Bob Rae

[National Defence, May 2nd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, perhaps the Prime Minister can tell us quite simply whether the government accepts the Auditor General's findings.

Who in the government will take responsibility for the fact that the Canadian public and Parliament were misled by their own government? It is the Prime Minister's government that is refusing to take any responsibility whatsoever for the problems that have been so clearly described by the Auditor General.

Who, across the way, is truly responsible?

[National Defence, May 2nd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, let us understand what the conclusions of the Auditor General were. In paragraph 2.76 he says that the replacement aircraft were not accounted for, upgrades were not accounted for, cost of weapons were not accounted for, the true cost of annual maintenance was not accounted for. In paragraphs 2.80 and 2.81 he says that the National Defence did not exercise due diligence, which National Defence objected to and which it would appear still objects to, with respect to the findings of the Auditor General.

You are now creating a new process. How can Canadians trust the integrity of the process when your own deputies and your own departments are not following--

[National Defence, May 2nd, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister, the Minister of National Defence and the Minister of Public Works have all stated, as well as the government House leader, that they accept not only the recommendations of the Auditor General with respect to the fighter jet program, but they also accept the conclusions, his findings.

Could the Prime Minister comment on this? How does he expect us to take this seriously when his deputy minister yesterday testified that he thought the Auditor General had “got it wrong”? How do those two things compare and compute?

[Points of Order, May 1st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, in light of the answer given by the Prime Minister today to my questions with respect to the testimony in the public accounts committee, I wonder if I could have unanimous consent to read the relevant section of the testimony in that committee into the record.

[National Defence, May 1st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, this is not a trivial matter, because it has to do with the overall position of the Government of Canada with respect to what the Auditor General said.

The Auditor General said that not all costs had been fully divulged. He said that to compare the training costs on the F-35 with the training costs and the maintenance costs on the CF-18 was completely unrealistic. He said there was no accounting for the question of attrition and the number of jets that would be lost over the life cycle. He said that life-cycle accounting had to be done.

We now have the deputy minister of National Defence saying to the people of Canada that the Auditor General is wrong. Who speaks for Canada? That is the question we are asking with respect to this matter.

[National Defence, May 1st, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, another amazing contradiction was revealed today in the public accounts committee when the deputy minister of National Defence said that the Auditor General “got it wrong” when the Auditor General discussed budgetary matters in front a committee last week.

I would like to ask the Prime Minister this. We are now in an extraordinary situation. The government says it accepts the report of the Auditor General and it accepts the conclusions of the Auditor General, as well as the recommendations. Mr. Fonberg, the deputy minister of National Defence, says he rejects the findings of the Auditor General.

Who speaks for the Government of Canada with respect to the findings of the Auditor General?

[Business of Supply, April 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I knew the parliamentary secretary was going to raise that issue, which is why I would ask him to have a look at Justice O'Connor's report that points out that the reckless Rae administration reduced public expenditure in the ministry of the environment from $363 million to $271 million.

The difference between the government that I led and the Harris government was that nobody died on our watch. People need to ask themselves what the consequences will be of their actions? This is something the government is not prepared to accept.

I will not carry on a debate with respect to what happened between 1990 and 1995. The deficits that were run up in recent years by the current government are far larger than anything ever seen in the province of Ontario. The government has increased spending by over 40% of those five years. The Rae government increased it by 18%. The kinds of comparisons the member is making are nonsensical.

[Business of Supply, April 30th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I have very clear memories of that budget as I was premier of Ontario at the time that it was introduced.

However, it is important to recognize that different provinces managed those cuts in different ways. Not every province decided to cut its welfare benefits by 22%. Not every government, on the immediate impact of the federal transfer cuts, decided to cut its own revenues by cutting taxes saying that the approach that was being taken was being put in place.

I am sure the hon. member will recognize that every government in the country, in the years between 1990 and 1995, had to make some very tough decisions about how to deal with the deficit. We had to make them in Ontario and other provinces had to make them. The federal government did as well. I can say that at the time I did not relish the changes that were brought about in the 1995 Liberal budget but I think everyone recognizes that how each province responded to those was a matter of choice for those provinces.

The argument that one might hear from the Conservatives in Ontario, that the devil made me do it, is a completely nonsensical argument. It did not have a similar impact in other provinces. We did not have a similar collapse of the regulatory regime in other provinces that we had in Ontario.

What we have in Canada today, however, is a direct imitation of that approach and that philosophy, which is why we are pointing out the risks and dangers of it.

[Business of Supply, April 30th, 2012]

moved:

That, in the opinion of the House, the government, and specifically the Minister of Finance, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and the President of the Treasury Board, has failed to learn the painful lessons from Walkerton which proved that cuts to essential government services protecting the health and safety of Canadians are reckless and can cause Canadians to lose their lives; and further, that the House condemn the government for introducing a budget that will repeat the mistakes of the past and put Canadians in danger by reducing food inspection, search and rescue operations, and slashing environmental protections, and call on the government to reverse these positions.

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Wascana.

It is well known that the Conservative movement around the world bases its policy prescriptions on several key ideas, one of which is deregulation and the other of which is less government spending. I think it is fair to say that this government has been captured by this idea, as was the Harris government in Ontario.

It is important for the House to take the opportunity to understand, in the aftermath of the budget, the risks involved in following this ideology in a very stubborn way, such as we are seeing from the government.

It is ironic and nevertheless appropriate for this debate for us to point out that three of the senior ministers in the government were also senior ministers in the Harris government. It was during the time of that government in the year 2000 that there was an E. coli outbreak in the water supply of the community of Walkerton in the province, which led to the death of seven people, to 2,300 people falling ill and to the fact that even to this day some people are feeling the continuing effects of the E. coli outbreak.

As a result of that terrible series of events, the government of Ontario established a royal commission that was led by Mr. Justice Dennis O'Connor. Mr. Justice O'Connor found that, although one could point to individuals who had clearly failed to do their job, and subsequent charges were laid against those people, nevertheless there were broader responsibilities that needed to be established and spoken about.

In particular, Mr. Justice O'Connor found, and I am quoting from page 27 of his report where he said:

I am satisfied that a properly structured and administered inspections program would have discovered, before the May 2000 outbreak, both the vulnerability of Well 5...

which was the well in question that was contaminated

...and the PUC's unacceptable chlorination and monitoring practices. Had these problems been uncovered, steps could have been taken to address them, and thus to either prevent the outbreak or substantially reduce its scope.

He also concluded on page 30 of the report:

I am satisfied that if the MOE had adequately fulfilled its regulatory and over-sight role, the tragedy in Walkerton would have been prevented (by the installation of continuous monitors) or at least significantly reduced in scope.

In the course of his inquiry, Mr. Justice O'Connor pointed out the extent to which dramatic cuts were made in the Ministry of the Environment in the years after 1995, cuts that followed a period of restraint, admittedly, between 1990 and 1995, but were nevertheless a shift in philosophy.

There was a decision in 1996 to privatize the laboratory system, which would assess the quality of water, and continuing refusal of the government to implement a regulation that was suggested over and over again by several, including the Environment Commissioner of Ontario in 1996, that at the very least the private laboratories had the obligation to inform and to provide notice to the public health officer whenever there was a problem.

As it stood at that time, the only requirement was that the laboratories had to tell the very officials who were sending them the information.

What is interesting as well is that at the hearing, during the inquiry, the premier of the day, Mr. Harris, testified. He said:

I'm in a position to say, that at no time was any action taken by our government that I believe either jeopardized the health or safety of the people of this province or of Walkerton. I am in a position to say that.

He went on to say:

At...no time would we have approved or would I have approved, and I...don't believe our government would have approved, I don't know anybody that would, any reductions that would have jeopardized either the environment or public safety.

That is precisely what one would expect the premier to have said. If I may say so, it is precisely what we hear from ministers opposite when we challenge them with respect to the regulation of the food system and when we challenge them with respect to the changes in the search and rescue operations that are being shifted away from those areas that are closest to and best able to provide immediate response, to more centralized operations in Halifax and Trenton. Similarly, we hear from the Department of the Environment that the changes it is making are in fact going to improve the quality of the environment.

Perhaps we can be forgiven for taking with more than a grain of salt, but perhaps with several canisters, the comments we hear from members opposite when they say they can make these changes and they will have no deleterious effects, no negative impact on the health and safety of Canadians.

We do not have to go to other countries to find out what happens when deregulation goes too far. We do not have to go to other countries to find out what happens when the cuts in public expenditure, or when the reduction in the number of inspectors, or when the cuts in the numbers of people who are involved in an oversight and regulatory role, in fact, lead to loss of life. We do not have to go to the terrible examples around the world where regulatory failure has resulted in loss of life. We only have to go to Canada. We only have to go to the province of Ontario.

We do not have to look elsewhere to see negative outcomes and even loss of life. People have gotten sick not for a certain period of time, but for their whole lives because the regulatory system failed and cuts had a direct impact on their health. Of course, every time governments make those kinds of cuts, they will tell us that there will be no impact. They will keep saying that there will be no impact on the health and safety of Canadians.

We on this side are not simply skeptical. We are saying to at least let us learn the lessons of our own history. Let us at least understand that the kind of ideology that is rooted in this government is the same ideology that was rooted in the government of Ontario in the years 1995 to 2003 and that the consequence of that ideology had a significant impact on what really happened. People lost their lives. People died. People got very sick.

It is no exaggeration for us to say this: Let no one in Canada say that this Parliament did not warn the Government of Canada that the path it is taking us down on food inspection, on environmental protection and on search and rescue is a path that will have a direct impact on the real safety and security of Canadians, which is after all the fundamental purpose and objective of every government, regardless of its ideology.

[Privilege, April 26th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I want to reply to the comments made by the government House leader with respect to the question of the incompatibility between the government saying that it accepted the findings of the Auditor General and accepted his conclusions and the unwillingness of the government to accept any degree of ministerial accountability and any degree of responsibility for providing disinformation, misinformation, inadequate information over a year and a half with respect to the most important procurement that the Government of Canada has ever made, most important in terms of the sums of money involved.

It is a classic case where the government House leader again adopts the same line that was used during the break by the Minister of National Defence, saying that all we have here is a difference of accounting techniques between the Parliamentary Budget Officer and the Auditor General and the Government of Canada, that this is simply an accounting issue and has nothing to do at all with respect to ministerial accountability or ministerial responsibility.

To quote the comments that were made by the government House leader:

As we can see, this issue boils down not to whether Parliament was deliberately misled about the costs of the F-35, as the leader of the third party might like us to believe, but to the best way to account for the costs of purchasing replacement equipment.

This is a false statement by the government House leader. It is not what the issue is about. It does not describe the problem. It does not recognize the findings and the conclusions of the Auditor General. It does not in fact refer to the answers that the House has been given since the summer of 2010 with respect to this question of the purchase of the F-35s.

It is a fact that it was a finding of contempt by the House with respect to the refusal to provide adequate information to the finance committee and to the House of Commons that led to the contempt motion which led to the election.

The evidence is overwhelming, and it is overwhelming even today as the government responds to our questions, that in fact the contempt continues. This is a contempt that has still not stopped. The government is still not prepared to come clean. The government is still not prepared to provide us with adequate information. The government is still not prepared to accept responsibility for what has taken place. That is the basis of the question of privilege.

The privilege is very clear. Ministers systematically, since 2010, gave the House information which has proven to be incorrect, inadequate, partial and, in some cases, untrue.

As I am being heckled by members opposite, Mr. Speaker, let me simply refer you, Sir, and the House, once again, to the comments of the Auditor General of Canada, because these comments are very clear and it is very clear that we are not dealing here with an accounting question. We are dealing here with information that has simply not been provided to the House and with this absurd situation where the government says, “We accept the conclusions of the Auditor General”, and I can read out the conclusions of the Auditor General, but then nothing happens as a result.

No minister is held to account. Nobody is responsible for misinformation or disinformation being given to the committees of the House of Commons. No one is held accountable for the fact that Parliament was supposed to get information on this issue, but did not receive information on this issue. The government, to this day, continues to show not just disdain for the questions that are posed and refuses to give answers, but contempt for the House and, indeed, contempt for the entire process in simply not giving us the information which it has, which the Auditor General says its has and which it is not prepared to provide.

Let me refer you, Mr. Speaker, to the report of the Auditor General.

On page 28, paragraph 2.71 states:

We have a number of observations regarding the life-cycle costing for the F-35. First, costs have not been fully presented in relation to the life of the aircraft. The estimated life expectancy of the F-35 is about 8,000 flying hours, or about 36 years based on predicted usage. National Defence plans to operate the fleet for at least that long. It is able to estimate costs over 36 years.

Further on in that paragraph, it is stated:

However, in presenting costs to government decision makers and to Parliament, National Defence estimated life-cycle costs over 20 years. This practice understates operating, personnel, and sustainment costs, as well as some capital costs, because the time period is shorter than the aircraft’s estimated life expectancy. The Joint Strategic Fighter Program Office—

--the office in the United States--

—provided National Defence with projected sustainment costs over 36 years.

That clearly implies that the Minister of National Defence knew what those 36-year costs were. The entire time the House was debating this issue, he refused to come forward.

Paragraph 2.72 states:

Second, the following expected costs were not accounted for:

Replacement aircraft. National Defence considers 65 aircraft the minimum number needed to meet its training and operational requirements. Based on past experience, National Defence expects to lose aircraft in the course of normal usage. Based on National Defence’s assumed attrition rate, in order to maintain the fleet of 65 aircraft, Canada may need to purchase up to 14 additional aircraft over the next 36 years. National Defence did inform the government of the need to consider the requirement for attrition aircraft at a later date. The cost of replacement aircraft is not included in the life-cycle estimate for this project and will be treated as a separate project in the future.

In other words, all of the costs which were presented by the Government of Canada to the Parliament of Canada with respect to this issue did not include the question of replacement costs. In other words, this House was misled. We were not given the full information to which we were entitled. We were given answers by the Minister of National Defence which did not in fact respond to the need for life cycle all-in costs. We repeatedly asked the minister for all-in costs and he repeatedly told us they were $9 billion plus $7 billion, a total of $16 billion. That was the number he gave us. That is a false number. It is an inaccurate number. It is an incorrect number. It does not in any way add up to what the real costs of this are.

In paragraph 2.72, the Auditor General states:

Upgrades. It is expected that over the life of the aircraft, Canada will need to invest in various upgrades to the F-35 fleet, both in software and hardware. These costs were not known when the 2008 and 2010 budgets were established, but have since been estimated to be more than CAN$1.2 billion over 20 years.

We have not been provided with that information.

The Auditor General went on to say in paragraph 2.76 on page 30:

We also have significant concerns about the completeness of cost information provided to parliamentarians. In March 2011, National Defence responded publicly to the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s report. This response did not include estimated operating, personnel, or ongoing training costs.... Also, we observed that National Defence told parliamentarians that cost data provided by US authorities had been validated by US experts and partner countries, which was not accurate at the time.

Let me repeat that:

Also, we observed that National Defence told parliamentarians that cost data provided by US authorities had been validated by US experts and partner countries, which was not accurate at the time.

In other words, inaccurate information was given to the committee that was studying this question. It is further stated in that paragraph:

At the time of its response, National Defence knew the costs were likely to increase but did not so inform parliamentarians.

I say to my colleagues who are sitting patiently on the other side of the House that if they were sitting on this side of the House, they would be up on their feet asking, “Where is the accountability?” They are the ones who brought in the Federal Accountability Act. They are the ones who asked, “Where is the accountability?” We are asking a simple question. When Parliament is misled, when Parliament is given inaccurate information, when Parliament is provided with information that the government knew perfectly well was not correct, where are we supposed to go, except to this place and say that a government which persistently gives us inaccurate information is a government that has been in contempt of Parliament.

I do not see how you have any other conclusion to draw, Mr. Speaker, except that the information provided to Parliament was inaccurate. All you have to do is compare the Auditor General's report to the answers that have been given in this House by the Prime Minister of Canada, by the Minister of National Defence, by the Associate Minister of National Defence, and then ask how the answers given compare and compute with the report of the Auditor General of Canada. The answer is that they do not. They do not compare and they do not compute. It is really striking to me that even today the Auditor General said that he got letters from the officials, the deputy ministers in the departments which he was criticizing for their lack of due diligence, saying that they objected to the conclusions in the report.

The Leader of the Government in the House of Commons has said there is a difference between what the deputy ministers say and what the Government of Canada says. That is news to me. That is a novel doctrine of constitutional law. It is a novel doctrine of administrative practice. The Prime Minister says it is normal practice for deputy ministers to object. Do they object to something without the approval of the Prime Minister? Do they object to something without the Prime Minister's Office knowing they are objecting? It is inconceivable.

We are in a ridiculous Alice in Wonderland situation. We have deputy ministers who do not agree with the Auditor General because he finds them and their departments responsible for what has gone wrong. We find a Prime Minister who says that he accepts the conclusions but that there are no processes of accountability for what has happened in the past. It is the worst abnegation of ministerial responsibility we have seen. The government and the Prime Minister are refusing to take responsibility for what has taken place. What has taken place is that the government is refusing to admit that it provided to Parliament information which was inaccurate, inadequate and did not in fact deal with the seriousness of the situation.

Hence, the contempt that was found in March 2011 continues today. There is no way we can accept the conclusion of the government and the excuse it has given. Conservatives have gone on talk shows and elsewhere and said that this is simply an accounting issue, that it has to do with other things.

There are so many examples in the Auditor General's report. He refers very explicitly to the fact that the estimates provided by the government with respect to maintenance are based on the notion that somehow the same maintenance costs will be there for the stealth fighter as were there for the CF-18, which is like saying that the maintenance costs for a Maserati will be exactly the same as the maintenance costs for a Ford Fairlane. I say to my friend, the Associate Minister of National Defence, he knows that is not true. I am not suggesting he has a Maserati or a Ford Fairlane. I am just suggesting that the government has to come to grips with telling the truth to Parliament.

The Conservatives have not told the truth to Parliament and they cannot simply turn the page and say, “Oh well, that was then and this is now. We're not going to take any responsibility for what has taken place in the past, we are simply going to talk about the future”. This is a place of reckoning.

The House of Commons is the place where people have to speak the truth. If we cannot believe what ministers, deputy ministers or prime ministers say, if we cannot believe them, the trust that exists in the House will be completely lost.

That is the situation we find ourselves in today. This is why we raised a question of privilege: we do not have truth and accountability. This is the problem, this is the situation, and that is my response to the replies from the government House leader.