Deborah Grey

[Taxation, February 19th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, hello Edmonton North. I look forward to campaigning on Reform's platform of more jobs through smaller government and lower taxes and against the Liberals' tax gouging, job killing record.

The Minister of Finance says that he has not raised taxes. Oh, really?

What about the tax increase on life insurance premiums, gasoline, air transportation, private corporation dividends and securities?

What about the elimination of the lifetime capital gains exemption, the income test for age credit, and the lowering of the withdrawal age for RRSPs?

What about the 70 per cent increase in CPP premiums that will deliver $9,000 a year to Edmonton pensioners while the MP pension plan yields five to six times that amount?

Call it what you like but it is still a tax, T-A-X. By increasing overall taxes for Edmontonians 30 per cent and personal taxes40 per cent, the Liberals have picked an extra billion dollars out of our pockets.

Let us set things right. Hello, Edmonton North.

[Canada Pension Plan, February 18th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the Prime Minister this question. To be consistent, to be fair to all Canadians in this Chamber and outside, will the Prime Minister today announce an immediate 70 per cent increase in the premium for the potlicker MP pension plan?

[Canada Pension Plan, February 18th, 1997]

A pension porker I am not. I opt out; Sheila copped out.

[Canada Pension Plan, February 18th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, it may be that I am a porker but I opted out of that pension plan and the taxpayer does not owe me one single penny for that.

[Canada Pension Plan, February 18th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, the parliamentary secretary said that the CPP premiums are not a tax but a contribution to a public pension plan. Let us just look for a moment or two at a private pension plan, the MP pension plan, the most obscene in the country.

Canadians are now paying twice as much of their salary for a paltry $9,000 a year in CPP. Thanks to the government, parliamentary porkers like the member for Sherbrooke and the Deputy Prime Minister are going to pocket five to six times that amount. That is scandalous.

How can the Prime Minister justify asking Canadians to pay 70 per cent more of their meagre pensions when he and his Liberal colleagues are just going to lap up the lavish MP pension plan?

[Supply, February 17th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I think I made it fairly clear in my speech that I have a problem with the way the government went about it, first, in terms of the cost of the flag program, for which we do not have the money, and second, in terms of the fact the Liberals think this is their only national unity scheme.

The member said that he has respect for the flag and I appreciate that. He said he has a great love for his flag, the fleur de lis, the Quebec flag. I also have the same love for my provincial flag of Alberta. Over arching that is my citizenship as a Canadian. I celebrate the Canadian flag first and foremost and after that come the family of provinces and there I celebrate the Alberta flag.

He said that there was no great ceremony for flag day. Could it have something to do with the way flag day went last year? Members will remember what happened last year. The remembrance I have of flag day was not so much the celebration of the flag but watching my Prime Minister take a guy out because he got in his way at the flag day ceremonies. What a disgrace, what an embarrassment for a national leader.

He did not follow the RCMP who celebrate the flag and who were looking after the Prime Minister that day. He just bulldozed out into the crowd to be the great hero. Some protester got in his way and the Prime Minister said: "So I had to take him out". He just turned him around and threw him to the ground. Is this what we are to celebrate under our flag? Is this what other countries see when they look at our flag? Is this the way Canadians behave? I do not think so.

I appreciate what the member said about the flag. I was not sure I heard that earlier from his colleague from Rimouski-Témiscouata when she said it hard to love a country that is not lovable. That is shameful. It is absolutely shameful that someone would holler that out in the shouting match between two Quebecers. She said: "If you want us to stay, come and get us". For generations the rest of Canada has been coming to get Quebecers.

Quebec is in this family. There are days when we are not happy to be part of a particular family. I know that. There were four teenage sisters growing up in my family and lots of days I am sure we all wished we had another family, as is only normal. But love is not conditional. This is the family. These people are part of this family and family life is not conditional.

The flag is ours. And whether some days or some years the people in this separatist camp think they want to run away from home, they are part of the family. I think it is shameful to say: "It is hard to love a country that is not lovable" and "If you want us to stay, come and get us". You are here. We love you. Please stay.

[Supply, February 17th, 1997]

That explains a lot of things also. Nonetheless, that flag debate was one of the most acrimonious debates in this House.

We went to the Canadian flag in 1965 and this maple leaf is one of the proudest symbols worldwide. I am glad to be a member of a Canadian society where my flag is held to be so special to us in this country and internationally as well. That is so important.

It bothers me and upsets me that a group of people in the House of Commons wants to leave this country. They are out and out separatists. They try to dress it up with all kinds of fancy names but they want to pull out of this country. And they are calling our flag propaganda. We have heard it several times today. It is unfortunate that the context of that could not be ruled unparliamentary because I certainly think it is unparliamentary. It is shameful that there would be people in this place who call our flag propaganda.

Unfortunately the Minister of Canadian Heritage has tried to offer this free flag program. It is a symbolic thing which, if times were great, would be appreciated. If we had a great surplus of extra cash lying around, it would be a great project. But we are $600 billion in debt. The government is spending $70 million a day more than it is bringing in. It has cut health care. It has cut transfers to the provinces incredibly, $7 billion with the Canada health and social transfer.

However this minister wields so much power that she can go into cabinet and demand $20 million, $50 million, $100 million for these special projects. That is probably the nub of the issue right now. It is not whether or not we celebrate our flag, or whether or not we should have a flag program. She said at the beginning that this would come from donations from people across the country and that it might cost $6 million. Guess what? It has come from donations but it has come directly out of the pockets of Canadian taxpayers and they did not have any say in how that cash was going to be spent. It was another one of those voluntary-involuntary programs that we as Canadian taxpayers get stuck with over and over again.

The idea was a good one: to generate patriotism and drive Canadian unity. That is a noble aspiration and a good thing to do, but again the cost was exorbitant and the minister had no idea where the cash was coming from. She was able to get her elbows sharpened up and make some way at the cabinet table. She scared the Minister of Finance off so that he bought this thing: peace at any price; the Minister of Canadian Heritage will get some cash to keep her quiet. It is unfortunate when so many other priorities have had to be put aside, yet the minister has been able to get her way.

There is another thing that bothers me about this. It is not just the cost of it but this seems to me to be the government's idea of a national unity program. Is that all there is? Free flags to say that this is going to solve our national unity problem?

We do have a crisis in the country, which is that members of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition are separatists. They do not like this place and they do not like Her Majesty. They have made that very clear. Is this the government's response in total? Is that all there is, my friend? Here is a free flag. This is our new national unity program. What a tragedy and only a year and a little bit after a referendum that saw us come so close to falling over the edge. The Prime Minister says: "We won that referendum".

It is like the Stanley Cup. We won. I have news for him and his seatmate the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Canadian Heritage, and news for everyone on the government side and for everyone who is watching today. Unfortunately, that referendum was not the end of the Stanley Cup. This thing is going into overtime because Lucien Bouchard is at the helm in Quebec. Members know only too well that he was my seatmate for three and

a half years in the back row. Although I disagree vehemently with his politics, and I am a Canadian through and through, I learned to understand what a masterful strategist he is. I also know that if he gets his way and has another referendum in Quebec, he does not have any intention of losing.

Surely there must be something better that this government can offer those of us who are federalists and passionate Canadians. Surely there has to be more to offer than just a Canadian flag.

The minister criticized me one time in question period saying that people in Beaver River ordered flags, as if this was some terrible thing or some wonderful thing that she had discovered. The people in the Beav are proud and passionate Canadians as well and many of them did order a flag. They are not ashamed to fly the Canadian flag. When these things were being offered to them, many of them did write in and ask for a flag. And what happened? They each got three, four or five flags in an envelope. What in the world is going on in that office where they cannot even count to one? There is something sad about it.

There has to be something better than national unity just by a free flag. It has got to be deeper than that.

Our 20-20 plan addresses this so well. We have said that we understand that there are very real concerns of the people in Quebec. What we need to do is give back to the provinces what was originally in their jurisdiction.

We see so much overlap. There is so much incredible lust for power from the federal government. It has all that power to organize and administer everything and it simply cannot relinquish it. There still must be federal powers: defence, foreign affairs, monetary policy, regulating financial institutions, the Criminal Code, facilitating national standards, equalization, international trade, domestic trade. Those are things the federal government should do well and does do well.

We are always told that we are going to have to decentralize and there will be no federal powers left, but that is not true. The provinces still must have the jurisdiction they were originally designed to have. I think many Quebecers would be happy with that.

On the flip side of that are 20 reasons why you might want to stay in Canada, 20 realities about the cost of seceding-or the cost of separating, let us call it what it is-and those are not pleasant to think about. I think you should think twice before you decide to go away.

When anyone sits close to me here and is a separatist and says that my flag is propaganda, it really bothers me. I want to take them on and challenge them by saying: When you criticize my flag or Canada Day, you criticize me because I was born on July 1 in 1952 and nobody is going to mess with my flag or Canada Day, or Dominion Day as I still like to call it.

[Supply, February 17th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, let me begin my remarks by saying that those statements are absolute fiction.

We have said that we need to restore the fiscal situation in this country. Any of the cuts which were suggested in the taxpayers budget have been far superseded by Liberal cuts. The cuts which

have been made by the Liberals have been deep. They have been painful for people right across the country.

When we look at health care especially just to sum up the member's statements, this government has cut more in the area of health care than any Reformer would ever think of doing. Every hospital closure in the country ought to have a sign over its door which reads: The closure of this hospital has been brought to you by the Liberal Government of Canada.

Probably some of the acrimony which we have seen is what gave rise to this debate today. I cannot agree with Bloc members on how they feel about our flag, but I can understand their sense of disappointment with the status quo, the way the country has gone. In fact, that is why I am here too, because I cannot go along with the status quo.

On the one side we have a government which says status quo; Liberal or Tory, it really does not matter. That certainly was proved today by Guy St-Julien, the former member for Abitibi, an old Tory who used to scream from that side of the House across to this side. He is now going to run as a federal Liberal. What is the difference between a federal Liberal and a Tory? I do not think there is a difference. They are just flip sides of the same loonie.

Beyond that the other choice is out and out separation, which is what the Bloc Quebecois offers. Even though it has been proved wrong twice in province-wide referenda, it is still here squawking about it.

This debate today is in fact round two of the flag debate. I was a teenager when this debate was in the House in the sixties. It was a pretty painful process to watch. It took about six months because the government of the day did not bring in closure quite so much as it does now.

[Canadian Census, February 6th, 1997]

I know the time has expired. I am asking you to put the question now on the amendment.

[Canadian Census, February 6th, 1997]

Yes, Mr. Speaker. As you know Motion No. M-277 is my motion. I spoke earlier in the debate on November 26, 1996 when my colleague from the Bloc, the member for Bellechasse, brought forward the amendment.

If we could look at a snapshot of what is wrong with this country, it is somebody from a group who is going to add to the list rather than make the list smaller. That probably sums up so clearly the main reason I brought this motion forward in the first place. We need to be recognized as Canadians and Canadians period. Yet here is somebody in the Chamber who wants to make the list longer rather than shorter.

I know it has been quoted here several times today by my colleagues who have spoken on this but let me in disbelief read one more time what the actual amendment states:

That the motion be amended by replacing all the words after the word "should" with the following:

"include "Canadian", "Quebecker", "English-Canadian", "French-Canadian" and "Acadian" among the questions of ethnic origin on the Canadian Census."

This is not derogatory toward any of these groups. Every one of these groups is to be celebrated. In Beaver River I have an enormous francophone population and we celebrate that. It truly is a multicultural microcosm of this country. Not only do we have a huge francophone population, the second largest in Alberta, but we have an enormous Lebanese community up in the Lac La Biche area. There were fur traders there in the twenties. We have a large German population, a large Ukrainian population and on and on it goes.

There is one common denominator of those people in Beaver River. They would jump to their feet in a moment if they could be here today, if we could transport them, to say: "I am a Canadian, you bet". It is as simple as that. They would say: "I am a Canadian period". And they would leave off all this nonsense after all these commas.

I had a number of calls in my constituency office and here in Ottawa from people who were among the unlucky one out of five to fill out the long census form. It upset me more than anything that I got a short one. I was just waiting. When my husband phoned me from home to tell me we got our census form, I asked him to rip it open to find out if it was the short one or the long one. Mr. Speaker, you know Lew and you know he was just as anxious as I was to get the long form and he was pretty upset. I think he was ready to drive around the countryside to find a neighbour he could swap with, but it did not happen and we had to fill out the short one.

It is for this very reason that Lew, who just happens to be my husband and I think the greatest guy in the world, as a regular Canadian said: "Let me get my hands on this so I can tell this government exactly what I think about this kind of list making and categorization of people as if we were just a bunch of so many pigeons".

It is wrong. Mr. Speaker, you know it is wrong and I think many people in this Chamber feel it is wrong. I know how important it is for the people my colleagues have alluded to this afternoon to say wait a minute here, there is something wrong because there is an underlying motive, which is wrong, for asking these questions. That of course is: "We will attempt some social engineering. We know what is best for you".

The census people from Stats Canada did not dream up these questions. They were told, they were ordered, they were commanded by the people who are obsessed with employment equity and government grant giving because they think that will help unify the country. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am so sad that some colleagues across the way did not even stand up on behalf of this motion today.

When are we going to stand up in this Chamber and say: "I am a Canadian and I am proud to be a Canadian"? When am I going to be able to count on folks on the other side of the House who may disagree with me politically on all kinds of things, which I respect, but for goodness sake, it took us a year and a half to sing "O Canada" in this place after I tabled a motion on that. Is it too radical to sing our national anthem in the national Parliament? Is it going to be too much to ask people to say: "Let us say we are Canadians on the census"? I could understand it from the Bloc Quebecois. But for the life of me I cannot understand it from people on the other side of the House who are proud and passionate Canadians. We should be able to say "I am a Canadian" on question 19. By jingles, the next time that census comes around, I will put Canadian no matter what, because that it what should make us proud.

Let me just close by asking the Speaker to put the question now on the amendment by the Bloc Quebecois.