Jim Gouk

[Transportation, June 5th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, committees are charged with the responsibilities of reviewing the estimates of government departments and agencies. Recently, the transport committee reduced the funding request of VIA Rail by $9 million after VIA failed to explain why it needed even more money than last year. The minister has indicated he will move to overturn the committee's decision and put the money back.

Can the minister explain how he justifies circumventing the decision of an all-party committee so he can give even more money to his personal pet project VIA Rail?

[Points of Order, May 29th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the intervention that was just made suggested that the House leader did not know, or the whip did not know, that there was not simultaneous translation available. Where did he think that was coming from when the meeting clearly said that it was in the parliamentary dining room?

[Points of Order, May 29th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I am responding directly to the comments made by the Liberal whip. Simultaneous translation was available to every member present. Everything that was said by the member of the Bloc Québécois was translated into English for all around the table. Everything that was said in English was translated for that hon. member, plus a Liberal member who was sitting there as well, who is obviously fluent but still had the right to get and consequently got that interpretation. So it was there. It was available.

The point has been made that the meeting was opened, no one objected to it being opened under the conditions that were there, the meeting was carried out and the meeting adjourned. There was no objection raised. Had there been, we could have addressed it, but it was not raised.

One cannot accept the conditions that are there and then after, because something did not go one's way, decide on some kind of technicality that one is going to object to something that one could have objected to and did not.

[Points of Order, May 29th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, first, I do not believe standing orders require notice except for an inaugural meeting. Second, I would contradict what the House leader of the Liberal Party has to say, because this place does suspend the sitting when there is a quorum call. Quorum is called. There is a procedure later. Quorum was not called; the meeting was suspended because there was not a quorum and it was a choice of the chair concurred in by those present.

The other point I would like to make is that last night at committee the minister appeared before the Standing Committee on Transport and the minister himself specifically asked for the recording to be turned off. It was a choice of the minister. I do not think the minister figures that he was not at that meeting because he asked for the recording to be turned off. The House leader makes the point that the meeting this morning was not valid because it was not recorded and yet his own minister last night asked at a meeting for the recording to be turned off.

Now, either the minister was asking us to act contrary to allowable procedures or the procedure followed this morning was in order.

[Ethics Counsellor, May 16th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, the Canadian Alliance supports this motion for the production of copies of all reports of the ethics counsellor concerning the former solicitor general. It is important that details of this conflict of interest be open and transparent, as well as many others that have been raised in the House today. The Government of Canada has a duty to tell the people why the former solicitor general was forced to resign. They have the right to know.

Over and over we see the government's complete lack of will to provide openness and transparency. The promise by the government to establish new standards of ethics has taken over a decade to surface and even then it is only just barely popping its head up. We have seen scandal after scandal with the government and each time the government promises to be open and more transparent. Yet each time that a scandal erupts, the government does damage control and then tries to cover up the wrongdoing of the minister.

This is not just limited to the former solicitor general. We are also talking about the former minister of public works, Alfonso Gagliano; the former minister of national defence; the House leader of the Liberal Party in his role as minister of public works; the minister of industry; and even now there is one that is still ongoing where medical studies on aboriginal health were done by an auto restoration firm; and of course, the Prime Minister himself. The government has existed on excuses and when it cannot come up with excuses in the existing conflict of interest guidelines, it manipulates the guidelines to encompass a whole set of brand new excuses.

The Liberal standard has fallen to a new all-time low. The government need only review the words of former Prime Minister John Turner who said in Parliament on May 12, 1986:

In public administration a minister has the burden of proof, the duty to show that what he is doing is beyond reproach. The burden of proof is not on Parliament. It is not on the opposition, nor the media. The burden of proof is on the minister.

If the minister failed this test put forward by the Prime Minister through the ethics counsellor, then Parliament and Canadians have a right to know what was so compelling as to require his resignation.

In October 1993 the Liberal Party of Canada published its election promises book known as red book I. One of the promises in it stated:

A Liberal Government will appoint an independent Ethics Counsellor to advise both public officials and lobbyists in the day-to-day application of the Code of Conduct for Public Officials. The Ethics Counsellor will be appointed after consultation with the leaders of all parties in the House of Commons and will report directly to Parliament.

An ethics counsellor was indeed appointed, but without any consultation and reporting directly to the Prime Minister.

Let us fast forward to February 2001. The Canadian Alliance brought forward a supply day motion quoting word for word from the 1993 Liberal red book promise. The motion asked the House of Commons to adopt a policy to appoint an ethics counsellor who would report directly to Parliament and asked the government to implement that policy. It was defeated by a vote of 145 to 122 with all opposition members voting in favour. Once again the Liberal government failed to live up to its promises.

In Bill C-34 it is proposed that the new ethics counsellor will report to the House. If that is good enough now, then why not table the reports regarding the solicitor general today? Why wait and why create a double standard?

There were many unanswered questions surrounding the dealings of the former solicitor general. The government parades itself as being responsible and ethical. If this is so, then the government has a responsibility to table the ethics counsellor report in the House of Commons.

The government has taken 10 years and has made many attempts at striving for ethical standards. It should prove to the people that it is serious in making sure that parliamentarians work under ethical standards. A step in that direction would be to table the documents and show by action what, in essence, the Liberal government says it really means. If this is not done, the government will have let Canadians know that its decade old attempt at coming up with an ethical standard is just another empty promise.

Canadians need the government to be candid, something it has not been. The government has continually attempted to set rules for its members to follow. When they cannot follow the rules, it simply sets up new rules.

We need to assure Canadians that rules have been followed and can be followed and when they are not, that the government will be forthright with Canadians as to what went wrong.

[Employment Insurance Act, May 2nd, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise to speak on this today. While I disagree with a lot of the premise of what the member has presented and proposed today, I still nonetheless want to recognize that he believes in this and that he is doing it for very altruistic purposes. It is not a personal benefit thing. It is something that he truly believes will be of benefit to workers.

Unfortunately, I do not think he is going about it the right way. In fact it starts with the very alarming premise that we should change the name of the program from employment insurance to unemployment insurance. Frankly, when it used to be called unemployment insurance, I never thought it should have been changed. I thought that was the stupidest thing the government did. It cost taxpayers, and ultimately workers, $5 million to change the name from unemployment insurance to employment insurance. Why? Because it is supposed to make people feel better. I thought that was pretty stupid. However it is equally unsound to spend another $5 million to change it back to a name that will make people feel worse, not that I think people felt a whole lot better having changed the name in the first place.

What the bill proposes is that we will get bigger benefits for a longer period of time. People will have to do less to receive them. It will eliminate severance pay and vacation pay before one can start collecting. On that specific point, the NDP member who presented the bill said that it was unfair that vacation and severance pay should be included and that people should be using it to help them find a job.

The reality is that when people end their jobs and get six weeks pay as a severance package and three weeks vacation pay, they are technically not unemployed until that runs out. Employers are saying that although they will not have the people working, they will still pay them as if they were working for the period of severance and vacation. I just wanted to make specific comment on that.

It also provides benefits for those who quit their jobs without just cause. The member has left a qualifier on it that there will be a waiting period, which he wants to eliminate in other places.

People are insured to have a job. If people personally choose to quit their jobs, it is not unlike people who insure their houses and then burn them down because they do not want their houses any more. First, aside from the concept of any criminal act of burning the house, one can imagine how any employer would feel if it was told it had to insure the house and if the person decided to burn it down, then employer would have to pay the person for the amount for which the individual insured the house. There would be an awful lot of people who would not worry about selling their houses. They would just light a match. Imagine the havoc that would cause.

Frankly it will create the same form of havoc inside the employment insurance program if people were to say that they have enough weeks now to quit their job, take a year long vacation while collecting these benefits and then find another job, work for the minimum period required and quit that job.

This bill promises more for less. Who can resist that? What a wonderful concept: sign on to this bill and people will more money, get it easier and get it for longer. However what will it cost society, employers and the workers themselves, the very people the hon. member wants to help, in terms of premiums?

I have looked, as I am sure he has, at the obscene surplus that is there right now. At least in theory it is there. In reality, it is gone. Just like Blackbeard used to run the high seas in days of past, looting and plundering at every opportunity, grabbing every dollar possible from every source, we have a government that taxes people. I think this comment has been attributed to the candidate who was the former finance minister and now running for leadership. Whether it is true, I have often heard it attributed that he said, “I have never met a tax I didn't like”.

The Liberals have said that they have lowered income tax and employment insurance taxes. However they raise so many other things in so many other ways that they are a net increaser of taxes, a net plunderer of the wealth, income and revenue of ordinary Canadians.

That is something we should probably look at because if something like this were to pass and even if the government, in a fit of remorse, repaid the incredible surplus it has, and I do not want to say an unparliamentary word as tempting as it might be, absconded from the fund and spent, this would erode that money down to a point where we no longer would have a sustainable margin or a rainy day fund, as it refers to it.

The current surplus nonetheless is on paper. This would mean ultimately that we would see not only no further premium reductions, which we should be seeing right now, but we would start to see increases in premiums in the future. We absolutely know that employment taxes kill jobs. The taxes that employers and employees have to pay are the things that kill jobs.

Employees say that they cannot afford to work below a certain net income, yet there are all these taxes that they have to pay on their income over and above income tax, which still goes into the pockets of the government.

Employers say that to have jobs for people, they have to get a certain return. They have to make a certain amount of money that covers not only wages, but all of the costs incurred by having people work for them. One of the those is the employment insurance premiums which they have to pay. This is something that will likely cause these things to be put up.

Our position is that families would be far better served if we in the House start working together, including the hon. member who brought this in who truly is concerned about workers, to develop policies that create real long term sustainable employment. After all, this is a safety net. This is for people who lose their jobs. Instead of figuring out how to treat them better when they lose their jobs, we should be working together to try to find ways not only so they do not lose their jobs, but so they do not continue to be, as in many cases, underemployed and where they can aspire to maybe a job with more responsibilities, more personal reward in terms of the type of work that they do and of course the pay that they take home.

The Canadian Alliance written policy on this is long established. EI premiums would be set by an independent EI commission based on recommendations from the Chief Actuary. The fund should be enough to cover the emergencies when people suddenly finding themselves out of work with a reserve that is sufficient to ensure that we can cover this in the event of a sudden downturn. A separate hard reserve, not unlike the trust the hon. member suggested, would be established to ensure the payment of benefits in periods of economic downturn.

Employer premiums would be experience rated, not unlike any other insurance plan that is out there, so employers that have a record of fewer layoffs than other employers in the same sector, not across the board, will pay lower premiums. In other words, employers that do not work the system within a given occupation will be rewarded for that. Employers that keep employees employed rather than this continual cycle of layoffs, which is again what I believe the hon. member ultimately wants to get at, will get a bonus in terms of lower premiums.

The frequency of maternity leave or sickness leave, however, will not affect those premiums. That is something which is beyond the control of employers and they will not be penalized for it.

Further, we continue to argue the concept that the best social policy for workers is a job, not a sum of money that they get because they do not have one. That is at best a crutch to prop up the system. The real answer is that we need to do something to create more jobs.

I believe it is irresponsible to place a great burden on the employment insurance account just because it has a paper surplus at this point in time. Premiums could be lowered for workers and employers rather than treating this non-existent surplus like some kind of lottery jackpot to be exploited. The hon. member offers basically a land of milk and honey to everyone without concern where these resources would come from and to afford the ideas that have been dreamt up.

Well meaning though it is, it would be far better if he would turn his attentions toward working with us to create real jobs, real employment, rather than how we will help and prop up people when policies of the government let them down and they lose the job they would far sooner have.

[Petitions, May 2nd, 2003]

Madam Speaker, the second petition deals with child pornography. The petitioners draw to the attention of the House that the creation and use of child pornography is condemned by a clear majority of Canadians and that the courts have not applied the current child pornography laws in a way which makes it clear that the exploitation of children will always be met with swift punishment. Therefore, the petitioners call on Parliament to protect our children by taking all necessary steps to ensure that materials which promote or glorify pedophilia or sado-masochistic activities involving children are outlawed.

[Petitions, May 2nd, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I have two petitions today.

In the first one, the petitioners draw to the attention of the House that the definition of marriage as being between a man and a woman is being challenged and that this hon. House passed a motion in June 1999 that called for marriage to continue to be defined as a union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others. Therefore, the petitioners call on Parliament to pass legislation to recognize the institution of marriage in federal law as being the union of one man and one woman to the exclusion of all others.

[Private Members' Bills, May 2nd, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, private members' bills often bring forward issues which either the government has overlooked or are too small for formal legislation. Unfortunately, the government tends to look upon them as an intrusion into its powerful domain as drafters of legislation.

I recently introduced Bill C-347 seeking to eliminate conditional sentencing for violent offenders. After conditional sentencing legislation was first introduced, the then justice minister said that he never intended for it to apply to dangerous offenders, yet never did anything to fix it. My bill will.

I will soon be introducing a bill to eliminate automatic parole for offenders who have done nothing to earn parole. I am also working on a bill to broaden pension accrual legislation to apply to all public safety occupations and another to create a national compensation fund for public safety personnel. I will only be able to bring one of these important bills forward during the session.

I urge the government to examine these and other private members' bills and seriously consider introducing a collection of the as one or more government bills to place these overdue changes into legislation.

[Supply, May 1st, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, as I was saying, the complexity and whole nature of unions have changed tremendously. The point I will make goes back a long way and I do not want anybody to misunderstand it. It goes right back to the very origins of the trade union movement.

We found by and large that union workers did not have access to education or training and were often in the workforce at the age of 12 or 13. They counted on the union leader who hopefully had some education and some training, and the thick skull and brawny arm which was necessary in those early days, to look after them. These were young men who had neither the education or training, or anything else to collectively or individually deal with an oppressive company. It is understandable that unions were extremely necessary by the nature of how employers operated in those days.

Union workers in the 21st century have not only completed their high school education, but in many cases have completed university and sometimes have more than one degree. They also have a variety of training. Many of them operate their own successful businesses on the side. It is a different nature of person entirely. Consequently, the leadership needs to change too. In some cases there is very enlightened leadership in trade union movements, but some still operate under the old premise of might is right and one union had better have more might than the other. Some unions like to operate from a strong arm point of view which shows a lack of growth and a lack of evolution inside the union movement itself.

Originally when strikes took place they were primarily an economic tug of war between an employer and an employee or a group of employees. It was a question of how long the two sides could do without money. In other words, who would blink first. The employer and employee or group of employees primarily suffered from the damage. For example, if it involved a mill in a mill town there obviously would be some collateral damage. The town itself would suffer because no money would be available while this would be going on. Primarily it would be very isolated.

The most simple example I could give the House would be to pick on a bakery where workers would feel that they should have a higher wage. If they did not get the higher wage they would go on strike. Without the employees the bakery would not have any bread to sell so therefore it would have no revenue. People in the community would go somewhere else to get their bread or they would bake their own or even do without. This is an example of the economic tug of war between an employer and an employee. That has changed immensely.

I used an example the other night where under our current system a handful of longshoremen went out on strike in the port of Vancouver. As a direct result of that, a farmer and his family in Manitoba, thousands of miles away, could possibly end up losing their farm.

There is a difference in complexity and a difference in the nature of the impact of strikes and lockouts now. There is a tremendous national impact. That is something that must be addressed. It is not addressed by shuffling the chairs on the Titanic and not by taking a little portion that has some clear impact in certain unique circumstances and ignoring all the other things that are wrong with the system that need to be looked at and taken into consideration.

Bloc Québécois members spoke about labour relations this morning. I was making notes of certain key things that they said. I would like to talk for a moment about labour relations. There are exceptions to everything, but primarily labour relations in collective bargaining are confrontational.

I am the official opposition critic for public works and government services which includes Canada Post. I worked very closely with both sides when Canada Post went on its fourth national strike, and I have never seen worse labour relations in my life than what I saw between Canada Post and its workers at that time. It was absolutely unbelievable. Under those kinds of conditions it would be a shock if they actually sat down and simply negotiated something. The premise that they started from was so far out that it just could not be done.

There are other problems. I recall when I was a city councillor and was asked questions by a number of school teachers inside my community because I was involved quite a bit with the school board. They were in a labour dispute with the B.C. government and they wanted me to address them because they wanted to ask me some questions. The very first question I was asked was whether I would support the teacher's right to strike. I replied that I would give them a real honest answer provided that they listened to the entire reply.

My answer was that I did not believe that the teachers should have the right to strike and I used the scenario that I just did with the bakery. I said that in this case the economic tug of war or the battle was not between them and the employer. In theory and on paper it was, but the person who got hurt was not the employer. Children were counting on them to educate them in school. They had an economic battle with their employer and the collateral damage would affect all the children who were counting on them for an education. I also used a number of other scenarios.

I want to make one particular point that I told the teachers in this case because this is an example of how there are so many other factors that we must take into consideration. I addressed the teachers by asking them to imagine the minister of education coming out before the microphones and all the media, wringing his hands in anguish and saying that everything was being done to get them back to the bargaining table to resolve this. He would say, “We will bend over backwards. We will do almost anything. We want the children back in school”. Then the lights would go out, the microphones would go dead, and the minister would walk back into the cabinet room and say, “Okay, folks, how do we piss them off enough to keep them out another month so we can resolve a lot of our budget problems?” The teachers would get the flak for not educating the children. The employer would be in the reverse of the normal economic tug of war. The employer would actually be saving money. There are all kinds of issues that we must look at in terms of what happens in labour disputes.

Back to the situation with Canada Post. One of the things that I explained to both Canada Post and the union was the impact of what they were doing. I said that when union members go on strike, Canada Post shuts down. The union wants better wages, guarantees that no one will be laid off, and it wants part time people being made full time. Yet the nature of it going on strike, withdrawing its services, and consequently Canada Post not providing postal services would force people in the public to start considering alternatives in order to get their mail, cheques, information, and everything else delivered.

In this electronic age it is getting easier to do that and a whole lot of people would suddenly start finding alternatives to Canada Post during a strike. When the strike is finally over, many people find that it was suitable enough and non-disruptive enough that they do not go back to use Canada Pose. Canada Post gets back into business with less business. As a result it would need less workers, so the very reason that the union went on strike in some cases would cause union workers to lose the very things that they were fighting for. That is something that must be taken into consideration as well.

Let me talk about essential services. We recognize that certain services should not or cannot have the right to strike, such as policemen or firemen. There must be a provision for policing, even in the event of a dispute between police officers and their employer, between firemen and their employer. We recognize that and so do they. They are good, honourable people, and accept and recognize that. There are people like that and it is becoming more widespread all the time.

Then there are transportation services. Marine Atlantic is a good example right now. Its hearing has not started yet but is coming up. It may withdraw its services which will essentially shut down the ferry between Newfoundland and the mainland. It is obviously a pretty essential service.

These things exist and where they exist we must have something that says that this is how we will settle for these people. They should not be penalized because they are important. We must come up with something that is fair, that recognizes they cannot withdraw their services, and yet they must be treated fairly. We need to work on that because therein lies the real answer to labour problems in the country. If we were to come up with something that is fair for these people, and we had better, then why would it not apply to everyone? Why would we allow all the other types of damages that I have talked about instead of resolving the disputes that we have now?

This is about helping workers. However, we must recognize that it is about helping workers in a new economy, in a new concept of how the country works. Bloc members have taken a kernel of a good idea, just a kernel, but we need something much broader. I would ask them to withdraw their supply day motion, which has good intentions, and come back with it again but in a much broader context. We cannot micro manage a system that is highly complex, but instead we must find a new way for better union labour harmony in the country for the benefit of all Canadians.