David Anderson

[Patrick Tremblay Foundation, February 16th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the issue is a very important and serious one particularly for the family involved.

The department is faced with the problem of the very tight legal requirements put on it by this House and of course by legislation. I will however attempt to see what I can do. In due course I hope to be able to report to the hon. member a decision one way or the other.

[Taxation, February 16th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member, her party and all other parties in the House can be assured that is an objective, to ensure there is fairness not only in this particular area of taxation but in others.

I will give a little more information on this. There are differing theories of how to tax international corporations and at what point. We do have some differences with the Americans in this regard. It is a matter not only for my department and the Department of Finance to work on, but also for other colleagues to deal with the Americans and other countries to make sure we establish a system which is not only fair from a national point of view but is also workable in international economic affairs.

[Taxation, February 16th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for her question. Aspects of tax revenue and what we receive are under constant and careful monitoring by my department and of course by officials of the Department of Finance.

I would like to inform the hon. member that we are pleased she has come forward in this House to point out there may be tax inequities which my colleague the Minister of Finance will address next week in the budget.

[Prince Edward Island Fixed Link, February 15th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I have a quick comment on the member's speech.

First, there appears to be some confusion between him and the Leader of the Opposition on the environmental effects and the satisfaction on this. I trust that they will straighten out this apparent discrepancy.

I would also like to point out that many of the questions which he wished to pose to the minister were in fact replied to in the minister's address. I do not know whether the hon. member was here at the time. Perhaps he was talking to a colleague. However, many of the questions that were raised were, as I understand it, from at least a failure to appreciate what the minister was saying.

The hon. member mentions the absence of the minister. I would like to point out that almost immediately behind the minister sits his parliamentary secretary, the hon. member for St. Boniface. I believe it is important for all members to recognize the tremendous support that ministers receive from their parliamentary secretaries. These members accept additional responsibilities and do a tremendous job, particularly on detailed questions such as the one the member put.

While I do not wish to build up the hon. member's performance to levels of high expectation, we fully expect all questions of this type to be very carefully analysed and dealt with by the parliamentary secretary.

I have a parliamentary secretary sitting just behind the member for St. Boniface and she is of immense help in debates such as this in dealing with questions. When she speaks on such questions I want it known, just as when the member for St. Boniface speaks on such questions, that these people are acting on behalf of the minister. In fact, quite often they speak more eloquently than ministers. We are very happy with the support that is given.

I am sure the hon. member will want to correct the impression given that somehow the parliamentary secretary is not able to handle the questions he put. I know full well that when the parliamentary secretary rises to speak we will have a detailed and careful analysis of the questions. The hon. member I am sure, being a man who is very fair in his approach in the House, will find the answers extremely acceptable.

It is important to point out that if at any particular moment the minister of public works happens to be out of the House we can rest assured that the presence of his parliamentary secretary backstops very well that absence. The same is true in my case. I was away from the House yesterday on business in Vancouver and I had absolutely no compunction in leaving everything related to my department in the hands of my parliamentary secretary who, as I mentioned before, is a person whose skills and ability I have high regard for.

I trust the hon. member will recognize there are ministers in the House from time to time but we have full confidence in the ability of our parliamentary secretaries. If the hon. member was not here to hear the minister and thus had questions about what he did not hear, we would be-

[Business Corporations Act, February 15th, 1994]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-12, an act to amend the Canada Business Corporations Act and to make consequential amendments to other acts.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read for the first time and printed.)

[Cigarette Smuggling, February 10th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, we have very close, friendly and useful relations with the American customs service and the other forces in the United States, as I have indicated. Certainly it is true that they are not following the considerable increase in personnel and hours of service that we are instituting on the Canadian side.

We know full well that there will be some border crossing points where the American post is closed and ours remains open. We know full well that in certain of these border crossing places normally they are left completely without any personnel at all in the off hours, the hours when the posts are not open.

We expect there will be occasions where there will be a Canadian post staffed and there will be an American post which is not staffed. It is nothing surprising to myself or to the customs officers. They are disciplined uniformed people who do an excellent job. I am surprised the hon. member suggests they are wasting their time.

[Cigarette Smuggling, February 10th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I am somewhat troubled by the question because there was no cancellation of any great plan. In fact all information has been provided to members of Parliament and through a press

conference attended by myself, the Solicitor General and the Minister of Health.

We have I think been very open in questions in the House as the leader of the Reform Party, given the information on finances for example, will agree with.

As far as the particulars of these 24-hour openings at border points, we have a system in Canada, which I will have to explain to the member, whereby some border crossing points are kept open for 8 hours, some for 16 hours and some are kept open around the clock, 24 hours. We are doubling the numbers in certain areas of the country. We are increasing the hours of certain border crossing points from 16 hours to 24 hours and some from 8 hours to 24 hours. There is no question of this plan having been put in place and then suddenly reversed or interrupted.

Naturally we are targeting certain areas on the basis of intelligence we received from the RCMP, the Quebec provincial police, the Ontario provincial police and municipal police forces. We are also using the American police forces information nets. There will be times when we will divert resources from one particular area to the other.

If the hon. member thinks I am going to broadcast in advance to assist the smuggling groups, he is wrong.

[Excise Act, February 10th, 1994]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-11, an act to amend the Excise Act, the Customs Act and the Tobacco Sales to Young Persons Act.

Mr. Speaker, this is first reading of the bill and I will defer my comments until later.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed.)

[Child Care Services, February 9th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I can understand the hon. member's concerns. This is a matter of financial policy. I will take it up with the hon. Minister of Finance and get back to her as soon as I have an answer.

[Cigarette Taxes, February 8th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, if the measures taken by the government do not work, smuggling will continue, but if they work the problem will be solved. To ask a question on the premise that the measures will fail is really not very useful at this point.