Dick Proctor

[The Budget, March 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I will be dividing my time with my colleague, the member for Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore.

I am going to focus this afternoon on two important aspects of the budget, post-secondary education and agriculture. Before I do that I want to say a word or two in general about the budget itself and respond to the criticism from the Canadian Alliance, the C.D. Howe Institute, the Fraser Institute and other right-wing organizations that accused the government that spending was raised too quickly in its budget last month.

Au contraire, we would argue that with the enormous surpluses the government has been running, together with its perpetual ability to grossly underestimate said surpluses year upon year, the budget could have and should have done a whole lot more to make urgently needed social investments. When measured against the share of the overall economy, program funding continues to fall and remains well below where it was a decade ago. Federal spending for example has dropped from 16.5% of gross domestic product to just 11.4% over the past 10 years. This is a reduction that is equal to approximately $40 billion in annual spending.

I will now refer to post-secondary education.

This budget tells us that next year, the CHST will be divided into two separate transfers: a health transfer comprised of 62% of the resources, and another one designed to support post-secondary education and social service with 38% of the resources.

While health spending will increase substantially, funding for post-secondary education will decrease sharply, from $2.4 billion to $1.8 billion.

One must therefore wonder if the new spending for health announced with great fanfare is really new spending, or whether part of this spending comes from a reallocation of funds previously allocated to post-secondary education and social services.

The cutbacks to post-secondary education are unconscionable given what has happened to the levels of student debt and tuition fees in recent years. Average student debt when the government came to power was $13,000. Today it is over $21,000. Tuition fees have exceeded inflation by sixfold between 1991 and 2001.

The government responds by saying that tuition fees are a provincial responsibility, but what it cannot seem to get through its thick head is that it is federal cutbacks that have jacked up tuition fees. It is a cause and effect relationship.

Students and the rest of us realize every day that higher education has never been as important as it is today; new jobs are knowledge based. Yet, it is more difficult than ever to be a full-time student in Canada.

Over the past 20 years, the United States has increased funding for post-secondary education by approximately 20%, while Canada cut back support to colleges and universities by 30%.

For Canadians, this means higher tuition fees and debt loads and fewer students who can afford to attend university on a full time basis simply because they are forced to work part time to help defray their costs. It means crumbling buildings on university campuses because basic maintenance has been deferred due to the cash crunch. It means more reliance on sessional lecturers. It also means larger classrooms. Enrolments are forecast to rise by 30% over the next decade, and the government has to come to grips with that.

Are higher tuition fees keeping some students from attending university? One president told me last week that while the evidence is inconclusive, the data does reveal that children of families in the bottom quartile are not attending post-secondary institutions at the same high rate as those in the top quartile.

A number of solutions are obvious. Reduce costs by entering into genuine partnerships with provinces. Replace the millennium scholarship program with needs based grants. Relieve student debt by having the federal government assume interest costs on Canada student loans during the life of that loan. Eliminate all taxes on scholarships, grants and bursaries. If it is good enough for lottery winners in Canada to escape the tax man, surely it ought to be good enough for our students.

One meaningful solution would be to reduce tuition fees and provide a national system of needs based grants. Anything less is simply tinkering around the margins.

Let me turn briefly to the other subject, agriculture.

Although the government announced increased funding for crop insurance programs, food inspection, veterinary colleges and the Canadian Grain Commission, no new funds will go directly to farmers.

How can this be after the important announcement made by the Prime Minister last June? It is difficult for Canadian farmers to reach a consensus, but the current government has done the impossible.

Farm leaders are unanimous in their opposition to the business risk management proposal of the agricultural policy framework saying they are much worse off under these new proposals than what exists at the present time. It is elementary my dear Watson, the deputy minister, but with 22 major Canadian farm groups saying they have been ignored, the only farmers the department has not alienated are those it has not yet met. This is because the new NISA is nothing more than the old Canadian farm income plan and the government is demanding that more of the money for the new NISA come directly from a farmer's or a producer's NISA account.

In other words, even if some producers are in a better position following the creation of this new risk management program, it will be because they took risks with their own money. If they do not have the necessary funds, too bad for them.

In fact, the current government should increase its financial support for agriculture by $1.1 billion per year, over the next five years. Currently, there is no indexation, and this is totally ridiculous. This money would help farmers forced to compete with the treasuries of Washington and Brussels. This means $1.3 billion annually.

The budget makes passing reference to the problems of international subsidies in agriculture but once again fails to offer any solutions. It could be summed up as “we feel the farmers' pain”. Maybe the government should feel the pulse of farmers instead. If it does not do something and do it significantly and quickly, agriculture and the family farm as we know it will simply not make it.

Based on the Harbinson draft report on a new agricultural agreement at the WTO, it seems likely that in nine or ten years, a new agreement in this area will greatly reduce agricultural subsidies. But the current government carelessly assumes that our farmers will be able to survive another decade of unfair competition by foreign governments.

The government must recognize the damage done to farm families by American and European subsidies and protect the income of farmers.

Ottawa must consult openly with farm organizations, provincial and territorial governments to provide new safety net programs acceptable to the industry. It is time finally to show some grit and determination by challenging the Americans and the Europeans at the WTO.

The U.S. farm bill last year announced an additional $19 billion in farm subsidies which took the Americans to the outer limit, we were told, of what they could spend under the WTO rules. How is it then that they have just announced another package in excess of $3 billion to assist American grain and oilseed producers. The nervous Nellies across the way say we cannot take the U.S. to WTO court because the trade imbalance is so lopsided in Canada's favour.

We witnessed the contretemps that occurred on the split-run magazine issue when the Americans threatened to retaliate on steel. If that is the case then we should not have signed the agreement in the first place. Either we have rules that everybody signs on to and agrees to play by or we walk away from the agreement.

As the Prince Edward Island farmer told the Standing Committee on Agriculture and Agri-Food a year ago, the way it is now under the WTO and the free trade agreement, Americans have rights while Canadians have obligations.

[Health, February 28th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, there is still no accountability in the latest health accord and public funds continue to pay for the privatization of health care. Indeed, on page 37 of this year's income tax guide, expenses can now be claimed for staying in a licensed private hospital.

Will the acting prime minister explain why, instead of dedicating all of the $1.5 billion on diagnostic equipment like CAT scans and MRIs, federal taxpayers will almost certainly end up buying more icemakers, floor scrubbers, delivery trucks, sewing machines and lawnmowers for certain provinces?

[Physical Activity and Sport Act, February 27th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to take part briefly in this discussion of Bill C-12. The reason we are dealing with it is that four amendments have come back to us from the other place. One is on linguistic duality. The second is on grants and contributions that will accord with the Official Languages Act. The third one deals with the corporate plan of the new sports body to be tabled annually in both Houses and, finally, that an annual report be tabled each year.

Just briefly by way of background, Bill C-54, now Bill C-12, was considered to be non-controversial and was supported unanimously last June by all parties in the House. The bill replaces and updates the Fitness and Amateur Sport Act, which dates back to 1961, and is intended to bring people, organizations and governments together to encourage, promote and develop physical activity in sport in Canada, a goal that all parties supported enthusiastically, as I have said.

In its preamble, the bill indicates that sport and physical activity can be forces that bind Canadians together, enhancing, among other things, the bilingual nature of Canada. The bill received unanimous support in the House on October 9, 2002, although I do not believe there was a recorded vote at that time.

To deal specifically and briefly with the amendments, Motion No. 1 makes a change to the preamble to the bill by adding the phrase “linguistic duality”.

The preamble states, and I quote:

whereas the Government of Canada recognizes that physical activity and sport are integral parts of Canadian culture and society and produce benefits in terms of health, quality of life, economic activity, cultural diversity and social cohesion, including strengthening the bilingual character of Canada;

And the amendment reads as follows:

social cohesion, linguistic duality, economic activity, cultural diversity and quality of life;

The main change here is to have the phrase “linguistic duality” replace the words “bilingual nature of Canada”. I would point that out to the member for Fraser Valley, who seemed to be concerned that the government was somehow trying to sneak something in as a result of the proposed changes from the other place. I think the two are very similar.

Motion No. 2 relates to the grants and contributions in accord with the Official Languages Act. The bill as passed in the House last year read as follows:

For the purposes of this Act, the Minister may provide financial assistance in the form of grants and contributions to any person.

The amendment adds, after the words “to any person”, the following words:

in accordance with Parts IV and VII of the Official Languages Act.

In Motion No. 3, the corporate plan of the new sports body is to be tabled in both Houses each year, with the annual report to be tabled in both Houses each year. We support both of these.

With regard to the corporate plan, the Senate amendment adds a new subclause 32(4), which states:

The Minister shall cause a copy of the corporate plan to be tabled in each House of Parliament on any of the first fifteen days on which that House is sitting after the Minister receives the plan.

We contacted representatives of the sports community. They were initially opposed to that clause being added, arguing that the sport body was set up to be at arm's length and the government seemed to be pulling it back under too tight a control. They insisted initially that enough accountability had already been built in and that these amendments sent a negative signal to sports bodies and athletes.

We have been told, however, that after consideration they are now prepared to support these amendments. So are the members of this caucus. We will be supporting the four amendments that have been presented to us this afternoon.

[Agriculture, February 25th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, more than 80% of Canadian customers abroad say they will not purchase any genetically modified variety of wheat, but this has not stopped Monsanto from seeking regulatory approval to introduce GM wheat in Canada. Because there is no effective way to segregate wheat from genetically modified wheat, and knowing that the introduction of this product will result in hundreds of millions of dollars in lost sales annually, would the agriculture minister not agree that a market impact test should be completed before genetically modified wheat is foisted upon Canadian producers?

[Agriculture, February 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, whether they sell their produce through the Wheat Board or supply management, the draft proposals released last week by the chair of the WTO agricultural panel spell even more problems ahead for Canadian agriculture producers.

Moreover the chair's proposal on export subsidies will force Canadian farmers to wait another nine years for the United States and Europe to eliminate their trade distorting largesse.

In light of these bad news proposals, will the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food advise the House and Canadian farmers how the government intends to protect Canadian agriculture in the future?

[Canada Elections Act, February 17th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member for Fraser Valley with some interest. The substance of his position is that the Canadian Alliance obviously opposes the bill, but I did hear him say that it supports some measures of it. Specifically, what is the position of the Canadian Alliance regarding the $10,000 limit by individuals to political parties?

When I first read this I assumed it was capped at $10,000. As the member will know, it is now $10,000 for each recognized and registered party. Would he and his party be prepared to support amendments to cap that at $10,000? There are some of us who think that is very generous, but certainly $10,000 multiplied by six, seven or eight is just outside the limit.

[Canada Elections Act, February 11th, 2003]

No, Madam Speaker, I would not agree with that analysis, but I do agree to this extent that there is no question that all of the political parties are going to continue to raise funds, but from individuals. We are going to go out and talk to union members and other ordinary Canadians and ask them to continue to support us with their $10, $20 and $30 donations.

I think if the member from the Canadian Alliance were to look, he would find that his party receives about the same percentage amount of donations from individuals, as the New Democratic Party does, which is around 60%. His leader said 61% in the House earlier this afternoon.

Clearly, each of those two parties has a base of individual support. We are going to continue to reach out, build the base, and raise money from the base. At the same time the political parties are losing the wherewithal from unions, corporations, and other organizations to raise money. We think the principle of some public funds to offset what we are losing at the other end is worthwhile.

This is an extension of public financing of political parties. This is something that was begun in 1974. There has been a grand hiatus, but now we are into something that is new. It is definitely a step in the right direction and worthy of our support.

[Canada Elections Act, February 11th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I wish I could help my colleague from Brandon--Souris as to why it is not in there. Obviously being on the opposite side of the floor from the government, I cannot really answer. I think it is an omission. Perhaps, with the goodwill of the government that is introducing the bill, it is something that we can deal with.

I firmly believe it should be in the bill. Otherwise I think this will be open to all kinds of shenanigans about how to get around the law. Some might say that if it is only $1,000 surely there must be some way to funnel money in the back door. I think the best way to deal with it would be for the political parties that have these backbenchers or cabinet ministers, or whoever it is who has these trust funds, to say to them very clearly, directly and distinctly, “Get rid of them because they have no place, and as we are amending the law with Bill C-24, let us do away with them”.

As I said before, take the $246,000 that is apparently in one member's trust account and donate it to a university, hospital or charity of his choice, but let us get rid of it now.

[Canada Elections Act, February 11th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for South Shore for his question. First, with regard to why I did not talk about the 2000 election campaign as opposed to 1988's, the member is correct. The point I tried to make was that in regard to the 1988 election campaign I think there is a general consensus that there was a lot of interest from people who were proponents of reaching a free trade agreement with the United States. They, and they being largely corporate Canada, were putting a lot of time, effort and particularly money into the campaign to ensure that the government of the day would be returned and free trade would become a reality.

In fairness, in the 2000 election campaign we did not have those kinds of issues, but the point still remains that proportional representation would have been helpful in both elections because we did elect a majority government with a minority amount of the vote.

With regard to the thrust of the member's question on individual donations, yes, I think obviously we are going to continue to have fundraising. Individuals, if they are so inclined and so endowed, will be able to contribute up to $10,000 a year. The point is that a corporation, a trade union or an organization will be prohibited from donating to any political party, but they will be allowed to make a maximum aggregate donation of $1,000 to a candidate or to a constituency, a New Democratic Party or a Progressive Conservative Party constituency.

That, as I tried to indicate in my speech, is a bit of a gift to some of the Liberal backbenchers. When the bill was floated, we will recall that the president of the Liberal Party said it was as “dumb as a bag of hammers”. Other people have been complaining about it too. I think this was a bit of a gift to them to try to alleviate some of their concerns with the bill. Fundamentally what the government is saying by introducing the legislation is that trade unions, corporations and organizations will not be able to donate money to political parties themselves, that only individuals will, and that is worthy of support.

[Canada Elections Act, February 11th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I will not be sharing my time this evening but I am pleased to be the lead speaker for New Democratic Party.

I gather that we are speaking to the amendment to Bill C-24, that the House decline to give second reading to the bill, which was introduced by the Canadian Alliance. We will be voting against the amendment.

I would like to make a small prediction. Like the pensions for members of Parliament, the Canadian Alliance will vote against and then quietly accept the public largess that will follow.

Bill C-24, an act to amend the Canada Elections Act and the Income Tax Act, is highly complex legislation with many technical changes because the amendments to the Canada Elections Act, instead of being a complete code within themselves, are amendments and this adds to the complexity of it.

Basically, the bill before us today, as we have heard from the Prime Minister, is being distributed to us as a way to remove big money from the political process. We in the New Democratic Party support the bill in principle. We support the idea of it. We had a convention last month in Toronto and passed a resolution similar to what is being proposed today.

I note in passing that in the minority government period of 1972-74, the New Democratic Party leader of the day, David Lewis, secured the passage of the Election Expenses Act which set, for the first time, spending limits on national and district campaigns and expanded public access to the source and amounts of contributions of all political parties. That was a very good beginning. We have not had very much in the quarter century or almost 30 years since then. However the bill does build on the work of David Lewis and that minority Parliament back in the 1972-74 period.

We start from the premise that the only people who should be allowed to contribute to political parties are those who are actually eligible to vote at election time. That would exclude organizations, corporations and trade unions. We think that is a good, fundamental way in which to begin.

As the House knows, currently political contributions are allowed unlimited amounts of money from individuals, corporations, trade unions and other organizations and, as I said, with no limit on the amount of money that can be contributed.

Because of that, we have the perception that money buys status and influence, that money talks, as the Prime Minister himself said. Companies give thousands of dollars, as we have noted, and tend to give dollars to parties that are likely to win the election or are up for re-election. Therein lies some of the problems that we have witnessed in this Parliament and some of the things that need to be redressed and fixed.

The heritage minister herself has indicated that the ratification of the Kyoto protocol was delayed by the government because of the lobby from big businesses to delay and frustrate the ratification of the Kyoto protocol.

With the bill that is before us today, I think it will reduce, if not eliminate, those kinds of peculiarities and problems. Bill C-24 requires that only individuals can contribute to political parties. They can make financial contributions to registered parties, to constituency associations, to leadership candidates and nomination contestants. It is capped at $10,000 in total to a registered party, its electoral district association, candidate and nomination contestants.

I want to stop here to say that the $10,000 should be a total aggregate amount of money. It should not be possible for a wealthy individual to give $10,000 per annum to all five of the parties that have status in the House, plus the other registered parties, even if the individual has the wherewithal to do that. That certainly does not remove the perception of big money and influencing politics.

We will be looking for an amendment that would cap that at $10,000 as the total amount of money if the individual wishes to contribute to more than one political party, but certainly not $10,000 to all.

The bill would prohibit corporations, trade unions and associations from donating money to any political party or leadership candidate. They may, however, contribute to a maximum of $1,000 collectively to a party's candidate, nomination contestants and constituency associations. I think this is a bit of a sop to perhaps the government backbenchers who have been concerned that they would not be able to raise any money from an organization, a small business or a trade union that is in their riding.

On balance, we will not raise much objection but when we begin to make changes, even modifications, along this line it does open up the possibility of finding more loopholes. On balance, I would prefer that this were not in the legislation but we will not object beyond that.

We are pleased to take part in the debate because we know that Canadians want a real debate in the financing of political parties. We know that Canadians overwhelmingly want government and political parties to clean up their act in this money buying spree that we have seen, particularly on the government side last year.

As I indicated, the New Democratic Party has long called for removing big money. We certainly support the bill in principle but we do have specific amendments and, as is often said, the devil is in the details. We will be proposing important amendments to the committee but we do support the bill in principle.

It is worth noting, from our perspective, that about 60% of the donations made to the New Democratic Party do come from individual donors, people who give $10, $20, $30, $50 or $100 to our party and to our candidates. That situation stands in stark contrast to what the Liberal Party has enjoyed in recent years: 60% of its donations come from the business community and only 32% from individuals.

Our political enemies always take every opportunity to point out that the New Democratic Party is overwhelmingly supported by the trade union movement. We are proud of the special and unique partnership with the labour movement. That was how the New Democratic Party was founded back in the early 1960s. We are and remain full partners with the labour movement, and, yes, unions do support us, but to a far lesser extent than most people believe. About 30% of our donations come from the trade union movement but the overwhelming amount, 60%, comes from individual donors.

The legislation would allow individuals to donate $10,000 a year to any party. Individuals could donate in multiples of $10,000. For example, one wealthy individual could give $10,000 to each of the five parties in the House. We believe that is far too high, and that donations of that magnitude could still buy considerable influence. It flies in the face of removing the perception of big money influencing politics. We think that even the $10,000 level is too high. I heard the rationale from the Prime Minister. He said that $10,000 was about what $3,000 was worth back in the 1970s when René Lévesque brought this legislation to Quebec. That is a fair point but it still strikes me that it is a large amount of money.

Furthermore, the limit, whatever it will be, should be the total amount that can be donated to all parties in aggregate, not the amount that can be donated to each party. If we say that we are going to get big money out of politics, then let us not fool around. Let us actually do it.

The bill prohibits contributions to political parties from corporations, unions or associations. As a minor exception, it proposes permitting such organizations to contribute $1,000 annually to the aggregate of candidates' local associations and nomination contestants of a registered party. In other words, all contributions from corporations, unions and other associations are combined under the $1,000 limit.

We are checking on this and it may not prove to be a valid concern, but we wonder whether a trade union with many locals will be considered as one unit no matter how many locals it has, as compared to perhaps an automobile dealership that may be considered as a separate entity, with each of those dealerships in the Ford Motor Company, let us say, being able to donate $1,000.

We want to make sure of this in the legislation. We will be asking some questions to ensure that there is a level playing field, that everybody is operating on the same level and that we are not treating unions and corporations differently just because they are set up differently under the various acts.

Trust funds were mentioned earlier in the debate. We know or are aware of some members of the government side who have amassed pretty impressive trust funds, upwards of a quarter of a million dollars. It is not entirely clear to us how the legislation is going to impact on those trust funds.

It seems that while this legislation will not in any way prohibit the trust funds, the intent is that the people who control the funds will be restricted to the $1,000 maximum annual donation to a candidate's riding association or candidate for nomination.

We fear that there will be an enormous temptation for members of Parliament with these trust funds to find ways to slip money over and above the annual maximum into their own good political work and campaigns. We firmly believe that there is no place for trust funds in politics. We know that there are some political parties in the House that do not allow candidates to amass or to begin a trust fund. I would appeal to the members opposite on the government side to take the steps necessary to see that these funds are dismantled now.

This would be a good time to dismantle trust funds when we are changing the Canada Elections Act and putting strict limits on donations. Let us get rid of these trust funds. The Prime Minister makes a good point: if we want them to be donated to universities, hospitals or other good works, let us do that. However, let us get trust funds out of the Canadian political system.

Another area is the area of third parties. This is not really addressed in the legislation. We know that third party advertising has had an enormous impact on politics and elections in other countries, particularly in the United States with all of the so-called soft money that goes into advertising there. Those of us who were around in 1988 also remember the famous free trade election and the barrage of third party advertising to support the free trade agreement with the United States.

It could be argued, because it was a very close election, that the third party advertising played a disproportionate role in the outcome and may have thwarted the democratic will of the majority of Canadians. Of course, proportional representation would have helped a lot too, because we will recall that the government of Mr. Mulroney was returned with about 42% of the popular vote while the New Democratic Party and the Liberal Party had a combined vote of about 58%. However, because of our first past the post rules, the Conservative Party had an overwhelming majority. A combination of the lack of proportional representation plus third party advertising did contribute heavily to the outcome of that election.

If the government truly wants to remove the perception that big money rules politics, then I think it is imperative to limit the amount of money that third parties can spend during elections and on politics generally. Yes, I am thinking of the National Citizens' Coalition, which the leader of the official opposition mentioned earlier, and of other organizations with deep pockets and not much accountability.

The current election act limits expenditures by third parties, but several elections back, the Alberta Court of Appeal ruled in favour of the National Citizens' Coalition. Unlike the leader of the official opposition, I am pleased that the federal government is appealing that ruling. The limits on third party advertising have effectively been ignored heretofore as a result of that court ruling.

As an aside, let me say that I think it will be more difficult for the Judge Muldoons of the world to argue in favour of no limits on third party advertising when the political parties themselves pass this piece of legislation and restrict themselves, not only to the amounts of money they can accept but from whom they can accept that money. Not being a lawyer, I obviously do not know, but that is my faint prediction when it comes to third party advertising. I am glad the government is appealing that decision.

The concern is that Bill C-24 does not deal adequately with third party expenditures. Its intent is to remove the influence of big money from politics and that will be severely undercut if third parties are free and able to spend whatever they want.

Once this legislation comes into effect, it will confine political parties to accepting only individual contributions. At the same time, if third parties can continue to raise unlimited amounts of money at election time when candidates and parties are bound by the new restrictions, then we will simply be making a travesty out of the commitment to remove big money from politics.

I will briefly talk about public funding for parties between elections and at election time. It is premised in the bill that some of that money has to be replaced. If we do not allow corporations, trade unions and other organizations to donate, then we have to deal with that. Bill C-24 does so by proposing that $1.50 per vote go to each party, based on the previous election. Some people say that is handicapping the outcome of the last election. In a horse race, weights are usually put on the favourite to slow that horse down, but as has been pointed out, about $7.8 million will go to the governing party under this proposal based on the results of the last election. Lower amounts will go to the five political parties. I think that we are prepared to accept that arrangement and, as an aside, to assure the Liberals and anyone else that in the next election the New Democratic Party will be receiving many more votes than it did in the November 2000 election.

I do note that there is no provision in this legislation to index these publicly funded amounts, so they will decrease over time. It is worth noting that contributions from individuals, corporations and unions are indexed on the $1,000 side. We believe that public funding should be looked at and considered for indexation as well.

In conclusion, the New Democratic Party does support the legislation in principle. Given the hostile comments we have heard this afternoon from the official opposition and what we have not heard from some members on the Liberal backbench, perhaps the Prime Minister is going to need all the support he can muster. However, we will be putting forward amendments because there are flaws in this piece of legislation and we look forward to the debate when we get to committee stage.