Jocelyne Girard-Bujold

[Question No. 55, September 21st, 2001]

For the fiscal year 1999-2000, can the government provide a detailed list of all grants awarded by the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec in Quebec's 75 federal ridings?

Return tabled.

[Youth Criminal Justice Act, May 16th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, usually, it is a pleasure for me to speak in this House, but, today, I am very sad. With Bill C-7, we will be burying a practice that has proven its mettle in Quebec, that of democracy.

Before I begin, I would like to congratulate my colleague, the member for Berthier—Montcalm, for preventing the government from burying the Young Offenders Act for years now.

Yesterday, in the Jonquière region, with stakeholders from the community, I attended a meeting. In attendance were representatives of the Centres jeunesse du Saguenay, the head of youth protection, the Syndicat des enseignants de Jonquière, the Corporation de développement communautaire des Deux-Rives, which comprises some 50 community organizations and the Aînés de JAK de Jonquière, senior citizens. They said “No, no, no. We seniors oppose this bill”.

As well, there was the Association des parents d'ados, an organization helping young people. This organizations provides a 24 hour help line.

Also in attendance were the Patro de Jonquière, streetworkers, Justice alternative jeunesse du Saguenay Inc., the Commission scolaire des rives du Saguenay, the Commission scolaire de Jonquière, the Association québécoise de défense des droits des personnes retraitées et préretraitées, the Centres Jeunesse and a number of individuals.

They all came to speak to my colleague and to Marc Beaupré, the person in charge of the non political aspect of the issue in Quebec. It is far too important an issue to make it political. Marc Beaupré is doing an excellent job of it.

I also attended a meeting in the riding of Sherbrooke, with my colleague who represents that riding and about twenty stakeholders, ordinary people, street workers, community organizations. They came to tell my colleague and me that they did not want this bill.

They are the ones who are the first to intervene with young people. They are the ones who know how effective the Young Offenders Act is in Quebec. I am not saying that it does not need any improvement. Nothing is perfect in this world. But these people work with this act and they are telling us “We have the right tools; we must just improve them and invest in the front line, that is, in prevention”.

This is what they came to tell us. I did not ask them to do so. They are the ones who agreed to meet my colleague and who said “Congratulations, you are informed. You are defending young people. You are defending tomorrow's society”.

In the last couple days, I have been witnessing a vaudeville in the House. We know what a vaudeville is. It is a human comedy.

I think now that enough is enough. What is happening now with this arrogant government is enough. The Minister of Justice should go and listen to the Quebec people. Why does she not travel? I am prepared to invite her to my riding of Jonquière, so she can meet workers who will tell her about their views on the Young Offenders Act and Bill C-7. I would like that. I am inviting her. I am extending my hand to her. I would even like to invite the Prime Minister and tell him “Come and listen to ordinary people. You are a lawyer by training. Come and listen”.

Judges are saying that they will not know how to implement Bill C-7. Moreover, it will cost between $200 million and $250 million to do so. That money will not go to young people. It will be lost in structures such as buildings and facilities, and in training for judges.

Two hundred and fifty million dollars to implement a bill, when street workers back home are not even paid minimum wage to provide frontline to young offenders. They sure could use $250 million. In Quebec, the recidivism rate is nil. It would be wonderful; things would be even better. We would be able to help young people who have stumbled.

At age 14, we all make foolish mistakes, including you and I, Mr. Speaker. Should a 14 year old be branded for the rest of his life? Today's young people are not allowed to buy alcohol or cigarettes until they are 18 years of age. The law prohibits them from doing that. But at age 14, they would be sentenced and branded for the rest of their life? This is unacceptable.

How can we get this across to the Minister of Justice, all members from Quebec and all Liberal members from Quebec? They should tell their minister “Open your eyes. We are successful in Quebec. Make sure it gets even better. Help us improve things if necessary, but do not dismiss it out of hand and start all over again”.

We have been successfully implementing this legislation for years in Quebec. Why should we pay for the other provinces, which had the same legislation, but did not implement it?

I am speaking for young people. I have children myself, and I have grandchildren, as do many of you and many of those watching us today. Parents came and told us “The young offenders system is helping us. But with this bill, it will become judicialized”. This is not what people want. They want assistance, assistance for the young people, and for their families so that the young people can learn to take charge and make something out of their lives. This is possible under the present Young Offenders Act, but it will not be under Bill C-7. What a shame.

I do not know how I will proceed, but I have a lot of imagination and I will not allow the minister to come in my province, where we are successful, and establish a system under which this success will be ignored, and young people will have no opportunity to take their destiny into their own hands. This is unacceptable.

Yesterday, actor Marc Beaupré came to speak with young people. He asked them what they thought about the bill. They answered “We cannot support this bill. You must stop them”. But how can they be stopped? That is the question I ask Quebecers and Canadians, as well as the Liberals in the House.

I am asking the Liberals “When will you stop criminalizing young people with such a bill?” I do not think that we should throw stones at the young person who commits an offence. In life, we should all have an opportunity to get their lives back together.

In my family there are several lawyers, so I know how the judicial system works. Instead of helping young people we will put them through the judicial system. That is enough. We are dealing with young people less than 18 years old, not with adults. Oddly enough, adults sentenced to six years of prison, thanks to a remission of sentence, serve only two years. That is serious.

Presently, under the Young Offenders Act, young people sentenced to six years serve six years. They serve their sentence in a rehabilitation system, in institutions that allow them to know themselves and progress. This is possible under the Young Offenders Act.

The minister must be thinking “I made a mistake. We must allowed Quebec to withdraw from the application of that act”. We must be allowed to keep on applying proactive measures for our youth. We are asking her to allow us to do so.

If she wants to maintain her bill as is, she should keep it for the other provinces and let Quebec withdraw from its application. That is what I am asking her to do. If she maintains it as is, I will vote against it.

[Canada National Marine Conservation Areas Act, May 10th, 2001]

Madam Speaker, I listened very carefully to the speech by my colleague, the Canadian Alliance member. I might have ten or so questions to ask him as a result of his speech, but I will sum them up.

He mentioned the precautionary principle. I believe it is quite normal for him to do so.

I would like to know what he means, as the Canadian Alliance critic in this matter, by precautionary principle with regard to the marine conservation areas?

At present, marine conservation areas cover endangered species and territories located in the provinces. Throughout his speech, I did not hear him refer to consultation with the provinces. The member made no mention of the involvement of provincial governments in the decision to create such areas.

In my area of the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean, we have the Saguenay—St. Lawrence Marine Park, which was created after consultation with the community, the province and the federal government. Based on that, the government did something really fine. I believe it is a model of what Canada and Quebec can do together. The member did not mention that.

He also said in his speech that no matter what the environmental sustainability of a project is, we must forge ahead. I have very serious reservations about this. He referred to the Rio convention and the precautionary principle.

These are the first questions I would like to ask the member. If I still have the time, I would like to ask him some more.

[Patent Act, May 10th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to take part in today's debate on Bill S-17, an act to amend the Patent Act. The objective of the bill is clearly to change our patent legislation in light of two recent WTO rulings.

The first ruling relates to the duration of patents before October 1, 1989, and the second concerns the provisions of the act on storage.

In 1987, several important changes were made to the Patent Act. The duration of patent protection went from 17 years after patent registration to 20 years after the filing of the patent application. That change came into effect on October 1, 1989.

Before the Uruguay round, multilateral trade negotiations on GATT did not cover intellectual property rights. The Uruguay round, which gave birth to the WTO, also produced the agreement on trade related aspects of intellectual property rights, which contains certain provisions on patent protection. Section 33, for example, says that the protection duration must not be less than 20 years from the date the patent application was filed.

As a matter of fact, in 1992 the federal government undertook to amend the Patent Act by introducing in the House of Commons Bill C-91, an act to amend the Patent Act, 1992. This bill eliminated compulsory licensing for drugs. Compulsory licensing had been set up under the act. It authorized the licence owner, and only him, to produce, use and sell a patented invention before the patent expired.

This bill also created two exceptions to infringement of patent, a rule under which anyone who produced, used or sold a product protected by a valid patent without the consent of the patent owner could be sued for infringement of patent, by authorizing the use of a patent for certain purposes before it expired.

I would like to provide members of the House with some background information. At the end of 1997, the European Union asked Canada to hold consultations as part of the dispute settlement procedures of the WTO, on the one hand because of the protection provided to pharmaceutical inventions under Patent Act, and on the other because of Canada's obligations under the TRIPS agreement.

Specifically, the European Union was concerned about the exceptions regarding regulatory approval and storage. In early 1999, the WTO created a special panel mandated to review the European Union challenge to these two exceptions under the agreement, with regard to intellectual property rights as they related to trade.

The European Union argued in this regard that the Patent Act and the regulations authorizing protection and storage of drugs without the consent of the owners of the patent during the six months prior to its expiry—this is section 55.2(2)—was an infringement of Canada's obligations under the TRIPS agreement—namely sections 28.1 and 33.1.

The European Union also argued that by applying to drug patent owners a less generous treatment than for other technological areas, Canada had ignored its obligations under section 27.1 of the TRIPS agreement, which provides for the granting of patents and the enjoyment of patent rights without discrimination based on technology.

On this occasion, the European Union also indicated that the provisions of section 55.2(1) of the Patent Act authorizing a third party, without the consent of the patent holder, to use a patented invention during the term of the patent, in order to obtain regulatory approval for the sale of an equivalent product after the expiry of the patent, violated the provisions of section 28.1 of the agreement on TRIPS.

The WTO struck a special panel, which backed the European Union as far as the exception relating to storage contained in section 55.2(2) of the Patent Act was concerned, deeming it to be incompatible with Canada's obligations under section 4 of the agreement on TRIPS.

Canada was to implement the panel's decision concerning the exception relating to storage by October 7, 2000 at the latest. The manufacturing and storage of patented medicines regulations were revoked in accordance with this decision.

In September 1999, a special WTO panel was struck to address a claim by the United States that the protected period conferred by a Canadian patent as the result of an application filed prior to October 1, 1989 was incompatible with the obligations under the agreement on TRIPS. The same thing is happening today with the United States, as in the example of the softwood lumber agreement.

According to the United States, under the agreement, the protection conferred by a patent is for a minimum of 20 years from the date the application was filed. Patents granted in connection with applications filed prior to October 1, 1989, those granted under the old legislation, with a duration of 17 years from date of issue, would therefore be contrary to the agreement on TRIPS, if that period of 17 years from date of issue is shorter less than 20 years from date of filing.

This argument applied to patents under the old legislation that were issued within three years of the date of filing.

As a result of the position the United States has stated, Canada maintained that the patents granted under the old act enjoyed essentially the same protection as those granted under the new legislation, and that the provisions of the TRIPS agreement on the term of protection did not apply to patents granted before the coming into effect of the agreement.

In October 2000, the WTO ruled in favour of the United States. It felt that the term of protection for patents granted under the old act was not compatible with the TRIPS agreement in the case of patents granted during the three years following the date that the request was made. I am referring to section 5.

Bill S-17 would amend the Patent Act to comply with the rulings issued by the WTO following the challenges by the Europeans and the Americans concerning certain provisions of the act.

The Bloc Quebecois supports these changes. It is clear that the protection of intellectual property must go along with technological and pharmaceutical advances.

However, it is unfortunate that Canada had to appear twice before the WTO's tribunal to solve this dispute, which is, after all, a minor one. There are much more fundamental issues with which the tribunal should be dealing.

I am thinking, among others, of the lumber issue where, even after registering several victories, Canada literally caved in to the Americans by imposing quotas on Canadian and Quebec lumber producers. The agreement on softwood lumber expired on March 31 and we could again find ourselves before the WTO's tribunal, which will have to deal with this problem for the fourth time. Needless to say, this is a critical issue for our lumber producing regions.

The Minister for International Trade ought to stand up to the Americans, in my opinion. Someone should give him something to make him strong enough to tell the Americans that the only possible solution, in the short and the long term, is a return to full free trade.

I will conclude by saying that the protection Canada must provide to researchers regarding their inventions must comply with international agreements. However, Canada could go even further, since it is lagging behind the United States and the European Union. Nevertheless, I will be pleased to support this bill.

[Marine Liability Act, May 9th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill S-2.

I would like to congratulate my colleague from Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel who spoke earlier this afternoon. I want to tell him how much I appreciated his comments and how true I found them to be.

What I believe once again is serious. I believe it is a sad thing to see this government introduce bill after bill dealing with a very specific problem. The idea is good, but as soon as the opposition parties bring forward amendments to improve the bill the government says nothing and refers the matter to the parliamentary secretary. As far as he is concerned, everything coming from the opposition has to be dealt with in a very negative way. This is a serious problem.

This afternoon I listened to Alliance members and the member for the New Democratic Party. As I had not debated this bill, it gave me an idea of what should have been included in it. Listening to the opposition parties does not mean one is an idiot, but rather it shows that one is intelligent. They had good ideas, they were on the right track, but they stopped halfway there.

Stopping halfway is serious because this bill deals with a particular problem. We do not rewrite the same laws every year, I believe they are made to last a few years. Why stop halfway in dealing with a problem that really had to be addressed in order to have, in the end, something tangible and forward looking?

I think that, as my colleague was saying, this government is arrogant. It is not a word to be used lightly, but I am sorry to say that this government is indeed arrogant. We were all elected by the people we represent. They told us to represent them, hoping we would pass on to the government their wishes and their suggestions for a better society. I see that they did not get the message, or if they did they did not understand it. It is very sad.

I think we are all people of goodwill, whether we belong to the Canadian Alliance, the NDP, the Progressive Conservative Party or the Bloc Quebecois. Sometimes I wonder if the Liberal government has the same goodwill.

It is too bad that we just had an election because Canadians already feel that this government is not listening to them. It has been only five or six months since it was elected. Imagine how out of touch it will be in three or four years. We will have passed bills that will have done nothing for the advancement of Quebec and Canadian society.

This bill dealing with marine liability validates certain bylaws and regulations. It was introduced in the Senate on 31, January 2001. Current Canadian legislation relating to the marine mode of transportation includes several regimes governing the liability of domestic and foreign shipowners and shippers, and their responsibility for damage to property, environment, or loss of life or injury to others during maritime activity and therefore dealing with the economic and legal consequences of maritime accidents.

The environment is an issue that is very important to me and I will be addressing several parts of this bill that are related to it in various ways. I will finally get the opportunity to talk about threats to the environment. We no longer have the right not to protect the environment for current and future generations.

This is a serious threat to our planet. We cannot afford to make any concession where the environment is concerned. I think we ought to take every known measures and every measure soon to be discovered to fight against any threats to the environment. We have to face some serious threats like oil spills at sea or close to the coast.

The bill would consolidate existing marine liability regimes, fatal accidents, limitation of liability for maritime claims, liability for carriage of goods by water, liability and compensation for pollution damage, into a single piece of legislation which would also include new regimes concerning shipowners' liability to passengers and apportionment of liability applicable to torts governed by the Canadian maritime legislation.

The bill would retroactively validate certain bylaws made under the Canada Ports Corporation Act and certain regulations made under the Pilotage Act. The validating provisions are of a strictly housekeeping nature and are unrelated to the marine liability regimes set out in the bill.

I would like to talk about the description and the analysis contained in part 1 dealing with personal injuries and fatalities. Those provisions are set in clauses 4 to 14.

It follows a decision made in 1993 by the British Columbia Court of Appeal where the court found that relatives of persons killed in marine accidents could sue under part 14 of the Canada Shipping Act.

Part 1 of the bill would generally re-enact the provisions concerning fatal accidents that currently appear in part 14 of the Canada Shipping Act, revising them to give effect to the various Supreme Court of Canada decisions. More specifically, part 1 would update Canadian maritime law to reflect developments in provincial fatal accidents legislation and to confirm that maritime wrongful death and injury claims may be made against persons as well as ships.

Part 1 would apply only in respect of claims for which a remedy would be sought under Canadian maritime law, as defined in the Federal Court Act, or any other law of Canada in relation to any matter falling within the class of navigation and shipping or dealing more precisely with clause 5. Any action based on part 1 of the bill would be barred for two years.

This would improve legislation but would not solve the new problems users would be facing. The Bloc Quebecois agrees with this part, whose aim is to permit the dependants of a person injured or deceased to recover damages and interest. We agree with these measures, but we could have been, as my colleague has said, more attentive to what the witnesses said when the bill was being examined in committee.

I will also address part 2, that is clauses 15 to 23, which set out the apportionment of liability. It involves the application of the principle that if several people or ships are liable each is apportioned part of the blame, and if it is impossible to determine individual degrees of fault all are equally and jointly responsible.

The claimant may initiate proceedings for negligence in shipping matters in Canada. First, the common law defence of contributory negligence prevents a claimant from recovering anything if the defendant can prove that the claimant's own negligence, even in the slightest degree, has contributed to the damages.

Second, a defendant who is found responsible for paying a claimant damages is then prevented from claiming a contribution from other persons. It really concerned these clauses; it improved them and the problems. It also made it possible to link this new apportionment of liability with the Quebec civil code, which had always recognized these rights.

At the federal level, however, apportionment legislation such as currently exists at the provincial level has never been enacted, except with respect to damage caused by collisions between ships. It is important to have this vision so that this problem may be really linked with provincial jurisdictional distribution.

Also, the Quebec government with its civil code has always been further ahead. I am not saying this because I live in Quebec: I think this has been recognized throughout Canada with many issues. The civil code, which was updated a few years ago, has really been updated to respond to what is happening. That is what is important to legitimize, to allow the apportionment of liability in part 2 which includes clauses 15 to 23. We agree in principle with this apportionment of liability in part 2.

I will also deal with part 3, which includes clauses 24 to 34. It covers the “Limitation of liability for maritime claims”. This is very important. I believe it is very important to ensure the apportionment of liability, whether financial or by units of account or special drawing rights issued by the International Monetary Fund under the London convention of 1976 and the Canada Shipping Act, with an extension to cover the liability of dock, canal or harbour owners.

I would also like to point out that claims arising from a ship in collision will be limited to two years. This is in subclause 23(1). However, a court with jurisdiction to deal with such an action could, in accordance with the rules of the court, extend the two year time limit to the extent and on the conditions that it thought fit. As well, the court could extend the time period for arresting a ship if satisfied that the two years had not afforded a reasonable opportunity to arrest the ship within the waters of a province or of Canada.

It is a very important provision, because these things could take a long time. These legal actions took a long time to settle. Ships could be tied down and, before everyone could agree on some kind of settlement undue extentions could be granted. We all know how long judicial proceedings can be.

This clause would speed up the determination of liability and the processing of maritime claims. That is what is called limitation of liability for maritime claims.

As my colleague pointed out, this provision could have been improved upon further. I think that we in the Bloc Quebecois will support this aspect in relation to part 3. Given all we have heard in the past, legal actions that went on for years on end, witnesses that came before the committee urging us to take action and to take all necessary means to do so, I think the government is not going far enough.

I know that my time is quickly running out. As I said at the beginning of my speech, I also want to talk about the environment. As we know, it is a very important issue. It is just incredible how many environmental disasters we see around the world. We hear about ships accidentally discharging their cargo into the environment. We can see how unacceptable this is from the ecological point of view. It will be years and years before all the flora and fauna, all the shore areas affected by spills can recover and finally get back to the way they used to be.

We know that many species are endangered. There are endangered birds and marine species. It is very important to ensure heavy vigilance. I believe we can no longer allow these companies to travel about the planet anywhere they want, doing anything they want.

As for the $100 million figure for the fund, I will take the example of the incident on the coast of France a few years ago. Initially this was to cost a few million dollars but in the end the figure was escalating; $100 million is very low. This bill ought to have given a far higher figure. We have absolutely no idea today what it will cost to restore what we have destroyed.

Far be it from me to alarm the people listening to us today. That is not my intention. I have never wanted to do that, but we must be responsible. As responsible persons we must tell oil companies which have a major responsibility that they must assume their responsibility.

Under the heading “Payments into the Ship-source Oil Pollution Fund”, clause 93 and the following clauses say that ship owners must pay 30 cents per metric ton “in respect of each metric ton of oil in excess of 300 metric tons imported by ship into Canada or shipped by ship from any place in Canada in bulk as cargo”. This levy set as of March 31, 1999, will be adjusted annually. I believe it is generous. This bill is generous toward the oil companies.

These days, for the past year and a half to two years in fact, we have experienced spiralling costs. The government says it is not responsible. Oil companies say they are short of money but they are making record profits. I will not tell the House what people back home are saying. In the Saguenay we have words to describe this kind of people but I will not say what they are because it is not parliamentary. Allow me to think and say that it is indecent. Let us talk about how much money the oil companies are making on the back of the poor.

You must have poor people in your riding, Mr. Speaker. You have farm workers, taxi drivers, school bus drivers. All these people need a car to go to work. Do you not think it is very hard for them?

In the Quebec City area I paid 89 cents for a litre of regular gasoline. It is a lot. What is it going to be this summer? They say that during the holidays people are not cost conscious. I believe it is indecent to think that way.

As mentioned by my colleague, the Bloc Quebecois will support the bill with some reservations. I believe it could have been improved to show that we were finally going to do the right thing.

[Questions Passed As Orders For Returns, May 9th, 2001]

For the fiscal years 1997-98 and 1998-99, can the government provide a detailed list of all grants awarded by the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec in Quebec's 75 federal ridings?

Return tabled.

[Questions On The Order Paper, May 1st, 2001]

Could the government provide: ( a ) the amount in the transitional jobs fund that was not utilized in the fiscal year 2000-01 and was redirected on June 22, 2000, toward the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the regions of Quebec; and ( b ) a list of all amounts paid out in grants since June 22, 2000, by the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the regions of Quebec through the Canada jobs fund, indicating the date each such grant was made?

[Volunteers, April 25th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, this week Pearl Dugas will be one of the 60 persons honoured in Ottawa as part of the International Year of the Volunteer.

Ms. Dugas has been a social worker for 10 years and works as a volunteer administrator for the Société d'aide au développement des collectivités de Ville de la Baie, where she works developing businesses in rural communities.

She also served as the president of the Société de développement de Saint-Félix-d'Otis for four years and helped organize rural economic summits.

I have no doubt that the contribution of volunteers is essential to the development of modern Quebec. In their exceptional work they devote themselves body and soul to improving their community.

On behalf of the regional caucus of the Bloc Quebecois in Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean—Côte-Nord I pay tribute to the generosity and devotion of Pearl Dugas.

We offer our hearty congratulations.

[Resource Industries, April 24th, 2001]

Madam Chairman, in my region, we have the exact same problem. We are under the responsibility of people in Quebec City or in Montreal. We do not have our own officials in our region.

I want to go back to Canada Economic Development. When I submit applications from my region to Canada Economic Development, I cannot have a say with regard to these applications. If I want to have a say with regard to an application given to me by one of my constituents, I am told that it will hurt the applicant. Decisions are made in Quebec City, Montreal or Ottawa. I find that extremely hard to take for people in my region and for those whom they elected.

CFDCs give repayable loans. They give grants to non-profit organizations, but not to businesses that want to develop new niches. They only give repayable loans. I think it is a very serious problem. These people often need substantial capital to develop an expertise and to start up a business that will enable us to progress. I find that deplorable.

[Resource Industries, April 24th, 2001]

Madam Chairman, what the secretary of state said about rural development is exactly what I said. We did that exercise back home. We did it regarding rural communities and regional development. We did that exercise. We said “This is what we want to develop”.

Why not sit with these people and tell them “You have defined this? We are prepared to help you”. This is what I am saying. I agree. However we will not do the exercise all over again. It was done in my region. It was done in done in all the regions of Quebec.

A number of very specific areas were defined. Very important resource regions were defined, including the Abitibi—Témiscamingue, the Magdalen Islands, the Gaspé Peninsula, the Saguenay—Lac-Saint-Jean and the North Shore. This was all included in the exercise conducted by the grassroots over the past four or five years.

Is the hon. member prepared to sit with these people, the grassroots, and hear them tell him “This is what we want and we want to have money, we want the same thing that the Quebec government is putting on the table”? This is what I am asking.

We have done it, and was along the lines that the parliamentary secretary mentioned since the beginning.