Derek Lee

[Communications Securityestablishment, April 30th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence.

About a year ago the House unanimously adopted a motion calling for the creation of an independent review mechanism for the Communications Security Establishment. We know that both the Prime Minister and the Minister of National Defence support this initiative.

Can the minister inform the House of the government's progress in responding to the proposal of the House to put in place an oversight mechanism for the CSE?

[Supply, April 23rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to be recorded as voting with the government on this amendment.

[Supply, April 23rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with almost all of what the member said. I congratulate him on introducing the motion. If somehow in the translation the word symbolic came across in my remarks, I do not recall using it or at least intending it. I do not consider there is anything symbolic in this at all. It means what it says.

In terms of how the voting goes on the motions and the technical words, I have already made my point that I do not want to be into the technical side of this at all. I made up my mind long ago about what went on 81 years ago. I simply want a resolution of the House that is effective for the very well intentioned purpose of the member opposite.

[Supply, April 23rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for the question. I resist the urge to be too philosophical about a proposed solution. I am sure all members of the House are prepared to do what they can as legislators to advance Canada's role in the international arena in a way that would hopefully obviate the need to address these kinds of tragedies in the future.

I am compelled to recall a remark to me by a legislator of the Indian Parliament. In a conversation we were having about another issue he said you can only address the politics of a gun with a gun. This to me means that if there is a potential genocide or a slaughter by a machete or a gun or poisons the only way to deal with it is with force. That means the United Nations, of which Canada is a member, must pay more attention to the proposal of a rapid reaction force. That means using a gun against a gun, a blade against a blade.

If we want to sit around and be philosophical about why these things should not happen for the next half century we may end up watching another Rwanda or Cambodia without the means to stop it. We will end up simply wringing our hands.

The only short run solution to stop these things when they begin to brew is a rapid reaction force that will use force with prejudice for the purpose of ending what may appear to be a genocidal initiative.

[Supply, April 23rd, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to have an opportunity to participate in the debate on the motion proposed by the official opposition.

The theme is man's inhumanity to man, an exhortation that we set aside a time every year to take note of this unfortunate subject. The subscript on the theme is the Armenian genocide of 1915.

Some amendments have been proposed by the government and by the third party dealing with technical aspects of the resolution and exhibiting some caution in terms of the use of the word "genocide."

Perhaps some of us are looking for ways to finesse the use of these historical facts, bring them into the present and find the proper pigeonhole, the proper categorization, the proper way to try to articulate it. I think there is some difficulty in doing that. Members on both sides of the House have articulated various perspectives on the difficulty. It is not easy to articulate events which happened a long time ago, in this case 81 years ago.

In any event, I have made up my mind. I made up my mind some time ago. I do not care about the technical aspects of this. I will leave that to others. Frankly, after 81 years we are at the point where the lawyers have become irrelevant.

I first became aware of what is being called the Armenian genocide about 12 years ago. I had an Armenian Canadian friend. He certainly did not become my friend to make me aware of the issue. However, in knowing his family I became aware of it.

About the same time I had the occasion to read an academic article in a British magazine of political philosophy and history. That magazine is called "Encounter". It was a well written and objective presentation of many aspects of history and political philosophy.

The article that I read was quite objective. It dealt with the then existing historical controversy about the issue of how many people actually died in the Armenian genocide. At the time, and perhaps still, there are conflicting views on the number. However it is measured, we are dealing with six or seven digits. However it is measured, it was, at least, a tragedy. It was the first genocide of this century. I have accepted that.

Irrespective of the vote on the motion and how the lawyers amend it, dovetail it and finesse it, I want Canadians to recognize what happened in 1915.

Since that time I have attended the annual commemoration of the April 1915 events. Everyone will know that the perpetrators were incapable of killing 1.5 million people on April 24, 1915. It went on for some time. At the time the world was engaged in another slaughter, the first world war. Millions were killed in that exercise. It happened at the same time that Lawrence of Arabia was pursuing his military career, perhaps 100 miles south of where this was happening. The world did not pay too much attention.

However, there were those who took note. I am pleased to say that there were those in Canada who took note. About 1921 some Canadians got together to bring to Canada some orphans of the Armenian genocide. Those orphans came to be known as the Georgetown boys. They were brought to a place near Georgetown, Ontario. While by present day standards it does not look too pretty, these orphans were parcelled out and taken to farms. They were not adopted. They had guardians. They were sent to school and they worked very hard on farms. Recently there was a commemoration of them by the Armenian community in Toronto which I attended. It was very moving.

These people are now very old. Most of them had smiles. However, the wrinkles in their hands and faces showed me something very real that happened 81 years ago.

We can all pick whatever term we like on this, tragedy, genocide, but all of us cannot help but pause and ask how this could have happened and to ask God not to let it happen again.

Following that, for the Armenians of that part of the Middle East and eastern Europe there was a diaspora. Those who were able to flee did. Those who were deported moved on. Somewhere between a few and many found their way, thankfully, to Canada, with the Armenian community regarding itself as a minority within Canada. Many of them have been mainstreamed, leading lives not so much as Armenian-Canadians but as Canadians of Armenian heritage.

However, one cannot forget that a huge chunk of people, part of one's heritage, was simply liquidated by a political entity, the Ottoman Empire. I was not alive during the time of the Ottoman Empire so I do not know what it was. I can read about it in the history books but I cannot reach back and touch it as part of history. However, those who survived those events have told me they happened. It is more than past due for the rest of the world to recognize it as it really was.

We should not leave this event alone in history without recognizing that man has on numerous occasions killed just as many in this century. There was the first world war, the Russian revolution which killed millions, and the genocidal German concentration camps which killed millions of Jews, Gypsies and political opponents.

We were a party to the second world war during which millions were killed. The Chinese Communist revolution was not a genocide but millions died. There was a massive slaughter of military personnel and civilians in Yugoslavia immediately following the first world war.

In the partition in India in 1947-48, two million people were killed trying to draw a line between India and Pakistan. It was a terrible tragedy. No one willed that one; it was man's inhumanity to man.

Just since I have had the privilege of serving as a member of Parliament, we have had the ugliness of the slaughter in Bosnia and in Rwanda.

This motion today is not just an attempt to recognize what happened in Armenia in 1915. It is an attempt by all Canadians to reconcile inside themselves with what has happened here, these tragedies, this death, these inhumanities. We have very little else we can use to help us reconcile inside ourselves. This resolution is one of the ways we can do it as a people.

We also wish, if we can, to reconcile ourselves with history. In this case it is my view the history books do not show exactly what happened. Maybe some do. Forgive me for not being able to read all the books and articles on this. However, in my experience as a Canadian and with my education I did not have access and was not made aware of the extent of this slaughter as I went through my schooling, as I was privileged to do for many years. I regret that we do not in a dedicated and comprehensive way try to make our students aware of some of these aspects of history.

I do not think we should be too partisan about the 1.5 million dead. I hope there is a way the opposition motion, the government amendment and the subamendment from the third party will resolve this in a unanimously adopted motion. It would be difficult

for anyone to vote against a motion when we are looking down a gun barrel at this many dead.

[Taiwan, March 25th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, the House should recognize and congratulate Taiwanese President Lee Teng-hui for his victory in Saturday's first democratic presidential election in Taiwan.

This event is the culmination of a series of democratization initiatives in Taiwan going back several years. All the political parties, the candidates and the electorate deserve praise for this democratic success.

Four weeks ago China began conducting military exercises near the island of Taiwan in an attempt to influence the outcome of this election. Defiant voters were not intimidated by Beijing's threats to destabilize their democratic initiative.

I congratulate the people in Taiwan and their political parties which now collectively take responsibility for their future and for Taiwan's relationship with Beijing and other countries in the region and around the world.

[Privilege, March 13th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, this is a good question. The hon. member opposite will take note that the Speaker has already found that the issue, as framed by the hon. member who originally rose, is prima facie a matter of privilege and therefore the matter has already been framed.

Second, the body of debate that accompanies this motion in its eventual passage or non-passage as the case may be will be part of the record that goes to the committee. There will be no doubt in the minds of committee members what the Speaker has ruled, what the member originally moved and what members of this House have put forward in relation to these facts.

[Privilege, March 13th, 1996]

Also in Ontario, as my friend reminds me quite appropriately.

However, none of us have been made privy to the legal opinions on which those decisions were based. It may well be that the major reason no one would proceed was precisely because the member involved had privileges as a member of Parliament and those privileges, which my friend has just made reference to, protect us all in our speech and in our activities in this House of Commons.

It may be that the committee which will deal with this will rate our privileges so high that it will accord to the member enough freedom so that he could do again what he did then. That might or might not happen. However, I just wanted to concur that the privileges, which we all have here and which we all share, are very important to us all.

[Privilege, March 13th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his comments. He focused quite appropriately on our privileges as members of Parliament. I cannot do anything but support him in that because his privileges as a member are mine. We all share and have a very great interest in those privileges.

I want to point out that although the facts of this case have been presented to persons and authorities outside this House, it is my understanding that a public prosecutor in the province of Quebec declined to proceed in relation to these facts.

[Privilege, March 13th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, we have all been following the remarks of colleagues very closely on this important issue. As much as we would like to conclude debate and have the matter dealt with, I would hope that most of us would want to see the matter go to committee, rather than taking up the time of the House.

Certain things have to be said and certain things have to be clarified and I would like to focus on two or three of them now.

The process which I support is one that would cause the motion to be amended, as has been moved, and referred to a committee. The importance of amending the motion before it is referred to a committee lies in two or three reasons.

The first reason is that all of us in the House, I am sure, wish to accord to each other over the period of our service here the utmost in procedural fairness and respect.

The manner in which this motion was originally framed, although perhaps it was not intended, alleges that the action of the hon. member who was cited was seditious. His action may or may not constitute sedition. It may or may not constitute something else in the Criminal Code. It may or may not constitute something else again, simply involving the appropriate activities of a member of the House of Commons. Clearly there are some questions on which we are not clear and the precedents do not teach us well.

The motion should be reframed and the matter should be sent to a committee in a manner which will not prejudge precisely what the error was, if any, that occurred by the action which was taken by the hon. member.

Every one of us has an interest in ensuring procedural fairness. Today I have heard suggestions from the leader of the official opposition about this being a kangaroo court. I could be critical of that. In saying that he does a disservice to himself, to his colleagues and to all of us in the House by prejudging that something which we will put in place, something which we will do, will constitute a kangaroo court. I know that all members of the House will not let that happen.

I want to see the motion amended. I have concerns about the way the matter is being framed here in the House with constant references to sedition. There is no need to frame this as sedition.

The Leader of the Opposition and other speakers have attempted to define what sedition is. In each case they failed to take note of the very clear words in the Criminal Code that define sedition as more that just the presumptive words referring to use of force or violence.

I will read them. Just in case anyone wants to refer to it, it is section 59 and it states: "Without limiting the generality of the expression, seditious intention, everyone shall be presumed to have a sedition intention who does (a), (b) and (c). But the definition clearly says "without limiting the generality of the meaning of the expression, seditious intention". Where do we find out what seditious intention is? It is more than just the presumptive words.

The last case that dealt with this was Boucher v the King in the 1950s. The court was divided but it spoke. In my reading of that case, sedition does not just involve words or encouragement of the use of force in promoting public disorder. There are other elements to it. We should not refer this to the procedure and House affairs committee without acknowledging the fact that we are not just talking narrow words of sedition that have been described here. Sedition is more than that.

Even beyond that, the action by this member should not be seen as potential sedition. There is another section in the Criminal Code that has nothing to do with sedition. Section 62 makes no reference to sedition, but it does say: "everyone who willfully publishes, edits, issues, circulates or distributes a writing that advises, counsels or urges insubordination or disloyalty by a member of a force"-meaning the armed forces-"is guilty of an indictable offence". It says nothing about sedition.

The original motion in the House clearly referred to sedition. In my view that is too narrow. We must look at other aspects of the action by the member. It is possible he may not have been wilful. We do not know. The committee will probably look at that. However, we must determine whether he did what has been alleged here because we all have a concern about this.

I take another step and urge the acceptance of the amendment to the motion. We are not directly concerned here as a public prosecutor would be about whether there might have been sedition or that there might have been a counselling to disloyalty of a member of the armed forces. We are looking at whether a member of the House misused his office, resources, his taxpayer provided

resources, all the privileges he has in the House, for an act that would bring contempt on the House.

The original motion does not reflect that aspect. That is another reason why the motion should be amended.

I also heard the word treason mentioned. The word treason should not have come up. I think we have free speech here within the limits of the Criminal Code. Treason has not come up. It is a non-issue. No one has alleged, as the leader of the official opposition has alleged, that there was some type of treason. There is no connection between what has happened here and the political viewpoint of a person in the province of Quebec who may or may not wish to see his or her government take certain actions in the future. This is not an issue that involves sovereignty or separatism or secession.

We are dealing with the actions of a member of Parliament in using his resources to do something that may have been a breach of our law or a breach of the rules of the House. I have every expectation that we can fairly accommodate that in the procedures we have in this House. In my short career here I have seen three or four procedures involving the bar and motions for contempt.

We have difficulty from time to time when some of us-we are political animals-politicize these incidents. I would encourage members on both sides to please try in this case to avoid politicizing it to the degree to which we are all capable, especially because the raison d'être of the Bloc Quebecois is arguably related to the actions of that member. I would not want us to be blind to the fact that we all could politicize this past the point where we have the ability to act fairly: fairly in relation to the member, fairly in relation to ourselves and the precedent we may or may not set for dealing with these kinds of actions in the future.

I want to see the motion amended. I want to see the matter dealt with. I have confidence in the abilities of members on both sides of the House who will sit on the procedure and House affairs committee to dispose of this matter fairly.