Philippe Paré

[Journée Internationale De La Francophonie, March 20th, 1995]

On behalf of all my colleagues in the Bloc Quebecois I am especially proud today to mark the Journée internationale de la Francophonie.

On this day, it is fitting to point out that Quebec's opening up to the world has been nowhere more evident than in its participation in the international francophone community. Since the early sixties, Quebec has been forging special bilateral links with France. This intense co-operation between Quebec and France has contributed significantly to the strengthening of multilateral contacts with francophone communities, resulting in numerous exchanges between Quebec and its main francophone partners, especially Europe and Africa, in many areas such as culture, education, scientific development, high technology and industry.

The Journée internationale de la Francophonie is especially significant this year as it happens to be the 25th anniversary of the founding of the Agence de coopération culturelle et technique. In the early seventies, the agency provided the focus for the development of the international francophone community. Quebec's right to formally participate in the agency's proceedings was quickly recognized, as was its right to sit as a participating government in the francophone summit.

There is no doubt that Quebec's participation in the international francophone community is vital to its opening onto the world. Moreover, rediscovering the way to a vibrant solidarity with francophone and Acadian communities in Canada, Quebec will be able to play a central role in building a francophone space in North America.

Last May, while making public the Bloc's commitment to the American francophone community, the Leader of the Opposition rightly pointed out that by building bridges between francophone communities in North America and the rest of the world, Quebec will be able to help make the voices of francophone and Acadian communities in Canada heard in the concert of nations, and will be thus in a better position to promote their cause.

Francophones in America have a common future and, when Quebec becomes a full partner on the international scene, freed from the constraints of being a mere province, it will be able to play this role fully. We are eagerly looking forward to that day.

[Immigration, March 15th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, how does the minister explain the fact that the Immigration and Refugee Board apparently did not look into the grounds for Mr. Khan's request, as the UN committee's ruling indicates?

[Immigration, March 15th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

Yesterday, the UN Committee Against Torture ruled that Canada's treatment of Mr. Khan, a refugee claimant from Pakistan, violated the international convention against torture, to which Canada itself is a signatory.

Since the decision concludes that this individual would be in danger of being subjected to torture if Canada sent him back to his native country, does the Canadian government undertake not to deport Mr. Khan?

[International Assistance, March 14th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, how does the minister justify such a substantial reduction in its direct assistance to the poorest countries even before completing the reform of CIDA recommended by the Auditor General of Canada?

[International Assistance, March 14th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

In its budget, the government announces a substantial cut in international development assistance, in particular food aid to the poorest countries on earth. In fact, it is reducing by 16 per cent the multilateral and bilateral food aid budget, which will fall from $300 million to $250 million this year.

How does the Minister of Foreign Affairs reconcile Canada's substantial cuts to its international assistance budget with the support it gave to increasing development aid to the poorest countries at the Copenhagen summit on social development?

[The Budget, February 28th, 1995]

Madam Speaker, I would like above all to respond to the initial remarks made by the member for Nickel Belt. He seems to regard it as quite an exploit that, thanks to Canadian federalism, he is still able to rise in this House and speak in French.

I must say, it is very difficult for me to understand how this view can be so easily accepted since the opposite would indicate assimilation. So he admits that it is exceptional that he has not been assimilated.

As he comes from a French speaking community, I find it rather difficult to understand how someone like him could say that; he is aware of the incredible rates of assimilation in Canada. In 1971, the rate of assimilation for all English speaking provinces was 27 per cent, but by 1991 it had increased to 37 per cent.

Equally, he is a member of a government whose language commissioner recently released a totally shocking report on this government's inability to provide francophones in other provinces with services in French. He is also a member of this government which will make cuts to the CBC, no doubt equally in the French and English networks, without realizing that the French network has been discriminated against for 20 years, although audience ratings are identical and budgets are one third higher for the English network, identical ratings and identical schedules, unless I can be convinced that the English language CBC network is on the air 36 hours a day, which I would find very difficult to understand.

I find it difficult to understand those remarks and I would like to know how he can rise in the House and praise a federal system which has created these things which are after all neither very interesting nor very praiseworthy.

[The Budget, February 28th, 1995]

Madam Speaker, for many months and in fact for a number of years, federalists have claimed that all Canada's economic ills are caused by political instability. When in recent months interest rates went up and the Canadian dollar went down abruptly, people said: It is all because of those nasty separatists.

Perhaps the hon. member would care to explain why, the day after a budget that was rather well received by the financial community, interest rates seem to be going down and the dollar seems to be going up? Why, since the Quebec problem still exists? How would he explain that?

[Cuba, February 20th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak today on behalf of the Bloc Quebecois on Motion No. 281 presented by the member for Burnaby-Kingsway.

The aim of the motion essentially is to induce the Canadian government to denounce the American embargo on Cuba in the strongest terms possible at the United Nations, at the OAS and to the American administration directly. It also supports the re-establishment of full aid and bilateral trade ties with Cuba.

It is one thing to express solidarity with the people of Cuba; but it is another matter altogether to interfere in United States' foreign affairs and to support a dictatorship. The member for Burnaby-Kingsway, in an analysis that was hardly more than an expression of emotion and without even having heard our arguments, condemned the position of the Bloc Quebecois. I would ask him, therefore, to take note of the basis for our position. Perhaps he knocked down a door that was open much more than he thought.

The Bloc Quebecois will vote against the motion. Now allow me to set out the reasons behind our position. There are two reasons for our disagreement.

First, we do not believe we should force the United States to change their foreign policy to meet the objectives of Canadian foreign policy, especially because we, ourselves, are particularly jealous of our own sovereignty.

Second, we do not believe the state of human rights in Cuba would permit the re-establishment of bilateral aid with it.

With respect to our first objection, we do not see how the Canadian government could dictate rules of conduct to the American government. Canada has always refused to interfere in the internal politics and diplomatic conduct of foreign states. We do not see why Canada would change matters now, and believe, furthermore, that it would not be in Canada's interest to do so.

If Canada undertook the action proposed by our NDP colleague, we would have to be consistent and adopt a similar attitude toward a multitude of other countries whose foreign policy objectives do not coincide with our own.

In any case, the Canadian government already has enough to do to look after its own foreign affairs, without taking on the task of advising its partners.

In this regard, we would like to mention that a number of questions are currently awaiting action by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, such as the case of Tran Trieu Quan, which I have mentioned on several occasions in the House. The minister should do everything possible to have this Canadian prisoner released from Vietnam rather than attempting in vain to influence American foreign policy.

Moreover, while the American embargo against Cuba is certainly harming that country's economy, Castro's regime is clearly also responsible for the present economic crisis in Cuba. Would Canada not be better advised to attempt to convince Cuban authorities to truly liberalize their economy, rather than attempting to convince American authorities to raise their embargo? Cuba's state run economy carries a very high price and the few liberalization measures implemented recently, such as making the peso convertible, will not be enough to stop the Cuban economy from nose diving.

Cuba needs help in initiating the unavoidable transition to a market economy. The best thing for Canada to do in this regard is to support such reforms through dialogue and trade. Such

action on the part of Canada would be welcome in view of its new foreign policy direction.

Economic reforms must nevertheless be implemented concurrently with political reforms. Dictatorship and the culture of fear must be eliminated in Cuba. Since the Bloc Quebecois strongly opposes the philosophy of trade at any price, human rights in Cuba should be taken into account in shaping our relations with this country. I will return to this later.

That said, we would be against Canada participating in the embargo against Cuba. The Bloc Quebecois expressed its approval when the Canadian government announced its decision to resume aid to this Caribbean state last June.

Let us keep in mind that, following Cuba's involvement in the Angolan conflict in 1978, Canada decided to stop providing aid to, while maintaining diplomatic relations with that country. Now that the cold war is over, the new international order calls for a reorientation of Canada's relations with Cuba. The time has come to end that country's diplomatic and trade isolation. At stake is the very survival of its people, who have been hit extremely hard by Cuba's severe economic crisis. Therefore, it would be quite appropriate to resume our humanitarian aid to that country.

However, this new decision by the Department of Foreign Affairs does not include restoring bilateral aid. The Bloc Quebecois agrees with the government on this. The motion put forward by our colleague from Burnaby-Kingsway calls for restoring bilateral aid. That is another reason why we cannot support it.

The Bloc Quebecois feels that Canada should give priority to partnership-based aid programs and that international co-operation through NGOs is by far the safest and most efficient way to deliver aid to needy countries. This principle should be implemented especially when human rights abuses preclude any sustainable human development effort.

In our dissenting report on the review of Canada's foreign policy, we were very clear on this. The majority of witnesses who appeared before the special standing committee agreed with us.

In this report, we recommended that "Canada discontinue all bilateral aid to states that UN agencies or any other agency recognized by the UN have identified as having committed or been responsible for gross and reliably attested human rights violations".

So far, Cuba has shown no sign of being on the road to democracy and establishing a state based on the rule of law. The Cuban government did however make real progress in some areas, particularly social and economic rights.

But as regards civil and political rights, which are systematically violated by the Cuban regime, there is still serious cause for concern, as evidenced by UN resolutions on the matter as well as constant inquiries about Cuba at the Commission of Human Rights in Geneva.

On this subject, I would like to remind the Canadian government that Cuba is not the only latin-american country to violate human rights and that, in fact, matters are considered to be even worse elsewhere in that area. In January, a slew of NGOs expressed concern to the Canadian government about the situation in Guatemala, Mexico, Columbia and Peru.

At that time, the Canadian government was asked to denounce the human rights violations going on in these countries at the 51st session of the UN Commission of Human Rights in Geneva. It matters more to us, the Bloc Quebecois, that the Canadian government take this kind of action in the case of Cuba rather than condemn the conduct of the U.S. foreign policy.

In a nutshell, it might be a better idea for Canada to provide technical assistance and to do so though NGOs, because Cuba, which is currently facing a major food shortage, really needs humanitarian assistance. Any assistance sent directly to the Cuban government is not likely to serve Canadian official assistance objectives as well as if it were granted to humanitarian and non governmental organizations.

This is basically why the Bloc Quebecois opposes Motion No. 281 and why we will be voting against this motion.

[Petitions, February 14th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, one of my constituents, Tran Trieu Quan, has now been in prison in Vietnam for nearly a year. Your petitioners call upon Parliament to take action as soon as possible in order to obtain the release of Mr. Quan, a request I fully support.

[Foreign Affairs, February 13th, 1995]

Mr. Speaker, are we to understand from the foreign affairs minister's comments that his efforts and those of the Prime Minister were unsuccessful and that he is unable to protect a Canadian citizen whose fundamental rights are being flouted in Vietnam?