Gérard Asselin

[Petitions, November 26th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, in the second petition, gun owners request that the government repeal Bill C-68 and redirect the money being wasted on the licensing and registering of responsible law-abiding gun owners and their firearms toward more effective methods of reducing the number of victims of violent crime.

[Petitions, November 26th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I am laying before this House today two petitions signed by several hundred residents of the riding of Charlevoix.

In the first one, the petitioners call upon the government to put the surplus accumulated in the employment insurance account back into the pockets of the unemployed by revoking the current eligibility rules for new entrants and using surpluses for training for the unemployed, thereby promoting direct employment.

In a nutshell, current employment insurance eligibility rules should be revoked so that more unemployed people can have access to the plan.

[Icebreaking Policy, November 20th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, in the Atlantic groundfish strategy, the federal government has placed Quebec at a disadvantage compared to Newfoundland.

The government is doing it again on the icebreaking issue.

What does the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans have to say to all ferry service users, particularly those in Rivière-du-Loup, Tadoussac and Baie-Comeau, who will have to bear the brunt of this new tax?

[Supply, November 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, to start with I would like to congratulate the member for Vaudreuil—Soulanges for supporting the motion moved by the Bloc Quebecois, which demands that the federal government invest $2 billion in the Canadian health care system.

The member for Vaudreuil—Soulanges is consistent with the former MPP, former Quebec premier and provincial member for Vaudreuil, Daniel Johnson, who under Mr. Jacques Parizeau's government, had condemned in the National Assembly the federal cuts, especially cuts to the health and education transfer payments.

Would the member for Vaudreuil—Soulanges agree that if today we are debating a motion on health care moved by the Bloc Quebecois it is as a result of federal cuts mainly in transfer payments to the provinces? These cuts have had an impact on the health care sector for instance. Not to mention cuts in employment insurance, which have hurt workers and the unemployed.

[Committees Of The House, October 27th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, first I would like to get some clarification from the NDP member who just spoke. I also want to congratulate him for caring about the groundfish fishery.

Did I hear that the government set up a committee with a majority of members from the Liberal Party of Canada and some opposition members? The committee drafted the report after hearing a number of witnesses from all over Canada, people who were experiencing problems relating to the fisheries, people who had been invited or who had asked to be invited by the committee to make representations.

You will agree that the government spent a lot of money on that committee, which was nothing but window dressing. The whole thing was just for show. The government said “We are listening to you, we are taking note of your claims and we will ask the minister, following your testimonies, to amend various clauses of the bill”.

The report was unanimously approved and signed by all committee members. If I heard right, when the time comes to vote in this House, some members will go so far as to renege on their commitment and deny their involvement as well as the seriousness of the report, supposedly because the government does not recognize the time that members from the NDP, the Reform Party, the Bloc Quebecois and the Progressive Conservative Party have put into the report. We worked with diligence to produce that document. We members of this House have better things to do than just go through the motions when we sit on a parliamentary commission or committee.

I am asking the government and the members who sat on that committee to show some respect. When the House votes on the report, I hope that government members will rise and support it. I would appreciate it if the NDP member could tell the House, or explain more clearly, what happened to make these members vote against a report that they endorsed.

[Budget Implementation Act, 1998, March 24th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, I appreciate the summary of the financial history of Canada. However, I think the hon. member went back too far. Going back to 1984 would have been sufficient. We would have heard of a former Prime Minister, namely Pierre Elliott Trudeau, who led a Liberal government for twenty years or so. We are too young to go back as far as the member did.

In 1984, the Canadian debt—and that was before the Conservatives took office—was $187 billion. The Liberals are ones who had been in power. They were originally responsible for the Canadian debt.

When the Liberals took over from the Conservatives in 1993, the debt was $500 billion. Today, the accumulated debt has reached $585 billion. This means that, between 1993 and 1997, the Liberal government has let the debt grow, just from accrued interests of course, because it is not doing anything any more. If the debt continues to grow when there is no spending, it has to be from accrued interests.

I would like the hon. member to comment on this. When the Liberal Party was in the opposition, it voted against the GST and free trade. If it had not made cuts in transfer payments to the provinces and in employment insurance, if it had acted on the auditor general's recommendations, I think it would have achieved a zero deficit just the same.

[Petitions, March 19th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 36, I am pleased to lay before this House a petition signed by 71 residents of the riding of Charlevoix, and the municipality of Saint-Aimé-des-Lacs in particular.

This petition contains the signatures of the mayor, fire chief, councillors, volunteer firefighters and citizens of the municipality.

Volunteer firefighters often represent a community's only firefighting force. Not once since 1980 has there been an increase in the tax exemption for expenses incurred in discharging their duties.

The petitioners therefore ask that the government double the tax exemption on volunteer firefighters' expense allowance from $500 to $1,000.

[The Budget, February 26th, 1998]

There is nothing in the budget for them.

[Sable Island Natural Gas, December 4th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, in order to have an informed judgment on the entire question, is the minister prepared to ask cabinet to stay the final decision for the time it takes to have a fair and equitable evaluation of the Gazoduc Trans-Québec et Maritimes project?

[Sable Island Natural Gas, December 4th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, at their meeting on June 7, 1996, the Prime Minister of Canada and the Premier of Quebec agreed to support the Gazoduc Trans-Québec et Maritimes project for the transportation of Sable Island natural gas.

We learn, however, that the National Energy Board recommends that the government give the go-ahead to a competing project, the purpose of which is to service the American market directly.

Is the minister aware that, at the rate things are going, the Gazoduc Trans-Québec et Maritimes project will not be able to be studied on its own merits by the appropriate authorities?