, to continue along this theme, the solicitor general continues to allow his bureaucrats to put the comfort of killers ahead of public safety. Correctional Service Canada plans on spending $500 million in taxpayer dollars to expand its cottage style or open concept prisons, fondly known as club fed. How can he justify this to Canadian taxpayers?