René Canuel

[Coast Guard, May 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, following this cut carried out without consultation, in which 50 employees may lose their jobs, will the Minister of Fisheries undertake not to transfer the icebreaker before the advisory committee has completed its study?

[Coast Guard, May 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.

On May 7, 1996, the coast guard informed its St. Lawrence region employees of the upcoming transfer of the Wilfrid-Laurier , an icebreaker, to the west coast region, before the coast guard advisory committee has completed its study on icebreaking operations in the St. Lawrence.

How can the Minister of Fisheries justify that, before the committee even got a chance to complete its study of icebreaking operations, one of the five icebreakers making up the St. Lawrence fleet based in Quebec is taken away, from Quebec again, while there are still nine icebreakers based in Nova Scotia, where they do not even have ice in winter?

[Employment Insurance Act, May 2nd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I would like to thank the hon. member for Mercier, as well as my colleagues from Lévis and Kamouraska-Rivière-du-Loup, for the excellent work they did on this issue. Never before, during the last two years and a half, have we put so much work into a bill. Of course, we worked hard on other pieces of legislation, but particularly on this one. We did so for two main reasons. First, this legislation affects all the citizens from coast to coast, and especially the people in Quebec. Second, Bill C-12 goes directly after the poor and the destitute.

That is why the Bloc Quebecois has focused all of its efforts to try to reason with the government. We used some very solid arguments. I will not go over them again, we have mentioned them often enough. We have shown that this is not a good reform proposal. Today, I want to try to reach the hearts of my colleagues, and I hope they have some compassion left. In a democracy, the people are represented by those they chose to elect. But they have taken to the streets.

They do not want a mini-reform, they want this employment insurance bill, as it is called, to be completely withdrawn. The people who have taken to the streets are not beer drinkers, not professional agitators and certainly not cowards. Quite the opposite, these people are responsible citizens. But mostly, although these people want to work, they cannot find work year round. These are outstanding citizens. Some people in my riding and elsewhere have heard of Nelson Pilote, from Saint-Alexandre-des-Lacs, who is a tree harvester. In the summertime, he gets up at 4 a.m., brings

his chain saw with him to the forest and works until 5 or 6 p.m. He works hard. He has a nice family, five young children.

While he receives UI benefits, from the premiums he and his employer paid, he does not do any moonlighting. What does he do instead? Volunteer work. He coaches hockey and several other sports. He teaches young children and gives them a fresh outlook on life. He is not necessarily a PQ or a sovereignist partisan, but he puts his heart into it and he wants to live a decent life.

In Amqui, he gathered, not by himself, of course, but with the help of a few unions, 5,000 people, who came to demonstrate and ask for the withdrawal of Bill C-12 now before the House.

Also, I have a friend who is a bishop in Gaspé. He is not involved in politics either. He too joined the workers to ask, on behalf of his flock, that this bill be withdrawn because he knows that in Gaspé as in Matane and in Mont-Joli as well as in Amqui, people want to work but it is not so simple. Come and try to create jobs in our region! You will see that it is more complicated than you think.

Members are also aware that forestry jobs are the least costly to create. The Canadian government cut its $6.5 million a year grant to the East Plan, which created jobs, good jobs. They cut it. They also want to cut funding for the Maurice Lamontagne Institute, where year after year researchers make discoveries that are published throughout the world.

It seems to me that the government is cutting funding everywhere: for researchers who give hope to the young and for the most disadvantaged people, the poorest of the poor. And for women in our areas, especially the rural areas. Women who have seasonal jobs will suffer as well as seasonal and part-time workers.

I do not want to go over all the arguments again. Members know quite well that in our areas as elsewhere in Quebec and in the Atlantic Provinces, it is almost impossible for someone who enters the workforce to accumulate 910 hours of work. Only a few will be able to do it.

Yes, I appeal to my colleagues. Let us hope that our arguments will at least touch their hearts, if not their minds.

It is not easy for people who want to work and who will no longer be entitled to this employment insurance, that back home we call poverty insurance, because that is right where it will lead. Someone said to me: "Do you know that if this employment insurance comes to our regions, people will be worse off in a few years than they were during the '30s"? They will turn to welfare, of course, but they do not want to. People want to work.

You know, it is very hard on a person's morale to rely on welfare. I have known many men with families who, having lost their jobs and been on unemployment insurance for a year, have then unsuccessfully sought work and become completely discouraged. The whole family was affected. It is extremely hard for the children, and it then becomes society's problem. It is not just the individual's problem, the family's problem, but the community's or society's problem.

This is why I am appealing to my colleagues. There is still some time left. They can still vote against Bill C-12. I ask them with all my heart to think about their constituents. There were demonstrations in the Atlantic provinces as well. If we want to represent our constituents properly, how can we not listen to what they have to say? I find this tragic.

Of course, they can always say that if we do not listen to them, two years, six months down the road, they will throw us out. As you well know, Madam Speaker, in four or five years, a government in power can do a lot of stupid things, and you know that they have done their share. They are about to do it again. I think that this will be the worst yet, a terrible mistake, and it is workers, young people, women, in other words, the poorest members of our society, who will suffer the consequences. It is not just the individual who is affected, as I was saying earlier, but families, parishes, all of society. When apolitical people say that it does not make sense, I ask my colleagues across the way to sit up and take note.

[Fisheries, April 26th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.

With the tabling of his crab fishery plan, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans has spread confusion, once again, by allocating part of the quota to other categories of fishermen. In so doing, the Minister has sown division in the ranks of the fishermen and thus weakened the industry.

Since the traditional crabbers are taking twice the available resource, does the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans intend to finally speed up and improve the plan for buying back permits, as in the B.C. salmon fisheries?

[Maurice Lamontagne Institute, April 19th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, the Maurice Lamontagne Institute has to continue to exist, but it is getting smaller and smaller each year, and Quebecers are really concerned about that.

Is the minister telling us that, just like in Varennes, the federal government is reducing even more its financial participation in advanced research in Quebec?

[Maurice Lamontagne Institute, April 19th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans.

The reputation of the Maurice Lamontagne Institute is firmly established. This institute employs 280 people at the present time and offers, among other things, a fish stock evaluation program as well as hydrographic services. Yet, its future is threatened.

The Maurice Lamontagne Institute's hydrographic service is one of its main components. Can the minister confirm to us that his department is about to shut down this service and transfer the activities to Cornwall, Ontario, which would mean the loss of dozens of jobs in Quebec?

[The Budget, April 16th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague talked about job creation. He said that jobs are created every day. He said that 500,000 jobs have been created since his government came into office. However, how many jobs have been lost during the same time?

Of course, we are all morally responsible. Those who should bear the most responsibility are those who have created the deficit, the debt. When Mr. Trudeau came into office in 1970, he began to get the country deep into debt. And this went on. When the Conservatives came to power, they did not do any better.

It is true that we have a responsibility, and I think that everybody here has benefited from that in some way. Some a lot, some less. However, those who benefited the least are the poor, and more particularly maybe the people living in rural areas like mine and in isolated areas. Now, today, we are asked to show restraint, to tighten our belts, and very often those who have benefited the most are asking those who have benefited the least to suffer the consequences. That is unfair.

Yes, I recognize that we all have some responsibility. Yes, I recognize that I myself have benefited somewhat from it. But at least let us not ask those who hardly benefited at all from it to tighten their belts even more today.

Someone said earlier that we have to find money somewhere. The question is where do we look for that money. We proposed and we are still asking that we look for it in the family trusts and the banks, because they definitely benefited a lot from it. Therefore, they should at least pay a fair share of the bill. I have here a long list of duplications that everybody can see. The Minister of Finance has seen it himself.

I will repeat just part of what he said. Just about every small business has had a federal tax auditor drop in, followed by a federal sales tax auditor, a provincial corporate tax auditor, and a provincial retail sales tax auditor. All these people wanted to get the same figures. And they all came at about the same time and on the same day.

The government has just realized that, but we have been pointing out this problem for years. I could give many more examples of duplication, but my question for my colleague is this: Instead of targeting those who did not gain any advantage from this collective debt build-up, should we not be going after those who did mightily, and have them foot part of the bill?

[The Budget, April 16th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague. He has put his finger right on the problem, and it is an even larger problem in rural areas and in the regions.

This budget affects farmers. We talked about that earlier. My colleague opposite seemed to say that everything is going as it should, while in the east things are desperate.

For the unemployed this budget is a disaster. In my area, in Amqui, a small town of 6,000 inhabitants, 4,500 to 5,000 people demonstrated to protest against the employment insurance plan, and they did not do so for the fun of it.

I remember very well that 20 years ago the same people or their fathers or mothers demonstrated in the streets because unemployment was at an unacceptable level. This year, their children have taken to the street, because the unemployment rate in my region is even higher.

This means that this budget is not a source of hope but of hopelessness.

Another thing I have just found out is that, as in the case of the royal military college in Saint-Jean, the Maurice-Lamontagne Institute, a research and development centre in my riding, that is wellknown at the local, national and international levels, because its researchers come from all over the world, is facing drastic budget cuts that will force several of its staff to go find work elsewhere.

When I asked the Minister if this was true, he told me about the need to streamline, that it was Mr. Martin's fault. In my region, it is very difficult to accept. They are going to cut funding to Quebec's only fisheries research and development school. What tells me that the amounts will not be increased in Ontario or elsewhere?

This is really very hard to take in Quebec. I referred earlier to the Collège militaire royal in Saint-Jean, where our officers used to receive superb training in French. That is gone. Now funding for the Lamontagne institute will gradually dry up. This was a venture with a future, with plans to increase the number of researchers over the next five or ten years, until drastic cuts were announced.

If that is what my hon. friends opposite call a good budget, I suggest that they go and tell that to the regions. As far as producers from my region are concerned, the president of the Dairy Farmers of Canada lives in my riding, I could almost say in my parish. He told me: "René, it will have a terrible effect". It is terrible, although most producers in our region get by. In terms of climate, when I travel to Gatineau, I notice that farmers there can sow one month sooner. In our region, farmers have to wait one month, sometimes six weeks more before they can do so. Such are the laws of nature and there is nothing we can do about it. As a result, farmers in the east are penalized. And so are fishermen, with their quotas being cut.

My hon. colleague from Kamouraska-Rivière-du-Loup has painted a very accurate picture of the situation. I have a simple question for him. What future will our young people have after this budget is implemented? Will there be incentives to remain in the region longer? The university is 120 kilometres away. Up til last year, the only cégep was located in Matane, and there was none in the Matapedia Valley. This meant that, just to attend college upon graduating from high school, our young people had to go to Rimouski, Matane or Quebec City. That is totally unacceptable.

I will put my question again to my hon. colleague: Does he foresee a better future for our young people? Will they be able to remain in our regions longer?

[Supply, March 15th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, the Supreme Court has ruled in favour of Hydro-Quebec twice. Furthermore, the federal government did not use its political power to override these court rulings because the contract no longer suited its purpose or because the political balance of power had shifted. A contract is a contract.

No one forced Newfoundland to sign this agreement, which at the time appeared to be beneficial for both parties. Newfoundland benefited from Hydro-Quebec's contribution in terms of both money and expertise. In return, Hydro-Quebec would maintain fixed prices for the electricity generated. We might even add that, had Hydro-Quebec not been involved in this project, Churchill Falls might never have been harnessed.

As I said earlier, this agreement was negotiated for years and years. It is almost insulting to those who signed it. As you know, the then premier of Newfoundland, Mr. Smallwood, was one of the signatories. I do not understand how those people can be accused of acting hastily. On the contrary, they knew exactly what they were doing.

Obviously, there were pros and cons. It was beneficial. It was seen as a good deal. A few years later, we realize that it may be true, that one of the parties may have got the short end of the stick, but the fact is that the contract was signed.

How can my colleague ask the federal government to intervene in an area of exclusive provincial jurisdiction, when these contracts were originally signed by two companies that were both extremely responsible? Why ask the government to intervene? Above all, why-and this is what I find most shocking-are they talking about injustice in this case?

[Supply, March 15th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, in 1969, the federal government could have forced Quebec to open a corridor to let Newfoundland run its power lines through Quebec's territory. It did not do that. Had it done so, it would have been totally unacceptable.

I ask the member opposite, who is the chairman of the natural resources committee, to assure me that his government will respect the terms of the contract, which was duly signed-as the member himself said earlier-between the CFLCO and Hydro-Quebec.