Garry Breitkreuz

[An Act to amend the Criminal Code (cruelty to animals and firearms) and the Firearms Act, June 4th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, will we not also give those Liberals who were very vocal in their opposition to this an opportunity to stand?

[Canadian Wheat Board, June 4th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, it goes beyond that. The government appointed five of the directors present at the Liberal Party fundraiser. They clearly contravened the code of conduct guidelines for directors of the Canadian Wheat Board. These guidelines state that a director's “political activities must be clearly separated from activities related to” his or her appointment.

Does the Prime Minister support his wheat board officials violating their own code of conduct and what will he do about it?

[Canadian Wheat Board, June 4th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, last Thursday 10 officials of the Canadian Wheat Board attended the now famous Liberal Party fundraiser in Winnipeg at a price tag of at least $400 each. The money for the tickets was taken from prairie wheat farmers who are forced to participate in this monopoly.

Forcing farmers to donate their hard-earned money to the Liberal Party is clearly wrong. Does the Prime Minister not see this as a highly unethical practice?

[An Act to amend the Criminal Code (cruelty to animals and firearms) and the Firearms Act, June 3rd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate that because of closure or time allocation we have only a couple of minutes left and I cannot raise many more issues. I am going to go quickly through a couple of things.

First I want to reply to the previous Liberal member who spoke. I think he has a great misunderstanding of the issue or has no comprehension at all of what this legislation has the potential to do and how it will affect many farmers, especially in my riding. He used the example that there is a lot of pressure coming from people on the front lawn of parliament and from e-mails and phone calls pressuring him to pass the bill, to invoke closure to get it through the House.

He has no idea how strapped farmers are for money. They cannot afford to travel 2,000 miles to stand on the front lawn here and lobby the government. Instead they go through their members of parliament and tell those members what they think about this. That is why the vast amount of mail that we get is in opposition to this.

If the government understood the farm crisis and the fact that farmers cannot stand here on the front lawn and lobby the government, it would know why there are not a lot of farmers in their faces here. That is the reality of the situation. That is a very poor excuse for pushing the bill through parliament.

I want to zero in on something that I raised this morning with the minister and did not get an answer to. The minister said that there is nothing to fear in this legislation. I immediately asked him, if there is nothing to fear, would he commit to funding the legal defence of farmers, ranchers, hunters, trappers and others who have used traditional practices for years and years. I asked him if he would commit to defending them when they are hauled into court by these huge international lobby groups that have the big bucks to charge these people and use this legislation to go after people who cannot afford to defend themselves.

The minister refused to commit any funds to help defend poor farmers who cannot afford to come here or go to court and defend themselves. They are afraid of this legislation. When the minister says there is nothing to fear he does not put his money where his mouth is and make this fair. That is a huge concern to me and that is one reason why we should stop this legislation right now.

We need the minister to publicly state that the normal traditional practices will be defended, that farmers who are very apprehensive and cannot afford to take on these multinational lobby groups will be helped in their defence of traditional practices. The minister did not do that and that is one reason why this legislation should not see the light of day.

I also want to point out that the member from the Liberal Party who just spoke talked a lot about how when this goes to court and so on this will all be decided. That is the real fear that I and many farmers have: that when this legislation is passed and lobby groups begin to abuse their privileges with the amount of funding that they have, those people who legitimately use animals in pursuit of their normal activities will not be able to defend themselves.

The Liberals have divided society into groups. They pit one group against the other, urban against rural, as we pointed out in a previous debate, and there will be a lot of problems in the country. The Liberals will say when it comes to the courts “We passed the legislation and we are sure that the courts will make the right decision. It is in the hands of the courts. We have no control over this any more”. That is what they have done with many previous pieces of legislation and that is what they are going to do again.

I need a lot more time to go through the notes that I have here. It is unfortunate that I cannot because of time allocation. I wanted to deal with the Firearms Act with which there are a lot of problems. I have 15 pages of notes that I need to share with this esteemed assembly right now and I cannot do that. The Liberals have invoked closure. They do not even want to examine the Firearms Act and what a boondoggle it is. It is going to waste a billion dollars. The bill does nothing to correct any of the problems with the Firearms Act. It is what is not in the bill that is really the problem, which is that the Firearms Act as it presently stands ought to be to scrapped.

[Question No. 149, June 3rd, 2002]

With regard to the Canadian Firearms Program: ( a ) what is the total amount of money spent on the program since 1995; ( b ) how many employees are working in and for the program; ( c ) how many police officers and police personnel are working in the program; ( d ) how many employees in the program are paid for by the federal government; ( e ) what is the total number of firearms registered; ( f ) what is the total number of firearms still to be registered; ( g ) how many firearms transfers have there been since December 1, 1998; ( h ) what is the total number of valid firearms licence holders; ( i ) what is the total number of gun owners that still don't have a firearms licence; ( j ) what is the error rate in the firearms licencing and registration system; ( k ) in what percentage of all violent crimes are firearms actually used in the commission of the offence; ( l ) what percentage of all homicides are committed with handguns and prohibited firearms; ( m ) what percentage of firearms homicides are committed with registered firearms; ( n ) what percentage of firearms homicides are committed with firearms that should have been registered but were not; ( o ) what percentage of all homicides are committed with long guns; ( p ) what percentage of all robberies are committed with handguns and prohibited firearms; ( q ) what percentage of all robberies are committed with long guns; ( r ) how many times are firearms used by citizens for self-defence every year; ( s ) how many individuals have a record in the Firearms Interest Police data base; ( t ) how many people are prohibited from owning firearms; ( u ) how many violations of these firearms prohibition orders have there been; ( v ) how many guns have been seized from these prohibited firearms owners; ( w ) how many times have these prohibited firearms owners been checked to make sure they have not acquired firearms illegally; ( x ) how many people have had their firearms licences refused or revoked; ( y ) how many guns have been seized from these refused and revoked licencees; and ( z ) how many times have these refused and revoked licencees been checked to make sure they have not acquired firearms illegally?

Return tabled.

[Government Contracts, June 3rd, 2002]

I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. I withdraw.

[Government Contracts, June 3rd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I was quoting the Ottawa

Citizen.

[Government Contracts, June 3rd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, before Sunday, Saturday was not going very well for the Prime Minister either.

The Ottawa Citizen ran a four page exposé by Graham Green, providing a blow by blow account of the Shawinigate file under a banner headline “Double Standard”.

The Citizen editorial said of the Prime Minister that it was “Time To Go”.

The only question for the Prime Minister is, is he going to sue the Ottawa Citizen or was the article correct in its conclusion? Again I quote: “He lied”.

[An Act to amend the Criminal Code (cruelty to animals and firearms) and the Firearms Act, June 3rd, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the minister said there is nothing to fear in regard to this legislation. My direct question to the minister is, will he commit funding to legally defend farmers, ranchers, hunters, trappers and others that are charged for practices they have used traditionally in pursuit of their normal occupation? The minister needs to publicly state that he will commit to that funding and protect normal traditional practices.

[Government of Canada, May 30th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister and his deputy object to anyone using the word corruption when we rise to question government ministers on their ethical lapses.

My wife has been watching the performance of the government in question period. Here are a few synonyms she came up with for corruption. I wonder which ones the Liberals would prefer that we use: laxity, iniquity, solecism, turpitude, banality, underhandedness, decay, deceitful, degradation, distortion, improbable, knavish, recreant, and putrescence. Here are a few more words that my constituents came up with on their own: sleazy, slimy, bottom-feeding, pork-barreling, slush funds, patronage, scandal, kickback schemes, and so on.

The Deputy Prime Minister blames the opposition and the media for destroying the reputations of ministers. It is their acts that are destroying their reputations, not the messengers, and causing Canadians to lose confidence in the government.