John Reynolds

[Citizenship Act, March 20th, 2003]

I would like to introduce a bill for the member for Portage—Lisgar, who cannot be here today.

[Citizenship Act, March 20th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have two items. Bill C-343 is standing in my name and I would like to change that to the member for Okanagan—Shuswap.

[Points of Order, March 20th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. There have been discussions with the other parties and I think if you seek it you will find unanimous consent to revert to routine proceedings so we could make a couple of changes to private members' business, as has been discussed among the whips.

[Business of the House, March 20th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the government House leader if he could give us the business for the rest of today, tomorrow, and next week. Also, could the government House leader, if he were to schedule a day for the Senate amendments to Bill C-10A, advise the House of his intention regarding time allocation since he already has given notice of time allocation on Bill C-10A? Could he also advise the House, so we could all know what we are doing this afternoon, whether his whip, using the rules, will defer today's vote to a future date?

[Privilege, March 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege relating to information provided to Parliament by the President of the Treasury Board. The minister has deceived the House in an attempt to keep Parliament in the dark with respect to the funding of the firearms registry program.

As you are aware, the issue regarding the reporting of the funds for the firearms registry has quite a history. It is a history of deception. The latest deception involves the classification of the firearms registry as a major crown project. On February 25, 2003, in response to a question from the member for Yorkton—Melville, the President of the Treasury Board said, “...according to my information the program was not formally designed as a major crown project”.

The Auditor General, in a letter provided to members of the public accounts committee, provides evidence to counter the claim of the minister. The evidence is not at dispute between the Auditor General and the President of the Treasury Board. The dispute over whether or not the firearms program is a major crown project comes from the same source: the Treasury Board. It is similar to the case of the former minister of defence, who gave two versions of events to the House, and is also similar to a 1973 case involving information given to the House and conflicting information given to a royal commission. I will present the two cases later.

The Auditor General has sent a follow-up memo to the MPs on the public accounts committee and the senators on the Senate national finance committee. The memo provides several examples in which both Treasury Board and the justice department make use of the term “major crown project”.

The National Post obtained a letter from the Auditor General and published some of its contents on Wednesday, March 12, 2003. The article states:

“The Department of Justice now appears to be objecting to the chapter's description of the Canadian Firearms Program as a major Crown project, and it appears to consider this a significant matter,” writes Ms. Fraser. “Our review of government documents related to the Canadian Firearms Program clearly indicated that the Program was a major Crown project.”

In one example, Ms. Fraser wrote that draft versions of her report are sent to departments for review. Ms. Fraser states the Treasury Board did not dispute the term's use, and in fact corrected one paragraph, requesting that the phrase “major capital project” be changed to “major Crown project”.

Mr. Speaker, it was the Treasury Board that corrected the draft report to read “major Crown project” with respect to the firearms registry. We have the minister saying one thing and the department saying another.

The Ottawa Citizen and the Calgary Herald ran a similar story. They reported:

Fraser wrote to the committee, saying that in March 1998, the year the National Firearms Act took effect, the Justice Department defined the program as a major Crown project when it sought preliminary project approval from Treasury Board, a committee of cabinet.

“The Treasury Board approved the submission in April 1998,” says Fraser's submission.

In May of the same year, the department again stated the Treasury Board had directed the program be managed as a major Crown project.

In a November submission to the Treasury Board, the Justice Department “specifically noted that the project was a major Crown corporation,” wrote Fraser.

Fraser told the committee that even in response to her own findings about poor spending controls in the program last year, the Justice Department and Treasury Board did not challenge her statement, prior to the release of her report, that the firearms program was a major Crown project.

A spokesman for the Canadian Firearms Centre two weeks ago told CanWest News Service that the registry had never been designated a major Crown project, but the department “treated” it as a major Crown project.

The same spokesman on Tuesday, when informed about Fraser's testimony, said he had since checked again and learned that the department had in fact treated only the computer-system components as a major Crown project.

On February 1, 2002, the Speaker ruled on a question of privilege raised by the hon. member for Portage--Lisgar concerning statements made in the House by the former minister of national defence.

The hon. member for Portage--Lisgar alleged that the former minister of national defence deliberately misled the House as to when he knew that prisoners taken by Canadian JTF2 troops in Afghanistan had been handed over to the Americans. In support of that allegation, he cited the minister's responses in question period on two successive days and alluded to a number of statements made to the media by the minister.

The Speaker said:

The authorities are consistent about the need for clarity in our proceedings and about the need to ensure the integrity of the information provided by the government to the House.

Even though the former minister of defence claimed that he did not intend to mislead the House, the Speaker found that a prima facie question of privilege existed. The Speaker said:

I am prepared, as I must be, to accept the minister's assertion that he had no intention to mislead the House. Nevertheless this remains a very difficult situation. I refer hon. members to Marleau and Montpetit at page 67:

“There are...affronts against the dignity and authority of Parliament which may not fall within one of the specifically defined privileges...the House also claims the right to punish, as a contempt, any action which, though not a breach of a specific privilege, tends to obstruct or impede the House in the performance of its functions; [or that] obstructs or impedes any Member or Officer of the House in the discharge of their duties...”.

The Speaker concluded his remarks and said:

On the basis of the arguments presented by hon. members and in the view of the gravity of the matter, I have concluded that the situation before us where the House is left with two versions of events is one that merits further consideration by an appropriate committee, if only to clear the air.

The situation regarding the term “major Crown project” is similar. The minister advised the House that the firearms program was not a major crown project. It was reported to a committee of the House that the program was considered by the Treasury Board and the Department of Justice as a “major Crown project”. In addition, the Auditor General reported to the House that it was a “major Crown project”.

That term is significant with respect to how the government must report to Parliament on the funding for the firearms program. It is also significant that the firearms program is under intense scrutiny and the government believes that it would be advantageous to keep Parliament in the dark as much as possible. It is only advantageous, Mr. Speaker, if we let the government get away with it.

There was a case in 1973 when the member for Northumberland--Durham asked questions of the then solicitor general about the practice of the RCMP opening mail. Later remarks before a royal commission by the former commissioner of the RCMP disputed that claim.

The sum of this evidence permitted the Speaker in 1973 to find a prima facie case of contempt where the RCMP was alleged to have deliberately misled a minister of the Crown and the member for Northumberland--Durham, resulting in “an attempt to obstruct the House by offering misleading information”.

In the 1973 case, two versions of events were presented, one in the House and one at a royal commission. The sources for those two versions were the same: the RCMP. In 1973, the minister was not actually aware that he was misleading the House. He received his information from the RCMP.

In the case I present to the Speaker today, we have two versions of events as well: one statement from the minister to the House, and several statements to the contrary, from department officials, that were reported to a committee. As in 1973, the two versions came from the same source, with officials saying one thing and the minister saying another.

Adding to the allegation of deliberately misleading Parliament, we have an officer of Parliament, the Auditor General, confirming that Parliament has been and continues to be deliberately misled. The Auditor General's report to Parliament states:

Back in 1995, the Department of Justice told Parliament that the program would cost taxpayers about $2 million. The Department now says that by 2004-05 the cost of this program could amount to more than $1 billion.

And even though the department has many explanations for this ballooning of costs, it never shared any of them with Parliament...What's really inexcusable is that Parliament was in the dark. I question why the Department continued to watch the costs escalate without informing Parliament and without considering alternatives.

The Auditor General also pointed out that:

The information the Department provided states that by 2001-02 it has spent about $688 million on the Program and collected about $59 million in revenues after refunds. We believe that this information does not fairly present the cost of the Program to the government.

The Department also did not report to Parliament on the wider costs of the Program as required by the government's regulatory policy.

Furthermore, the entire Program was designated as a major Crown project. Treasury Board policies require departments, at a minimum, to annually report the following types of information to Parliament--

The government is playing fast and loose with the term “major Crown project” in order to keep Parliament in the dark. On the one hand, the firearms program is a major crown corporation, and on the other hand, it is not. The government claims on some occasions that the firearms registry is not a major crown project, yet on other occasions it claims that it is. The Auditor General reports that it is. The President of the Treasury Board reports that it is not. The House is told that it is. A committee of the House is told that it is not.

In the Speaker's ruling of February 1, he said:

--in deciding on alleged questions of privilege, it is relatively infrequent for the Chair to find prima facie privilege; it is much more likely that the Speaker will characterize the situation as “a dispute as to facts”. But in the case before us, there appears to be in my opinion no dispute as to the facts. I believe that both the minister and other hon. members recognize that two versions of events have been presented to the House.

Mr. Speaker, in this case, two versions have been presented to the House and to its committees.

The member for Yorkton--Melville has raised a question of privilege in the House on a similar matter. One of his concerns was the impression left with the public. He quoted a headline from the Globe and Mail , “Lies and contempt for Parliament at root of scandal in gun registry”; the Ottawa Citizen , “Government accused of hiding secret audit ”; the Winnipeg Sun , “Liberals lied”. Now we have more stories about scandal, contempt, lies and cover-up.

While certain committees of the House are investigating the scandal aspect of the gun registry, we also need to look into the contempt aspect of this tragedy. There is enough evidence to show, as the Globe and Mail put it, that there exists “Lies and contempt for Parliament”. Of all of the investigations, this one is crucial because in order for other committees to be successful they must be assured that they are not being deceived. Those who are deceiving must be punished and the contempt for Parliament by the government must stop.

[The Budget, February 26th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, it was not a tirade. I was simply mad because the government has no compassion. Every time it talks about health care, it tries to knock the government of Ontario.

I went through the health system in Ontario. I went for an operation in a hospital right here in Ottawa. My mother has been in the hospital. The hospital care that my mother and I had in this province was as good as it could be. The nurses and doctors were spectacular. Do members know what they all asked me? Why did the federal government cut this $20 billion out and slow down what the provinces were doing?

Do not knock Ontario. Ontario is the most successful province, other than Alberta, in creating jobs and through no help of the federal government. It is the government that has no compassion that hurt all the provinces in health care and tried to blame it on the premiers who were re-elected. I can remember sitting in the House and hearing all members on the other side saying Harris will never be re-elected. He was re-elected because the people of Ontario liked what he was doing, contrary to what the federal Liberals said. He was a good manager and did a heck of a good job. So is Ralph Klein who is doing a great job in his province, which has some of the best health care in Canada.

In my riding alone the hospital was voted as having one of the best systems in all of Canada for health care. There is nothing wrong with our health care program, except the lack of federal money that the government stole out of it to pay off--

[The Budget, February 26th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. If the parliamentary secretary would like to ask another question, I would seek unanimous consent to let him do that. It would be a wonderful idea.

[The Budget, February 26th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, to say that Canada was a basket case is an embarrassment to me as a member of Parliament. It never was a basket case. The government had a deficit and cut health care in the country by $20 billion which affected every poor Canadian. That was not compassion. That was the government wanting to help its friends.

Let me go through some of those areas. The government cut the heck out of the military. Where was the compassion when it sent soldiers away with uniforms that were the wrong colour, things that did not work, and boots that did not fit? Where was the compassion in the Liberal Party? Its compassion is for Groupaction, an agency in Quebec, where its friends got money and grants and kicked it back to the Liberal Party. That is where its compassion is. Do not talk to me about compassion in this party.

Let us talk about money. I will tell members right now what we would cut. We would cut the scandal in GST fraud. All the money that has been ripped off there, which the minister keeps denying, will come up before the next election. We would not have had the billion dollar boondoggle of HRDC, having spent millions on computers still sitting in warehouses. That is where the compassion is in the Liberal Party, giving its friends contracts for computers they never use.

We would not have spent $1 billion on a gun registry after telling the Canadian public it would cost $2 million. Where is the compassion about a gun registry that does not work? Some 90% of the registration is not working properly. Ask any major police force in the country if it really helps and they will say no. We can always find a Liberal police chief somewhere in the country who will write a nice little letter so the minister can rap it off his sleeves. The Liberals keep on wasting money on the whole damn program.

Liberals talk about compassion. There is no compassion in that party over there. Let us talk about Groupaction and that whole scandal with 13 police investigations.

The Prime Minister talked about having a government that would not be like the one before it and would have no scandals. We have more police investigations on that side now than there ever were on the other side. The previous government might have had a couple of big scandals, but the Liberals have major scandals. They have taken money and gone through agencies, and that is correct. That is why there are police investigations. That is why there have been charges laid and convictions.

Liberals talk about compassion. We would not have cut that $20 billion out of health care. They ruined the health care system in the country, then gave Mr. Romanow another $25 million to wander around and tell us what we already knew.

A parliamentary committee is talking about democracy. Democracy should be happening right in the House of Commons. We should not be hiring Mr. Romanow to be telling us what to do in health care. We should be dealing with elected members of Parliament in committee telling the government what should be done, and the government should be listening. But no, the government likes to hire the Romanows, have a committee somewhere, investigate, and look into things.

That is not compassion. They do not even answer the questions. Let us give food service workers a $3,000 cut-off. These kids that are going to school are putting money into EI that they are never going to collect. Does that make them think that government is fair and equal? No, it does not. That is not compassion to our young workers.

The food services industry is the largest industry in the country. The industries of lumber and building cars do not equal the food services industry. It is the largest employer with 1.02 million employees. It has been begging the government to do what would help it with its businesses and employ more people. It employs a lot of young people who are working their way through high school or college, or helping families who do not have a lot of money.

There is no compassion there. The Liberal government is not a government of compassion. It is a government of helping its friends.

[The Budget, February 26th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I found it extremely interesting listening to the parliamentary secretary brag about a government that has cut the deficit. He forgets that the government when was elected it promised Canadians it would eliminate the GST. That is not the real reason why it paid down the deficit. It paid down the deficit by cutting the guts out of health care and the defence department. I could go on and on. That is the real reason it got the deficit down. Then the government had the GST money to play with, to spend on its Liberal programs. The government also does not talk about the fact that the debt is larger today than when it took over.

What is there to brag about? The debt is larger. The government could have used a lot of the money it spends on its wasteful programs, like the billion dollar boondoggle and the gun registry, to lower the debt, to ensure that our dollar was stronger and to ensure that Canadians did not owe so much money. That is the Liberal way.

The budget of February 18 was as close to a socialist Liberal document as the House has seen since the wild spending days of the sixties and seventies. The word “prudence” has been ripped from the Liberal vocabulary.

This was an equal opportunity budget. Every working Canadian has an equal opportunity to watch his or her hard earned dollars squandered by a lame duck Prime Minister and a wannabe Prime Minister. Every mother, father and child is equal in Liberal eyes as a potential source for the dollars needed to buy off the special interest groups or as inspiration to write reams of new legislation to control their lives.

This is a government that believes every living Canadian has an equal opportunity to be denied a higher standard of living because Liberals like to chase hare-brained schemes that cost billions of dollars more than the millions they promised.

Last week the finance minister boasted about the number of new jobs created within the Canadian economy. Liberals are always quick to claim credit for employment gains but they are painfully slow to recognize and respond to the needs of the people who are responsible for job creation. Remember that. Liberals take credit for the job creation but rarely do anything to help the real creators of jobs: Canada's living, breathing and risk taking entrepreneurs.

Let me cite figures regarding Canada's food services industry. This is an industry with annual sales of $42 billion with more than one million employees. It is the largest employer in this country. That is over 6.5% of Canada's total workforce. These are employers and employees who fund the employment insurance program, and $45 billion over recent years has been stolen from them by the Liberals.

The Liberals rattle on about a $45 billion employment insurance fund but they hide the truth from Canadians. There is no fund. There is no surplus. All that money, all $45 billion has been spent, squandered by the Liberals who all time pretended it was being banked for the employers and the employees.

Now the Liberals are promising to reduce contributions by 12¢ and that is beginning next year. That will give the Liberals a juicy $3 billion to add to their slush fund in the next 12 months. Why could it not have been now, not next year?

I have two questions. Why is it when Liberals promise to return money to the taxpayers it is never immediately? It is always next year or the year after that. Why did they not reduce employment insurance premiums immediately? It would have pumped $3 billion into the economy this year alone. That would have been $3 billion for those employees and employers, the people, the entrepreneurs and the risk takers in this country. That $3 billion, circulated among taxpayers, would help our economy a lot more than having Liberals pick it over like vultures on a carcass. We know that a lot of good and dedicated people at senior levels and middle management are as dismayed by political spending as we are.

Here is another question which has to do with the Liberal belief that equal opportunity means the working poor must feel more pain than wealthy Canadians. Why will the Liberals not adopt a yearly basic exemption which would benefit those most truly in need: low income Canadians and labour intensive businesses? A $3,000 yearly basic exemption would benefit lower income Canadians and working students who pay a higher percentage of their incomes to the system than the higher income earners. Those Canadians who would benefit from this system should know and remember that it is the Liberals who are resisting this wonderful idea.

The Liberals who are resisting are those who pretend they have the talent, compassion and vision that leadership requires. They are the ancient mariner himself, the member for LaSalle--Émard, and the present finance minister, the member for Ottawa South. Many people who are employers and employees in the food services industry in both of those ridings should remember they have no friends in the Liberal Party.

What last week's budget confirmed for thoughtful Canadians is that the Liberals will never change. They will continue to gouge all Canadians for more tax dollars because the Liberal priority is to spend.

A party that cared about the future of Canada, and not about the future of the party alone, would have brought in a budget of compassion and vision. A party that cared less about power and more about the people it purports to govern would have reversed the spending and tax cut numbers in that budget. It announced $17.4 billion in new spending over three years, but returns only $2.3 billion to the taxpayers over that same period. That tells us what the Liberal government is all about.

It would amaze and please taxpayers if just once the Liberals announced they planned to return more to taxpayers and to spend less on HRDC boondoggles, the firearms registry, or to lose less to GST fraud.

A government that cared less about power and more about its citizens would never have promised and then tried to implement a firearms registry program. This is another billion dollar scandal on top of so many that have gone on before. I mentioned the HRDC boondoggle and we are waiting with trepidation for the final cost to taxpayers of the GST fraud, but a billion dollars is not out of the question.

A government that cared about families and lower income earners would listen when the Canadian Alliance called for a reduction in the federal tax on gasoline. A government that cared would immediately implement a yearly basic exemption for lower income earners.

A government that cared would never have squandered all the billions of employment insurance money sent in by trusting and hardworking Canadians. They all believed that money was being banked for their use on a rainy day. Little did they know that the Liberals did not put one penny in the bank. They spent every last one of those pennies, some $45 billion dollars.

A government that cared about Canadians would have listened when the Canadian Alliance said there was sufficient surplus in last week's budget to allow for a reduction in the much hated goods and services tax. A party that cared about Canadians would never have lied in 1993 and promised to scrap, kill, and banish forever the Conservative goods and services tax. This was a promise made during the election, but totally ignored after the election.

A compassionate and caring government would understand that many of the people who work at lower paying jobs are not always there out of choice while others are. It would never occur to a smug Liberal finance minister that many of the people in the food services industry, for instance, are there because they are working their way through school. They do not have scholarships like the ones awarded to up and coming Liberals.

Only a Liberal could sit back smugly and say that only Liberals know best when it comes to day care and one Liberal size fits all.

Why can families not choose on their own the way they want to raise their children? For instance, a married couple employed in the food services industry with children might well be working opposing shifts so that one parent is with the children at all times. That is good parenting by any definition except the Liberal definition.

If the finance minister and the Liberals had any compassion, they would have introduced a yearly basic exemption of $3,000. That would make a small difference in the lives and well-being of that married couple employed in the food services industry. Had the government listened to the Alliance and implemented a $3,000 per child deduction, that couple would still be productive members of society and have the option of choosing what they deem best for their family and their children. We do not understand, nor do Canadians, why the Liberals believe only they and the bureaucrats know best how Canadian parents should raise their children.

Another question that must be asked is, why do Liberals keep on committing our military people to foreign assignments while letting their clothing and equipment become tattered and rusty? It is bad enough they cannot make up their minds about what to do regarding the Iraq crisis, but to treat our military the way Liberals have treated our military is beyond comprehension.

Liberals ask so much of our military personnel and yet give them so little of what they need to do the job that is asked of them. Unlike Liberals, we in the Canadian Alliance are proud of our men and women in all branches of the armed services. Like Canadians generally, our people in the armed forces deserve better.

This was not a budget for Canadians. This was a budget for the ambitious and vindictive, on one hand a finance minister's leadership agenda, and on the other hand a Prime Minister who seeks revenge. It was not a budget for future Canadians either. The debt today is higher than it was when the Liberals were elected in 1993.

[Privilege, February 25th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, in this House I have received many letters from members of other parties asking me to join their cause and there is no signature on them. Certainly if I sign anything for any member that was not signed by them, I would not expect it to be something they endorsed. In fact, I just signed a letter for another member of Parliament today who sent it to my office for something to go to the Prime Minister. It was not the same issue.

I know my colleague always likes to get up and raise something, but the member may have printed the letter because he felt some people could not read it unless he wrote it down for them.