Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I recognize how critically important this is and it is absolutely shameful that so few people are listening to such an important bill. I therefore ask that you call quorum.
House of Commons photoWon his last election, in 2004, with 37% of the vote.
Species at Risk Act February 20th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I recognize how critically important this is and it is absolutely shameful that so few people are listening to such an important bill. I therefore ask that you call quorum.
Species at Risk Act February 20th, 2002
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today on this part of Bill C-5 dealing primarily with compensation to property owners who would suffer under the impact of the bill.
Let me give an example that is typical of this, because we are talking primarily about rural lands, farmland and ranchland. It is one of the anomalies in the bill. If there were four large ranches all in the same area, all interconnected, and there happened to be some endangered species habitat found on one ranch, that particular rancher could potentially suffer financial harm without proper compensation or even any compensation under the bill while the other three ranchers in the immediate area would have no financial penalty at all.
One of the problems we have with legislation throughout the country is getting people to relate to what the actual problem is. It is sometimes very difficult to get someone in an urban centre, where housing density is much more concentrated, to relate to what is happening to a random rancher or farmer but not to any great numbers of them. I would like to use examples which, while not necessarily factual, certainly could be.
I will pick three urban ridings, the first one being the federal riding of Davenport. Inside the federal riding of Davenport, let us say that a constituent goes to his member of parliament asking for help because six feet are being taken off his 70 foot lot, his fence is being taken down, his fruit trees taken out and the government is offering absolutely no compensation because it says that this is less than 10% of the individual's property and he should be prepared to give it up for the government.
In another riding, that of Kitchener Centre, let us say that someone with a large commercial building goes to his member of parliament stating that the federal government next door has decided it needs to expand its building and is taking away from the back of his property his legal access to his loading docks. Without that access, says the individual, “I have no way to bring in my trucks and I am going to suffer severe financial harm because the government is taking away a legally entrenched access route, which is right on the deed of property, but because it does not represent 10% of the value of the business I am not going to get any compensation”.
In the third riding, that of Victoria, British Columbia, a group of property owners goes to the member of parliament asking for help. They have waterfront property and the federal government has decided it needs some property on the water for a port activity. It has decided to take 50 feet off their property, denying them waterfront any more because another property will be between them and the water. The government will take away a substantial part of their lots and they will get approximately only 50% of the value of the land the government is taking.
In each of these cases, the member of parliament they went to for help is in a conflict because the three members of parliament for those ridings are the Liberal chair of the environment committee, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of the Environment and the Minister of the Environment himself.
In this legislation, they have not denied that they are following the provisions of something called the Pearse report, which recommends that the impact on anybody whose property is taken or whose operation is curtailed by less than 10% of the value should not be compensated at all. That would follow for the first two examples of Davenport and Kitchener Centre. In the third example, where substantial value is being taken, the Pearse report states that if it is more than 10% of the value then 50% of what the individual loses should be compensated.
I would hope that people from urban centres who are listening to this debate recognize how they would feel if the government said “We're taking a piece of your property. We're taking six feet off the side. We're taking away the new fence you just built and we're not going to put it back up. We're taking away all the fruit trees that line that side of your property and we're not going to give you any compensation”.
If they cannot relate to some random rancher or perhaps a farmer out in a rural area, then perhaps they can relate to someone on their street or even possibly themselves having the government come and say it is taking their property and there will be no compensation.
We certainly support the concept of protecting endangered species and their habitat. We think it is very important, but the very notion that a few people would be asked to finance the cost of this when it is of benefit to all is absolutely absurd.
I would hope that the members on the Liberal side would reflect on this. We know we are from different parties but sometimes I even wonder if we are not from different countries, with the gap between us on this side of the House and that little bit of space across the way to the government benches. How can they sit there quietly and say it is perfectly fair to take 10% of someone's land and not pay compensation? Are they are supposed to say “thanks very much for allowing us to contribute to the government”? That does not make a whole lot of sense and yet I do not hear a single voice from the government side speaking out in support of the people of Canada. That is really who they are acting against.
Whenever this happens to one group, in this case albeit a relatively small percentage, the farmers and ranchers of the country, the other people, those in urban centres and all those who say it does not affect them, have to realize that even though it does not in this case what happens the next time? What happens when the federal government does something that does affect them and other people say “it does not affect us so we're not coming to your aid”?
I had a recent case in one of my communities. The Department of Fisheries and Oceans decided arbitrarily that it needed a $400,000 fish screen placed on the opening of an irrigation canal that supplies water to the farmers in that area. That canal had been in operation over 80 years without any problem, but suddenly the Department of Fisheries and Oceans said it wanted to enhance the salmon fishery so it would have a fancy screen put on the opening of the canal. As a result, a small city of about 3,500 people is being handed a bill for $400,000.
All Canadians across the country must stand together to stand up to mistakes that the Liberal government makes from time to time. I would like to think that the Liberals are acting with honourable intentions. That is why we support the concept of the bill, but the reality is that it does no good to have good intentions if in fact serious harm would be done to a great number of Canadians across the country.
The very notion that the government would impose this financial hardship on a few suggests that it really does not care about making a bill that is right. It only cares about scoring a few cheap political points with a few people who are pushing this agenda particularly hard.
I salute the people who are pushing the agenda to protect the endangered species of the country, but I am sure even they would not agree that only a handful of people, particularly rural farmers and ranchers, should be the ones who have to bear the burden for it.
I would hope that the government will consider changing this part of the bill. We know that it has been drafting the bill for seven years. Would it not be an embarrassment to the government that it would come forward with a bill at this stage that would so unfairly penalize a small number of people within our community after seven years of a bill being brought before the House, being debated, being lost when the government prorogued the House and brought a session to an end and then being reintroduced yet another time, and with all the hearings across the country and the information we have received from divergent groups all recognizing the unfairness of this? It would be unconscionable. The government has an opportunity to change it and I hope the government will take it.
We are in report stage now and there is an opportunity for the government to accept that. If it does not, then the only other opportunity we have left is the thought that the government has no real agenda. There are a lot of rumours that the government will prorogue the House. That has bailed it out of bad legislation before. That is one of the reasons for proroguing the House: to wipe the slate of bad legislation. This bill is that and if ever there was justification for taking legislation off the slate this is it.
If the government does not fix this legislation, then it has to remove it. Otherwise, it is being very unfair to a number of good Canadians, Canadians who deserve better from the government.
Criminal Code December 7th, 2001
I have a few he could have.
Prebudget Consultations November 7th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, leading in to a question for the hon. member, I would like to comment on the previous speech by the member for Vancouver East. I do not know if she was confused and got her facts backward but she said, and I assume she is referring to British Columbia, her province and mine, that there are subsidies for private motor vehicles and subsidies for the highways but unfortunately no subsidies for public transportation.
It is the exact opposite. Public transportation in British Columbia, particularly in the lower mainland in the area she is from in Vancouver, is heavily subsidized. On the price of gas alone that the private vehicles buy, there is an extra two cents a litre to help pay for that, so it is the exact opposite.
This goes to a question I asked a government member earlier and I address it now to the member. We need a good highway infrastructure system in order to get our economy working to travel east and west within Canada and north and south across the border. We have a tremendous amount of cross-border traffic. We need a much better highway system.
The federal government spends about $200 million per year on national highway infrastructure. In British Columbia alone it extracts $1 billion out of the province in fuel tax which was put on ostensibly as a highway tax to build and maintain our highway infrastructure. That is just the federal tax.
I would ask the hon. member what she thinks would be fair. Perhaps we could come up with some kind of system so that her government puts back some of the money so that we can spend it directly on the very sector it was taken from, the public transportation sector. Then we could have better infrastructure in order to move the goods to create the wealth that pays the taxes that keeps the government going.
Prebudget Consultations November 7th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, I listened with great interest to the last member and in particular to his comments about the need for infrastructure. He emphasized Ontario but I have to reflect this in terms of my own province of British Columbia.
Governments in general have an excise tax on gas. The Liberal government right now takes in about $1 billion a year in fuel taxes from my province of British Columbia and yet it spends only about $200 million nationally on this highway infrastructure the hon. member talked about. If he thinks there are problems with highway infrastructure in Ontario, imagine the challenge we have in British Columbia with our highly mountainous terrain. B.C., being forestry dependent and having a lot of mining product that goes south, needs a very good highway infrastructure and it is very expensive to maintain.
Having made a comment about the infrastructure in Ontario, what does he think about his government's policy of spending $200 million a year on the highway system nationally while extracting $1 billion from British Columbia alone? B.C. needs some of its own money back so it can fix its highway infrastructure.
Airport Security November 5th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, a few weeks ago I asked the Minister of Transport to explain how spending tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on state of the art detection equipment for major airports would enhance safety for the travelling public when many smaller airports do not even have basic x-ray equipment. Passengers travelling through these smaller airports arrive on the secure side of the minister's fancy new equipment.
His answer was that travellers from these smaller airports are rerouted through security at the larger airports. That is untrue. The minister either intentionally misled the House or he is imply incompetent.
I pursued this matter at adjournment proceedings where I had the opportunity to expand on my question and seek a more detailed and hopefully more accurate answer.
The minister obviously thinks so little of the safety of the travelling public that he did not even send his parliamentary secretary. He sent the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Health who, if possible, knows even less about airport security than the transport minister.
Perhaps the Prime Minister should make airport security the responsibility of the immigration minister, a portfolio where Canadians have learned to expect incompetence.
Foreign Missions and International Organizations Act October 22nd, 2001
Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that I did not get an answer during question period which is the reason I asked to come before the House tonight during adjournment proceedings. I did not get an answer again. It is very unfortunate the minister could not have sent someone who had some transport knowledge. Obviously he does not. We would very much like to get an answer. My question was not answered. It was not even addressed.
The government's priorities have to be questioned these days. We are in a time of national and international stress. People are concerned. What has the Liberal government done? We adjourned early on Friday and we adjourned two hours early today.
Where is the government's priorities and plan? It does not have any. It cannot answer basic security questions in transport. The government does not have a plan and it cannot even give a straight honest answer.
Foreign Missions and International Organizations Act October 22nd, 2001
Mr. Speaker, last Wednesday I pointed out that the Minister of Transport had announced the spending of $79 million on new security procedures in transport, a vast majority of which was going toward highly sophisticated state of the art detection screening equipment. I asked the minister what airports that equipment would be going to. His response was that it would go to the major airports where the highest volume of traffic occurred.
In a supplemental question I asked the minister what good he thought it would do to put the equipment into high density airports when at dozens of small airports across the country there was not even basic x-ray equipment for carry on baggage. People going through those airports are subject to a hand search. I am not disparaging the people who operate those security checkpoints. They are not given the tools. It is very easy for them to miss a hidden compartment or something else that basic x-ray equipment would pick up.
When people board aircraft and fly into a major airport, such as Vancouver or Calgary in my case, they are deposited on the secure side, around the back of the sophisticated equipment which the minister is spending millions of taxpayers' dollars on to no avail.
I asked the minister how he thought it would help to put in the fancy equipment and then have people fly out of small airports and simply be routed around. His response as reported in Hansard was:
Mr. Speaker, the hon. member should know that when that is the case those people in transit are required to go through security at the larger airports.
That is not true. Virtually every week I fly out of small airports that do not have x-ray equipment. I know for an absolute fact that I am deposited on the secure side. At no time ever, not once, have I been re-routed through enhanced security at the larger airports.
I would like it clarified why the minister gave such an answer. Was he endeavouring to intentionally mislead members of the House, or was he simply incompetent in answering a transport question?
Transportation October 17th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, most of us have heard the old adage that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link but obviously the minister has not. State of the art equipment at major airports does absolutely nothing to enhance safety if terrorists board aircraft at airports with no radar or x-ray security whatsoever, then fly into a major airport and disembark on the secure side.
Why does the minister think that enhanced equipment will make flights safer if some passengers can avoid it and fly in from small, unequipped airports?
Transportation October 17th, 2001
Mr. Speaker, the government has announced it will be spending $79 million to enhance security at Canada's airports. The majority of that money, $55.7 million, will be for enhanced electronic security equipment.
Could the minister tell the House if that is scheduled for all airports in Canada and, if not, what categories of airports are being considered?