Mac Harb

[Income Tax Act, June 1st, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-361, an act to amend the Income Tax Act (to provide for the deduction of funeral expenses).

Mr. Speaker, the bill would allow a tax deduction of up to $10,000 for a taxpayer who has paid the funeral expenses of a person who has been buried in Canada. Taxpayers eligible for the tax deduction include the taxpayer who has died, the legal representative of the taxpayer who has died or any other taxpayer who has paid the funeral expenses of the person who has died.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Income Tax Act, June 1st, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-360, an act to amend the Income Tax Act (tax credit for mental or physical impairment).

Mr. Speaker, the bill would allow people who suffer from a physical or mental impairment that prevents them from performing housekeeping activities to use the Income Tax Act for the purpose of deductions for themselves or their families.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Oil And Gas Ombudsman Act, June 1st, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-359, an act to establish the office of Oil and Gas Ombudsman to investigate complaints relating to the business practices of suppliers of oil or gas.

Mr. Speaker, this enactment establishes the office of the oil and gas ombudsman which would receive and investigate complaints about the business practices of oil and gasoline suppliers, as well as producers.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Competition Act, June 1st, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-358, an act to amend the Competition Act (vertically integrated gasoline suppliers).

Mr. Speaker, the purpose of the bill is to address the fact that vertically integrated gasoline suppliers that manufacture more than a certain percentage should not be able to act as suppliers as well as retailers at the same time.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Protection Of Privacy (Social Insurance Numbers) Act, June 1st, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-357, an act to protect personal privacy by restricting the use of social insurance numbers.

Mr. Speaker, this enactment establishes that no person would be required to disclose his or her social insurance number except where that disclosure is specifically required by law.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal Act, June 1st, 2001]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-356, an act to amend the Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal Act (Book of Remembrance for peacekeepers).

Mr. Speaker, the enactment of the Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal Act requires that the minister establish a book of remembrance for Canadians who have died during an international peacekeeping mission.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Disaster Relief, June 1st, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. Recent television news has shown some dramatic images coming from forest fires in Alberta.

Has the Government of Canada received any requests for assistance from the government of Alberta and, if so, what does it plan to do about it?

[Trade, May 18th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, last week team Canada Atlantic participated in the first ever trade mission to Atlanta, Georgia. Atlantic Canadian companies have joined the Prime Minister, provincial premiers and federal ministers in meetings with business leaders in the southern United States.

The purpose of the mission is to explore the market potential for Atlantic Canada's products and services in the region. In 1999 Canadian exports to the region exceeded $22 billion. For every $1 billion in trade there are 10,000 jobs being created.

On behalf of my colleagues, I pay tribute to our Prime Minister who has opened more doors for Canadian trade than any other prime minister in the history of Canada. I congratulate team Canada.

[Landmines, April 5th, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the Government of Canada is fully committed to the implementation of the Ottawa convention to ban landmines, to assist landmine survivors and to prevent the devices from inflicting deadly harm sometimes well into the future and many years after military conflicts are over.

Canadian industry plays an important role in this effort, in co-operation with our Centre for Mine Action Technologies. Since 1981, for example, Med-Eng Systems of Ottawa has provided protective equipment to help save the lives of bomb disposal and demining personnel in over 130 countries worldwide.

With the assistance of this corporation and through the Department of Foreign Affairs and CIDA, Canada has proudly donated demining equipment for use in six different countries affected by anti-personnel landmines, including Ecuador, Peru, Jordan, Yemen, Bulgaria and Moldova. Soon Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia will be added to the list.

All Canadians can be proud of our efforts to help prevent further suffering from landmines.

[Supply, April 3rd, 2001]

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman seems to be a reasonable member of parliament. I want to read for him three quotes.

The first one is from the Leader of the Opposition when he was in Alberta in 1996 and an issue affecting some sort of situation in the House came up. He said “It would be an abdication of our role as legislators if we depart from dealing with the internal proceedings of this House and hand it over to some other adjudicating body”.

The second quote is from the member for Calgary—Nose Hill. The member on January 2 in the National Post in an interview commented on this whole situation. She said “I don't think that warrants a criminal investigation. To be a credible person, especially in public life, you have to go to the facts...I don't think it would be responsible to make these kinds of suggestions”.

The third and final quote I want to ask my colleague to comment on is from the member for Edmonton North in Hansard on March 15 when she indicated that “The Prime Minister could get over this in a heartbeat by just tabling his bill of sale for those shares in 1993”.

I want to ask my colleagues to frankly put all of the partisanship aside. With respect to all those statements, the Prime Minister has dealt with each one of them in a very effective and efficient way. He has answered each one of them openly in the House, outside the House and during an election campaign. At the same time, on the issue of the investigation and potential criminal offence the RCMP has looked at these issues and one of our colleagues has said there is no problem there. With regard to the third point on tabling the bill of sale, the Prime Minister has tabled the bill of sale.

We have the House to debate the issue in and we have been doing so for a long time. With regard to the second point, there is no criminal action by anyone. On the third point, the Prime Minister has tabled all of the necessary documentation.

Having heard all of that, does the member really believe that the House should vote for a public inquiry and spend millions of dollars unnecessarily?