Ian McClelland

[Criminal Code, September 23rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, as always, the eloquent member for Kingston and the Islands has favoured us with his prose. As always, hidden in the jewels of his prose, is perhaps a bit of wisdom or perhaps a bit of fantasy.

I ask the member for Kingston and the Islands, whose heart is so full of compassion for the perpetrators of crime, to reflect on the words by a former British prime minister. On the sixth floor of this very building there are portraits of past British prime ministers, one of whom is Benjamin Desraeli.

The member opposite was so quick to stand and shout charges of extremism at this side of the aisle because we would say that those who break our laws should be sanctioned. That is part of the social contract.

I wonder if he realizes that when he hurls that charge of extremism across the aisle at us, Benjamin Desraeli, the great British prime minister, once said that today's extremist is tomorrow's moderate. We are the pathfinders. We were called extreme because we said that it would be a good idea for us not to leave future generations of Canadians bankrupt because our generation spent beyond its means.

When the House decided it was going to do away with the death penalty 30 years ago, the quid pro quo was 25 years. It was not 15 years or 10.43 years. It was 25 years. As a civilized society we would no longer take a life because a life had been taken. We would protect society. There would be deterrence because 25 years means life, but we would not be taking a life.

Members today have a duty and a responsibility to the victims and to the potential victims which should override that compassionate, soft heart. Yes, we should all be compassionate. However, if it was the member's family or if it was the member's neighbour who was violated by a murderer, would he feel so charitable? Would he think that there should not be a sanction beyond a fine, or that simple remorse is good enough?

As a society we are not going to get blood from a stone. We are not talking about manslaughter. We are talking about premeditated murder. We are not talking about accidental murder or crimes of passion. We are talking about cold-blooded, premeditated murder. It is important to make that distinction.

I would ask the hon. member opposite to justify to the people of Canada why he thinks those who commit cold-blooded, premeditated murder are worthy of compassion.

[Committees Of The House, September 23rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, as I understand it, the debate takes place in this context. The auditor general brought down a report which had something to say about family trusts. The Liberals opposite felt that the auditor general was overstepping his mandate and should not be investigating family trusts.

In my business experience it is often the things that we do not know that hurt us more than what we do know.

My question for my hon. colleague is this. Is it not the appropriate function of the auditor general, acting in his capacity as auditor, to investigate and bring to the attention of the government that which it does not know? Is the auditor general not doing exactly what he should be doing by bringing this to the attention of the government?

[Supply, September 18th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, when the hon. member for Gander-Grand Falls earlier in his presentation quoted from the document that is known in these circles as the "Taxpayers Budget" released by the Reform Party a couple of years ago, it reminded me of the day I brought home a shiny brochure of a nice new car. I put it down on the kitchen table and my wife went ballistic. I asked: "What is the matter, dear?" She said: "I know it is only a brochure on the table today, but it is going to be in the driveway tomorrow".

That is exactly what we will see with the taxpayers budget. It is on his desk today and it is going to be in their red book tomorrow, because it is a pathfinder. It is where the Liberals get their direction.

Where did we get the $600 billion debt? We all acknowledge the fact that we have a wonderful country. But we have a sacred trust to pass this wonderful country on to our children and their children and their children in at least as good a shape as we got it. How can we do that if we give them a legacy of $600 billion of debt, if 40 per cent of every dollar taken in by the federal government goes to pay interest on the debt, money that we have already spent? Our generation has enjoyed the benefit. If we do not make the tough decisions that the Liberals will make because they are forced to by the Reform Party, we will never get our House in order. If we had not kept the Liberals' feet to the fire there would not even be a sniff of a chance that we would be as far down the road as we are today.

[Petitions, September 18th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, the third petition is signed by 80 petitioners mostly from Edmonton Southwest, many of whom are associated with CARP, the Canadian Association of Retired Persons. The petitioners bring to the attention of this House and request that Parliament take the necessary measures to ensure that Canadian citizens who are recipients of American pensions are not penalized. This flows from the change in legislation in the United States whereby recipients of U.S. pensions in Canada have 25 per cent of the money that is due to them held back.

[Petitions, September 18th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, the second petition signed by 47 petitioners asks and prays that we conduct a full public inquiry into the relationship between lending institutions and the judiciary and to enact legislation restricting the appointment of judges with ties to credit granting institutions. The idea is that there is some sort of collusion between the judiciary and credit granting institutions which has resulted in the fact that credit granting institutions are never ever taken to task.

[Petitions, September 18th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, it is my honour and privilege to present three petitions to the House today, two on behalf of the esteemed member for Edmonton Southeast.

The first petition is signed by 33 petitioners who pray and request that Parliament oppose any amendments to the Canadian Human Rights Act or any other federal legislation that will provide for the inclusion of the phrase sexual orientation.

[Criminal Code, September 17th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, the very first words I said in the House after the last election when most of us were rookies here in the House, were to the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, who has been in the House longer than virtually anybody here today. I spoke at that time about the culture of the government at that time which led to the laissez-faire attitude we have had for the last 30 years or so with criminals.

Some members will recall that October 7, 1972 was a pivotal day for jurisprudence because on that date the then solicitor general stood in the House and said that from that day forward the primary raison d'etre of the criminal justice system would be the rehabilitation of prisoners.

He said this and this became the raison d'être because the recidivism rate was so high. He thought that if the road we have been going down all these years has not worked, then perhaps we should try something different, so let us make our raison d'être, rather than the protection of society, rather than a punishment of wrongdoing, rehabilitation. There is nothing wrong with that ideal. It is a noble ideal.

In any event, I had some words to say about that. I attributed some words to the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce who was sitting opposite. I noticed the look in his eyes. I knew I had misjudged the situation.

At the first opportunity I apologized to the member opposite because I was wrong. I have over the last couple of years engendered a good deal of respect for the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, the member who introduced the so-called faint hope clause to the House. I know he did so because his heart is in the right place. The problem is that in my respectful opinion sometimes we need to use a soft heart and a hard head. Sometimes it is absolutely essential that people in our society know that there is a line beyond which it is not appropriate to cross.

I mention this because it is important to know to put the introduction of this law into the context of the time. Laws need to be adjusted to suit the temper of the time. In the context of the time we as a nation and most of the western world were experiencing a flower of magnanimity to one another, one to another. In the context of the time we got rid of capital punishment.

How can a civilized society be more civilized by perpetrating a barbaric act of murder, killing someone else, in order to justify its existence? I am now a proponent of capital punishment and I would not be if life meant life. The quid pro quo for our country to get rid of capital punishment was a 25 year sentence for first degree murder. It was a life sentence, minimum 25 years. That was the quid pro quo. That was what the government of the day used to sell the notion of getting rid of capital punishment.

That brings us to 25 years or so after the fact. As the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce said yesterday, it is merely a faint hope clause. Very few people take advantage of it. Fifty people have taken advantage of it, 50 of 175 or so people eligible to take advantage of it. That is one-third. Two-thirds of the people who have applied for it have been successful

The point is not how many are successful and how many apply. The point is that when someone takes the life of another person and it is deemed to be a first degree offence, premeditated murder, the sanction that our country has prescribed and the sanction that the social contract we as citizens of our country have prescribed is a life sentence, not 15 years. Whether a person in that first 15 years of incarceration has seen the error of their ways is not the question.

The point is that we made a bargain. We were not going to take a murderer's live, even a first degree murderer's life, as a society. What we were going to do is to put them away so they cannot harm anybody ever again in the future.

That was a social contract. We are abrogating that social contract when we slide in the so-called faint hope clause. That brings us to the duplicity of this argument today, which is this.

By taking the bill of the member for York South-Weston, which would abolish section 745 from the table and insert a lame duck replacement, it has put the Reform Party and others on the Liberal benches who would have voted in favour of that bill in the position

that they cannot find themselves in. It is wrong to vote for this half measure while at the same time it allows Liberals on the other side to vote in favour of the measure that they would not have been able to vote in favour of because they do not want to change it.

Altogether, the removal of the member from York South-Weston's private member's bill, which would abolish section 745, which should say life means life, and inserting this other bill which really does not accomplish anything is window dressing. It is fluff. It begs the question why is it okay to kill one person while it is not okay to kill two persons. It does not make any sense, none whatsoever.

My angst of this bill is two-fold. First, we have abrogated our responsibility, the deal we made when we said life means life in place of capital punishment. At the same time, we have taken a private member's bill which dealt squarely and honestly with the issue off the table and inserted in its place a half measure which is nothing less than duplicitous and not worthy of this House.

[Questions On The Order Paper, June 19th, 1996]

With respect to the government's potential $ 1.5 billion liability to settle pay equity complaints dating back to 1984: ( a ) what provisions has the government made to fund this potential liability going back 12 years, to 1984 and ( b ) how are private sector compensation and benefit levels for persons performing similar functions factored into the Treasury Board's evaluation when considering ``equal pay for work of equal value'' in the public service?

[Canada Pension Plan, June 19th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, that is good news. I am sure Canadians would feel much more secure if the fund were made politician proof so that this huge fund of resources could not then become a slush fund for political parties or politicians.

Following up on the response, will the 20 per cent investment rule be waived? Second, Canadians need to be assured that the retirement income of today's retirees and those who will retire in the immediate future will be protected. Those of us who are grandparents understand that our grandchildren should not pay a disproportionate share of both the national debt and retirement income.

Has the government done any studies or background work on the impact of this fund on job creation and growth, particularly to those in the 20 to 45-year age group?

[Canada Pension Plan, June 19th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Prime Minister.

The doubling of Canada pension plan premiums will result in a very significant pool of Canadian taxpayer retirement cash accumulating in the hands of government.

What Canadian in his or her right mind would trust a government that has our country $600 billion in debt with the income for his or her retirement? Why should Canadians trust the government to manage their retirement income?