Rick Borotsik

[Supply, September 21st, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, to be perfectly honest I cannot speak to the fundraising tactics of members of the Canadian reform conservative alliance party. If they want to associate or involve themselves with a certain sector of industry, that is fair ball for them. I do not have the privy or the insight as to their connections with that sector.

I do realize, however, a substantial number of their members come from Alberta. I suspect they have an awful lot of ties with the oil industry. That is to be expected. I also suspect that their fundraiser will be attended by any number of people. I expect a lot of grassroots populists will probably also be in attendance.

[Supply, September 21st, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I feel sorry for the hon. member, I really do. He is so cynical as to suspect that the removal of a 1.5 cent per litre excise tax, which was put in place initially to resolve the deficit issue, would automatically be taken up by gas companies and not passed on to consumers. That is true cynicism on behalf of that member. If we do not attempt to do that, it simply means that they are not prepared to try anything. Would it mean that the tax remains forever, that the 1.5 cents a litre has to remain forever?

The government could never get rid of it and, if it did, it would automatically go to the profits and bottom lines of oil companies. We as Canadians suspect that every tax placed on cigarettes, on liquor, on gas and on everything we do will never be changed because the government cannot do it in that the companies will take advantage of it.

The member also said that a lot of these recommendations were being implemented. That is cold comfort for the people who have not been benefactors of any of the tax reductions that should be taking place right now. Saying simply that we will look at and implement tax legislation is cold comfort for the people who will not be able to pay their heating fuel bills this coming winter.

[Supply, September 21st, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I am at a loss. I do not understand why there is such an embarrassment of that particular party with respect to its previous roots and previous name and its raison d'être for being back before the metamorphoses of whatever this new party is. However, I will get back to the debate.

I am very happy to speak to our issues and our points which were brought forward. Last Monday I was very proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Right Hon. Leader of the Conservative Party and with other members of the party to put forward to Canadians a blueprint, a road map, a strategy that would help Canadians overcome a crisis, the crisis being a terrible increase in gas prices which most Canadians cannot incorporate into their lives right now.

I will speak to those issues. First, when we brought these issues forward, the finance minister rather than saying yes, that they had the ability to help those people out, he said that they had to bring all of the provinces together before they could make any decisions. That is a political cop-out. That same finance minister came forward two days later and said we had a surplus of $12.3 billion in the fiscal year 1999-2000. For the first quarter of the fiscal year 2000-01 there is now an anticipated $13 billion surplus.

The finance minister should thank the member for Kings—Hants and the previous government for putting in the policies that allowed the finance minister to accumulate those surpluses. Those policies were free trade, the GST and an inflation rate that took interest rates to the point where we did not have to spend the majority of Canadian taxpayer dollars on the service and debt. Thankfully, the interest rates are low enough because of a policy that was put in by a previous government. I have not heard the finance minister thank us yet but I am sure it is on his agenda.

I also heard the finance minister make comparisons to liquor taxes, cigarette taxes and gasoline taxes. That is terrible. It is nonsense and it is ludicrous. Gasoline tax is not a luxury. Gasoline is the engine by which our economy is driven.

I had opportunity last night to speak to and meet with some truckers. Truckers drive our economy. Canada is a huge country with small populations over huge areas. It costs an awful lot of money to deliver goods and services across the country. Truckers are the lifeblood of our economy. Gasoline is not a luxury. It is what we depend on.

Also a misconception was raised yesterday during a telephone program in which I took part. One individual on that program said that there is and must be a risk management opportunity for truckers to put a gasoline surcharge into their contracts.

That is the misconception out there in the public. In the majority of contracts signed by the trucking industry, by independent truckers particularly, there is no ability to include a gasoline surcharge clause. If an independent trucker tried to include that in a contract, the contract would not be accepted and the trucker would not have a job.

The federal government today does not allow gasoline surcharges in its contracts. People in my constituency office have signed contracts with Canada Post, a crown corporation. Those contracts do not have a built in gas surcharge. When they sign a contract to move mail hundreds and hundreds of miles on a daily basis for Canada Post, they do so based on a contract price.

The unfortunate part is when the gas prices go up, as we have seen them go up in the past number of months, those costs are borne specifically by truckers. They are now doing the job for nothing. When they approached Canada Post to have a change in that contract they were told they had to live by the contract. There were, in fairness, some changes made and some dollars returned to the truckers but on a totally ad hoc basis with no logic associated to it at all.

The point I am trying to make is that there are no risk management tools of which truckers can take advantage. We would like to see the government show some leadership. It should stand and say that it respects the trucking industry, the agricultural industry, the mining industry, natural resources, and those people who are doing jobs for Canadians. It should try to do something to allay all the problems they are now facing with gas prices.

Some 1.5 cents per litre of gasoline is not the be-all and end-all, but it shows there is a government that cares and understands there is a problem. Truckers will not be made rich by a 2 cent diesel tax reduction, but it will make them feel that someone cares, someone is listening, and there is someone who can do something for them to show respect for what they are doing.

There is no such respect right now. All I have heard from the finance minister is that they cannot do it until the provinces come along or until the oil companies promise they will pass it on to consumers. That is a political cop-out, a pure political cop-out. We would like to see some leadership and some action taken.

Do we not think the provinces will follow suit? Do we not think the provinces will say that the federal government has finally done something to show it cares and that they will do that as well? There is political pressure within the provinces. Are there not enough smart people on that side of the House to make sure the gas companies pass that on to consumers?

Gas companies are not that stupid. They know that has to be passed on to consumers. We have said unequivocally as a party that we need action and we need action now.

We will support the motion that has been put forward simply because this is our motion. We would also like to say that there is one other very important component. That is taking the 7% GST off heating fuels, including natural gas and heating oils.

As was mentioned earlier in the discussions by the leader of this party, that would go directly to consumers. We know that. That cannot be attached in any way, shape or form by oil companies. It will specifically go to the people who need it going into this winter. It is September 21 today. It starts getting cold very soon.

Members of the governing party need some direction so that there is an opportunity to reduce those costs going into the winter months. I thank the House for the opportunity to speak to this very important and very valid issue. I wish they would also look at it as being a valid opportunity to put forward a request for the government to show leadership and to start going in the right direction.

The member for Pickering—Ajax—Uxbridge said that this was not something new. He is absolutely correct that they have been working on it. The report was tabled in 1998 and contained some excellent recommendations. This is now September 2000 and none of those recommendations have been acted on. I wish they had been. When they come forward we will look at them and we will support them as well.

[Supply, September 21st, 2000]

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, but I still would like to have clarification because I do believe that the official name is the Canadian reform conservative alliance. I will refer—

[Supply, September 21st, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, if you check Hansard , my reference was to the Canadian reform alliance. For clarification, I am under the impression that the actual name is the Canadian Conservative Reform Alliance. Is that not correct? I would like clarification on that point. Or, is it the Canadian reform conservative alliance? Could you please confirm that because I would like to have the opportunity to speak to them in their true form.

[Supply, September 21st, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I take this opportunity to congratulate the Leader of the Progressive Conservative Party on his maiden speech of this 36th parliament.

It is very intimidating for me to follow such a statesman who has just had the opportunity to address this House. I am sure that there are many in the House who will be able to learn from his experience and statesmanship, as I wish to and hope to over the next numbers of years in this particular party.

I am very happy to stand and speak to this motion from the Canadian Reform Alliance. I am especially happy to speak to this motion because it embraces basically every one of the issues that I, the leader and other members of this party had an opportunity to speak to on Monday morning at 10 a.m., substantially before—

[Financial Consumer Agency Of Canada Act, September 18th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, once again, welcome back to the chair. It is nice to have you here after the summer break. It is certainly your privilege and pleasure to be in the chair while I give my dissertation on Bill C-38.

First, I thank the hon. member for bringing to the attention of the House that it is the birthday of the late Right Hon. Mr. John Diefenbaker. It is not just useful information for members of the House, but for Canadians in general. We recognize the importance of Mr. Diefenbaker and the Conservative Party back when Mr. Diefenbaker was the leader, and certainly the history that the Conservative Party brought to this country all the way back to Confederation. I thank the hon. member for drawing that point to the attention of the House and to Canadians.

I have the pleasure of standing before the House today to speak to Bill C-38. I should also indicate that this is a responsibility that was given to me just recently.

Recently, the previous member for Kings—Hants, Mr. Scott Brison, was the one who had carriage of this particular portfolio in this piece of legislation to this point. I can mention his name in the House now as he is not a member. I would like to thank him on behalf of our party for all that he has done for us as well as for Canadians in putting forward what I consider to be the best of the critics' responses to the Minister of Finance. I would almost suggest that the Minister of Finance would agree with me on that comment. Mr. Brison is no longer a sitting member of the House because he gave his seat to an individual who is of the same stature as the Right Hon. John Diefenbaker, the Right Hon. Joe Clark who will be sworn in tomorrow. We thank him for his sacrifices and his diligent work.

It is my duty today to speak to Bill C-38 on behalf of the Progressive Conservative Party. I am sorry I was not able to speak after the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle because it was very important that there be some sort of segue from the NDP ideology and the Progressive Conservative ideology with respect to the banking industry.

I have a lot of respect for the member for Regina—Qu'Appelle, make no mistake about that. He is an individual who has been in the House for a number of years and is certainly very familiar with the issue of finance as he sat on the finance committee for some time. I look forward to working with him as well as with the other members of the finance committee and the Minister of Finance.

The member for Regina—Qu'Appelle certainly espoused his party's ideology with respect to the banking industry and this particular piece of legislation to the point that I almost thought that he would suggest that the nationalization of the banking industry would probably be better for Canadians than having it on an open market basis in the free market system that we now have. That may be a bit insensitive, but I suspect it is probably closer to the truth.

The banks are not the bogeymen in this scenario. The banking industry in Canada is very important not only to us but to our economy. I am sure Canadians recognize that the banking industry itself employs approximately 222,000 Canadians. It is a huge industry that is regulated by legislation. It comes on a regular basis every five years to get legislation changed so that it can operate within those regulations.

The banking industry also has an estimated annual payroll of some $12.6 billion. This is very important for the people who are employed in the industry as well as to governments which obviously tax the people who are employed in that industry.

The banking industry we have today has more than $1.4 trillion in assets. It has over 8,423 branches across the country. It is a huge industry. The banks are not the bogeymen. They are simply an industry trying to do business in Canada.

The banks today generate more than 49% of their earnings outside Canada. Fifty per cent of what the banks earn come from outside the borders of the country. That speaks to the globalization of the financial industry as well as the banking industry.

The really interesting point is that one out of every two working Canadians in some way, shape or form has an interest in a bank. Either directly or indirectly, he is stockholders and shareholders in the industry. Whether it is through a pension plan, through individual stock trades, through mutual funds, or through other types of financial vehicles, one out of every two Canadians has a direct or indirect connection with the stock of a bank.

The legislation which has come forward is very comprehensive. It has 900 pages and takes into consideration 22 separate statutes in the federal government. It deals with approximately 4,000 pages of those 22 statutes with amendments to those pieces of legislation.

I have with me the bill of 900 pages. I anticipate the clause by clause study of the 900 pages of Bill C-38, but in the meantime, I am very pleased to speak to the bill and will try to speak to some of the issues reflected in the bill.

The member for Regina—Qu'Appelle spoke articulately of what was good and what was bad within the bill. I could accept a lot of what he said with respect to good and bad, although I could not accept a lot of the other areas he went to with respect to ownership being raised from 10% to 20%. He was totally opposed to that and I will get into that later. We are not opposed to that at all.

He also said he would not support nor vote for this piece of legislation to go to committee. I find that very strange because there are a number of good issues dealt with in the legislation. We should be supporting it and taking it to the committee level so that we can make the necessary changes, as long as the government and the people on the committee are prepared to listen to good, constructive amendments and changes being proposed. We will get into those certainly at a much later date when we deal with them in committee.

We in the PC Party have been waiting for this piece of legislation for a long time. It is long overdue. We have been waiting for several years to have the legislation on the table. In saying that, I will also state the intention of the Progressive Conservative Party to support the legislation at second reading to get it to the committee stage so we can try to make those necessary changes.

It has taken an awfully long time for the legislation to come forward. It has been almost seven years that the government has been in power. It has been almost seven years since the government has gone through the delaying tactics of task forces, of consultations, of special reports, of any other type of delaying tactic before it could come to the table.

We have heard already that this process started back in 1996 with the MacKay task force. That report was presented to the Minister of Finance on September 14, 1998. It has been over a year since the task force reported to the finance minister and the white paper was dealt with and we are at second reading on September 18, 2000. It has been two years since the MacKay report was presented to the Minister of Finance and we finally have the bill on our desks, a fairly long delay.

In the meantime the Minister of Finance also said to the banks that they would not be allowed to merge. Even though the MacKay report spoke specifically to that issue, I guess the Minister of Finance was caught off guard when some of the banks brought forward their proposals for mergers with other banking corporations.

For over 100 years Canada has enjoyed a competitive advantage over the U.S. in terms of a much more enlightened system of banking regulations. In a previous life when I actually had a real job as opposed to simply standing in the House and speaking to you, Mr. Speaker, and enlightening you and obviously making your day much brighter because of that, I did have the opportunity of working with a corporation that needed the banking institutions that this country has. We were very competitive not only in Canada but also in the United States because we had the ability of dealing with a national bank within this country. We had the ability of generating capital that would not necessarily have been generated within the banking system of the United States.

We in Canada have been very fortunate to have the banking industry we have. For example, in 1987 the Conservative government allowed banks to acquire security firms and five years later, cross ownership was permitted across all four pillars of the financial system: banks, security firms, insurance companies and trust companies.

The opening up of Canada's securities industry in 1987 allowed banks to strengthen the sector thereby maintaining a viable domestic industry. At that point we were the strongest of the banking industries anywhere on the globe. That has changed. We now have some difficulty maintaining the global competition and we will speak to that. In fact this legislation starts to speak to that issue.

Then over the course of the 1990s Canada lost its competitive advantage as U.S. regulators moved to an unrestricted Canadian style system of national banking. As it stands now, the regulatory environment south of the border is far superior to that of Canada's.

Last fall a major new financial bill was passed in the United States which allowed for cross ownership of banks, security firms and insurance companies plus cross selling of services. This means that the bank merger process in the United States does not have to include any public hearings and little political input. In fact a recent wave of mega mergers has reshaped the U.S. banking sector.

Mr. Speaker, we of the elder generation, and I put myself in that category as well, perhaps have not kept up with the changes in the banking system, but banking has changed. Today we do not have to walk into a bank in order to access all of the services we require. We can do all of our banking at a computer terminal. We can do most of our banking by telephone. We can do most of our banking without even having to talk to a banker with respect to loan guarantees, with respect to accessing the loans that are required to maintain business and personal services. That is what we are speaking of and it is not really reflected in this legislation just yet, but we are getting there.

For Canadian banks, any interbank merger is subject to high level political open-ended scrutiny. It would be like trying to get through a minefield with no map. That speaks to the merger requirements that are necessary within the Canadian banking system. This legislation still has put in too many of those minefields to allow Canadian institutions to compete on a global basis with the competition from other countries.

The Canadian financial services sector throughout the past 10 years has undergone more change than in the previous 150 years. At the same time Canadians have advanced legitimate concerns about their banking system, ranging from access to capital for small businesses in rural communities to creating a climate for increased competition in the provision of banking services.

In September 1998 the MacKay task force report provided a comprehensive set of recommendations which successfully balanced consumer interests with the global competitiveness of our financial services sector. In his response the Minister of Finance has focused only on short term consumer interests and has ignored the long term interests of all Canadian consumers. In fact, given the timidity with which the minister has handled his response to the MacKay report, there is no reason that Bill C-38 could not have been introduced in 1994.

In framing public policy, it is very important that it reflects realities as opposed to perceptions. There are many widely held misconceptions about the Canadian banking industry. The reality is that Canadian banks are delivering good value to Canadians.

We enjoy one of the most stable and efficient banking systems in the world. Canadian banks are widely owned by Canadians. Some 7.5 million Canadians have invested in banks. These 7.5 million working Canadians are relying on their bank shares to provide for retirement savings, or for that matter, investment income.

Furthermore the financial services sector employs over half a million Canadians. Its payroll, as I mentioned earlier, is $22 billion. It represents 5% of the total GDP.

Components of this important piece of legislation include allowing single shareholders to own 20% of voting shares of the big five banks, up from the current level of 10%. These banks, however, have to keep Canadian headquarters and their boards have to be three-quarters Canadian. That is a good component of this legislation, an increase from 10% to 20% ownership.

It allows banks to set up a holding structure which could then have separately regulated subsidiaries, including retail banks, credit card companies and insurance firms. That is a wise move on the part of this legislation.

Banks with between $1 billion and $5 billion in assets would be allowed to have controlling shareholders with stakes of up to 65%. The current rule is a single shareholder can own no more than 10%. Banks that fall into this category include the Laurentian Bank, the National Bank and Canadian Western Bank. Ministerial approval would still be needed to approve any takeover, which would effectively shield these banks from hostile takeovers.

We heard earlier about some concerns with respect to the power of the ministerial rights and we agree with that. We believe that the minister has substantive powers built into this legislation. It is one of the areas we would like to see changed quite dramatically going into the committee and going into the hearings. We would like to hear from the stakeholders as to how they feel that after all the processes have been followed it will be the minister who will make the final decision. It was said earlier that it should be parliament that has the say in those decisions, not just the minister.

There will be a new federal ombudsman established to handle complaints who will be independent of the existing banks. His or her ruling would not be binding on the banks, but the ombudsman would have the authority to make the complaints public. That is very positive.

There will be a new consumer finance agency. The agency will be established to strengthen the overseeing of banks. This new agency would be an advocate for consumer issues in the financial services industry.

All consumers will have the right to basic banking accounts and standard services at a low cost. This is in response to past complaints that the poor have had difficulty in gaining bank accounts. This is a positive change and one which the PC Party wholly supports. It was also one of the changes which the hon. member for Regina—Qu'Appelle indicated was a very positive step forward in this legislation. That is why I find it very difficult that the member would not see fit to support this legislation to go forward to committee so that this one area of the legislation could continue forward and be a very important part of the new regulatory system for the banking industry.

This legislation, however, fails to put into place a less arbitrary and political process for bank mergers. We have already heard from the Liberal government experts and the people who sit on the committee, those beacons of knowledge across the floor who have uttered such phrases as “I don't imagine we are going to look at a bank merger proposal anytime soon”. I find it difficult to recognize that these people, who are the experts in the financial industry, are now suggesting that bank mergers are not a part of the future. Mergers are a part of the future, have been a part of the future and are certainly going on as we speak today internationally as well as in the United States.

In addition to putting mergers on hold indefinitely and loosening share ownership restrictions, which could result in foreign control of the Canadian banking sectors, Bill C-38 does not adequately address the competition issue. If the government was serious about increasing competition it would have adopted the MacKay recommendations that the interact network become fully accessible and fully functional. Full functionality of the interact network would effectively provide any new bank with 14,000 access locations.

According to the government the aim of the bill is to allow banks to evolve to meet competition and at the same time protect consumers. I would argue, however, that due to the government's slow reaction to the changes in the financial services sector Canada has already fallen far behind. The one thing that is clear is that after years of uncertainty from the current government it has finally added some clarification and stability to the banking industry.

The PC Party of Canada will be supporting this bill. We feel that this is the first tiny step in the right direction.

[Criminal Code, September 18th, 2000]

Madam Speaker, once again let me echo my colleague's comments from Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore. In coming back to the House after our summer recess I know that you are happy, Madam Speaker, to see all of us here. I am very happy to see you in the chair.

I am very pleased to speak on behalf the Progressive Conservative Party to Bill C-334 which has been placed before the House. The Progressive Conservative Party supports the rights of families of veterans to honour the memories of their ancestors and their accomplishments. We support Canadian pride in our country's military history, heritage and the sacrifice that has been made on behalf of all Canadians and Canadian society.

As my colleagues have said, the PC Party is not in favour of this piece of legislation. I do not believe that it is up to the House of Commons to determine for veterans who should be allowed to wear their decorations of honour. I believe that we should listen to our veterans on this very important matter. They made the sacrifices; they earned the medals; and they have the right to make those decisions.

The offices of the Royal Canadian Legion have expressed their opposition to this bill. My party supports their position. They understand the intent of families who believe they can promote Remembrance Day by wearing the medals but the veterans associations do not agree with this action.

The Dominion Command Office believes and states that medals are not symbols of remembrance. Rather they are symbols of service and commitments made by those men and women who were overseas. Medals are very personal, awarded to specific people for specific details and specific sacrifice. They are intended to be worn by the person who earned them.

The intent of the bill is clearly to honour our valiant soldiers and their services. However, if the wearing of another medal is permitted, the possibility that medals will start to lose their significance is strong. We have to be aware that those who are wearing medals earned by others for their special acts of valour could offend some living veterans who proudly wear their medals on Remembrance Day. Is that fair to our proud living veterans of today?

I agree with the member from the NDP Party for Sackville—Musquodoboit Valley—Eastern Shore. One of the most important functions on a yearly basis that I have to attend is that of Remembrance Day celebrations on November 11. I attend because I have personally suffered a loss in the great war. I lost an uncle in that war, an uncle whom I never knew. When I go to Remembrance Day celebrations it is the memory of that man which makes me stronger as a Canadian, knowing full well that I did not have to fight in my lifetime for Canada. My uncle fought. He gave the ultimate sacrifice. He lost his life on my behalf.

When I go to Remembrance Day celebrations I make sure that I take my children to those services. They must remember too. They never had to fight for the country. They have simply been given a gift by the men and women who have gone before us and who made those sacrifices. That is the remembrance we must have for the people who went before us, not to wear their medals on our chest to show people that we remember. We can remember them in many other fashions or in many other ways.

I am certain that many of the people here today have family members who served with distinction and honour. The family members of deceased veterans certainly have the right to remember the deeds and the valour of loved ones. However I suggest that there are many other ways to honour those veterans than wearing their medals.

A specific problem with the bill is that it does not stipulate who qualifies as a relative. Other than specifying that adopted relatives are also eligible to wear the medals, there are no specifications on who is allowed to wear these sacred decorations of honour. Will a veteran's third cousin by marriage be wearing the decorations of the veteran, or the veteran's eldest child?

Understandably this is a decision that each family would have to make if the bill were to pass. This vagueness brings into question what honour would go with wearing the medals. Where is the maintaining and restraining enforcement? A status of decorum must be upheld, and I do not see it in the bill.

Every November 11 we see veterans marching with their hard earned medal decorations pinned proudly to their chests. On this day of remembrance we acknowledge veterans for the sacrifices they made. If Bill C-334 were to pass, it is entirely possible that we would be acknowledging persons wearing medals they did not earn them and for achievements they did not accomplish. We could not even be certain that these people were the relatives of a veteran. I suggest to the House that this would be demeaning to the veterans who risked and perhaps even sacrificed their lives.

War decorations say something about the wearer. They say “I am proud to have served my country with distinction and with honour”. Were Bill C-334 to pass, this message would be muddled. One could not be certain that someone wearing a medal had served in the military or whether the wearer had a parent who had served, or a brother, or an aunt, or a third cousin by marriage.

As the law currently stands the wearing of war decorations is very meaningful. I fear that allowing anyone other than the person to whom the medals were awarded would depreciate the value of the medals and diminish the privilege of wearing them. We need to encourage remembrance of our war veterans. There are many ways to do it. Let us leave the wearing of war decorations as the exclusive right of those who earned them.

I maintain that we let the veterans themselves tell us what they would like to do. It is their honour and it should be up to them to decide if, when and with whom they would like to share it.

As said earlier the party I represent, the Progressive Conservative Party, certainly extends its gratification and gratitude to all veterans for services rendered to our country. It is they who should wear those medals with pride, not I or any other member of the House, unless in fact we earned them on the field of battle or in the service of our country.

I thank the member for bringing forward the legislation. However the Progressive Conservative Party will not be supporting the proposed legislation.

[Canada Transportation Act, June 14th, 2000]

Mr. Speaker, I extend my thanks to the member for Palliser who has allowed me to speak as the last speaker to this bill. We can get on with life after my few comments.

At the onset of my seven minutes or so I thank the transport committee. I do not normally sit on that committee. Nor does the member for Palliser. Nor does the member from the Canadian Alliance. Normally we sit on the agriculture committee, but we sat on the transport committee specifically because we had a bit more knowledge with respect to western grain transportation than perhaps my own colleague who was sitting on the transport committee.

I thank the chairman of the transport committee who is in the House today. I thought he did a very commendable job. He was fair. He was honest. He was open in the process. I also thank members of the government who sat on that committee. They were very attentive. They listened to the petitioners and the witnesses that came forward with very logical presentations and points of view.

From that point on it sort of went downhill, but let us talk about the process itself. I must spend a couple of seconds dealing with that. The process is certainly a prime example of the manipulative process the government has put into place with respect to this piece of legislation.

As was mentioned earlier, this was not something that snuck up on us. This was not an issue that jumped out of the hall closet. We had to fix this problem. Rail transportation in western Canada has been an issue for years and decades. As a matter of fact, for three years now the particular issue has been studied by what I consider to be two of the best known experts in the industry, a gentleman by the name of Justice Willard Estey and another gentleman by the name of Arthur Kroeger.

These individuals put forward a process that was very gruelling and grinding. They came forward with what they thought were the necessary changes to the system. A systemic change was necessary. Mr. Kroeger came forward in September 1999 with his report based on the Estey report. Mr. Kroeger said that in order to make it work we would have to change the system. It had to become a commercialized system. On May 10 the three ministers came together at a press conference and told us what they would put together with this piece of legislation.

What happened between September 1999 and May 10, 2000, is kind of a black hole. I suspect the Canadian Wheat Board had a lot of ongoing negotiations with the minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board to try to fix the problem to the best of its advantage, not to the advantage of producers, not to the advantage of what Mr. Kroeger and Mr. Estey saw was a commercial system.

Between May 10 and when we received this piece of legislation is again kind of a black hole, a bit of a vacuum. All of a sudden there is an urgency and a necessary 11th hour demand that the legislation had to be passed before the House rose for its summer recess. We had to have it in place by August 1, the crop year.

I do not disagree that we need to have the legislation in place so that it can take effect for the next crop year. What I disagree with is the process the government followed to get it there. There was an 11th hour requirement. All stakeholders were asked to come together for two grinding and demanding days of committee hearings so they could tell us what was right and what was wrong.

The Minister of Transport is either delusional or is totally under a misconception. He stood before us and said that they must have got it right, that everybody liked the legislation. I sat through those two grinding days of hearings. Not one person, not even the Canadian Wheat Board, said that what was being proposed was the right legislation for the system. Out of the 30 witnesses that appeared nobody came forward and said “Hallelujah, you got right”. In fact I heard quite the opposite.

Organizations like the Hudson Bay Route Association said to scrap it, that it was not good. I heard other producer organizations come forward and say that what had been done would exacerbate the problem of rail transportation in western Canada. A rail coalition came forward and said nothing in the legislation indicated who would be accountable for transportation. We would still have the finger pointing of the past and the system would still break down. Not one organization or producer group said that it was the right thing to do.

Let us talk about what is not right. What is not right is the fact that this is not a commercial system. The legislation allows 25% of the business now performed by the Canadian Wheat Board to be tendered. That is wonderful. It also says, and I have also heard it, that the Canadian Wheat Board will control not only the tendered portion but the untendered portion. It will rebalance that tendered and untendered portion to the two railways. That is not a commercial system. It is a manipulated system between the Canadian Wheat Board and the railroads.

There is a monitoring process that is very positive. The monitor is a third party that will be chosen by the government. The monitor will report to three ministers. It will not report to parliament, except for once a year which was a minor amendment that was put through. Unfortunately it will not be open and transparent like the government said it would be.

What happened when we got to the amendments at committee level turned my faith off with respect to the particular process. We listened to some very good people make some very good presentations. The government then decided to take some members from the committee who I believe were very understanding, knowledgeable and supportive of some of the changes. It replaced them with individuals who had never listened to the presentations and never understood what was going on.

Believe it or not, we had the wonderful opportunity of having the whip of the government party sitting in during the voting on those amendments. I have a lot of respect for the whip, but why was it necessary for him to come in at the 12th hour to make sure government members would toe the party line? Was it necessary?

We will support this legislation not because the government got it right but because there is a carrot being dangled to my producers who desperately need some financial recompense. One hundred and seventy-eight million dollars may—and I stress may—go back to them from the revenue cap on the railroads. That is not a given in itself. We do need that $178 million to go back to producers, plus much more. If we had a truly commercial system, I believe that $178 million could have been $350 million.

I will reluctantly support this legislation, but the government did not get it right. We will be back in the House within three years to deal with other issues. We will be back in six months.

[Canada Transportation Act, June 14th, 2000]

Madam Speaker, I will speak very briefly to the proposed amendments. I must stand after those last comments made by the parliamentary secretary.

The amendments were put forward by witnesses and by organizations that appeared before the committee. They were amendments that were, in most cases, approved and suggested by those organizations in order to make the legislation better than what it is.

I will speak specifically to the amendment that was put forward by myself as well as the member from the Canadian Alliance Party, that being the definition of shipper. That speaks to the essence of the bill which was to have a true commercial system. Unfortunately, the Canadian Wheat Board once again got its wish and its way in order to manipulate the process to the point where this will not be a true commercial system.

As for the memorandum of understanding, we wanted to have that open and transparent, as the government has always indicated that it should be. The fact is that now the memorandum of understanding need not come before parliament and need not come before members of the committee. It need only be dealt with by the Canadian Wheat Board and the minister, as well as the monitor. It goes specifically to the minister as opposed to parliament. I believe that speaks specifically to not having it open and transparent and having a system in place that is not only the same as we had before but in fact worse than what we had. I will speak to that on third reading.

The amendments are solid, good amendments. Unfortunately, they are not going to be passed because the government does not want to see better legislation.