Jim Silye

[Crtc, April 24th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, with the cabinet's unprecedented use of special powers to overturn a CRTC decision, which contradicts the red book promise of open government, the federal government is now becoming more powerful and more secretive.

For instance, the regulatory efficiency act will give the cabinet power to exempt companies from regulations through special private compliance plans. The potential for abuse is staggering. Canadians should be driving the country's agenda, not cabinet and special interest groups. The system must be transparent.

Will the government scrap the regulatory efficiency act immediately and keep power in the hands of Parliament where it belongs?

[Crtc, April 24th, 1995]

I guess, Mr. Speaker, I get to see arrogance in its visual form.

The Reform Party favours open competition and a firm policy that safeguards the best interest of the country and Canadians. However, if questions are being raised about the propriety of the deal the government has no one to blame but itself. Power Corp. said jump, and the cabinet and the Prime Minister asked how high by using special powers to overturn the CRTC original decision. This was all being done behind closed doors. Certainly consumers may benefit in the end but the end does not justify the means.

My supplementary question is for the minister. Will he assure the House that any further decisions on the direct to home satellite industry will be taken in full public view and not behind closed doors at special cabinet meetings?

[Crtc, April 24th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, tomorrow the federal cabinet will do something it has never done before. It will issue a cabinet directive overturning a CRTC decision on direct to home satellite television at the specific request of Power Corp.

In fact Power Corp. went so far as to say that it would withdraw its bid if the cabinet did not rule in its favour. It is amazing what one can accomplish when one has friends or fathers-in-law in high places.

My question is for the Prime Minister. If the government felt so strongly about opening satellite television to competition, why was it not done through the appropriate channels and why is Power Corp. running the show?

[Government Appointments, April 3rd, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, it is amazing how things change. A year ago the former cabinet minister was undermining national cultural institutions.

Given that the general public is fed up with making millionaires of defeated politicians and then watching them being appointed to federal boards and agencies, and given the government's hypocritical stance on patronage appointments to date, will the Prime Minister undertake to restore integrity, as he promised in the red book, to the appointment process by removing his exclusive franchise on the selection process and creating a non-partisan board to make these appointments, of course with his final approval?

[Government Appointments, April 3rd, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.

Page 88 of the Liberal red book states the Conservative regime has deliberately undermined our national cultural institutions. Given this fact, how can he justify putting a former Conservative cabinet minister behind the wheel of the CBC, unless it is to score cheap political points for patronage?

[Patronage Appointments, March 31st, 1995]

He should have been elected.

[Patronage Appointments, March 31st, 1995]

Patronage is an appointment or a promotion given by a patron to a former patron. Politicians are all part of the same old club. It is plums and rewards like this that Reformers want to put an end to.

I have a supplementary question. With Kim Campbell going off to Moscow when can we expect to hear or when can we get confirmation that Mr. Brian Mulroney will be singing "When Irish Eyes are Smiling" from the Emerald Isle?

[Patronage Appointments, March 31st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, patronage is patronage.

[Patronage Appointments, March 31st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, Reformers knew it was only a matter of time before the Prime Minister got back into patronage as usual.

Unlike his colleague, Jean-Robert Gauthier, Mr. Berger will not be given a seat in the Senate but will be made ambassador to Israel. Perrin Beatty, who stands to receive $5 million from the MP pension plan, has been today appointed to the presidency of the CBC. I am sure he will give up his pension as a condition of that.

My question is for the Acting Prime Minister. Between junkets abroad and patronage appointments, why does the Prime Minister insist on doing business the same way Mulroney did, especially since the Liberals raised such a big stink on these matters when they were on this side of the House?

[Borrowing Authority Act, 1995-96, March 28th, 1995]

Agreed.