John Reynolds

[Drug Overdoses, May 10th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, as the Minister of Justice hands out $2 million to the Canadian Bankers Association, the Insurance Council of Canada and the Retail Council of Canada to fight crime, over 2,000 people in British Columbia over the past decade have died of drug overdoses. In 1998, 371 died and from January to March of this year 48 died from overdoses in greater Vancouver.

Drug overdoses in British Columbia are reaching epidemic proportions and the Liberals choose to fund lobby groups to fight crime rather than deal with the drug tragedy. The effects of a government devoid of a drug strategy led this weekend to a riot at the Kent maximum institution in British Columbia where inmates high on heroin went on a $50,000 rampage. Add heroin to inmates already known for violence and escape and you have a recipe for this kind of carnage.

It is time the government got serious on the drug and drug overdose issue. The solution to this tragedy and the consequences we saw this weekend at Kent can be found at the street level, not in the boardrooms of lobby groups.

[Aboriginal Affairs, May 7th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, we are proud that we stand up for British Columbians and we are proud that we stand up for all Canadians. We believe in equality.

I want to read the quote to the parliamentary secretary again:

We are the true owners of British Columbia. The Indians across the province own everything—the rivers, the trees, the bugs, the animals, you name it. Subsurface rights, the air, the rain, the whole shot. That's what we mean when we say we have aboriginal title to the land.

My party and Canadians want to know if that is the government's belief. Is that what aboriginal title is in Canada? Is that what we mean by equality for all Canadians?

[Aboriginal Affairs, May 7th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the minister of Indian affairs. I would like the minister to listen closely to the following quote:

We are the true owners of British Columbia. The Indians across the province own everything—the rivers, the trees, the bugs, the animals, you name it. Subsurface rights, the air, the rain, the whole shot. That's what we mean when we say we have aboriginal title to the land.

Does the minister agree with the interpretation by the Nisga'a tribal council chairman, Joe Gosnell, of aboriginal title?

[Dangerous Offenders, April 30th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, parents have a right to know if their children are seated next to an unescorted prisoner. Their safety should be of the utmost concern to all of us.

Will the minister assure the House and commit today to notifying bus companies and passengers of the existence of criminals travelling by bus?

[Dangerous Offenders, April 30th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the solicitor general. We do not expect the solicitor general to know every prisoner in Canada but we know he can set policy.

With summer coming and a lot of parents sending their young children on buses because of its cost effectiveness, will the solicitor general assure the House that his department will inform the bus companies and other people when prisoners are travelling on a bus so the safety of all Canadians is protected?

[Dangerous Offenders, April 30th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, Jean Gerard Dionne, a fugitive pedophile, is behind bars today, charged with sexual assault with a weapon, forcible confinement, uttering death threats and possession of a dangerous weapon.

Dionne began his sexually deviant criminal behaviour in 1982 when he sexually assaulted a two year old boy and then drowned him. Dionne spent two years in jail for this crime. Upon his release, he followed up by sexually assaulting a young girl in a wheelchair for which he did four years. Dionne himself and the prison psychiatrist said that he would strike again, and so he did, last week in Ottawa.

In the case of the wheelchair victim and because of our system, the jury could not hear evidence concerning Dionne's earlier crimes and victims. Dionne will probably do another four years and be released.

Is it not time for parliament to review this disclosure of past offences? Is it not about time Dionne and others, who continue to repeat these very terrible offences, be declared habitual and dangerous offenders and be given life in jail?

[Preclearance Act, April 30th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister for his comments. I will say right off the bat that the Reform Party supports this bill, even if it does come from the Senate. Some worthwhile things come from there and we are debating one of them today.

Bill S-22 is an act to establish the reciprocal agreement between Canada and the United States allowing U.S. customs inspectors to operate in precleared designated areas as established by the minister. The goal is primarily to allow a freer flow of goods and travellers into the United States.

Coming from Vancouver where the test case was done, it is certainly a great benefit to any of those who have been travelling into the United States over the last few years. A lot of us remember getting off airplanes in San Francisco, Los Angeles or even Hawaii after five hours in an airplane and standing in long lineups waiting to be cleared. It was a disaster. Canadians in the west are very pleased that the test was there and that it will be going right across Canada.

One of the more exciting things in this bill, as the minister has just said, is that we are going to study in Anchorage and San Francisco preclearing Canadians or others coming into Canada. That is extremely important.

The minister mentioned the people in transit coming through Vancouver and that only one has asked for refugee status, which is a pretty good record. It is a commendable record and certainly has speeded the service up. It has helped Canadian and foreign airlines increase business in the Vancouver airport which is great. It means more money for Canada if those planes land here, fill up here and the crews stay here.

There is an interesting aspect of preclearing when coming into Canada. A large number of people who come into Canada ask for refugee status at airports at our own customs and immigration facilities. Certainly if we get into preclearance, those numbers will be greatly reduced.

I hope the government gets on with its study quickly and does preclearance for all major locations coming into Canada, especially some of those in Asia and the U.K. I think it would certainly benefit all Canadians if we had that type of preclearance coming into Canada. For anybody who arrives at Vancouver International Airport now at certain times of the day when there is between 500 to 800 people in lineups, it can take an hour and a half to get through the clearance after having spent 8 to 13 hours on an airplane.

The sooner we look at this preclearance ourselves the better. It will benefit the travellers who will not have to stand in long lineups when they arrive in our country. It will also benefit our immigration process. People who land in Canada and their passports are missing and they say they are refugees get to stay here and go through a process that takes five to seven years. That is not acceptable to most Canadians.

This bill is such a good one. We are talking about television and we hope that when this bill goes to committee the meeting can be televised. Then all Canadians could see the great benefits in dollars this bill is going to bring to Canadians by allowing them this freer access up and down. It certainly would be a great bill to start the televising of committees which we have been discussing in the House over the last few weeks.

Last year 8.5 million people were precleared from Canada going into the U.S. That is a significant amount of our population. Certainly with this bill it is likely to increase a little bit over the years.

There are a lot of Canadians who will be quite excited when they read today that their travel is going to be made easier. I know those in British Columbia, many of whom will go through San Francisco when coming back in, will be quite happy that they will be able to get off the airplane in Vancouver and go straight home because they will have been precleared at the other end.

I guess we will find out when we get into committee when we are going to start these test cases. I know it will be a very popular move in western Canada.

I said earlier that the minister has laid out pretty well what is in this bill. I could go on for a lot longer on some of these issues, but I will sit down right now and get this bill through and into committee and make sure it becomes law as quickly as possible.

[Justice, April 23rd, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask another question of the parliamentary secretary, a very dedicated member and a gentleman I have a lot of faith in. In his last answer he said that these tapes were locked up. I would like to advise him that the lawyers on the case yesterday before the supreme court said “the tapes could potentially crop up again”. That does not treat victims well.

Will the government add one clause to Bill C-79 to put these videotapes under lock and key so we can show the supreme court that parliamentarians care about victims, even if it does not?

[Justice, April 23rd, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, as the justice committee completes its review of the victims rights bill, a piece of legislation premised on compassion and closure for all victims of crime and their families, the supreme court yesterday rejected an anguished plea by the family victims of the Bernardo murders and is allowing the videotapes of those brutal murders to be viewed by the public.

Will the government add one clause to Bill C-79, to put these videotapes under lock and key and show the supreme court that parliamentarians have compassion for victims, even if it does not?

[The Late Frank McGee, April 22nd, 1999]

Madam Speaker, I rise on behalf of Her Majesty's Official Opposition to pay tribute to Frank McGee.

I am moved to have this opportunity to pay respects to Mr. Frank McGee and his family because Frank McGee played a role in my early years as a member of parliament. In fact, Frank McGee played a very important and deciding role in the lives of a lot of Progressive Conservative MPs in the 1972 general election.

I will elaborate. On the evening of the 1972 general election Conservative Leader Robert Stanfield went to sleep confident he was the prime minister elect of Canada with a seat count of 109 for the Tories and 107 for the Liberals. By morning the seat count was 108 to 108. The governor general could have asked Mr. Stanfield to form the government but was unable.

A judicial recount in Frank McGee's riding of York—Scarborough two weeks after the election determined that Mr. McGee had lost his seat by four votes. Pierre Trudeau stayed on as prime minister in a minority government, supported by David Lewis and the NDP.

Frank McGee was born in Ottawa in 1926 and was destined for politics from birth. Both his grandfathers were members of parliament, something very unique: John McGee had been a member of Sir John A. Macdonald's government and his maternal grandfather, Charles McCool, was also an MP. His great uncle was Thomas D'Arcy McGee, a Father of Confederation who was assassinated in Ottawa in 1868. Talk about a political pedigree. It showed. Frank McGee was a determined, enlightened and effective member of parliament.

His political career started in 1957 after completing university at St. Patrick's College in Ottawa, signing up for the air force and then marrying Moira O'Leary in 1951 and moving to Toronto. He was elected in 1957 in York—Scarborough, then Canada's third largest riding. Mr. McGee won in 1957 by 18,946 votes, a handsome victory to an individual widely acknowledged as a diligent and dedicated person who had been called to public life.

His majority was the largest ever recorded up to that time for a Conservative member of parliament. He had to go back to the polls in 1958 and won that time by 35,877 votes in the huge riding of York—Scarborough. In fact Frank's riding was bigger than the province of P.E.I.

Frank McGee is remembered by many for his private member's Bill C-6 which he introduced in 1960, calling for the abolition of capital punishment. This seminal work by Frank McGee resulted in changes to the Criminal Code of Canada that ended the death penalty for almost all crimes. It was a statement of the tenacity of Frank McGee who faced much derision by his own colleagues that were opposed to abolition. In fact, Frank McGee's family faced death threats during the debate of that bill. He stood tall, devoted and constant in his belief during those very difficult times.

In the 1962 general election Frank won again. It was a minority government and Frank was sworn in as a minister in recognition of his ability and contribution to parliament and to his country.

In 1963 Mr. Diefenbaker and his Tories were defeated and Frank lost his seat. Frank moved to journalism and worked for the Toronto Star and hosted a CBC television series call The Sixties . He ran again in 1965 but lost. Frank went on in his contribution to public service by serving on the Security Intelligence Review Committee from 1984 to 1989 and in 1990 became a citizenship court judge. Frank McGee was a very accomplished man with a lifetime spent in the pursuit of public service in one form or another.

At the outset I referred to how Frank McGee touched the lives of many of us in the 1972 election and for that matter the role he played in the destiny of this nation. In the course of political life four votes can change the course of history.

Frank McGee is spoken of with warmth in these precincts. While determined, he was never dictatorial. While enlightened, he was never egocentric. While successful, he never lost his connection with his roots and with his values.

On behalf of the Reform Party I extend our deepest sympathy to his wife Moira and to his children Maureen, Owen and Sheilagh. They have lost a good father and this country has lost a genuine example of a gifted politician and a man with a sense of duty.