Len Hopkins

[Defence Policy, February 17th, 1994]

Madam Speaker, the hon. member who has just spoken has broad experience in government. He has been in provincial government and he has been in Ottawa for a while.

Does he not feel it is very important to have a number of members like 16 on a committee including senators and to have breadth and depth from across the country on matters as important as the future defence policy of our large country, a country that has a great name around the world in peacekeeping and in doing more than our share during wartime in the past?

We will have many people with expertise in foreign affairs. We will have people with expertise in the military field. We will have other people with expertise in the industrial and training fields. The Canadian forces is the largest training school in Canada.

Does the hon. member not feel it is important to have breadth and depth from across Canada on the committee, to have the committee going to meet Canadians who cannot afford to come to Ottawa because this is a huge country, and to let Canadians have their say on such matters as defence policy and foreign policy? If we do not have that breadth and depth, will we not have an inward looking attitude instead of a broad, outward looking attitude at the world and nationally in our own country?

[Pre-Budget Consultations, February 1st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I want to make a novel suggestion to the finance minister and it is one that has proved its worth in the past and I am sure it will work today.

I remember when I was going to elementary school during World War II and they had what was called war saving certificates. You brought 25 cents to school whenever you could afford it and they put a 25 cent stamp in your book. When you had $4 worth of stamps you tucked them away and in a certain period of time you got $5 back. A lot of the kids right across this country bought war saving certificates throughout World War II and they felt they were helping Canada.

I am going to suggest to the finance minister today that we use the same system for young people across the country, elementary and high school age, and for older people as well if they wish to buy back Canada certificates.

When I say buy back Canada certificates I am thinking of the debt that we have with foreign countries. In order to cut down the debt that we owe abroad, these buy back Canada certificates can be applied to the national debt to pay off foreign countries. Grandmothers and grandfathers can buy a $20, $50 or $100 buy back Canada certificate and give it to a youngster for his or her birthday or whatever. Any Canadian can invest in them.

In other words, it will go the year round. It is not just a certain period when you buy savings bonds. It will go the whole year. Let them buy these and it will instil in every young Canadian, every child, an attitude of Canadianism. "I am a Canadian citizen. I am contributing to this country. I am buying back Canada. I am buying back Canada's debt from foreign countries." They are looking to their future. They are building their financial future.

I think it would catch on and it would make every Canadian a part of a Canadian solution. It would help every Canadian contribute toward the national debt, bring down the deficit and feel that they are part of the action. In this way we will be helping senior citizens who are in need because their pensions can still come through.

I had a lady phone me this morning from Deep River who was very concerned about her pension because she knew this discussion was going on in the House today. I told her I would bring up that item on her behalf. She is the type of senior citizen who did not have a chance to have a contributory pension during her lifetime and worked hard. Those are the people we have to be thinking about at this time.

Medicine in this country is for everybody, not just the sick. We should be looking after ourselves through preventive medicine. I went on for years not looking after myself. I worked 15 and 16 hours a day, travelled all weekend, seven days of the week on this job. I never paid any attention to the fact that my father and his brother had heart problems and that some uncles on my mother's side of the family had heart problems. When I left the farm I kept on eating in the same manner I had been when I was working actively every day at physical work.

As a result I ran into problems. The good medical care of this country helped put me back on my feet after a triple bypass operation, after a triple vessel cleaning. The doctors and nurses were wonderful. We have outstanding medical care in this country and we have to support these people.

How can we support medicare? By looking after our own health, by looking after our own diet. It is not only after we have had an operation that we should look after our diet. It is up to every Canadian from the youngest to the oldest. By looking after our own health and putting some discipline into our every day life can be preventive medicine. Every one of us should be paying attention to that.

At a Heart and Stroke Foundation dinner on the weekend I paid tribute to Dr. Wilbert Keon who is the head of the University of Ottawa Heart Institute and Director General at the Civic Hospital in Ottawa. This man was born in a small community just across the Ottawa River and up a bit from Petawawa where I live. He spent years in medicine. He dedicated his training to becoming a heart specialist and he did.

However, after Dr. Keon received his training at Ottawa University, he received help from Canadians so he could become a great heart specialist. He did not take off to the United States where he could demand the biggest buck going. He did not head off for Britain or some other country to make big money. He stayed right here in the Ottawa Valley and contributed to Canada. He is probably the top heart surgeon in this nation right now. He has trained many others. A top heart surgeon at a hospital in Edmonton trained under Dr. Keon here in Ottawa.

This is the kind of loyalty that Canada needs from professionals today, people who are going to stay here and put their life and soul into their work the way Dr. Keon did. To me that is the mark of a great Canadian. We need more like him. The staff around him is so oriented to thinking of the family.

People think the National Defence Medical Centre in Ottawa is only there for national defence personnel. Canadians who are in the trade business, Canadians who are diplomats, every Canadian soldier has the right to go there for their operations and they do. However, the operations for the Heart Institute take place at the University of Ottawa Heart Institute at the Civic Hospital. They do the work and send the patients back for post-operative care. Those people are wonderful.

We sometimes get very down. We cut this program or that program. There are other ways of cutting programs. I mentioned one tonight, preventive medicine, when talking about looking after ourselves better than we do. Diets are not just for people who have had problems. They are for people who are still healthy, to keep them healthy and to keep them out of the medical system.

People think that research and development is something that is very expensive. They cannot see any immediate returns from it so they get upset and say it is a waste of money.

I wish to say a few words about Crown corporations. Atomic Energy of Canada Limited is one of my favourites and I talk about it often in this House.

The Canadian public has invested $4.7 billion in Atomic Energy of Canada Limited since 1952. But do you know what the return is on its research? A recent Ernst & Young report stated that the return to the Canadian taxpayers was over $23 billion. That is a good investment. If you could get that return on every investment you made it would be great.

I was part of the legislative committee that steered Bill C-13 through this House and through the committee system. It dealt with the sale of Nordion International. Nordion provides radioisotopes to hundreds of hospitals across this country. We had 90 per cent of the world's market captured. Today what has happened? The previous government in 1989 sold Nordion International to a private concern. Now it is in a big dispute over the contract because AECL says it cannot provide the radioisotopes for the price the contract provided and the other company wants AECL to live up to the contract. Today we are in a position where hospitals in this country may end up with a shortage of radioisotopes.

I am going to leave it there because it is a subject I could speak on for the next hour. However, I wanted to highlight that radioisotopes today are becoming a very serious issue. Research and development on the medical side is becoming a serious issue and we have to invest if we want that four and fivefold return on R and D in this country. It has to happen.

[Foreign Affairs, January 25th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, first, Canada is loved and respected around the world. There is a great difference between being loved and being respected. We happen to have both those good qualities in the eyes of other countries.

The best work Canada can do today is to bring nations together in a diplomatic manner and have them sit down to decide on these measures, just as the Prime Minister did when he attended the NATO conference in Brussels recently.

We have to protect our own soldiers. We are not going to have them in situations where they are fired upon or bombed. They must be looked after. We cannot have the people over there using them as targets either.

Another thing I want to say to the hon. member, and I thank him for his kind comments at the beginning, is that it is very important that the United Nations itself be strengthened. If anything is going to come out of the situation in the former Yugoslavia it is going to be that the United Nations itself must be strengthened. It must be updated and brought into the 21st century. As I said in my speech, there will be many issues to face throughout the 21st century and we cannot do it with a century-old logic.

[Foreign Affairs, January 25th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I compliment those who have stood in their places today to express their views on this very important topic.

Someone asked how we gained a reputation as peacekeepers. I would suggest it did not just start in recent times. I would go back to World War I where 66,000 young Canadians lost their lives. I would go back to the League of Nations where the first big challenge came to the league 12 years after it was founded in about 1931 when Japan entered Manchuria. There was no muscle in the league. No one wanted to take a stand. They had problems back home that were more pressing and Asia was too far away. The league failed in that one.

In 1935 the league failed again when the Italians took over Abyssinia. There were too many problems. France did not want to disrupt its relationships with Germany. What happened was that we simply drifted into two world wars because there was no one who was ready to take a firm stand united together. If there is anything the United Nations stands for today it is the element of unity, of bringing countries of the world together to take an international stand against aggressors.

My feeling is that in no way can we allow an aggressor to get away with anything. The War Crimes Commission is on the ground in Yugoslavia now. That should be followed up with charges against those who commit war crimes, those who have committed war crimes against children, women and the elderly, those who have destroyed property and everything under the sun in the horrible situation in the former Yugoslavia. The court system is not good enough for them. They must be brought to justice. If that is not done it is a weakness within the UN itself, but I would suggest the world community would demand that it be done.

The Right Hon. Lester B. Pearson is another reason why Canada has peacekeeping in operation today in a very successful way. He started that in 1956 in Egypt and the Middle East. Canadians really made their mark there. We were active in many peacekeeping operations. Of course the first big test for the United Nations was the Korean war itself. Over 1,500 young Canadians gave up their lives on that occasion.

The question today in my mind is not whether we can afford peacekeeping. The question is whether we can afford to be without it. My answer is no. We cannot afford to be without it. We cannot afford to sit back or to have other countries sit back. Other countries have a firm responsibility in this regard along with us. They must play a role. They must pull their weight.

If we do not take a stand against all these little aggressors around the world then we are going to have a major conflict. We are going to have other young people from this nation, the cream of the crop, in another world war. Heaven knows what that will be like. We cannot have this situation coming about. We must handle bonfires wherever they occur in the world.

I would like to say a word about what happens at home. Military people are looked upon as soldiers. What about their spouses back home? What about their families back home when the other spouse is sent off to peacekeeping duties for six months at a time as they are today? What help do they have? What about the mother with three or four small children? What help does she receive?

There is help in the community. There is an organization called the rear party. It maintains communications with the families. There is always someone there to help them. They give them information about what is going on in the United Nations

site where their spouses are, where their fathers or mothers are or whatever the case may be. Spousal groups are included in the rear party organization back home on the base. Spouses meet with the rear party. Spouses write messages and news items. They send tapes to their loved ones. No one is left alone.

A resource centre was set up in Petawawa. I live three miles from the base gate at Petawawa, Ontario. I used to teach school there. I was there for five and one-half years before going into politics. I have learned the operations of the military community, how it operates first hand. I have the greatest admiration for those people.

The family resource centre provides advice and assistance to the rear party group. They work with agencies in the community. I must say of my own area in Renfrew County, in the Petawawa area, we have three Petawawas: the village, the township and the base. Then Pembroke is 10 or 12 miles away. Deep River and Chalk River are to the north. There are other communities around Renfrew County. They too support the base in spirit on Remembrance Day and in many ways as family units. They mix together and the rapport is tremendous.

Social workers are on the base to help these families when the soldiers are away on duty. There is a senior officer in each group who will have information on the families before they leave. They know the soldiers' spouses. They know about the soldiers' families. They mail videotapes back and forth. There are padres and doctors in the field and at home as well.

There is an overall unity plan working in a major role for military families. A well organized system is in place. We ask what about the expenses? These expenses are paid for. I want the taxpayers of Canada to know they are paid for by non-public funds. They are paid for by raffles. They are paid for by profits from messes, canteens and so on. This says a lot for the dedication and the care of the Canadian soldier community.

The work with agencies in the community is very important. At Christmastime they send letters back and forth. Before they leave they even make sure that their wills are intact so that if any accident does happen their families do not have to go through the whole legal rigmarole of putting things in place; they are already there.

The dedication and the ability to cope on the part of our Canadian forces are real examples of citizenship. Canadian soldiers will do the job they are called upon to do, as the hon. parliamentary secretary said this afternoon. Soldiers are prepared to do the job. We have some soldiers in the House today who are members of Parliament. I am glad they are here to give their first-hand experiences.

The mandate in the United Nations must be clear. There must be an element of co-operation among all parties. If not, our troops are indeed in danger. There must be a responsibility in the parties to respect international decisions. Should we arm the troops? People say: "Why not give them arms so they can go in and fight?" If we do that we are taking sides in the conflict and destroying the very basis of the UN in the first place.

I received a telephone call from one of my constituents today who wanted to see our soldiers armed. That is something which will have to be debated in the House and something the UN will have to take a closer look at in terms of how well they are armed to protect themselves. All parties must agree with the mandate and live up to it.

I am glad the War Crimes Commission is on the scene in Yugoslavia today to pin down people who are disobeying international law, those people who are committing war crimes. After this is over they should be brought to the International Court, formally charged, tried, and sentenced accordingly. We cannot allow this to go on.

Canadian soldiers, as I said, will do their job. Should they be in Yugoslavia? If we as one of the United Nations do not supply soldiers to look after the humanitarian side of operations in Yugoslavia to try to bring parties together and save the peace, we are not really living up to the international spirit that is the very basis of the United Nations itself.

Again I ask the question: can we afford to be there? In today's world, with trouble spots all over the world, I do not think we as Canadians can back away from it. We were one of the founders of the United Nations, one of the key players at its founding. Yes, the United Nations needs upgrading. It needs improvement to meet the situations and the challenges of the future. They are going to be many.

In order to do so we must work together with the international community. The UN must be strengthened and improved to enable it to meet those very situations. We cannot allow young children and women to suffer. If the United Nations were to pull out of Yugoslavia today there would be more rapes, more child abuse and more killings of children, women and elderly people. There would be no law at all.

We as human beings living on the face of this earth together today could not allow that to go on. We would have it on our consciences. Just remember, it was a small skirmish in Europe that set off the trigger for World War I. It was the depression years of the thirties that continued to set the stage for World War II. Again nobody stood up. Nobody wanted to be counted. They had too many problems at home.

Today we have a lot of problems at home. We have to look after them, try to solve them as well. We must also realize that the world today is like a little pea in a pod. It is small. Everything that happens around this world affects every other nation in the world. We cannot allow these bonfires to burn

without putting water on them, without cooling them and keeping peace in various parts of the world. We can bet it will be an ongoing battle. We have trouble spots today all over the world. The United Nations will have to face up to that or we will face a worse war in the future that maybe mankind itself will never survive.

Can we afford to be in the United Nations as peacekeepers? I do not think any sane nation on the face of the earth today has any other answer but yes, we have to be there. It is not a dollar value. It is a human value and it is the future of the world.

[The Late Senator Chesley Carter, January 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to add a few words to that of my colleague about Ches Carter. He and I sat together here in the back two rows when I first came here. Ches Carter was a very humble man. He had been in both world wars as my colleague has stated. He was a great champion of veterans. He went to bat for them and was responsible I am sure for some of the amendments to the veterans legislation in Canada.

Ches Carter also exemplified a man who had been a citizen of Newfoundland prior to it becoming part of Canada. He then got into the federal scene and came here as a member from Newfoundland and was highly respected in this House.

I want to extend our sincere appreciation to him for the work that he did on behalf of veterans across Canada and for his service in two world wars. He exemplifies very responsible Canadian citizenship and will be long remembered by those of us who knew him and should be long remembered by those Canadians for whom he made such a contribution.

I want to extend my condolences to his family. I thank them for allowing him to be part of this place and of the Canadian nation, to come forward to display his strength through humility for the improvement of veterans in Canada and to make his mark for the military forces in this country. He is an example for many to follow and we appreciate that.

[The Late Hon. Steven Paproski, January 20th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I simply want to agree with everything that has been said about Steve today. I knew him since the day he came into the House. He was a great friend, a jovial type, a very amiable character and, yes, a character. He was very proud of the fact that he came from Poland. He was very proud of his background.

If my memory serves me correctly he once came into my riding to the little hamlet of Wilno, which is the oldest Polish community in Canada and they thought the world of him.

He did far more behind the scenes around Parliament Hill than any of us realized to bring people together and he made good friendships all over the place.

To his wife Betty, five children and grandchildren I extend our sincere thanks for sharing him with us. On behalf of the Polish community throughout my riding that he talked to me so much about, I extend their sympathy to his wife and family.

We who knew Steve well can say today that we are thinking of him and of his wife and family. He might have been a linesman for the Edmonton Eskimos and a good one, but I will say that he was a great linesman around Parliament Hill too. He must have been a great linesman in his constituency. We all thought the world of him. I think anyone who can leave this place leaving that thought in the minds of the people with whom he or she worked, makes us indeed very fortunate.

[Speech From The Throne, January 19th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the hon. member's problem with transportation. It was rather ironic I was given a train pass on the day I was sworn in. I do not have access to a passenger train.

The hon. member mentioned the two founding peoples. He will also be aware, as I mentioned in my speech, that people in the early pioneer days worked together long before Confederation to bring together those two founding peoples. Confederation itself was based on protecting the language, religion and culture of Quebecers. Those were some of the main reasons for it.

The hon. member mentioned high poverty rates. There are areas of Canada with high poverty rates. I have some in my own riding. I can relate to that.

We will create jobs. We will create the initiatives to produce jobs. We are not going to say we will not do something because it is not in the program. If it falls under jobs and is going to create jobs then we want it.

The hon. member mentioned the throne speech and forests. As he knows the forestry industry comes under provincial jurisdiction. There are many members in our caucus who believe as firmly as I do that we should have federal forestry agreements as we have had in the past.

We have treated our forest resources very roughly and have not managed them well. One thing that must happen from here in is the planting of trees. We have some very good institutions that develop forest trees. The expertise is there and it is a way to produce jobs. We can get people to prepare our forests for the future. We need to take an overall look at our natural resources. We also need to deal with the provinces on many of them.

That is why in our red book during the election period, and every day the government will be sitting here, we put a great deal of emphasis on federal-provincial relations. It is going to be very important if we are to produce jobs for Canadians and to have a good rapport with governments of whatever stripe in whatever province so that we can work with them in protecting natural resources such as forestry, as the hon. member mentioned, and build a protection for agriculture, even though Canada was the only country at the GATT discussions that believed in supply management. It is the only one left of the 117.

We cannot very well sign an agreement with ourselves. Canada is the only one left that believes in it. The only way to go is with high tariffs to protect our supply management system. We attempted to do that. By and large a pretty good deal came out of it. Also the other sectors of the economy affected by the GATT agreement will be big pluses for the country.

I will certainly be glad any time to have a discussion with the hon. gentleman. I am sure we will find a common basis for friendship and serious discussion. I invite him to do that. We will learn to love this place after a while because we will know we are trying to do things for Canadians, that we are trying to do things for the people who sent us to Ottawa.

I have known people in years past whose greatest aim was to get on the front page of the newspaper and on television every night of the week, but they did not come back very often after the next election. They spent so much time promoting themselves that they forgot who sent them to Ottawa to work on their behalf.

I welcome the hon. gentleman in private conversation.

[Speech From The Throne, January 19th, 1994]

Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate the hon. member for Lachine-Lac-Saint Louis for his excellent speech this afternoon and also the hon. member for Beaver River, who I can say is a very kind person. She wrote me an excellent letter last winter when I was in the hospital, as many members on both sides of this House did. I appreciate that very much.

Madam Speaker, I want to congratulate you on taking the chair. I think it becomes you very well. I will likely have an opportunity to congratulate the Speaker in person. I would also like to congratulate the other two officers of the chair.

When I was sitting here this afternoon listening to the debate on whether we are going to separate this country or whether we are not, I found it rather depressing. As a result I threw away most of my notes. Therefore, what I am going to say tonight is from the heart. That is not to say that my notes were not.

When we think of what it took in human work and human effort, in negotiation and flexibility of human nature to get this nation of Canada where it is today, I think all of us in this House and indeed across this country should exercise that flexibility and make up our minds that there is a bridge that can be built between human beings as well as across a river. Mental bridges or regional bridges in Canada, whether it be east, west, central Canada, Ontario, Quebec or Atlantic Canada versus central Canada, or whatever, are part of the uniqueness of this nation. As we start off this 35th Parliament it is very important that we realize and think about where we are going.

At the outset I want to say that I cannot in any way express my feelings in words as firmly and as sincerely as I would like. No matter where I am in Canada, I feel at home. I hope there is not another Canadian from sea to sea to sea who does not feel the same way.

Whenever I am speaking to development groups, whether they be chambers of commerce or municipal councils or county or regional councils or whatever, I always impress upon them the importance of smiling to people on the street and saying hello. It is very important to welcome people to your community. You can do that by breaking the ice.

I believe there is an element developing in Canada where there is a coolness in one part of the country to people in the other. First of all we must remember that our ancestors put this nation together. They put it together through hard work and determination. Can anyone imagine the work it took to put the first railroad across this great nation of ours and why it was done? It was done to weld this country together economically and, hopefully, socially.

I have the immigration figures here for Canada from 1852 to 1972. It spells a story of immigration to western Canada. It spells the early days of immigration to-I do not call it central Canada, I call it by the names of the provinces-Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada. We have some great heritage in this country, not only in physical objects but in messages, philosophies and mentalities that have been passed on to us through generations.

I listened to the hon. leader of the Reform Party this afternoon. He had some particular views because he comes from another region of the country. I respect those views. I respect some of the views that have been put forward by the opposition. I cannot say that I go along with them, but they have the right to state them in this institution or anywhere in this country. We have to get down to a good, honest, in-depth debate on this nation. We cannot have an ongoing debate in a country as to

whether we are going to have national unity or whether we are not.

There are jobless people across Canada today. They want jobs. The average people in this country want to put bread on their tables. They want to have the dignity of being full-fledged citizens participating in their society. They would much rather be paying taxes than receiving welfare payments. It is up to us in this Parliament and in every legislature in Canada to think of those people, to think of the further advancement of Canada, this nation that was put together by great people like George Etienne Cartier, Baldwin and Lafontaine, people who had the flexibility to meet the other person's mind, have discussion and eventually agree.

That is going to be the big issue in this Parliament. Are we Canadians going to sit around, continue to bicker and differ among ourselves on questions of national unity when if we got together and had a meeting of minds we would go on to retain and improve Canada as one of the greatest nations on the face of the earth? Some people in other parts of the world would give their back teeth to be here with us today.

We not only have a great obligation to Canadians to provide jobs, we have a great obligation in this country to create research and development, to go on with it, to think of people in various parts of this country. Transportation is very important to this nation. We have many issues before us today; a $46 billion deficit in one year, a $500 billion debt in this country.

I beg and plead with all members in this House to get down to the business that our ancestors would want us to do, and that is building Canada, which they strained their backs and expended their energies to do. They had a vision for Canada. Let us not lose that vision. Canada is one of the most loved nations on the face of the earth today. Other countries must be wondering what is going on here. If we are arguing among ourselves, they will wonder whether we are going to tear it apart or not. I have such a deep feeling for this nation that I could not help but lay my notes aside tonight and express these very sincere and in-depth feelings.

We have a nation here that is not fully developed. Some people talk as if we are a fully developed nation. Out there we can create jobs by promoting tourism in this country. Tourism in Canada is virtually untouched, virtually untapped. We have some of the greatest scenes in this nation. Remember this. We have had a tremendous group of statesmen in this House over the years since these Parliament Buildings were first designed in 1859 and the members here now are in some of those seats. I ask the members to think about developing the vision, the sincerity and the dedication to our nation of those people who passed through these seats ahead of us over the years.

I have the list of Prime Ministers here. People think that Parliament is a raucous place today. Take out Hansard and read some of the debates on the great free trade of the 1911 election. Read the debates of the conscription issue in this House in 1917. It practically tore the country apart. It was a terrible thing on the social conscience of Canadians.

In the opposition lobby and in the government lobby of that day, I was told by an older person a few years ago, there was a bar and the debate went on all night long. Can you imagine what a spirited debate that was.

That is the kind of history we have here. We are not an old country. We are a very young country. It is not surprising that we should be having debates on national unity along the way. I just want to say this evening that we should think of the railway building which I mentioned and those people who immigrated to Canada and their train trips across this nation. After getting off ships some settled in Montreal. The St. Lawrence seaway development is one of the finest waterways that any continent could be blessed with. We can live together. You bet we can live together and we can thrive together.

If we put our energies into developing Canada and put a vision into this Parliament, exercise a vision to create jobs, we can make Canadians happy again right across this country. Canada is worth retaining. The world knows that. It seems to me that what we have to do is convince ourselves. We have some great talent in this country.

I have friends all across the province of Quebec. I have friends across Atlantic Canada. I have relatives in western Canada whom I have never seen, as many members may have. I have been to the territories in the north. This is the way we can build bridges. We must see our country and we must know our people. There must be respect for people out there. The only way that we can expect their respect is if we are not only seen to be but in fact are working on their behalf and on their betterment for the future.

There has to be respect for dignity, a respect for people of different cultures, yes, and a respect for some decency throughout the world. Hope and dignity should be the landmarks of this Parliament.

I agree with the hon. member for Glengarry-Prescott-Russell when he said a while ago: "People think everybody was fighting with one another in past Parliaments". Over my years here I have had many very good friends on both sides of the House. I remain in touch with some of them today.

The 205 new members in the House have one of the greatest opportunities going. It is a personal challenge. They too will make friends back and forth across the floor. They too will find

that those people worked just as hard to get elected and have good ideas for Parliament and for Canada. They will grow to respect one another.

To every one sitting in the House now I say it is a great opportunity to be flexible, to develop friends and to establish a base for helping people across the country. There are people out there who are hurting. Let us remember that the three main industries from colonial days that built this nation of Canada were the fisheries, the forests and agriculture. All three of them are facing considerable trouble today and we must have a feeling for the people out there who are fighting to stay alive, to make a living and to be creative.

Over the years Canada has grown up a great deal. We have developed into a very responsible nation. I went to Dieppe on one of the anniversaries of the battle there and I could not believe what I saw. It was the first time I had seen it. There was a little narrow beach with tremendous cliffs that had openings in them all the way up for machine gun turrets and other heavy artillery. Poor Canadians were sent across the English Channel to attack Dieppe. One does not need any imagination at all to question the senior officer or officers who made that decision. Canada must have greater say in what we do with our Canadians abroad, whether it be in peacekeeping duties or, hopefully not, in time of war.

Ten of thousands of young people died in World War I. They did not have an opportunity to live in this country. They did not have an opportunity to sit in this Parliament. Within 21 years there was a second world war that took another cream of the crop of young people from this nation. They are resting in graves far from this nation. They fought for Canada. They fought for peace in the world. They fought for freedom. They wanted a free world. Today in their memory the least we can do is have some flexibility and real sound friendship right across the nation for which they fought and died, were wounded or came home with horrendous thoughts about what they had experienced.

These are some of my feelings today as I sit here and listen to the debate. I did not get into the contents of the throne speech which is a good start, an excellent start. I remember every word of it as do other members on the government side of the House and those on the other side. We had the red book and what we have in the throne speech is part of the red book. There will be more to come. As parliamentarians we must gain the respect of Canadians by doing what we said we were going to do. We cannot win them all. We are not going to come out of it batting 100 per cent, but with the fact that there is a target to aim at we are going to come out of it far better than if we did not map out our route in the first place.

The very fact that each of us was elected to this House of Commons shows that we have some special qualities and appeal to the people who sent us here. I ask the new members to develop a good rapport with all of us. My mind is open. My handshake goes out to anyone in this House who wants to discuss an issue whether or not I totally disagree.

Let us think of one thing. We want to get Canadians employed. We want to continue this great nation for which our forefathers fought so hard. They put up with much torment to build our nation of today.

[House Of Commons, January 19th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I welcome you and all members of the House to a great job with many descriptions.

Today as Canadians we have many great challenges facing us, which also means that we have many great opportunities. Let us be very mindful that it is our responsibility to tackle the challenges of today with the same dedication, determination, courage and foresight as those early pioneers who developed this great country God has given to us as a gift.

On behalf of all Canadians it is up to us to build a human infrastructure into our nation in the form of human bridges of understanding among regions of the country, bridges between suffering and comfort, bridges between unemployment and employment, bridges among cultures based on a proud but humble Canadian spirit.

As Pearl McInnis said: "I have no yesterdays. Time took them away. Tomorrow may not be but I have today". Let us work toward a greater Canada and a better world. Welcome to these new challenges.

[Sitting Resumed, January 17th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, everybody has heard enough from me so far today but I would like to congratulate you first of all and wish you well.

To all of the candidates go our very best wishes and our sincere thanks for the seriousness which they showed toward this great institution of our country. I want to thank each one of them for their deep interest.

I particularly want to thank the members of this House for their conduct throughout the day and for the friendliness that was shown here today. I sensed a very good rapport within this House and I hope that will continue as we debate the issues in good spirit. I wish all the new members all the best in their careers and good wishes to those who have returned.

In you, Mr. Speaker, the integrity of this House rests to a large degree but it also rests with each and every one of us on the floor of this House. The Speaker cannot do it all by himself. We need the co-operation of all members to do it so we have to conduct ourselves in a decent fashion in this place.

If we do that there is no question in my mind, Mr. Speaker, but that you will carry the rest of the load.

The Speaker read a communication from the Secretary to the Governor General announcing that His Excellency the Governor General of Canada would proceed to the Senate chamber for the purpose of opening the first session of the 35th Parliament.