Deborah Grey

[Pensions, June 22nd, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, as the government passes the MP pension bill this afternoon may it ponder this poem called The Man in the Glass :

When you get what you want in your struggle for life And the world makes you king for a day, Just go to a mirror and look at yourself, And see what that man has to say. For it isn't your father or mother or wife, Whose judgement upon you must pass, The fellow whose verdict counts most in your life, Is the one staring back from the glass. Some people may think you a straight-shooting chum, And call you a wonderful guy; But the man in the glass says you're only a bum, If you can't look him straight in the eye. He's the fellow to please, never mind all the rest, For he's with you clear up to the end, And you've passed your most dangerous, difficult test If the man in the glass is your friend. You may fool the whole world down the pathway of life, And get pats on your back as you pass, But your final reward will be heartaches and tears, If you've cheated the man in the glass.

MP pensions: Reformers opt out, Liberals cop out. Shame.

[Petitions, June 21st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I have several petitions from Lac-la-Biche, Alberta in the constituency of Beaver River.

Pursuant to Standing Order 36, they are saying whereas the majority of Canadians are law-abiding citizens and respect the law, whereas the majority of Canadians respect the sanctity of human life, and whereas the majority of Canadians believe physicians in Canada should be working to save lives, not to end them, they are praying that Parliament ensures present provisions of the Criminal Code of Canada prohibiting assisted suicide be enforced vigorously.

They pray that Parliament make no changes in the law which would sanction or allow the aiding or abetting of suicide or active or passive euthanasia.

Also pursuant to Standing Order 36, I present a petition on behalf of constituents from Bonnyville, again in Beaver River. Whereas decriminalizing assisted suicide or legalizing euthanasia could lead to a reduction in patient-physician trust and respect, the degrading of the value of human life and the erosion of moral and ethical values, and whereas palliative care is active and compassionate care which can relieve the pain and suffering of terminally ill persons and families without the dangers of suicide, these petitioners pray that Parliament continue to reject euthanasia and physician assisted suicide.

They also request present provisions of section 241 of the Criminal Code of Canada which forbids the counselling, procuring, aiding or abetting of a person to commit suicide be enforced vigorously and that Parliament consider expanding palliative care that would be accessible to all dying persons in Canada.

[Literacy, June 21st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, this is going to every school in the country, not just to street kids and government money is being spent on it.

My party believes in literacy and keeping kids off our streets, but handing out scripts like this to every high school in the country is hardly the way to do it. Learning how to spell obscenities is not literacy and the real language the government talks about can be learned by reading washroom walls, not through government programs.

Can the Prime Minister assure the House and Canadian parents whose kids are going to be getting this stuff on their desks in September that it will not happen and this project will not go ahead?

[Literacy, June 21st, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, the federal government's literacy program has funded a booklet entitled: "Making Scenes Between the Lines", scripts written by street kids for use in our students' classrooms. In it a principal says: "F-- you. Empty your pockets", and the student responds: "F-- you, I will. You can take your attitude and shove it up your f--ing a-".

Why is the government allowing the literacy program to fund $200,000 for such a project and what in the world is this supposed to accomplish in our schools?

[Electoral Boundaries Readjustmentact, 1995, June 20th, 1995]

The answer is fairly clear, because there is a direct correlation to the amount of noise on the government side to the question.

If Bill C-69 receives royal assent by June 22, just 48 hours from now, after tomorrow we celebrate the longest day of the year, and nobody knows other than the people who sit in this Chamber how long these days are getting.

If it gets at the new redistribution process, we will begin all over again. We are going to start this dance again. Because of the government's interference in the democratic process, here we are almost two years later back to square one. Because of the time the electoral boundaries readjustment process takes, the new boundaries will not even be known until shortly before the next election.

With this process in place, we will have new ridings and new riding associations. The question of course is where is the money going to be split up between this riding and that riding? How are they going to break up the bank accounts? Who is going to run for nominations in these ridings? The answer: "Your guess is as good as mine". That is ridiculous. You cannot be prepared for an election, move ahead for an election, and nominate candidates if you do not know the boundaries until just a couple of months before the election is called.

This is the government that said it was going to restore honesty and integrity to our political institutions. Canadians are still waiting for that restoration of integrity. They are still waiting for some of those promises in the red book to be fulfilled. They are not waiting for a government that is going to start ramming through time allocation, closure, and the attitude of we know better than everybody else does. We have seen that in this House, and we are going to see it again in 1997 if this government does not get its act together, get these things on their way, and quit wasting time and money. The people who are paying the bills are disgusted with it.

[Electoral Boundaries Readjustmentact, 1995, June 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak in the debate tonight, but while we see this place going round and round, let me interject this. In the real world New Jersey has just scored and it is two to two with about three and a half minutes left in the game, so stay tuned.

We are tied up in a ridiculous wrangle about changing electoral boundaries. This has been going on for some time now. In 1993 when the former government set up the electoral boundaries commissions, as governments have done for many years, the process kicked into place. It was during the 1993 election campaign that the commissioners started their work. When they came out with the maps a year ago last spring, the present government was very displeased with them and Bill C-18 was put in place.

The question which anyone would ask is: Why was Bill C-18 initiated in the first place? We would not be here today debating Bill C-69 if Bill C-18 had not been brought forward.

The process was proceeding without government interference. The commissioners were chosen, the maps were being redrawn and people were attending the public hearings. That process was being carried out by the electoral boundaries commissions. It was fair and democratic and there was no basis for suspending it whatsoever at considerable cost to the taxpayer. This whole exercise has cost millions of dollars.

Last spring, a year and a bit ago, shortly after the independent commissions reported their findings and were preparing public hearings on the boundary changes, the present government blatantly interfered with the democratic process. Of course government members would argue tonight that they did nothing of the kind.

However, the maps were drawn by the original commissions after the 1991 census. Those people said: "Here is our best shot at it". Maybe they were not perfect. Who knows what the community of interest and all these other geographic and psychological boundaries are. However, the government said: "Wait a minute", and blatantly interfered with the process.

I am sure the government was under pressure from many new Liberal MPs who were not pleased with the new electoral maps, particularly where boundary revisions transferred blocks of voters from one riding to another. Nothing to me is sadder than a self-serving politician saying, "Wait a minute. That is my strong area that you are taking and you had better not do that". Territorialism is probably the most frightening thing that could happen in the Chamber, when someone says: "This is my ground. This is my territory," and as we say in Beaver River, "Keep your mud hooks off it". That kind of attitude is something that is becoming more and more prevalent, certainly not just with Bill C-69 but with a government, as we have seen in the last 10 days, that has said we know what is best for you and you just like it or lump it. Unfortunately, many of the members who are speaking up are going to have to lump it, and that is very unfortunate.

In the guise of opening the redistribution process for fundamental review the government scrapped the maps produced by the provincial boundary commissions and introduced Bill C-18, which suspended the whole operation.

I just did my spring tour in my riding. People asked me, where is this anyway? Is it cancelled? Is it going forward? Are the maps good? Are they no good? What is happening? I tried to explain to them that the government actually put this process on ice for exactly one year and now it is coming up with other legislation and if it does not get royal assent by the magic day of June 22, which is about 48 hours from now, then that whole process that we wasted all this time and money on, Bill C-69, gets scrapped and we go back to the original.

If anything is confusing for us, it is that process. How in the world are we supposed to tell people across the country the facts and the figures and what actually is going on? It is just absolutely ludicrous.

These commissioners last spring were told "You're on ice". You know that feeling, Mr. Speaker. "You're on ice. Hang on to it for a year and we will let you know next June 22 if your work is going to be of any use or not." It is ridiculous. Those commissioners felt disappointed, they felt disillusioned. They thought: "What about all this work? I was being paid good money for my work." It just seems as though it was all for nought.

Many of the witnesses who came in good faith and drove miles in our rural ridings thought the process was going somewhere, that they were really participating in democracy, only to be told, "Sorry, that's on ice. We'll let you know next June 22 if anything in fact is going to happen."

Following a one-day debate in the House of Commons the government imposed that "the question be now put", thereby suppressing any further debate and smothering democracy one more time. Here we are today, the democratic process again being thwarted.

Mr. Speaker, you and I sat in the last Parliament and watched government members then, the Conservatives, bringing in time allocation and sometimes they got really scandalous and just brought in actual closure, and my friend from Kingston and the Islands said that it was "scandalous" and of course "rubbish"

and finally he said "This is morally wicked for a government to do this".

What in the world is the difference between this side and three sword lengths across the aisle? It is three big steps. What ever happens to the psyche that goes from here, saying it is morally wicked, to all of a sudden on that side saying "We are government and we do have things that we need to get through for the Canadian public"?

I do not see any benefit to the Canadian public in this bill, quite frankly. What I see are self-serving politicians who say "We want it this way because I'll keep my good polls and you can give the lousy polls that don't support me very much to somebody else".

This process has gone on for a year. Last July these committees sat during the summer recess. They heard witnesses. It has just been chatted among us here and it is unanimous; you may find it surprising, but we decided that this whole exercise has been pointless. Frankly, there has been no positive outcome on it for anybody. I do not think these MPs are going to be a whole lot better off in the next election, regardless of what their boundaries are, if they keep behaving this way. It will not matter what the boundaries are, folks. It will not matter what the boundaries are one bit if people are disgusted and they say "You in your lofty positions on Parliament Hill, if you don't listen to us, you will go the same way the Conservative Party went in 1993". And no member in this House should think they will not do it. They did it in 1993 and they are prepared to do it again in 1997, with every opportunity that they see for this arrogant behaviour, keeping people here until all hours of the night, ramming legislation through 48 hours before it is actually due.

It has been a total waste of time. It has kept people flying back and forth to Ottawa. It has been an incredible waste of money. It has taken so long to do. This partisan manoeuvring and meddling are why we are here tonight to debate this bill.

The odd person is snorting across the aisle. I suppose that is fine for them. What they are forgetting is that there are real voters out there. We are not just talking about people in the Chamber and then all the rest of the people out there. People are not dumb. After the Charlottetown accord, which I have mentioned so many times in here, people are not going to put up with this kind of nonsense from politicians any longer. It is as simple as that.

Bill C-69 will go the way of the dodo bird for all those people who are running on these new boundaries that are supposed to be sacrosanct and supposed to save their seats. SOS-"save our seats"-is what this government is talking about. It is not going to happen.

This is blatant interference in what is supposed to be a democratic and non-partisan process. If ever I have seen anything that is partisan, it is certainly to say: "We know what is best for you. Father knows best. The House leader, the whip, the Prime Minister know what is best for you". It is interference. And Mr. Speaker, you know better than any of us in this Chamber that when there is interference there ought to be a penalty, for sure.

My guess as to why the electoral boundaries readjustment process was suspended is that the Liberals did not like some of the results in the last federal election. If we look at the numbers, not the theory, it is interesting what happened, especially in Ontario. While we are here in the province of Ontario tonight, we might as well have a look at some of those results. My friend from Ontario would be interested.

The Reform Party came second in 57 out of the 99 ridings. My friend from Broadview-Greenwood knows that. He has probably also added up that in 25 of those ridings the PC and Reform vote combined would have defeated the Liberal vote. That is rather interesting. That starts getting into the actual numbers of this and the hidden reason why so many people are demanding that their ridings become safe.

Across the country the combined PC and Reform vote defeated the Liberal vote in about 100 ridings. If you add that up you realize that only 130 Liberals would have been elected. That would have been a minority government.

If it comes to another vote in 1997, I could refer my friends to the corner over there, where the former government, for the first time in Canadian history, was totally obliterated. That may well happen again.

It has often been said that the Reform Party would split the vote. Of course nothing could be further from the truth, because those people are going to go for absolute, fundamental change and democratization of this system, regardless of what my friends in the governing party would say. This is democracy. It is wonderful.

Closure is okay now that the Liberals are government, making sure that their backbenchers fall into line or their nomination papers will not be signed. That is the kind of behaviour people are sick of and do not want to see any more.

The Reform Party has managed to get some improvements to the redistribution process. The selection of boundary commissioners is less partisan and subject to more public scrutiny. That is a wonderful thing. That is a good move with some of these amendments.

Under the changes that have been made, the role of MPs and the redistribution process has been greatly reduced. As far as I

am concerned, nothing is better than politicians' hands being pulled out of any of these processes. There is nothing better than politicians being yanked back from the process and not being able to take part in it quite so self-servedly.

In provinces where significant population change has occurred, the possibility of a five-year redistribution now exists rather than ten years. I know my friend from York North has an incredible population explosion. It seems wrong that he would have to wait for ten years. There is also my friend from Surrey-White Rock-South Langley. The population in the riding she represents is incredible. To be able to do that on a five-year span rather than ten years is probably really good.

Reform also pushed for a cap or a reduction in the number of seats in the House of Commons. The Liberals rejected it at every stage totally out of hand. As a result, this House will immediately increase to 301 seats and continue to increase in the future.

I ask anybody sitting in this Chamber tonight or watching on TV, if they are not watching the hockey game, does this country need more politicians?

[Canadian Wheat Board Act, June 19th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I take this time to talk about the Canadian Wheat Board and some of the changes proposed in Bill C-92.

The purpose of the bill is to amend the Canadian Wheat Board Act for several reasons. The first is to change the pooling points on which initial payments are based from Thunder Bay and Vancouver to points in Canada designated by governor in council regulation, and then to establish a deduction from the initial payment which reflects the relative transportation cost advantage for each producer; in other words, to make the new pooling system work using the old system. We cannot see how anything old and new can be mixed. It reminds me of a Bible verse about putting new wine in old skins and vice versa.

To put a new pooling system into place when we are still using the fundamentals of the old system simply will not work. The whole move was partly caused by Alberta's recent move to hold a plebiscite on dual marketing which will include asking farmers if they wish to open up the Canada-U.S. border for direct shipments to the U.S.

The bill, which is supposed to come into effect August 1, will change how eastern grain transportation costs are paid. This means eastern prairie farmers who ship through the St. Lawrence seaway will have to pay the full cost of transportation. In the past all prairie farmers shared the cost through the Canadian Wheat Board pool accounts. The changes will result in higher relative grain prices for producers in eastern Saskatchewan and Manitoba once deductions for transportation are made.

The immediate effect after August 1 will be higher initial prices of about $5 per tonne for wheat across the prairies and $6 per tonne for feed barley. It is expected the increased costs will depress eastern prairie wheat prices by about $5.80 per tonne in the first year. For the transition assistance, partial compensation will be provided from the $300 million Western Grain Transportation Act adjustment fund to offset higher costs as a result of the pooling changes and to facilitate the transition to a deregulated system after August 1. Although these changes sound good, under a new system we have to ask why we are using the fundamentals of the old system to ensure that happens.

One way to real, meaningful change to the Canadian Wheat Board is through a farmer elected board of directors to replace the present system of government appointed commissioners, basically another patronage trough and an advisory board with no real power.

We have seen it happen over the years where people get government appointments to the Canadian Wheat Board. If the whole system is to be democratized and updated we need to pay attention to the requests of farmers, which are in fact becoming demands, to democratize the whole Canadian Wheat Board system and make sure that farmers elect their board of directors. I think of every situation across the country, every board of directors, every community group or whatever. Those people are elected yet somehow the Canadian Wheat Board is still in the old system of government appointed commissioners.

Farmers should be given the authority to decide what type of wheat board they want. After all they pay the bills. It is the very same as it is here in the House of Commons. If people are demanding something from government they will make sure they vote in and elect people who will effect the changes for them.

Farmers are paying the bills through the Canadian Wheat Board just as Canadian taxpayers are paying the bill for this place. We need to make sure that if we are to open up the Canadian Wheat Board, if we are to put new systems in place, it has to basically go all the way. We must make sure that we democratize it fully and that the wheat board directors are elected by the farmers who pay the bills for them.

Farmers should be given the chance to democratically examine their organization and all jurisdictional options. This would allow grain farmers to carefully consider and vote on a variety of market opportunities, for example introducing greater domestic and international domestic competition, allowing the purchase of wheat and barley on either a cash basis or a pooled price basis and allowing the board to operate as a seller from export terminal positions only.

If we are to see any changes in the Canadian Wheat Board these things will have to be updated regardless of who is in power and regardless of their views on the Canadian Wheat Board or on the dairy commission that we have just spoken about. We are getting close to the 21st century and we cannot continue with a system where government appointees who have been faithful political hacks are transferred to some of these boards.

These and other issues must be decided directly by farmers through referenda. My party has proposed national binding referenda in the House since I have been here in 1989 and we will continue to push that.

The Charlottetown accord was a perfect example of that through a national referendum in 1992. It was a really exciting day for everyone in Canada. Politics changed forever in the country as of that October evening when we had a choice of putting down yes or no. Of course the no side won. I was the only federal parliamentarian of a federal party in the House of Commons who was on the no side. It was not really a happy occasion for me in this place but fortunately the lives of most of

us do not just take place in the Chamber. We found incredible support in the rest of the country outside these hallowed halls from people who said they did not want a government dictating to them what would happen in the country. That was really exciting and opened the way for referenda.

As we move now toward democratizing the Canadian Wheat Board we need to continue to put pressure on the government as well as on various groups if we are to open up the system regarding the pools with which the bill deals. Maybe that is a good first step, but we need to open it totally after that and make sure people who are in the positions of power in the Canadian Wheat Board, in fact the directors, will be voted in and have some measure of confidence from the farmers who put them into place.

Referenda are exciting. Because we had one in 1992 does not mean that we have to put it off nationwide for another 40 years or 50 years. It is something that could be worked quite well into the Canadian system.

Reform believes that now is the time for a fundamental evaluation of the role of the Canadian Wheat Board and the grain handling transportation system in Canada. The Canadian Wheat Board will continue to be a contentious issue until the democratic rights of farmers are restored and they are given real choice.

We see the battle around the country about pro-choice. Farmers need to be given real choice so that they could elect the people who will sit on their boards. After all it is their organization, as I mentioned earlier. They are paying the bills for it. If they are paying the bills they should be the ones who decide how it is run in the future.

Obviously the minister of agriculture has made some changes but I am wondering whether he has the political will to make all changes that are necessary to the Canadian Wheat Board. The changes will come anyway and the big question is: Will our producers be prepared for them? That is what we are concerned about more than anything else. It is not with what the government is saying, that it is putting legislation in place or it thinks this is best. Let us be sure the producers are the ones who will be freed up in this and thereby the consumers.

In the earlier discussion on the dairy commission a Liberal member said that all dairy farmers felt that way because the dairy commission said thus and so. We have to be a little nervous about that. I am not sure any particular organization speaks for every one of its members.

We have just lived through the contentious Bill C-68, the gun control bill, in the House last week in which various interest groups had a vested interest. For instance the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police not only obtained a government grant, which seems rather ironic, but it was supporting the legislation and basically saying that every policeman in the country supported gun control.

I invited you, Mr. Speaker, to Beaver River last week to talk about pensions. I invite you again to come to listen to any producer. Being from Alberta you know they say whatever the organizations are, whether the Canadian Wheat Board or the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, they do not speak on their behalf, just as I am able quite freely to say that although the National Action Committee on the Status of Women claims to represent me as a Canadian woman it simply does not.

For us to take a blanket statement that my group speaks for me and we know what every producer thinks because some group said it means that we are making huge leaps in logic. We are pleased to see some changes in the pooling system. However, as I said about the old and the new, if we are to make changes and to make something new then let us make them completely new. Let us not just tinker with the system and try to keep the old in place and put patches of new cloth on the wineskin. It simply will not work. If we are to move in the direction of freeing it up for producers and ultimately consumers, let us go whole hog and make sure the Canadian Wheat Board is changed.

Having spoken of hogs I will sit down.

[Ethics, June 16th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, they say they have generally kept them, but specifically backbenchers are being nailed one by one the minute they open their mouths.

The Prime Minister said that he sets the moral tone for the government, and he certainly has. He has ignored the federal code of ethics, sidelined the ethics counsellor and has broken red book promises, all in the name of party loyalty and political expediency.

I guess we should not be surprised. In 1983 the current Prime Minister defended Alastair Gillespie, a former energy minister who had received financial favours from the Trudeau government. Twelve years later the Prime Minister dusted off Hansard ,

spiced up the rhetoric and gave the same speeches in defence of the heritage minister about ethical behaviour.

Will the government revive its promise to restore integrity in government and demand the resignation of the minister of heritage?

[Ethics, June 16th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, let me refer again to the Prime Minister's speech.

He promised to give a meaningful voice to elected representatives in the House and end the politics of cronyism and secret back door deals. I am sure that is cold comfort to the one dozen Liberal dissidents soon to be punished, cold comfort to the police officers in B.C. who have to deal with incompetent Liberal appointments, and cold comfort to the people of Wentworth Valley who have to travel along the deadly highway 104.

What has happened to this government's promise of giving a meaningful voice to MPs, ending the politics of cronyism, and ending secret backroom deals? They made the promise and broke it. Why?

[Ethics, June 16th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, one year ago today the Prime Minister rose in this House and gave a stern speech about earning public trust and restoring political integrity. He said that both were vital to democracy and were more than just nice words.

Twelve months later this Prime Minister's speech rings hollow. We have seen a heritage minister defended, even applauded, for dishing out departmental contracts as a reward for political donations. We have seen $26 million diverted to a tourist highway in the public works minister's own riding. We have seen the revenue minister's campaign workers lining up for patronage appointments in B.C.

Canadians expected as much from Brian Mulroney. They demanded more from this government.

Why has the government turned its back on the Prime Minister's words of only one year ago, abused the public's trust, and abandoned political integrity?