Ken Epp

[Firearms Registry, March 28th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, our daughter lives in Saskatchewan, the presumed home of medicare. She told me that two of her friends had to travel to Alberta and Manitoba to get critical health care. Her father-in-law had to wait six months for a critical heart operation and was told to be very careful while he was waiting. Our daughter was very upset about this. This is her question, and I quote, “Why does the government insist on spending billions of dollars on a useless gun registry when this money is so badly needed for health care?”

[Budget Implementation Act, 2003, March 27th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot say the words as they are unparliamentary. The member said a whole bunch of things that are just totally wrong.

First, he said that we had spent, when the Liberals took over, up to 70% of the money on interest. That is not true. At maximum, it was around 30%, which is still way too high, that the interest payments were taking, but it was not 70%. His numbers are all whacky. He talked about the debt and how wonderful the government is in tackling the debt and reducing it. The fact of the matter is that when the Liberals came to power the debt was $508 billion. Under their watch it grew to $583 billion. It is true that since then it has come down a bit, but it is still higher than when they took office. If it were not for their free-spending ways, we would have reduced it much more.

I have much more to say, Mr. Speaker. Could I ask for unanimous consent for another two minutes?

[Budget Implementation Act, 2003, March 27th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I regret interrupting my colleague because I am sure he has a good answer to the question, but it seems to me there is a standing order which does not allow us to reflect on a vote that has been taken in the House.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2003, March 27th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently to the hon. member's speech. I was particularly interested in his comments regarding the huge debt that students face in this country and the real tepid measures in this budget to do anything about it.

I have ideas about things I would like to see done. I would like to hear more from the hon. member since he talked about the huge debt, up to $50,000 and sometimes even more, for a graduating student. How would he suggest this should be handled by the Canadian government on behalf of Canadians and particularly on behalf of students in order to allow them to do as we did in our generation, that is to graduate debt free?

[Criminal Code, March 21st, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I have a couple of things to say on the bill. I think it would be appropriate for me to begin by making a very important announcement.

One hundred and seventy-five hours ago we saw another Epp baby come into the world. I am a grandfather for the fifth time. I will use a term which is unparliamentary but not offensive, it is my name. In the Epp tradition, the baby came into the world just perfectly. He even had a little hair over his ear to match grandpa's, which was very nice.

This grandchild is little Micah. He is the baby brother of Noah and Hannah. When I see him and his older sister and brother I cannot help but think how totally deplorable and depraved it would be for anyone to engage in any activity of a sexual nature with these innocent, young, beautiful children. Nor can I can understand how anyone would get any pleasure whatsoever from depicting, either by written words, by pictures. cartoons or whatever, that type of activity.

I find that totally deplorable. In fact, I do not know of any words in the English language or in either of my other two languages that come anywhere close to describing the absolutely horrific nature of such an activity.

Along come the Liberals and they say that they will introduce Bill C-20. It is a Criminal Code amendment designed to safeguard children from sexual exploitation. It is a very hapless title. It reminds me of the days when I drove a truck. I used to haul big loads with a big rig on the highway. Every once in a while we did not have a back haul. I would be driving the big truck empty simply to get to another destination. I had no load.

That is what the bill is. It has a fancy title but the bill is empty. It does not begin to address the issues that are before us as a society and as lawmakers in this country.

I want to be very specific because I know this is actually a bill that was brought forward to make political hay. The Liberals brought forward the bill with nothing in it to protect children so that we in opposition will have no choice but to vote against it. We will vote against it because it is ineffective. The bill does not do anything to protect children.

In the next election we probably will have brochures in our ridings asking why people would vote for that Canadian Alliance member when he voted against the protection of children. That will be the Liberals' messaging. I find that almost as offensive as the bill itself. I have seen this happen in previous election campaigns.

For the Liberals to use children in such a blatant way shows how really empty they are of any principles at all. I am really distressed about this.

We have, for example, in the bill a move that is supposed to make it easier to actually convict child pornographers. How will we do that if we stand in front of the same judges trying to make the case? In the past we went there and said that something was bad that the person should be convicted of a crime. The defence would argue, no, that this was in keeping with community standards.

It turned out that community standards basically allowed almost anything to go through because it is very difficult to define community standards. They changed that in the bill calling it “public good”. That may be a little more difficult to prove. Maybe community standards sometimes are contrary to public good but, as I see it, they are almost identical in the eyes of a judge in a law court.

The public good could be argued to be served if we simply fail to stop somebody from writing this junk. They would say “that is the public good”, and they would be arguing free speech. I am not against free speech but limitations to a certain degree are valid. In my humble opinion, when it comes to protecting our beautiful, innocent, young children, we stop at nothing.

I would be totally content to say that to depict child pornography in any form whatsoever, written, hand drawn, definitely photographs or films or videos, but even the written stuff and the hand created cartoon stuff, if it depicts children being abused, it is wrong.

We ought to have a law in this country that says that no one can do it. I would even go so far as to write into the legislation “notwithstanding anything in the charter” so that defence could not be used. I would say “notwithstanding anything in the charter, this bill provides that no one may produce or possess, in any form whatsoever, any form of child pornography”. Then perhaps we could stand tall and say that we are doing something tangible to protect our children.

I cannot let my time slip by without making a comment on a glaring omission in the bill, and that is the age of consent. I do not know how it happened in our country that we allowed the age of consent to slip down to 14.

Our goddaughter had a birthday yesterday if I am not mistaken. I know she just turned 12 but that means she finished her twelfth year of life and she is into her thirteenth year. Again, there is absolutely no justification anywhere, anytime for anyone to talk a child of that age into sexual activity. It just is wrong.

Here we have a bill that says we are going to protect children but does nothing with the age of consent. I need to explain this for anyone who may not know what it means. It means that an adult cannot stand up in court and say “I am innocent because she agreed to it”. That is all it means. No one cannot persuade a 13 year old in this country to have sex and get away with it because that is not permitted, but if she is 14, they can. I say that is way too low. The very serious omission in the bill is that it does not address that problem.

We could talk about many other things in the bill but I guess I will have only time for one more in my last minute and that has to do with minimum and maximum sentences.

In the bill the maximum sentences have been increased. Fine, but will the courts use them, or will they continue to give continual sentences?

I had a letter from an individual who actually chastised me for calling for minimum sentences. She said that she did not want minimum sentences for those creeps. She said that she wanted maximum sentences. I wrote to her and told her I understood what she was saying. She wants to punish them to the max, which is right, but, unfortunately, if a maximum sentence is given in the law it prohibits a judge from giving any sentence greater than that. A minimum sentence means that a sentence must be given of at least a set amount.

We should have minimum sentences in a bill that purports to protect children but it is not in the bill. Therefore I will be voting against the bill and my reason is that I truly want to protect children.

[Question No. 132, March 21st, 2003]

For each year from 1993 to 2001 what was the total amount billed to the government and it agencies by EKOS Research Associates?

(Return tabled.)

[Committees of the House, March 21st, 2003]

Madam Speaker, notwithstanding that the House leader for the government stood up, my colleague did ask for you to ask for unanimous consent and we would request that you do that.

[Parliamentarians' Code of Conduct, March 20th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. It seems to me that it is a rule of the House that a private member's bill cannot be introduced if there is already a government bill seized with the issue and I think that is the case with the code of conduct. I think perhaps this private member's bill just introduced should not be in order on that account.

[Supply, March 20th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, as I stand here today I share probably as much pain as any of the other members here, I believe, over the thought that there are innocent people in our world who are being killed. That is very unfortunate. In a way we are debating here that old philosophical question that we are asked at university. There are five people in a boat. One has to be pushed over. Which one goes, the baby, the mother, the old grandmother or the wretched old man who is in the back? Which one is taken? Then there is debate on what the value of human life is and how one makes these choices. I think the dilemma we face is in evaluating whether the loss of life in a short mission to stop this very evil person will result in fewer lives lost than if we were to allow him to continue with the kinds of things he has been doing for many years.

I think, for example, of our lack of involvement in Rwanda. My own son and his wife were in Rwanda as relief agents providing shelter and homes for 400 children whose parents were needlessly killed in the conflict in Rwanda while the rest of the world sat by and let it happen. We should have moved in and stopped it to prevent all of those innocent folks from being killed, but we did not. Perhaps this time we are saying that this is a tyrant who must be stopped and, as unsavoury as it is, we will stand between him and his victims.

Unfortunately, in every war there are innocent victims. Members of my own family were innocent victims. How many of us in this place have fathers, uncles and grandfathers who lie in graves in a foreign land because they were fighting not for Canada's immediate interests but for peace, democracy and lack of tyranny, for stopping people like Hitler and others? That is why we die. We do not do it only for what is immediately good for Canada. I share that as a dilemma. I know that people here have come to a different conclusion. When attacked I will do everything I can to stop it, but if that person is attacking others I believe I have an obligation to stand in between.

[Canada Student Loans Program, March 18th, 2003]

Madam Speaker, I support the measure taken in this private member's motion. It has been a theme of mine for a long time.

One of the greatest errors we make is that everyone in our country, all of our young people, our best and our brightest, regardless of their financial situation or the situation of their families, are not being provided with access to education. This has been a theme of mine.

I remember when I was teaching at the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology that too often there were students who had to stop their education for the reason that they could not afford to pay their bills. They could not pay for their tuition and their books and the usual costs of living which every person has. Especially with the increased costs of fuel, heating, electricity and all of that, students are being driven out of the education system and we suffer as a country.

I would even go so far as to say it is a great investment. It is a tremendously good investment when we educate our young people. I did a quick calculation. Let us assume that after graduating from a post-secondary institution, a university or whatever, a student earns $200 more a month over his or her earning lifetime. I think that is a very modest estimate. In most instances the salary would be much greater than that compared to the salary of someone who went into the workforce right out of high school.

That $200 more a month over a lifetime of earnings could easily provide that young person with an additional income of about $108,000 accumulated without any consideration of interest at all. If half of that was paid in provincial and federal taxes, which I guess is probably just a little over what it is now, but just using half as the number, it means that in educating one person, we would get back directly in tax dollars collected from that person, $54,000. That is not a bad investment at all.

Of course that totally ignores the fact that it is because of our educated young people that we enjoy the quality of life and the high standard of living that we have in this country.

I would like to see measures taken by the government that would enable students to get an education irrespective of their financial situation. We ought to do that. Of course, this is one possibility.

I have other proposals. I would like to see students earn their tuition and their books in the following year, strictly as a function of how good their marks are. If they worked hard and got good marks, they would be paid per mark, applied to their tuition and books for the next year. That would be a tremendous assistance to students. It is something we should vigorously pursue.

Of course this also is a measure which would reduce the debt load. How terrible of us to allow our young people to graduate from university or college and have a such a high debt load that they cannot put a down payment on a house. They cannot start their own little small business or enterprise because they have such a huge debt load just to pay for their education. That is atrocious and needs to be fixed.

I commend the member for this initiative.