John Bryden

[Supply, April 24th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by reminding those who are watching the debate of the actual wording of the motion because I think it is important.

The Bloc Quebecois motion says:

That the government put in place an open and ongoing process to keep Parliament informed of negotiations to establish a Free Trade Area of the Americas so as to allow parliamentarians to debate it and civil society to be consulted before Parliament approves it.

This is another example of why the Bloc Quebecois continues to demonstrate that it is probably the best opposition party in the House. I say this in the context of the problems today that have been experienced by the Canadian Alliance with the division within the party. More than that, this is the first time in a very long time that the House has had an opposition motion before it, which I think is a motion of considerable weight and quality and certainly merits the debate it is getting today.

If this were a motion put forward by a private member from the opposition, where we on this side regard all private members' motions and private members' bills as issues of free votes, I do not think there is any question at all that this motion by the Bloc would be supported. The negotiations that went on this last weekend in Quebec and which will continue pertaining to creating a sort of common market of the Americas is an issue of tremendous importance to Canadians and I think is an issue of tremendous importance to the House.

When the Bloc comes forward or anyone in the House comes forward with a motion suggesting that parliament should take these negotiations seriously and should stay abreast of these negotiations as best it can is quite appropriate indeed.

I can tell everyone that I have some sympathy with the protesters that appeared at the summit at Quebec on the past weekend. Of course I am not interested in those people who merely threw rocks and demonstrated for the television cameras. I do not have any respect for any person who considers speech something that requires him or her to wear a mask. When we speak either in the House or in public or even on the streets then we should speak as who we are and be seen. However, the majority of the protesters were seen and they were peaceful protesters. They had an important statement to make because whatever is happening and whatever is the ultimate outcome of these negotiations, there are legitimate concerns about sovereignty.

I am not one who puts a lot of credence in the kind of rhetoric that we hear from the Council of Canadians and its leader, but I really believe that when we establish transnational trade agreements and create dependencies among countries there are genuine issues of sovereignty. When we create dependencies, we create situations where we cannot take it back or we have situations where we have lost a certain amount of control as parliamentarians, as governments over our country's destiny because we have transnational agreements in place.

The Bloc during question period raised a number of questions with respect to the so-called chapter 11 in the North American Free Trade Agreement whereby corporations have an opportunity to litigate across the border. That is if a corporation in Mexico feels that a corporation in Canada that is competing unfairly for the same market within the United States, Canada or Mexico, if it feels that it has some unfair advantage in the terminology of the trade agreement, then it can take that corporation to court and possibly win.

There is a genuine problem of sovereignty there. What that really means is that a business enterprise operating in Canada is subject to rules and challenges that exist outside this country. It is very right to be concerned about that.

On the other hand, Mr. Speaker, I believe that the chapter 11 is necessary. However we should debate it, and it is healthy to debate it, because it works. I believe it works in the context that we have it now with the United States and Mexico.

Will it work as well if it is applied in the context of Brazil, Argentina and other countries of Latin America? Will it work when it is applied to 30 countries? I am not so certain. I need to see that debate. When the Bloc Quebecois comes forth with a proposal that says the House should debate that kind of issue, I can only actually support in spirit what the motion is proposing.

I have other concerns with respect to this whole process of a free trade zone of the Americas that again gives me some sympathy for some of the peaceful protesters who were in Quebec. I ask myself questions occasionally, Mr. Speaker, about what does it really mean? What is the real motive behind creating this enormous free trade zone of the western hemisphere when in fact most of the economic activity is occurring in North America? I suppose we could add Brazil and I think we would get probably three-quarters of the economic activity of the western hemisphere. So I ask myself then what is the incentive? Why are we bringing in all those other countries of the western hemisphere?

So far I have not had a really good explanation from watching television because I do not of course have any special access to the negotiations that are going on in Quebec, and nor should I because as the previous government speaker mentioned of course negotiations have to be undertaken behind closed doors. However there does come a point in which we as parliamentarians have to know the content of these negotiations and that is where I find a lot of favour in the motion before the House.

The question is where is it really taking us? Why do we want to make this common market of the Americas? More and more I am coming to the conclusion or coming to the feeling that it is all about creating a sort of firewall, creating an uneconomic entity in the western hemisphere to insulate Canada, the United States, Mexico and the other countries, but probably principally the United States because I think a lot of this is coming from the United States, to insulate the North American economies from what could happen in the Far East or in Europe. The world marketplace is changing dramatically and what has happened is we created huge economic dependencies in the Far East.

Again I come back to the point that this is where there are legitimate questions to be asked about globalization because it creates these enormous dependencies. What will happen, if when we create these expectations and we create these countries that rely on one another for trade, when the resources run out? What happens when an economic giant comes on the scene, like China?

I do not think there has been enough thought and debate in this House about what it is going to mean when the Chinese actually take their place in the world economy. It is an accident of history that the Chinese should be for 50 years under a communist regime, under a controlled economy regime because for thousands of years the Chinese have been the ultimate entrepreneurs. Chinese is the language of commerce in the Far East.

I think we are going to see dramatic economic changes in the Far East which could have an enormous impact on the western hemisphere. So I wonder sometimes whether this whole idea of a free trade zone of the Americas is really about creating some sort of insulation for Canada, the United States, Mexico and the countries of the western hemisphere.

And finally, I would say that with respect to keeping parliament informed, as this motion proposes, the reality is that we in this House cannot have an emergency debate or a debate like this every day or every week, even on an important subject like this.

I would suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, that we make sure that the Senate is paying attention to this motion, because I believe that the senators do, and they have the opportunity in terms of time and expertise to pay attention to this kind of issue and perhaps be the part of parliament that is kept informed as these negotiations are ongoing.

[Canada Elections Act, April 5th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, this is one of these occasions when I am a little puzzled by what happens in this place because if I were an opposition member of parliament I would be firmly opposed to this particular amendment.

Rather than serve the opportunities of parliament in general in making sure that the government does not dominate, what this does is it gives back to the government enormous power over whether or not an official vote using electronic means will take place.

Originally in Bill C-2, there was a clause, the clause that is under debate right now, which basically said that the chief electoral officer can experiment with electronic voting, but if he wants to actually undertake an official vote with electronic technology he has to get the prior approval of the appropriate committee of the House of Commons. That committee, incidentally, we would assume to be the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs.

What the amendment in Bill C-9 does is it takes away this exclusive power of the committee of the House of Commons to decide whether an official vote will be taken with electronic means and adds in a committee from the Senate. So now under Bill C-9 there would be two committee approvals required. The motion before the House would again revert us back to Bill C-2 by taking away the approval of the committee of the Senate.

I point out that what we are talking about here is an official vote. That is what the clause says, an official vote. That means somebody is going to be elected or not elected.

The way the original clause read, by giving the decision on whether electronic voting should be used or not in an official vote, it was giving it exclusively to the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, a committee that is dominated, always dominated, by the government. Basically, the original clause guaranteed that if approval was sought government approval would be given, either side. Or if the government disagreed with the possibility of using electronic voting, let us say it is a byelection, the government, using its majority on the procedure and house affairs committee, could stop it from happening.

This is where I get really puzzled. Basically, what the amendment does is it takes away some of that government power. It dilutes it by requiring approval to come from the appropriate Senate committee as well. That is not such a bad thing because the Senate is indeed not an elected body and it is not under the same direct pressure that MPs are from their own governments. I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, on a standing committee it is very difficult for members on any side to buck the basic policy of their party, and you would not expect it to happen on the procedure and house affairs committee in this particular instance.

However, for a Senate committee, even if every member is appointed by the government, it would not matter because the senators are still unelected and when it comes down to a matter of having to use their conscience, their discretion on something that is extremely important, we are talking about someone being elected officially to the House by a certain means, so, Mr. Speaker, it seems to me, on the opposite side, on the opposition side, every MP should be opposed to the amendment.

I note that the Canadian Alliance speaker that spoke just before me made a mistake because he suggested that all opposition MPs were in favour of this particular amendment that is proposed by the Bloc Quebecois, but in fact I did note that the speech from the Conservative member was opposed.

I would suggest that the opposition members reconsider because, while as a government MP I am happy to give my government lots of power and lots of things, I can tell you I am very nervous about giving my government, which could be the government of another party in the future, any kind of exclusive control over deciding whether or not an official vote should be taken by one means or another.

I point out, and I emphasize this to all members, that we are talking about approvals that come in committee. We are not talking about something that is debated in this entire House. We are not talking about a vote in the House or a vote in the Senate. We are merely talking about approvals in committee and I suggest to you, Mr. Speaker, the way the clause was written in the original bill, Bill C-2, was seriously flawed because basically it gave the power of approval to a committee of the House which is dominated by the government, which would have meant it would have been a rubber stamp approval anyway, and the amendment which the government itself is introducing goes a long way toward diluting this power and making sure that, as best we can, there is another calculation, another evaluation of the issue by the members in the other place, who I think we could trust in a situation like something as important as a vote that would bring a new member to the House of Commons, that we could count on the senators no matter what their original party affiliations to act in their very best judgment.

[Foot And Mouth Disease, April 3rd, 2001]

Madam Speaker, they call it the isle of tears. It is also called the island of death. It is an island in the St. Lawrence, 50 kilometres downstream from Quebec City, called Grosse Île. This island was Canada's quarantine station from 1832 to 1937. It is where all the immigrants coming to Canada had to spend a quarantine period before they went on to Canada proper.

I mention this because I believe this debate on foot and mouth disease, and the problem and indeed crisis we are facing now, actually signals a larger issue, an issue that is going to perplex the next generation of Canadians. Indeed I think what we are facing with foot and mouth disease today is a symptom of a hazard that is the result of this global village that is occurring.

Let me first, Madam Speaker, just give you a little bit of history of Grosse Île. Grosse Île was set up in 1832 as a result of a cholera epidemic that broke out in India in 1826 and spread across the Middle East, arriving in Moscow in 1831. By 1832 it had reached Great Britain.

In those days people did not know much about disease. They only saw the impact of disease. It was called Asiatic cholera and people died in the thousands. The Canadian authorities faced with the great ships and sailing vessels that were coming over with the great waves of immigration were faced with the dilemma of immigrants coming into Canada who may or may not have been carrying diseases that may infect the rest of the population. What they did was erect at Grosse Île facilities for holding immigrants for several weeks and for sterilizing their clothing.

Madam Speaker, you can visit Grosse Île today. It is now being turned into a national park. You can see at Grosse Île the installations where the immigrants came. They were in a large building. They were forced to strip, take all their clothes off. Through one door they walked through a series of hot showers to wash them clean. Through another door their luggage was carried into a primitive autoclave in which their clothing was sterilized with hot steam.

Despite that many people sickened and died at Grosse Île. They estimate about 20,000 Irish alone died as they tried to enter Canada in the years between 1832 and 1937.

The worst time was in the 1840s when this time it was typhus. Typhus is carried by lice. They did not realize at the time that this was the problem. They did know, however, that certain primitive sterilization procedures seemed to combat the disease.

The reason that story, this little bit of history, is significant is we move forward 60 years and what we find is that people come to Canada through our ports, but mostly through our airports with no quarantine period, with no thought of sterilization, with no concern up until this foot and mouth disease crisis that they may be carrying infectious diseases.

What this foot and mouth epidemic tells us is that we now have a situation in the global world we are living in, this global village, where diseases are worldwide. Today we are facing a crisis with respect to an animal disease which threatens to kill a large quantity of our agricultural industry. It has the potential of devastating our cattle industry. We have seen the pictures of course in Britain of thousands and thousands of animals being slaughtered and buried.

I must take a break and note that I am splitting my time. It is such an engaging topic that I actually would like to speak at some length because I am an historian and I am interested always in the way the past has instruction for the present and future.

The point I am trying to make is now suddenly Agriculture Canada, suddenly the government and suddenly the public are activated by this need to look at the security of our ports of entry when it comes to the possibility of infectious diseases arriving in the country. Suddenly we have an emergency on our hands.

I have listened to the earlier speakers and I am confident the government is doing all it can under the circumstances. I think what we are faced with now is a harbinger of further dangers to come, other dangers that may affect our food crops but other dangers that may also affect our people.

In my riding just recently we had a terrible scare where a person had come in from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and suddenly became ill. She showed all the symptoms of Ebola virus. She bled out of her pores and every symptom indicated that she was carrying one of the most highly infectious and most fatal diseases known to man.

The happy story is that after she was put in isolation and all the medical expertise was applied to the situation, it was discovered that whatever it was, and they still do not know what it was, it was not this particular infectious disease.

What this says to us and what the foot and mouth crisis says to us is that we as a nation, we as a government and we as a people have to be aware of the fact that we are moving into a new century in which there is a new type of threat to national security. It is not enough to suddenly put together defences which involve mats on the floors of airport corridors that sterilize the soles of shoes.

We have to create a game plan that puts us in a position where we are prepared to respond to another crisis that might affect our food crops. There are diseases that affect rice and there are diseases that affect wheat. I do not want to sound alarmist, but there are also very scary diseases out there that affect humans.

I think one positive thing we can get out of this crisis that is facing us today is that we as parliamentarians and we as the Canadian public should support our government in setting up long term strategies that look at this problem in a long term fashion, and looks at it not only in terms of the agricultural industries but in terms of national security in the broadest sense.

We have to co-operate not only with other government agencies. It should not just be the department of agriculture because it happens to be a disease that affects cattle. It should be co-ordinated by Emergency Preparedness Canada and it should embrace all departments including Health Canada. It also should affect of course the way we train our customs officials. Even more than that, it is not just a national issue. It is not just a federal issue. It is a provincial issue.

I think the time has come when the provinces and the federal government have to get together. They have to talk and they have to develop strategies between them and share the costs that look to the security not only of our food supply, not only of our agricultural industries, Madam Speaker, but also to the security of the generation of Canadians to come.

[Supply, April 3rd, 2001]

No, I did not. Read my speech.

[Supply, April 3rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, for the benefit of the member opposite, I would like to read a precis of what his leader said at the opening of this debate in justification of an inquiry. He said that some of the Prime Minister's disciples have said that the Prime Minister could not be capable of anything less than full disclosure and full honesty. “It is important to note that we are talking about the Prime Minister who ordered men and women to vote against their word. We are talking about a Prime Minister who ordered them to break their word. Would he be capable of contradiction on this file? Absolutely”.

Nobody asked me to break my word. When I speak in the House it is my word that is my guide and my conscience. What the leader did in impugning the honesty of the Prime Minister was that he impugned the honesty of every member in the House. This is what the debate is really about. It is about a leader who has in fact broken his own eighth commandment, which I point out is not just about lies. We do not say he lies. It is about harming the reputation of another individual. That is precisely what was said here.

It is hard not to get excited, but the majority of people on this side and in the House act according to their conscience. When one attacks the leader of this country, when one attacks his honesty based on his ordering people to break their word, it simply is not true.

[Supply, April 3rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, one of the things that bothers me about this debate is that there has been evidence presented by the Prime Minister, and I think it is very full and complete evidence. However the accusations remain. I always thought there was a presumption of innocence.

Does the member not feel that what is actually going on here with this call for an inquiry is the Prime Minister is being asked to prove his innocence? Is that not what is being asked?

[American Bar Association, March 28th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, an editorial in yesterday's National Post applauds President Bush for ending the American Bar Association's role in vetting judicial appointments.

The National Post says that this is a good thing because the American Bar Association has become overly political. America's top lawyers, according to the National Post , have committed the deadly sins of endorsing employment initiatives for minorities, of endorsing a woman's right to choose an abortion, terrible, according to the National Post , of endorsing federal funding for the arts and of backing Clinton's failed attempt to bring in public health care; dreadful ideas, according to the National Post .

And if that is not enough, the American Bar Association is further to be condemned for failing to support minimum mandatory sentences and capital punishment.

Well I guess we know where the National Post sits politically. Firmly and absolutely to the right, the American right. National Post ? Yes.

[Judges Act, March 22nd, 2001]

Madam Speaker, I raised this on questions and comments a little earlier, and I wish to put on the record that the cost of the transcripts that I was referring to from the Alberta court was $2.20 a page. I was unable to get these transcripts. I was unable to get them except by either paying the $2.20 a page or, in my case, I was lucky enough that I could go across the road and look at the transcripts in the Department of Justice. The Department of Justice could not release the transcripts because, as they were prepared by a private firm, the private firm was entitled to, by copyright according to the Department of Justice, to require that the transcripts could not be released.

They were in six boxes of thousands of pages apiece, and binders. The point I wish to make, regardless that this debate has to go on a little longer than perhaps intended, is that no one in the general public would be able to afford to see those transcripts. I was able to see the transcripts solely because I happen to live here in Ottawa, I happen to be a member of parliament and I was able to access them because the Department of Justice was the defendant in this particular case.

This is a trial involving a charter issue which is of concern to every Canadian. In order for an ordinary Canadian to access those transcripts, that ordinary Canadian would probably have had to pay something like $6,000 or $8,000.

I see the members opposite are laughing at that. They are so, so concerned about judiciary remuneration that they do not pay attention to the fact that ordinary Canadians cannot access the debates that are leading ultimately to the very judicial activism that they complain about.

I do not want to actually prolong the debate with a speech of my own, although I would be delighted to under normal circumstances. I would suggest to you, Madam Speaker, that in fact the thing that we should be really concerned about is not only making these transcripts available that are so important in criminal cases, as well as in civil cases and even in human rights tribunals, we still have to pay for the transcripts because private firms prepare them.

I would only say this. I hope that the members opposite would consider this as a very important issue that is just as important as the remuneration of judges, the public access to court transcripts, and put it indeed on the Internet just as our Debates are put on the Internet. I am sure the members opposite would agree that this would be a very fine thing to recommend.

[Judges Act, March 22nd, 2001]

Madam Speaker, the member seemed to be at one point in his dissertation struggling with the subject matter. I thought for a moment that I should rise and suggest that he share his time with a Liberal. I would have been happy to have a speech of my own on this subject.

If the House and the member will indulge me, I would not mind a somewhat extensive comment to the speech he just gave and a comment that I hope he will answer. I have the bill before me and it is all about numbers. It is about remuneration. Page after page we see the bill describe how much judges should be paid and all that kind of thing. It looks very important.

I say to the member opposite that we are missing an opportunity in the legislation because there is an opportunity to do something in the bill, not only for judges, but for people.

I had occasion to be in Alberta a month and a half ago trying to get a line on the case that is before the Alberta courts involving Mr. Stephen Harper and the crown. It deals with a charter challenge of the Canada Elections Act pertaining to certain aspects of third party advertising that is in the current legislation.

I was amazed to discover that I could not get court transcripts. What has happened in Alberta and many other jurisdictions is that the courts and the government have farmed out the taking of trial transcripts to private firms that record the actual verbatim testimony. A citizen, or even somebody who is a defendant at the trial, has to then purchase page by page the transcripts which can run into many thousands of pages.

What that does is make it impossible for the ordinary citizen, much less the person who is the defendant in the case, to have access to the deliberations of that particular court. This becomes very important when it is a charter challenge because something like that is of interest and of importance to every Canadian. Not only do we have to purchase it, but we cannot get it through the normal means.

I would have thought, and I would like the member to comment on this, that we in the House should be very concerned about the lack of transparency and the lack of opportunity of ordinary Canadians to know what is going on in the courts, issues that concern charter challenges, or any other case before the courts that has a wide public interest.

I would have thought that it would have been incumbent upon governments and indeed incumbent upon the courts to not only make the transcripts publicly available for free but to put them on the Internet, so Canadians can follow these very important deliberations. What I found out was that I could not gain access to the transcripts without paying for them page by page.

While I am probably a little bit more affluent than the average Canadian, at $1,000 a shot, it was not something I was prepared to do. I point out that this is not even an expense that is covered by the House. If I want to see the transcripts, it would appear that I would have to pay for them out of my own pocket. This is a situation that I do not believe is good for the country.

I cited a case in Alberta but I believe it is the same situation in Ontario and other jurisdictions. I suggest to the member opposite that if we really want to do something that is important for the public, we should be pressuring the government to add an amendment to the bill, phrase it so that it would require courts to take transcripts of the testimony and make the transcripts available to the public, not only for free, but also available on the Internet, so that all Canadians can be engaged in the kind of important debates that occur in the courts when someone like Mr. Stephen Harper decides to challenge the crown on something like the Canada Elections Act and makes it a charter challenge.

This is something that every Canadian should be engaged in and be able to follow. The only answer to that is to make all court transcripts available to the public for free.

[Modernization Of House Of Commons Procedure, March 21st, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, I can only confine my reply to the nature of my speech. I have to say that I have absolute faith in you and in the independence of your decisions. The House has absolute confidence in you, that you will exercise your heavy responsibilities with absolute impartiality and always look to the best interests of all the MPs because, as you are fond of saying, you are a servant of the House.

That is why I did get a little impassioned there. In fact, I have full confidence that you will interpret the power that Motion No. 2 has given you in a way in which the opportunities of backbench MPs to submit amendments at report stage will be preserved. In fact I do not expect you to follow literally the suggestion that motions in amendment that could have been presented in committee will not be selected. I am sure that you intend that to be exercised extremely narrowly. I have full confidence in you.