Vic Althouse

[Disaster Relief, April 13th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, people remember last summer's flooding in the U.S. midwest and the damage done to crops and communities there. The U.S. federal government responded generously and so did ours, sending PFRA technicians and engineers to assist with the the dykes and dams.

Our own flooded and snow covered crops in northeastern Saskatchewan and northwestern Manitoba, however, have so far been ignored. There were no large centres to be flooded, only acres and acres of flat black soil which were later covered with snow and subsequently trampled by wildlife, making most of it unrecoverable.

Not only has last year's crop been lost but conditions are such that probably this year's will not be seeded on those lands either.

Since such circumstances are not addressed under existing programs, I have asked the federal minister of agriculture to initiative third line of defence actions which are to be triggered when existing programs fail. Why has he not acted? Why are these farmers and communities being left to fend for themselves?

I know the red book ignored farm policy but surely the government cannot ignore this.

[Petitions, March 16th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I have about 1,300 more names on a petition to add to the several thousand that have already been presented from my riding.

These petitioners draw to the attention of the House of Commons that sections 41 and 42 of the Constitution Act, 1982 provide that an amendment to the Constitution of Canada in relation to certain matters may be initiated by a resolution of the House of Commons.

The petitioners therefore call upon the House to urge the government to abolish the Senate.

[Petitions, February 21st, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I have another 850 to 900 names affixed to a petition noting that the Senate is unelected, unaccountable and home for recipients of Liberal and Tory patronage.

The petitioners note that sections 41 and 42 of the Constitution Act provides that an amendment to the Constitution of Canada in relation to these matters may be initiated by the House of Commons. Therefore they call on the House to initiate a resolution to abolish the Senate.

[Ministerial Statements, February 18th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I am concerned about yesterday's refusal by the Reform Party House leader to allow a ministerial statement in the House.

Private members fought long and hard against Brian Mulroney's policy of ignoring this Chamber. He broke the longstanding tradition of making government announcements in the Chamber. Instead he and his ministers made statements to the press, often off the Hill, which members would read about afterward.

If this Chamber is ever going to get back its ancient role of being able to control and contain government spending, it must reclaim the right to hear all ministerial announcements that affect spending. Forcing ministers out of the House, as the hon. member for Kindersley-Lloydminster-

[Defence Policy, February 17th, 1994]

Madam Speaker, yesterday I rose in my place and put a question to the government which was answered by the Minister of Transport. However I believe he failed to catch the full impact of the question. He treated it as a pre-budget question which it was not.

Essentially the question concerned the government's intention with regard to the Crow benefit under the Western Grain Transportation Act, something that the red book forgot and which the Liberal Party ignored during the election. It is time the government became more clear as to what its intentions are with that Crow benefit because it is very important to the continued development of the economy of western Canada.

For those who do not know, the Crow rate was established to encourage settlement of western Canada. Settlement would not have occurred at the levels it did at the turn of the century without the Crow rate. In 1982 a previous Liberal government decided to kill the Crow and put in its place a Crow benefit which was supposed to continue into perpetuity.

The previous Conservative government under Brian Mulroney decided to begin dismantling that Crow benefit 10 per cent starting August 1 of this crop year and tabled a bill from the Ministry of Transport which would have the effect of doing away with that financial benefit entirely in four years.

That means the government will save somewhere between $650 million and $730 million annually. I suppose that is why it causes great fear in my heart to think the Minister of Transport would only see it that far.

Essentially this Crow benefit and the Crow rate that preceded it have been the underpinning of land values in western Canada. At the moment farmland values amount to something in the area of $35 billion. Doing away with this benefit will essentially make that land worthless.

If the government wishes to do away with the benefit, it will be taking away about $35 billion of equity in western Canada's economy which cannot be easily replaced and is being used now to finance the restructuring of that western economy. People borrow against farmland to build small and large plants in their own communities to diversify the economy of that part of the country.

If the Department of Transport has its way this opportunity for diversification will be cut off right at the knees. Not only will it be cut off but government will be cutting off all hope of future diversity financed from within the region. It will be killing the hopes and dreams of people and sometimes four generations of work of the people whose businesses will go bankrupt as a result of this policy.

If the government does not understand how the economics of this work, it should simply take a quick look at my own community where the Crow benefit amounts to something like $29 a tonne. We produce about one tonne per acre and the cash rents in that area are about $25 a tonne. Doing away with the Crow benefit means that cash rents have a market value of minus $4 per acre. I can assure the spokesman for the government that minus $4 an acre return means that the land is not worth very much.

[Grain Transportation, February 16th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the minister of agriculture or Minister of Transport.

Last August the previous government began dismantling the Crow benefit portion of the Western Grain Transportation Act by cutting it by 10 per cent. It proposed further cuts over four years which would see the Crow disappear completely.

Since rents and farmland values are being forced down by this policy, making the refinancing of a diversified western economy more difficult, if not impossible, will the government fully reinstate the Crow benefit in perpetuity?

[West Coast Ports Operations Act, 1994, February 8th, 1994]

Mr. Chairman, I wonder if the minister could clarify for us what the points of the dispute are, what the financial differences are between the two parties. Reports in the press say that it is 10 cents the first year, 10 cents the second and a nickel for other benefits. Is that in fact the only thing that is at issue between the two parties at this time?

[West Coast Ports Operations Act, 1994, February 8th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the hon. member's outlining his solutions to labour disputes at the west coast. I am personally quite angry that this particular dispute has come about and the disruption that has occurred. Before we are finished with this nearly three weeks will have been lost in the shipment of grains, at a time when the shipping program was at its peak and in particular at its peak for those grades which we have had some trouble disposing of since they were in surplus in Canada: No. 3 wheat and the feed grains.

In listening to the hon. member's solutions I wonder if he would square for me what I understood his party's position is with regard to property rights and the rights of the owners to manage that property. How would he square that right with his proposal to force these people to stay open, keeping in mind that this disruption for grain at least and the previous one or two disruptions came about as a result of a lockout where the owners of the longshoring companies or the grain handling companies simply refused to open their doors to let the workers continue?

[Petitions, January 26th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I have petitions signed by residents of Naicam, Saskatchewan and area who wish to draw to the attention of the House that the Senate is an unelected, unaccountable institution which has become the home of recipients of political patronage and has long since discarded any notion of working in the interest of taxpayers.

They note that since sections 41 and 42 of the Constitution Act of 1982 provides for amendments to the Constitution in relation to certain matters such as this to be initiated by resolution of the House, they request that the House pass such a resolution and abolish the Senate.

[Speech From The Throne, January 20th, 1994]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the member for Wetaskiwin on his introductory speech to the House.

Because we are only an hour away from having to make a decision on his party's amendment to the speech from the throne I wonder if he would be so kind as to respond to some questions I have concerning the proposal to put a cap on expenditures.

In spite of the fact that this House in the last Parliament passed such a law introduced by the then Minister of Finance, Don Mazankowski, member for Vegreville, we had the largest deficit overrun that has ever occurred in this country. I am wondering why he or his party think that a repeat of that absolutely useless kind of legal requirement from this House, that absolutely ineffective law and direction, is going to work this time.