Jim Gouk

[Supply, May 1st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the debate today and have listened for a few key words. One that I heard from the Bloc Quebecois was about helping workers. I want to take a look at this from the point of view of helping workers but I first want to get some semantics cleared away and clarify a few things.

When we start talking in terms of workers and unions, who and what exactly are we talking about? Is a union solely the collection of the people who are members of that union or does it have an identify of its own? Is that entity separate from those individual members who make it up?

I sometimes get introduced as the member of Parliament for Kootenay--Boundary--Okanagan who belongs to the Canadian Alliance. When that happens I have come up to the podium, thanked the person who introduced me, and said, “I have to make a small correction. I was introduced as belonging to the Canadian Alliance. I do not belong to the Canadian Alliance. I am a member of the Canadian Alliance. The Canadian Alliance is the organization whose policies are most closely aligned with my own. My colleagues in that organization work together with me so I might be far more effective and efficient than I am on my own, so that we may do certain things of commonality for the benefit of all of us”. That is not unlike a union, interestingly enough. However if I belong to anyone I belong to the constituents in my riding, not the party. I do think that is an important difference.

When we start talking in terms of unions we have to remember that a union is an entity that is made up of certain officers and executive, certain ideals and obligations within that executive to the union body itself, and of course its membership.

We spoke to this issue a couple of days ago on a private member's motion, also from the Bloc Quebecois. If we want to talk, in absolute isolation for a moment, to the concept of replacement workers, my response would be that I do not like them. I do not think it is a good system. However it is in isolation. It is such a tiny part of the overall scope of the labour picture that it is almost impossible to put it into context of a piece of legislation or the supply day motion that has been brought forward here in the House.

We have often heard the old adage of reshuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic . That in essence is what the Bloc is trying to do with the supply day motion it has brought forward. The Bloc members are saying that there are all kinds of problems in labour. They talk about the problems with Miranda. They talk about how long people are out on strike, the suffering of the workers and everything else, and then they come forward with something that touches just a tiny bit of the problem, and I do mean tiny. Taken by itself, they can make a case where in a specific example it has some catastrophic impact, but in the grand scheme of things it is a very tiny portion.

Maybe where to start is with the history of the trade union movement. Back in the 1800s in North America, primarily in the United States, we had things that were scenes right out of Dante's Inferno . We had mill owners who employed people in unbelievable conditions, unsafe and unhealthy, with wages that barely allowed them to buy table scraps and that doomed them to an early death, if indeed an accident in the mill did not do it before. If something happened to them there was nothing for the families. There was back-breaking labour, no time off and no benefits. It was horrible. Those were bad employers. They were oppressive.

Unions started to organize. In those days, union leaders needed incredibly thick skulls, not thick skins as perhaps they would need today. They needed thick skulls because there would be strikebreakers on both sides.

The strikebreakers from the company were hired thugs who would go out with baseball bats, crowbars and everything else to literally beat striking workers into submission. Therefore the person who was the union leader had to be just as tough as those to fight back, to try to deal with it that way. It was a brute force confrontation.

Many people were hurt, maimed, killed or blackballed. It was a horrible time. It was a horrible page in North American history and for history throughout the world where these types of confrontations took place.

Canada certainly was not isolated from this. I am talking about the 1800s. Very early on in the 20th century, right in Atlantic Canada in, I believe, Nova Scotia, there were laws on the books where workers could actually be put in jail just for asking for a raise. As the old cigarette commercial says, we have come a long way but we still do not have a perfect system. One of the reasons we do not have a perfect system is that some parts of the system have evolved and unfortunately some parts of it have not.

Nothing strikes me with more irony than when I hear of a strike taking place, not at Noranda, not at some big company, not at Canada Post or the ports but in fact in a union administrative office where the employer is the union and the workers are on strike because they cannot negotiate with their employer, the union, in a manner in which unions castigate the other employers for not being fair to their workers. It is, one has to admit, very ironic.

There is a growing complexity in terms of the unions themselves and in terms of work issues in this country. One of the things that has changed, part of the evolution of the union movement, is the fact that at one time a long way back the union workers were, by and large, uneducated and unskilled.

[Canada Labour Code, April 29th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, once again I am pleased to speak on the bill. I spoke on it when it was brought to Parliament under the old system and I am going to be bringing up the same points today.

The hon. member who proposed the bill said it would force negotiations. Maybe in some extremely limited situations it would, but this is not going to alter situations where there is simply a strike or a lockout. It only deals with one specific little narrow window, that is, where a company continues to operate by the use of hiring new replacement workers. For example, if a company is totally shut down, the bill would have no effect. If a company is running in a limited manner using management personnel, again the bill would have absolutely no effect.

The other problem with the bill is that it is really half a bill, because it deals with replacement workers. Replacement workers are found in a situation where the company and the union go on strike, the company says fine, go on strike, we will simply hire a bunch of new people who are not in the union and have them do the work. The original workers can stay out on strike as long as they want and it would not affect the company. The truth of the matter is that I do not like that. I do not agree with it. I do not like the whole system of strikes and lockouts that we have right now. I think it is something we should have addressed a long time ago and found some alternative for instead of maybe fiddling with little bits and pieces of it.

In terms of the specifics of the concept that the hon. member brought up, I do not agree with the company being allowed to hire people outside of the union contract and bring them in to do the work. There is a contract, an agreement. There is a resolution process in the event of the dispute, either a strike or lockout, and I think that both sides should have to live with that.

Unfortunately the hon. member's bill only deals with that one side. It does not deal with what I would have to call replacement companies. Here is what a replacement company is. When there is a strike or lockout, if a company cannot use replacement workers it is shut down, but the union members can still be on strike and can go to work at another job.

I have an example of this in my riding at a newspaper in my hometown. There was a strike between the newspaper and its staff. It was a very long strike and a very bitter one. In fact, I believe that the company was probably out to try to break the union. What happened is that the union started a newspaper. It was supposed to be a temporary measure to provide them with some revenue during the time that they were on strike, in essence so that they had some strike pay. I do not remember how long this has gone on now; it has been years. What happened in reality is that the newspaper they were on strike from they are still technically on strike from; however, we now have a new newspaper in our town that is run by the people who indeed are on strike and in addition, probably, by some new people they have hired since that time. In essence, the union has replaced the company.

I do not agree with that either, frankly. I do not agree with a whole lot of the process. I do not like strikes or lockouts. I think they are very unproductive. They were useful in the beginning because there had to be some kind of dispute settlement mechanism and that was the one that was used.

We have a power company in my riding. A few years back the workers there went on strike. They were out on strike for quite some time and management personnel kept the emergency things operating. There was not a whole lot going on so they managed to keep it running. I am sure it probably caused some problems for the company, but it also saved them a lot in salary. They did not hire any replacement workers. So again, this bill would have absolutely no impact on that operation. Months went by and eventually the workers, who had been doing without wages, went back to work. They will never make up the money they lost. The raise they got was essentially the same thing they were offered before they went out on strike.

I respect the hon. member's intentions in bringing forward the bill, but I do not really think it addresses the problem. It addresses such a small part of the problem, and only one side of it, that I think in essence it is problematic. I support collective bargaining, but there is a lot of misunderstanding about what collective bargaining is.

Collective bargaining is negotiations, conciliation and mediation. That is collective bargaining. Strikes and lockouts are not part of collective bargaining; they are the result of the failure of collective bargaining. A strike or a lockout is referred to as a dispute settlement mechanism.

When unions first started, they were needed. Boy, were they needed. In fact, to go back in Canadian history to the beginning of the last century, in certain provinces in Atlantic Canada a person could actually be put in jail for asking for a raise. It was a law on the books. One could go to jail for asking for a raise. That was what we would call an incredibly loaded system, all in favour of the employer. The problem is that when we start to try to deal with these issues and the pendulum starts swinging, sometimes it swings a little too far the other way. Sometimes we lose sight of what we are really trying to achieve.

I think that we need to try to find a way to get away from what we have in collective bargaining primarily today, and that is a very confrontational sort of system. There is a confrontation between the employer and the employee. We have in essence an economic tug of war between the two sides to see who can do without revenue the longest, the employer or the employee. Unfortunately under our current system the winner is often the party that loses the least, and that is not really a very good solution.

We need to come up with something that does exactly what the hon. member said at one point in her speech, that is, force negotiations. Because when the two sides are not negotiating, they are not settling anything. There needs to be some kind of alternative to strikes or lockouts as an absolute dispute settlement mechanism. One that I favour very strongly and which my party favours is final offer arbitration. We do not think that it should be arbitrarily the catch-all that solves all problems, because it is not perfect. Unfortunately I do not know of anything that is. Certainly strikes and lockouts are not.

If a company and the employees want to agree, they can do it through any number of different methods that do not involve a labour disruption, but I think we need to have something in place that says if parties cannot come to any kind of resolution or cannot agree on a dispute settlement mechanism, then there should be something rather than a strike or a lockout, where everybody gets hurt and there is a lot of collateral damage. In fact, in today's economy, particularly in the federal arena, a handful of longshoremen could go on strike in Vancouver and a farmer and his family in Manitoba could lose their farm as a result of that.

The world is getting far too complex for this. We cannot allow that kind of harm to occur. We must have something that says we will find a way to settle this dispute without it involving a labour disruption. I used to be an air traffic controller, which also comes under federal jurisdiction. The problem we had in trying to negotiate is that we were too powerful. If we could not settle and we tried to go out on strike, a relative handful of people could shut down the air transportation industry of this country. So we got legislated. What was the good of us having the right to strike if we were never allowed to use it because we were so powerful?

We recognize that policemen should not be on strike to watch people get mugged, raped, robbed or whatever else and say they are not going to help because they are on strike. We recognize that firefighters should not be standing on a sidewalk watching a house burn down, perhaps with a small child inside it, because they are on strike.

If we recognize that and say there has to be an alternative for them, then perhaps we should also ask why they should be penalized because of their importance. Why can we not come up with something that deals with the need for them to continue working but be dealt with fairly? Why can we not find that and then apply it to everyone?

I am afraid that I cannot support the bill. However, because I agree with some of the concepts the member raises, I will abstain when it comes to voting on this. I am labour critic for our party. It is a very awkward bill. I do not dispute that the member is trying to do some good or that there are some agreeable parts to her bill, but as I say, it is only half a bill. We cannot take a system, as bad as it is, and take away the tools from one side while leaving all the tools for the other.

Let us imagine a hockey team where one side was told it could not have a goalie. It would not be much of a game. There must be balance. As much as I think the member's intentions are good, the bill would produce an imbalance in the system. What we need to do is come up with a much more total solution so that everyone is able to continue to work, draw a salary, aid their community and not cause problems for other parts of our country as well.

[Canada Airports Act, April 28th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to stand to speak on Bill C-27 today. I listened with interest to the words of the parliamentary secretary to the minister and I will probably have some direct comments on some of those things if time permits.

With a bill like this, let us start with the worst. One of the worst things in the bill is that the powers of the minister are not subject to review or appeal. He gives himself awesome powers in the bill.

Let us just imagine how this would work in other areas like, for example, the former minister of finance, who says, “Let us close some of the tax loopholes in all these foreign countries where we have Canadian corporations that are getting tremendous tax benefits, but let us leave one open, Bermuda, let us say”, where, as it happens, the former minister of finance has all his ships in his private company registered, “and let us have that not subject to review or appeal”.

How about the former minister of public works and government services, who says, using these kinds of powers, “Let us have the power to award contracts without tender. Let us be able to send them out to our friends, our donors, and let us get into a big advertising scheme and pay these people whether they actually do the work we have contracted for or not”.

Or maybe we will have the former minister of justice, who will come up with a bill like Bill C-68, tell us that it is going to cost $2 million and, when it costs a billion, says, “That is fine. Let us leave it that way. Let us not review it and most certainly let us not have any appeal”.

Given the mistakes that the Liberal government and its various cabinet ministers have made in the past, I think the very notion that we would give any minister on that side of the House the powers to make decisions that are not subject to either review or appeal is absolutely absurd, yet that is exactly what Bill C-27 does.

I will now get to some of the specifics. One is airport authority directors. The authority makeup calls for up to 15 directors on the board and it is quite possible that there would not be so much as one person representing the airlines. The required makeup includes two from the federal government; we notice that the government always make sure that it is on the list. The mandatory requirements are two from the federal government, one from the provincial government, three to five from municipal government, and then three to five from two of the following five groups. To be sure, one of those five groups is the national association of domestic air carriers, but they do not have to use that one. The other alternatives are economic organizations, provincial associations of lawyers, engineers or accountants, community organizations and unions. Out of all of these three to five are taken. It is quite possible that in some cases there would not be so much as a single representative of the airlines on those boards.

This is a not for profit corporation we are talking about, the airport authority set up by the government, as the parliamentary secretary has stated. By contrast, the same government set up Nav Canada. Nav Canada also has 15 directors of which four are from the airlines and one general aviation representative on the board. Five out of 15, one-third of the board, are absolutely guaranteed to be from the aviation industry, yet for the airports of the country, the national airports, the government has a board that could quite conceivably end up with not so much as a single airline representative, yet they are the ones that have a primary interest. The primary paying customer of the airports is the aviation industry, but with this bill there is not a commitment to have even one industry representative on the board.

The airlines must have the ability to influence terminal designs in order to ensure that cost effective designs reduce costs. We can imagine how we could build a very elaborate and very fancy edifice with a lot of architectural oddities, wasted space, a lot of dramatic flare in the design and incredibly expensive furnishings, none of which are part of the functions of the airport. We do not want a bunch of ugly boxes dotting the country. We want buildings that are pleasant to be in and are effective for the flow of traffic and so on, but we all know that there are people who have a tendency to get carried away. With that very primary customer possibly not being on the board, there is nothing to prevent airport authorities from saying “We can charge pretty much what we want, add airport improvement fees, and build something pretty fancy. It would be a monument to our work and our board to have such an incredibly beautiful airport”.

We do like to have nice things, but we also like to have a functioning, cost effective airline industry, particularly at this time. We are finding out that the airline industry is having a tremendous amount of trouble staying afloat and the last thing we should be doing is coming forward with a bill that could add to those costs instead of trying to find ways to control them.

Speaking of controls, there needs to be some control on the rent that the federal government charges airports. The federal government used to lose hundreds of millions of dollars a year in airport operations. Now it makes hundreds of millions of dollars and all the improvements that are done to the airports are done at no cost to the government; now there is a sweetheart deal. The government used to have airport landing fees and a variety of fees that it charged the airlines. It used to lose a lot of money and it still had to operate the airport and do any improvements.

I was in the aviation industry for many years and saw how bad many of these terminals were. In fact, even now some of them are still in the process of growing out of that neglect by government. Right here in Ottawa is a prime example. We have a very inadequate terminal in Ottawa, but as we drive up to it, we see a very beautiful new terminal being constructed off to the right. That new terminal will be in operation sometime next spring, actually ahead of schedule. It is being built by the Ottawa Airport Authority at no cost to the federal government. We have that wholly inadequate terminal, out of which we are still operating while the airport authority puts up the new building, yet the government is essentially gouging these airport authorities. The government is taking huge profits out of these businesses, if we want to call them that, on which it formerly lost money.

Government rent increases are exorbitant, not just from where the rents started but in regard to where they have gone since the government has had these airport authorities take over. For example, when the Winnipeg Airports Authority officially took over the operation of the Winnipeg airport in 1997, the rent was $900,000 a year. That is quite a bit of money. Basically it is $1 million a year. Since that time, the Winnipeg Airports Authority has made many improvements, none of which were funded by the federal government. It has done this through its own drive, through its own funds raised in operating the airport. The rent that the federal government will charge by the year 2007 will have increased to $7 million from $900,000 in 1997. No wonder the airline industry is in trouble. It gives new meaning to the old adage “I am from the government and I am here to help”. With that kind of help, it is a wonder we have an airline industry left at all.

National airports are not the only ones affected by bad government decisions of this nature. When the government, as the parliamentary secretary described, set about creating the national airports program, it also set about divesting itself of all the other airports in Canada, all the smaller feeder airports and community airports. The government pushed these onto the municipalities, many of which really did not want to take them. They did not want to be operating airports. They have enough responsibilities on their own. In my hometown, the airport of Castlegar used to lose, under the operation of Transport Canada, half a million dollars a year, so the government was telling Castlegar, a small community of about 7,000 people, “You had better take over the airport, because if you do not, no one will take it over, so we guess we do not need an airport and we will just shut it down”. That is a hell of a load, frankly, to put on a small community of 7,000 people.

At the time the government asked Castlegar to take over, it said there were certain things that the city would be able to do to be cost effective and to hopefully get rid of some of this deficit, because of course adding half a million dollars a year in costs for a small community like that would be absolutely devastating. Castlegar was allowed to put on an airport improvement fee. The parliamentary secretary said the minister was very generous, that he would allow the city to continue to operate it to cover operational costs. It is a good thing, because otherwise it could not operate that airport.

There is one other thing that was done. At the time the City of Castlegar took over the operation of its airport, there was an airport fire department with a full complement of staff, vehicles, facilities and everything. They were well-trained, very conscientious people and I want to make sure that no one misunderstands that. I am not in any way suggesting that airport firefighters are not highly motivated and well-trained, conscientious people. However, in many of these airports, they are largely unnecessary. I worked directly at airports for 22 years. During that 22 years of working at airports, I have never once seen a firefighter save a life, not because they are not properly trained or motivated but because the opportunity never arose.

First, to put it graphically, the aircraft, if that is what we are dealing with, has to have the decency to have its emergency at the airport. If it happens somewhere en route and comes down somewhere off the airport, then the fact that there is a fire department at the airport is irrelevant. Second, gruesomely but accurately, there have to be survivors. If there are no survivors, then the whole exercise is for naught as well. Third, in terms of response time, it has to happen suddenly and without notice. If an aircraft has a problem and is coming in to land, the people on board want you standing by. They are not going to wait until they get to the airport to tell you this; they radio ahead and advise. So firefighters do not necessarily have to be at the airport. They can come from some distance.

The federal government said, “We know that there are a lot of costs in operating airports like Castlegar. We know that we lost a lot of money. We also know that there has to be some level of protection for public safety. That is reasonable”. It said, “You do not necessarily need to have the firefighters stationed right at the airport if you can demonstrate to us an acceptable response time for bringing in those firefighters from somewhere else”.

Castlegar and many other airports like it did exactly that and said, “Here is our plan, here is the location, here is the distance, here is the staffing we have, here is the response time. It has been all properly demonstrated. We can do this. This is our plan, presented in detail”. The federal government said, “We accept your plan. Do you now accept the airport, with this and all the other conditions that have been agreed to?” And the City of Castlegar, and many others, over 70 of them, said, “Yes, we do”.

The federal government, having had these little communities accept these airports, now has come back with Canadian aviation regulations 308, CARs 308, which now potentially would place the onus on many of these small communities that run these airports. They basically took money losers off the hands of the federal government. They came to an agreement with the federal government before they took them over in which the government said, “You don't have to keep the firefighters on. We agree with your proposal. It is safe”. Now the government is saying, “We changed our mind. Thank you for taking over the airport. Thank you for getting this loser off our hands and coming up with better, more efficient ways to operate it than we ever could. Now we are going to force you to put the firefighters back at the airport”.

For small airports such Castlegar, or even small communities in some cases, that is an overwhelming expense to visit upon a community of 7,000 people. In some case they are spread over a bit bigger population. That is absolute total irresponsibility on the part of government. Yet the minister wants us to think this is a good bill when it does not even begin to address things like that.

I would like to talk about some of the things the government is involved in that also have not been dealt with in the bill, things where the government could be saving money. It is just like the example I gave on small community airports where the government was so inefficient and ineffective in its operation that it lost a fortune. We should look at the things for which it is still responsible, that it still actually operates or an operation it has taken over and see whether is cost effective.

I am talking now about airport security in general terms. I would like to give a couple of examples that really draw to light the fact that airport security, to a certain degree, is a myth. It is nothing but a facade to make people feel safe. It is something that stops an honest person from accidentally doing something wrong, like taking along a little penknife that he forgot was in their briefcase. It stops him from doing that. It does not stop someone who intends to take some form of weapon that could be used against other people on board an aircraft.

Let me give an example of that as it applies to security at the House of Commons, post-September 11. Undoubtedly, Mr. Speaker, you have noticed the large number of RCMP officers at the foot of the road coming into the House of Commons down by the Confederation building. Half of the parking lot, which used to be there, is gone. A great big trailer is there. There is a big covered inspection station. At any given time there are as many RCMP officers and RCMP vehicles at that location as most individual detachments in my entire riding have.

What is their purpose? Their purpose is to inspect vehicles that drive on to the hill. They stop them. They check who is driving them. They check where they are going and why they are going there. They may look in the trunk. They may look under the hood. They have fancy roll out mirrors that they can roll underneath to see if anything is attached.

One time I asked an RCMP officer why they did that and what was the purpose. The officer said that it was to make sure somebody did not take something into Parliament that was not allowed, that would be dangerous and that could be used for destructive purposes. It was to prevent terrorists from smuggling explosives on to the Hill.

The RCMP officers stop these cars, open their hoods and their trunks and roll fancy little silly mirrors underneath the vehicles. Maybe they are dripping water on to the mirrors. Right beside that station people off the street, coming from wherever, dressed in whatever manner, without any security or any connection with the House of Commons whatsoever, walk on to the Hill with backpacks, with shopping bags and with big packages of things. They come on the Hill not only at the bottom by Confederation building where the vehicles are stopped but at a number of points along Wellington. They just walk on the Hill. If this is about stopping explosives and all these other things, what is the point of looking under a car's hood when there are people who we do not know walking on to the Hill carrying backpacks?

I am not suggesting that we stop and search every person who comes on the Hill. I am showing the absurdity of looking under the hood of a car to ensure there is nothing tied to a tailpipe but not worrying about people, whoever they may be, coming on to the Hill with backpacks, shopping bags and whatever other method of conveying stuff on to the Hill that they might happen to use. It is absolutely absurd.

In my entire riding there are 27 communities, 18 city councils and two regional districts. It is 27,000 square kilometres. We have 100 RCMP in my riding. We have about 100 RCMP officers on the Hill, never mind the House of Commons security people.

RCMP officers are not inside the buildings. They are out there wielding these silly little mirrors underneath the cars and watching all the other entrances, not for the people with backpacks and shopping bags but to ensure that someone does not drive through. I pointed this out to them one time and they said that if those people tried to come into a building, then their backpacks and shopping bags would be checked. Why do we not check the vehicles when they come into the building? That is absurd.

However, if we are worried about what is in the vehicle, then why would we not be worried about a vehicle coming through without anything, being checked through and then having half a dozen people with big backpacks or whatever come and put them into cars. Now they are inside the parliamentary grounds and the car has whatever has been taken in unchecked in the trunk, or back seat or wherever else. The concept is absurd. When we get to airports, we have exactly the same concept: the facade of security.

We now have plastic knives on board aircraft. We get plastic knives but we get China plates, glass glasses and steel forks. When I fly, I have a meal on board Air Canada. I am given two steel forks. Something happened some time ago now. The trays are a little crowded. I was working and then dinner came, so I put my work away and had my dinner. One of the forks must have been knocked off the tray and landed in my briefcase unbeknownst to me. When I got home and took the stuff out of my suitcase I discovered I had one of these forks. Being an honest person, I wanted to return it to Air Canada because it certainly was not my intention to steal that fork.

The next time I went to the airport, I took the fork with me. When I got to airport security I put all my metal stuff, my pen, my organizer and my cell phone, into the little basket. I also included the fork because I certainly was not trying to sneak it on board the aircraft. Security looked at it and said that I could not take it on board. I asked why not? I asked the security officers where they thought I had got it? It had an Air Canada logo right on it. I told them that I would be given two more as soon as I got on board the plane. They said that they knew that, that it was silly but those were the rules. They confiscated the fork, and I presume that Air Canada never got it back. I was stopped from taking on board a steel fork. We are paying a fortune to stop people from taking on something that the airline will give them once they get on board anyway.

While I had that fork, I looked at it because there were some striking comparisons. A lot of people may have found that when they tried to get on board the aircraft, they were stopped because they had one of those little manicure clippers, the kind that people squeeze together to clip their nails. It has a tiny slide out file. People can take the clippers on board but the files have to be broken off. I had one of those at home which had not been modified for airport security. When I looked at the fork, much to my surprise the tines on the fork were longer than the file I was required to break off if I wanted to go on board the aircraft with it.

We are not talking about John Q. Citizen. We are not talking about some accountant or a school teacher going on board to do something stupid. Conceptually at least we are talking about terrorists who would hijack the plane or do something incredibly disruptive on board. Do they need an inch and a half long nail file, especially given the training that many of them have? If they take an ordinary wooden lead pencil and hold it so the eraser part is in the palm of their hand and the rest of the pencil protrudes between their second and third fingers, that is infinitely more dangerous and more deadly than a sharpened stiletto in our hands. Yet they do nothing about that.

Let us talk about an ordinary credit card. A person can actually hone the edge of a plastic credit card to the point where it is as sharp as a knife. Speaking of knives, they make composite material knives, special hard plastics, that one could actually strap to one's leg and go through security. It will not set off any alarms because it is not metal. It will not be found in the X-ray machine because a person's leg does not go through. Yet it ends up on board in the hands of someone who is trained to use that type of thing.

That is the facade we are going through and nothing will change that. There are totally different ways of dealing with it. Many suggestions have been made, including something that is politically incorrect but nonetheless effective. Something like profiling is very open to criticism but it is effective. The Israelis have had one hijacking. They are a target, yet they have had one hijacking. That is the method they use. What we are doing is completely ineffective.

The carpet cutters that were taken on board were not snuck on board. They were taken on board because they were allowed. Now we do not allow carpet cutters but we still allow pencils and credit cards. The airlines still give out steel forks and regular glasses on board the plane. There are wine bottles, liquor bottles, all these things. Even things like a shoelace in the hands of a highly trained person is a deadly weapon. We have to be realistic about the incredible amount of money we spend and what it is supposed to do.

To put it in a more specific manner as to how we can save money in a lot of these airports, I go back to the example at Castlegar.

First, let me talk about the major airports. The major airports now have what the government calls enhanced security. More people have been hired and given training. Bigger and better X-ray machines are being put in and there is talk about putting in CAT scans. There are explosives sniffers and all kinds of things. Supposedly this is pretty effective.

Then we go to small communities like in my area: Cranbrook, Castlegar, Penticton. We do not even have basic X-ray machines. We have some very conscientious people who check hand luggage and make passengers walk through metal detectors. For all their training, it is incredibly easy to conceal things for those who would do that type of thing. Obviously it is easier to get something through there than it is when one gets to a big airport and it is run through a CAT scan.

However once people go through that and they get on board the plane, that plane flies around all that fancy enhanced security and deposits them on the secure side of the airport. All the money being spent to put this stuff into the major airports is for naught because we let people get on at the least secure airport and fly them around them.

How can the government save money? Places like Castlegar, Cranbrook and Penticton have Dash 8 service. Anyone can charter a Dash 8. It is not a big deal. They do not even use the terminal. They get on the plane and fly to whatever place that plane has been chartered. Why would people worry about getting on board a Dash 8 to hijack it? They can lease the plane and take it wherever they want?

I suggest the government look at doing away with airport security in the small airports that only have small turbo prop service. It should let people get on board in those places and not worry about checking. When passengers fly into places like Vancouver or Calgary or other places, the passengers should simply be unloaded into the general part of the airport so they do not go into the secure side. If they are only flying from Castlegar to Vancouver on a business trip, they are on their way, no hassle and no cost. If they are connecting to other places or flying overseas, they should go through this enhanced security. There is some logic at least to that.

It is still essentially ineffective for someone who is determined enough but at least there is some rationale behind that and at least we have eliminated the cost of security in a lot of airports where there really is no justification for it. The old adage for this one is “a chain is as strong as its weakest link”. It is a phenomenal waste of taxpayer money to put a CAT scan in Vancouver and one in Castlegar then fly them around the CAT scan in Vancouver having gone through in Castlegar.

Clause 116 would require every airport authority to display the Canadian flag in the terminal and in any other place to which the public has access. I like to see the Canadian flag as much as anyone. The people are arriving in Canada. The minister has suggested that these would be at airports that have international travel. I would suggest that it is probably already there. However if the government wants to formalize it I think it is going way over the top in terms of the bill. Beyond that, it would require that signs be erected in prominent locations around the airport and in every terminal building proclaiming that the airport is owned by the Government of Canada.

The only possible reason for doing that would be to fool travellers into believing that the new terminal, built with airport improvement fees, was somehow provided by the government. It is a deception at best and a fraudulent misrepresentation at worst.

Let us say that we own a business. We rent a building and make all kinds of development improvements to the building because we have an expansive operation. Why on earth would we put up signs proclaiming that the building and all the wonderful things belong to somebody else? It does not happen.

Why should these airport authorities put up prominent advertising saying that the building they are leasing happens to belong to the Government of Canada, especially in buildings such as the new terminal building that will be opened next spring in Ottawa which does not have 5¢ of federal money? Yes, it belongs to the federal government, and what a sweetheart deal that is, but not 5¢ was put in. In fact, a huge amount of money was extracted from the very people who paid to put that building up.

Clause 57 would limit an airport authority's ability to invest in another corporation, limiting it to 2% of gross revenues per year. This effectively would kill off Vancouver airport's very profitable YVR airport services by severely restricting its ability to finance projects in places such as Chile, Jamaica and Hamilton. The profits from these projects come back to be utilized by this non-profit authority and reduce the overall costs of airport operations.

The airport authority is made up of business people and the government is the last entity in the country that should be giving the private sector rules and advice on how to make a profit.

Going back to the example of Edmonton, here is an airport like all the rest on which the federal government lost money. The Winnipeg airport authority has made a tremendous number of improvements to its airport at no cost to the government. Its reward was, first of all, being hit with $900,000 a year in rent, and, if that is not bad enough, since 1997 its rent has been increased many times and will be $7 million in 2007.

Another thing that is significantly absent in the bill are rules regarding airport improvement fee money collected by the airlines on behalf of airports. This is curious given that the government has already recognized the need to protect its own money in the name of the air traveller's security charge currently being collected by airlines. The airlines are required to hold that money in trust separate from general revenues.

All funds collected by the airlines on behalf of others should be held in trust. It should not become part of the individual airline's revenue and then some other charge come out at some other point. If it is collected by the airline on behalf of someone else then it should be held separate.

As of April 4 Air Canada, which is, as we know, in a lot of trouble these days, owes Canada's largest airports many millions of dollars for airport improvement fees collected. That money is now tied up in Air Canada's bankruptcy protection hearings.

When we talk about small airports, as I have with my home airport of Castlegar, it does not take a lot of funds that were budgeted for and counted on by that community to run into serious trouble if they suddenly find that they are not getting paid those fees.

I would like to talk in general terms about the fact that the bill has too many errors and omissions for the aviation public to deal with. There are always a few things in a bill that someone will not like or a few things that should be in it but are not. That is what makes up Bill C-27. A vast majority of the things in the bill should not be in it or should at least be better modified. If the government were truly responsible a lot of things would be in the bill but unfortunately they are not. Committees should be tasked with fine-tuning bills, not doing major overhauls.

I want to touch on a few things the parliamentary secretary to the minister said. He said that the government was building on the 1994 airport program it introduced and that this was new international airport policy that was building on this and doing things well. One would think that when it takes nine years to put something together it would be put together a lot better than the government has done with this. There are so many problems in the legislation that it is absolutely absurd.

The parliamentary secretary spoke about monitoring and promoting good corporate policy and yet the government does not have any concept of good corporate policy. Everything it does is either touched with corruption, like the former minister of public works and government services, or it is corrupted with absolute financial irresponsibility, like the former minister of justice who came before Parliament with a bill that he said would cost $2 million and now has cost $1 billion. While all of this was going on, the government knew of the horrendous cost overruns and it covered them up. This is the organization that will monitor and promote good corporate policy for the private sector, not for profit airport authorities. That is pretty absurd.

The parliamentary secretary also talked about better transparency and public reporting. Why does the government not start over there on that side? It is curious to hear the government saying that it has to watch this organization to make sure it is held accountable, that it is absolutely transparent in its operations and that it holds public meetings to allow the public see exactly what is happening. Where was this idea when the government ran up a bill of $1 billion with Bill C-68, the Firearms Registration Act, which was supposed to cost $2 million? Why does the government not start with those kinds of policies and then maybe we can consider that it has some credibility to start talking about accountability from others?

Let me talk about the charging principles for airport improvement. The government wants to have mandatory consultations with the users and a lot of control to make sure nobody is overcharged. I again remind members of the example of the Winnipeg airport where $900,000, almost $1 million a year to start, from something that it used to lose money on, accelerating to $7 million a year by the year 2007, while that airport authority continues to build up that airport and make it better than it was when it took it over from Transport Canada.

The public bid solicitation is also something in the bill.

I see I am almost out of time so I will conclude by saying that I am concerned that none of the recommendations from committee dealing with security fees, airport rents and reduction of aviation fuel taxes have been addressed by the government. I therefore would move that the motion be amended by replacing all the words after the word “that” with “this House declines to give second reading to Bill C-27, an act to amend the Criminal Code and other acts, since the bill fails to address the recommendations in the first report of the Standing Committee on Transport, air travel security charge, tabled on December 12, 2002”.

[Airline Industry, April 7th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, Canada's airline industry is in chaos and the Liberal government can take the lion's share of the credit.

It is ironic that the Minister of Transport who shuffles half a million dollars a day in subsidies to VIA Rail, taxes the air industry to the point of collapse with a variety of taxes, user fees and other charges and policies that harm the air travel industry.

Then Air Canada has managed to run its newly privatized debt free airline $13 billion into debt in 14 years. Air Canada has continuously operated in a predatory manner against all competition. It moved into whatever routes new startup airlines operated, even when it was losing money on a continuing and long term basis.

The government needs to stop the air industry tax gouge and Air Canada needs to concentrate on high end main point national and international travel. Its cost base is too high to compete against low cost competitors that are not going after the higher end market.

Operators like WestJet found its niche. Air Canada needs to find its and the government needs to stop its destructive policy of taxing airlines and air travellers to death.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2003, April 1st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, many people have spoken to the bill today and in past days and many will speak after I do as well. Rather than dwell on its specific details, I would like to talk about the whole concept of government budgets, how governments spend their money and for that matter why they spend their money.

In this country there is far too much government, particularly at the federal level. In order to deal with that we need to look at why we even have government. I recognize we need to have government, there is no question of that, but what exactly is it that government should be doing for us?

Government should exist for the purpose of doing things for people that must be done, which they either cannot or will not do for themselves. That is the sole purpose of government. What government should not do is be in business. Especially it should not be in business to compete against the private sector.

We need to reduce government to do only those things which people must have done that they either cannot or will not do for themselves. Having reduced it to that, we next need to bring the government as close as possible to the people it serves. People should have the best access possible to their elected representatives. If an issue can be handled at the provincial, regional or local level, that is where it should be handled. Only those things which are best done at the national level should indeed be done here in Ottawa by the federal government.

There is a role obviously for the federal government. There are things that are best done at the federal level, but the federal government is involved in far more than that. That is why there are such huge and wasteful budgets. That is why there have been such overwhelming deficits in the past. That is why there is still such an outstanding debt. The interest payments on it are eating up a lot of the money that taxpayers send to the government.

If we took this to its ultimate conclusion, we could quite conceivably reach a point where it no longer became necessary or indeed practical to pay federal income tax. I know there are a lot of people out there who think the federal government does not even have the constitutional right to collect income tax but in actual fact it does. I have read this. It has been brought up a lot in my riding. As a result of that I did check into it and I can sadly confirm that it does indeed have the right to tax Canadians, and tax them it does. If we reduced government to doing only those things that governments should be doing, then we may come to a point where it would not be necessary to collect federal income tax.

Obviously if the government still had a role at the federal level, which it would, it would have to have the money to fulfill that role. What is the alternative to the government taxing the residents of the various provinces and territories? It is simply this. Taxes would be done at the local level and the federal government in essence would bill the provinces for services rendered.

The bill would be based on the provincial GDP. Each province would pay a different amount of money for that service. That in essence would become the equalization payment. A province that was richer and had a stronger GDP would pay a little more for the service than a province that was having a little trouble with its economy. That would be adjusted constantly. It would actually work a lot fairer than the system we have right now.

Right now there is an incredible amount of waste in the government. It is almost inevitable that the waste will continue as long as there is a government which is spread so thinly over so many things and which is breaking in on areas of provincial and local jurisdiction. At times its departments are tripping over one another. The justice minister is trying to hand off the white elephant called the firearms registry program to the solicitor general. There are so many glitches between the departments he has not yet figured out how to do that. It would be a whole lot better if he simply shut it down.

As a member of Parliament I am often asked by people, particularly in my riding, how I like the job, if I enjoy the job, if there are things I do not like about it and whether I find it frustrating. I tell them that yes, it is frustrating and that the most frustrating thing is coming to Ottawa and seeing all the problems that confront this country. There are far more than the average person would realize. It is frustrating to realize we could either correct or at least put on the road the solutions to almost every one of those problems in 12 months but there is not the political will to do it. That is incredibly frustrating.

Anytime I speak about government spending and budgets and everything else, I would be remiss if I did not mention my favourite ultimate boondoggle for the federal government and that is VIA Rail.

VIA Rail is an example of why government should not be in business. Aside from the fact that VIA competes directly against all modes in the private transportation sector, the phenomenal waste in VIA Rail is astounding. VIA Rail is subsidized by taxpayers, and those taxpayers include all of us in the House, subsidized to the amount of half a million dollars a day. Each year for just the operational subsidy of VIA Rail, the taxpayers of each individual riding send, on average, over $600,000 to Ottawa for the government to give to VIA Rail to fund its operating deficit.

Since 1993 when the Liberals took power, VIA Rail has been subsidized by the Liberal government to the tune of almost $3 billion. That is three times the amount of money it wasted on the firearms registry and we know how outraged people are about that. It is time that people started realizing how much of their money is actually going into VIA Rail.

With 301 ridings in this country, this means that, on average, taxpayers of each riding have sent to Ottawa $10 million for the government to give to VIA Rail. Members should think about what they could do in their ridings with $10 million. I am sure that in their ridings, like mine, they probably have some hospitals that are underfunded and need some modernization or some new equipment. I am sure there are roads and highways that are in disrepair. There is a variety of different problems, including housing and others. Members should think about how many of those things could be dealt with if they had the $10 million that taxpayers have sent to Ottawa in order to fund VIA Rail.

The firearms registry is yet another example. The Auditor General said that the Liberal government has now spent $800 million on a program that was supposed to cost $2 million. That is 400 times the estimate. If the program worked the way the government claims it works, some people might scratch their heads and say that $800 million is a lot of money but if some good can come out of it then perhaps, no pun intended, it is a bullet we need to bite and we need to spend that money.

However, let us think about the two things the government claims. The government claims that the gun registry it is going to prevent crime. Really, how is causing law-abiding duck hunters to register their long guns going to prevent crime? Criminals, by definition, break the law, so all the government has done is give them one more law to break and I am quite sure they are quite willing to do that.

Aside from that, after over 70 years of a strict handgun registration system, handguns are still the weapon of choice of criminals. Criminals have chosen to use something that has been subject to strict registration while all other firearms have not been registered even though this meant breaking the law. Those who are going to rob the 7-Eleven or the local bank do not stop to think whether or not they are breaking the law by having an unregistered firearm.

The whole concept that the gun registry will prevent crime is absolute nonsense and absolutely unsustainable.

The other claim is that it is going to save lives. The government likes to throw figures around. It has said that the registry will save lives in a variety of ways. I have never heard one real, substantive explanation of how that will occur. The government says it has prevented people who should not have firearms from getting permission to buy them. We had a firearms acquisition program before, one that we supported, one that the firearms community supported. We support the registration of the owners; it is the firearms that are questionable because of the cost and because of the uselessness of that particular program.

The government says the registry will prevent domestic violence. How? It is not going to prevent anything. First, any number of things are used in cases of domestic violence. The mere fact that someone has acquired a weapon legally and the fact that the weapon is registered is not going to make it any less deadly or any less threatening for someone who would break our laws. Whether it is a firearm, a kitchen knife, or a rope, or whether it is burning down a house, it does not matter in terms of registration. That does not stop a thing.

Had it cost the $2 million the government said it would, perhaps we could say that even if it saves only one life it is worth it. By the end of this year the cost will be close to $1 billion and an end is nowhere in sight. Now the government admits that the program, which was to cost only $2 million, is going to cost between $60 million and $80 million a year just to sustain it once it is up and running.

These are the kinds of things the government is doing in wasting taxpayers' dollars. It then comes forward with a budget and says, “Look how good we are and all the wonderful things we have done”.

There is a tremendous amount of increased spending in that budget. Instead of increasing the amount of spending, the government should have diverted some of the money currently being wasted on things like the firearms program and VIA Rail. These are the kinds of things for which the government has to start reining in its spending. If it wants taxpayers' support and wants taxpayers to understand why they are sending that money to Ottawa, taxpayers have to understand that the money is being spent responsibly. At this point it is not, and there is no indication that it will be anywhere in the near future, at least not before the next election.

[Sex Offender Information Registration Act, March 31st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have a couple of points that perhaps my colleague could comment on.

The hon. member across the way in his questions and comments said we must give a chance for amendments because that this is how the system works and it is good. He had over 50 amendments to Bill C-13 and I do not think any of them were passed, so I do not know how he can stand and say that we should go the amendment route.

The other point is the question of retroactivity. We are saying it is okay to do this in the future. We are not worried about the Charter of Rights and Freedoms of someone in the future. The only thing we are saying is that if the people who had raped and molested young children or attacked women in the past had only known that their names were going to be written in a book, perhaps they would never have done it.

It is not fair to now come along and say that after everything else that was done to them, their name is now going to be written in a book. They would say that is not fair because if they had known that, they would never have done these things. Does the member think that is even remotely possible? Even if it is, does that not suggest that it is a deterrent, not that I believe that it is the case, but it should not stop it from being put in?

What the government is using as an excuse is an absolute absurdity. It is time we started coming up with solid laws to protect law-abiding citizens in the country instead of being bleeding hearts about the rights of criminals.

[Sex Offender Information Registration Act, March 31st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have a couple of comments and then a very specific question for the hon. member.

First, he said in his speech that we were very selective, that we showed all the flaws in the plan but did not mention the good stuff, so I am going to correct that. It has a great title. It was a good point to start from and that is where they quit. The government had the title right but there is absolutely no meat in the sandwich. That is what the government has to go back to.

This has to be retroactive from the time it is put in or it is never going to be put in. If this thing passes without retroactivity, somewhere later it will be 10 times as hard. If a bunch of vacillating, fence-sitting, blow in the wind Liberals do not have the guts to do it now, then it is better that there is absolutely nothing and that they just get out of the way and let some new party come in that is going to do the kinds of things Canadians want and will put in this kind of law.

Second, he talked about getting it to committee so we could have expert witnesses. I saw that process already in the justice committee. I saw it with statutory release. I saw where there was unanimity that we would put in a recommendation to get rid of statutory release. What happened? The whip's office or the PMO or someone up there said, “We do not like this. Get back there and fix that”. What did the Liberals do? They selectively called more expert witnesses to come in and say that this was bad and that was bad. They reversed themselves and they reversed the arrangements we had already made.

The question I have is this. During his speech, the hon. member said that the bill is in response to the request of police agencies. There are at least a dozen police agencies in my riding alone and there are hundreds, if not thousands, across the country. I would ask him this: Can he name just one police agency, just one of all the thousands in this country, just one police agency that came to him or anybody in his party and said, “Please bring in a bill that has no retroactivity and a big loophole for anybody in the future”? Just one.

[Sex Offender Information Registration Act, March 31st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the member will probably recall that when I made my speech I talked about the Machiavellian mindset of the Liberals where they come out with something that gives us just a little bit and we are supposed to think the thing is fixed.

Is this going to do any good if it moves ahead? No. The bill is so flawed it has to be scrapped. We need to go back to the drawing board. If the bill goes through in the manner in which it is now, even with a little tinkering, the Liberals are going to say they lived up to what the people asked for and brought in a national sex offender registry. It is absolutely useless but people would have their sex offender registry.

I say to scrap it, take it back. We would not have one. They would still have to answer to all the people who demand that they have something. They would have to come back with something that actually worked and dealt with what the people asked for in the first place instead of pretending they have done something when they have not. They should go back and get it right. Maybe we could start fixing some of the problems in the country if we brought in new bills that had real teeth, that were not open to interpretation and which actually answered what the public was demanding.

[Sex Offender Information Registration Act, March 31st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, it always amuses me when I hear a Liberal member, albeit one who has some compassion in some areas, use the term justice principles. Principles and justice just do not seem to go together with the Liberal government.

I suppose one question might be, why would we want to have this bill ticking away instead of going to committee and putting in amendments. There are two reasons. First, there is the word maybe. We do not believe the Liberals would put in amendments on this. Second, we are not talking about a little tinkering. We are not talking about a bill that is fundamentally good and to which we have to make a little correction or two. We are talking about a bill that is fundamentally flawed.

It is an absolute farce to bring in the bill in the manner in which it is now. Are there problems of how judges would deal with this and interpret it? We have to start realizing that we are not people who draft some little thing for judges to consider. We are legislators. We write the laws. The job of the judges is to enforce what we write.

We have to start writing it a lot better. If there are problems, we had better find ways to fix them. What is happening right now is an absolute farce of the justice system. The victims have no rights at all. We bend over backward for the criminals and say that we do not want to step on their rights. What about the rights of the people who they violated? Those are the ones to whom we have to start paying a lot more attention than we are doing right now. The bill certainly does not do that.

[Sex Offender Information Registration Act, March 31st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, it has been said many times today that one of the flaws in this bill is primarily the fact that there is no retroactivity. The list will come out on the national sex offender registry and it will be completely empty and being completely empty, it will also necessarily be completely useless.

Just in case, as time goes forward, this thing actually does a tiny bit of good, and I do emphasize the word tiny, at some future point someone is going to commit one of these heinous acts and that person's name will be put into the book. However, because the government wants to keep not only all the people who have already committed offences of this nature out of the book but also wants to provide an opportunity for people who commit these offences in the future to be kept out of the book, it put in a provision which says that if this does more harm to the poor person who sexually molested a young child than public good, then that person's name does not have to go in the book either.

Let us consider for a minute why on earth the Liberal government would do this type of thing. There are two reasons.

One I almost hate to use because it gives the government the credit of being clever in a very sinister sort of way. The first reason is that we have to consider the people who make up the primary front line of the Liberal government starting with the Prime Minister and working down through the cabinet to junior cabinet ministers. The vast majority of them have listed “lawyer” as their former occupation. They are lawyers. They have that background and training. They have that strange kind of mindset. I do not necessarily wish to attack other lawyers. At least they have had the dignity to continue to do what it is they do and not come in here and combine it with politics. It seems that combination brings out some really twisted ideas.

The other reason is a more Machiavellian look into the psyche of the Liberal mind. This is the kind of psyche that produced the non-position the Prime Minister has taken on Iraq. The Minister of National Defence cannot even decide if we are there or not there, if we are there but are invisible, if we are visible but it is not because we are really there because we are not. That is the kind of mind spin that comes out of this.

The Machiavellian approach goes like this. The Liberals say, “We know the Canadian Alliance received a great deal of support when it came out with this push for a national sex offender registry. We know that the public is demanding this. What we want to do is come out with something that makes the public think we have actually done something. We want to take the pressure off, so we will do just the tiniest bit. No one who has already committed an offence will be in there, so we will not lose any support from the pedophiles, child rapists and molesters who have already committed an offence. After all, we went to a great deal of trouble to make sure they were able to vote while they are still in jail. The last thing we would want is to do something that would offend them”.

“We finally got this new cache of votes, so we certainly do not want to do anything that offends convicted people by telling them, just when they are able to start voting for a member of Parliament, that we are going to put their names in a sex registry. They might be offended by that and gee, we do not want to do that. Let us make sure that those who have already committed offences do not go in the book. We are going to put some other people in jail in the future and we want their votes too, so let us make sure they have the opportunity of not getting their names into the book either. We will leave that little loophole for them and make sure they understand where it came from. It came from us Liberals, so they will want to vote for us when they get to cast their vote in a federal jail”.

The other is an even more Machiavellian part of the same thing. That is where the Liberals actually want to come out with this and then have all the people who pushed and worked so hard to have this brought in and who put pressure on the government say, “See? We were not so bad not having brought it in because now we have brought it in and it really is not doing any good. A big fuss has been created over nothing. People were kind of looking down their noses at the Liberal Party because we would not bring this in. Now that we have brought it in, nothing has really changed. Everyone was wrong and we were right and therefore, people had better start thinking better about the Liberal Party because we know what we are doing when we do not bring in these laws that others want. They are not going to work”.

Certainly the laws are not going to work the way the government brings them forward.

I do not know how much time I have, but I can assure members that this is something on which I could talk at length. It is something which resonates strongly in my riding. It has been asked already here by a couple of my colleagues how this resonates in different ridings.

I represent a western riding, as do most of my colleagues. I have to assume that people in eastern ridings feel as strongly about this as we do in the west, that they are just as appalled at a government that brings in legislation for which people have been calling, then emasculates it in such a way that it has no real impact or effect.

I have heard people talking about judicial activism. That is where people are complaining about decisions made by the judges in this country. In this particular case, we are going to get into a situation where the government will say that if it starts putting people's names retroactively in the book, the judges may not like it. The judges may decide that it is not constitutionally fair, that we have not been reasonable to those terrible criminals and we have to uphold their rights. They would challenge the government.

I talked to a judge some time ago about the concept of judicial activism. He said to me, “I am not going to stand here and say that there is not a judge anywhere who makes a bad decision. We are human. We are like every other group. But before you start coming down on judges, start writing better legislation. When Parliament writes sloppy legislation, judges have no alternative but to consider the ramifications of what is written. Fix the legislation. Write better legislation. After doing that, if you still feel you have a problem, that is when you need to start looking at the judges”.

Let me give an example of this. I have a private member's bill on conditional sentencing right which tries to fix what the government itself admitted was a problem but would not do anything about. Conditional sentencing is something brought in by the Liberal government which says that judges can consider if jailing a person is not necessarily in the public good. If there is nothing to be gained from it, the judge may, at his or her discretion, decide to sentence a person to serve time in the public, not to have to go to jail, to serve no jail time whatsoever.

After the Liberals brought this in, not surprisingly we found that some people who committed violent offences, in some cases very violent rapes, were being let go with a conditional sentence. People who heard this were absolutely outraged, as well they might be. They wrote to the government. Certainly they wrote to us asking for our help and we raised it in the House of Commons.

The Minister of Justice said in defence that it was never his intention that it should apply to violent offenders. We said, “Then it is an easy fix. All you have to do is bring in a simple amendment that says it does not apply to violent offenders. We can pass it in the House in a day and we can take that loophole out”.

I believe that the minister said that in 1995. It is 2003 and it has still not been brought forward. I have now put it in a private member's bill. Hopefully with the new system we have managed to bring in, I may get to bring that bill before the House one day and hopefully the government will recognize the wisdom of passing it. That is just one example.

Another one which is a little different situation is statutory release. Statutory release is where someone, and in this case we are talking about child molesters, pedophiles, and people who commit sex offences, in some cases very serious ones, serve two-thirds of their sentences. They gave no cooperation inside prison. They did not take any kind of courses that would help them deal with whatever makes their minds so twisted to do those type of things. Maybe they have had some offences inside the prison, they have had problems with other prisoners, they have been disruptive. They have served two-thirds of their sentence and they automatically get out. It is not even subject to review by the parole board.

These are the kinds of things we want to change but the government says no, it cannot do that, that it is the prisoner's right. In fact, the Liberal government believes that prisoners retain every right and privilege of law-abiding citizens, except obviously the ability to keep them incarcerated. I fundamentally disagree with that.

If people want to hear more about this and particularly about statutory release, they should feel free to look at my website. There is a great deal of information on it. If the Liberals would like to raise questions, I would love to hear what they have to say about this.