Greg Thompson

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, November 27th, 1997]

Madam Speaker, I knew this was coming because the one thing the Liberal Party does not want to do is deal with the truth.

The point I want to make is simply that the Liberals dilly-dally on every single issue and problem in Canadian society. They are in office to deal with these problems today. It is like the hepatitis C sufferers. We need compensation for them but again they postponed that decision for five years and postponed CPP decisions for five years. These problems just compound and multiply. By the time they get ready to deal with it, it is blown completely out of proportion. That is what they have done with these CPP premiums that you and I and all Canadians are going to pay. It has been completely blown out of proportion.

I object strenuously to the type of bill that they want to introduce here to deal with the problem today.

[Canada Pension Plan Investment Board Act, November 27th, 1997]

Madam Speaker, I support the amendment just brought forward. The member is absolutely right.

Basically what we are talking about is retroactive taxation which I think most of us on all sides of this House would find most unsavoury. What it does is eat away at government's capital in the sense of confidence.

I do not think most Canadians can accept that. It means that at the end of the taxation year we are going to have to ante up more money for the government.

How many of us going into 1997 thought that was going to happen? I would submit not very many Canadians would expect the government to bring in a bill that is going to add to contributions already paid. There is something wrong with that.

The reason the government has the problem with regard to the Canada pension plan is that it simply failed to deal with that reality over the last number of years. Having failed to deal with that reality, it has to make up ground. Let us take a look at some past administrations. The person who comes to mind is a prime minister who was here long before our time, Mackenzie King.

That is what this government reminds me of, that type of leadership. I think if I could summarize how Mackenzie King operated, he operated on the basis that if someone waits long enough the problem will go away.

I think the present Prime Minister operates under that same formula. If you wait long enough, the problem will go away, so let's not touch it, let's not deal with it, because if you deal with it, it means that you would have to exercise that rare commodity that we call leadership.

When they took office in 1993, that was a problem facing them as a government. If they took a look at the numbers today, what they would have to do to fix the problem is multiply it tenfold.

Had they dealt with the problem in 1993, the exaggerated rates of payment or the premiums that all Canadians are going to pay would have been much less. They were operating on the premise that no, we do not have to deal with it today, the problem will disappear. It has not disappeared.

I think any financial analyst and anyone with any kind of thinking mind at all would have told the government then that the problem would not disappear, and they did. Canadians were warning the government what would happen.

Some of them were in this House. It could be the member standing and speaking because we all knew what was going to happen. The sad part about this horrendous increase in these premiums is that it is the young Canadians who are going to be paying the price for the present government's mistakes.

That is the tragedy in the whole equation. None of us mind paying our own way and that is the way it is supposed to be. However, the present CPP pensioners deserve what they have. None of us argue with that but the unfunded liability in the CPP amounts to $600 billion. That is spelled with a b , $600 billion.

Basically what we have now is a pay-as-you-go scheme that is quickly going broke. The demographics and the age differences and percentages in terms of the individuals who are retired now and the number of individuals working, that equation just will not support the system.

In future years that equation is going to be weighted too much on the retirement side. Again, the government knew that this was coming. It is like a freight train. It could be seen coming down the rails. The light is there. It is on the track. It is coming.

A collision can either be avoided by drawing back or by doing a number of things, but the government chose not to do it. Now we are looking at the most regressive of all legislation I think to enter this House in a number of years.

We are talking about a huge tax increase.

We can talk about it as being a premium, but anything that comes out of our pay cheques at the end of the week is a tax no matter how we want to word it. What this is is a hidden tax. It is a silent killer of jobs.

What we are suggesting as a party, and a responsible position, is that the government over the last number of years has built up this huge surplus in the unemployment insurance fund. Right now it has a surplus of about $12 billion, and that is spelled with a b as well. What is the government doing with that? The finance minister is using it to fudge the deficit numbers.

What we are suggesting is to simply reduce the unemployment insurance premiums that are paid by all Canadians. In all fairness to the government, it reduced it by a mere 20¢ last week. However, it could be reduced by at least 70¢ or 90¢ if it wanted to but it chooses not to do it because it wants to use those numbers and that fund for its own political purposes.

The finance minister is certainly not going to let the minister responsible for the unemployment insurance act or CPP use any of those funds other than for debt reduction or deficit reduction which is where the unfairness lies. If the government took those moneys today and said “Let's reduce the amount that we are paying into the EI fund, it would neutralize those increases in the Canada pension plan”. At the end of the day the workers in your constituency and the workers in my constituency are going to look at their pay cheque and it is going to be the same.

In other words, what we need is a reduction in some of those other taxes to offset the increases in the Canada pension plan. We cannot be totally naive. The government has put off the problem for five years and the problem has now compounded to the point where it has to go in there with a big hit.

I am going back to where I opened my remarks in this debate. It is like the old Mackenzie King philosophy: Wait and the problem will take care of itself. It has not taken care of itself. The government has provided no leadership at all.

In regard to the motion we are speaking on, I support that amendment in the legislation which would eliminate the retroactivity that is going to hurt every working Canadian in this country.

I am going to get off the topic a little bit. Yesterday in question period I and some of the other members had the same question for the health minister. I am going to point this out because it is the lack of leadership in solving a problem that we are talking about.

Yesterday I mentioned to the health minister the need to address the 12,000 hepatitis C sufferers in Canada as a result of the incompetence of the federal government to recognize a problem a number of years ago. The result is that we have 12,000 Canadians infected and compensation has to be paid.

[Health, November 26th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I cannot believe that answer. They have been in power now going on five years. They dilly-dallied on this issue four, five years. Nothing to do with the Krever inquiry. They know they have a problem. They do not want to deal with it.

The question is when are they going to deal with it. These are innocent victims, 12,000 Canadians, who deserve an answer. They deserve that answer now, not five years down the road, not ten years, but now. When are they going to act?

[Health, November 26th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, 12,000 Canadians suffer from hepatitis C. I want to remind members they are innocent victims of the Canadian blood supply system.

The question is pretty straightforward. I want to know from the government when it will announce a compensation package for these innocent victims.

[Aboriginal Affairs, November 25th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I guess I underestimated my own power in the House. I appreciate the minister's concern.

A great deal of hardship is being placed on individuals on and off reserve. That is the point I really want to make.

These financial hardships reach right down into the Fundy region where fishermen in Grand Manan have been left out and financial commitments not kept. Simply put, I would like the minister to act in the best interest of all sides, not only the Indian community but those people who are suffering financial hardship in that area.

[Aboriginal Affairs, November 25th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, financial mismanagement at the Oromocto first nation has left a toll of casualties both on and off reserve. Even with the $500,000 cash advance the band cannot meet its obligations. Band staff is being laid off. Men, women and children have not received a paycheque or support payments in six weeks. Contractual agreements have been broken and have not been honoured.

My question is for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. Will the minister take the necessary steps to ensure that all financial commitments and contractual agreements—

[Euthanasia, November 4th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to take part in the debate tonight. This is an example of the House working at its best, where there is reasoned and intelligent debate. Certainly we will not all agree with the hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas, but who am I quoting when I say “We do not argue his right to stand up and debate the issue or argue his case. We certainly would not deny the member that?”

The debate reminds me of the abortion debate. I know there are at least a couple of members on this side of the House who were here during that debate in 1989. I was a member of Parliament at that time. I often say I am very fashionable because I am a recycled member of Parliament. I was here in a previous life in the 34th parliament and I spoke on that issue.

This reminds me of that debate. It was one of those issues that I do not think the government wanted to bring to the floor of the House of Commons. That was understandable. Obviously there were two sides to that debate as there are with this one. I think that is reflected in the supreme court rulings that have come down on cases like this one.

One of them is the Sue Rodriguez case the member for Burnaby—Douglas quoted. He was very much attached to that case and to Sue Rodriguez herself. I do not always agree with the member. Nor do you. Nor does the House. He took a very courageous stand in defence of his position.

Ms. Rodriguez died before that ruling came down but the fact that they ruled 5:4 on that case indicates that even the supreme court is divided on the issue.

Canadians are looking for parliament to give them guidance. It is incumbent on us to do that and to bring this issue before the House of Commons for intelligent debate. I do not support the idea of spending money on a committee. The Senate did that. The Senate struck its committee. A couple of the members have mentioned the cost of that study. It becomes very expensive.

The secret to the whole process lies right here in the House of Commons. All members of Parliament are going to be here. They are paid to be here. They are paid to stand and present their positions. That is what I think should happen. An intelligent, reasonable, persuasive debate should take place in the House. At the end of the day we will have taken our respective positions and will have had our say.

I want to define euthanasia. I am sure there are people back home, including myself until I took the time to study the issue, who are a little confused on what the term means. I will quote from a fact book that was put together for me and other members a number of years ago by the Campaign Life Coalition.

This is basically a definition that Canadians should hear. The original Greek meaning of the term euthanasia is easy or good death. Over time this meaning has been lost so that today an acceptable definition of euthanasia would be to act or fail to act so as to cause the death of a human being for the purpose of relieving suffering.

The victim is usually though not exclusively a chronically or terminally ill patient, not necessarily imminently dying. The person performing the act of euthanasia is usually but not exclusively a health care professional. The participation of the medical profession in these acts has led to the use of the term medicalized killing.

As well as the understanding of the precise definition of euthanasia it is important to be clear on which medically based decisions at the end of life should never be classified as euthanasia. It is important that we listen to this carefully because allowing a terminally ill person at the last stages of life to die a natural death is not euthanasia.

Where the situation is medically hopeless, a decision not to provide or continue extraordinary or heroic measures where such no longer offer any hope for healing is ethical, legal and consistent with standard medical practice. It is important to remember that. More important, it is also consistent with thousands of years of religious belief and practice.

The purpose is to examine present law to decide whether or not it should be changed. That is what the member is asking. We do not disagree with that. It is just a case of bringing debate to the House of Commons and working through it in an intelligent fashion.

I am surrounded by members from all parties. To the right I have a few Liberals, to the left there are Reformers and there are a few Conservatives as well. The views of the respective individuals are interesting when we are engaged in discussion. There are some areas about which we fundamentally agree. There are some areas about which we fundamentally disagree.

This is the place where that debate has to happen. I urge all members to go home and do some research. In time hopefully this issue will come to the floor of the House where it deserves to be.

Earlier I mentioned the abortion debate which took place in the House. I remember as a member of Parliament at that time that I had to do some soul searching on the issue. I remember saying in the House that according to my definition if life begins at conception life should be allowed to continue. As a parallel to that, if we are talking about human life and we have accepted the fact that life is there, what right do we have as individuals to determine when that life should end? That goes back to the fundamentals.

We are talking about the continuation of human life or the termination of human life. It is no more fundamental than that. It is about life. It is about the preservation of life. It is about the continuation of life.

We have all had loved ones who have been terminally ill. I am sure many times the thought has run through the minds of many loved ones concerning whether or not there should be euthanasia.

At the end of the day I think most Canadians would say it is an issue worthy of debate. It is worthy of debate and it is worthy of consideration. Let us bring it to the floor of the House so that all concerned members will have a chance to speak on it.

[Fisheries, November 4th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, I am not sure the minister's response is going to offer much encouragement to the fishermen back home.

As we speak, fishermen are being subjected to electronic black box monitoring and on-board video surveillance. This is akin to the electronic bracelets worn by prisoners, but at least the prisoners had a fair trial before being subjected to this humiliating and patronizing process.

What are the limits of intrusiveness and again, will the minister review some of these costs and the purposes of some of these practices?

[Fisheries, November 4th, 1997]

Mr. Speaker, Atlantic fishermen are being subjected to an unbearable number of fees: licence fees, inspection fees, wharfage fees and monitoring fees to name just a few. Some of these have gone from $30 to $7,000 in a single year.

My question is for the minister of fisheries. Is it the intent of the department to put these small fishermen out of business and will the minister review some of these owners' fees with an aim to providing some relief to the fishermen in Atlantic Canada?

[Saguenay—St. Lawrence Marine Park Act, November 4th, 1997]

Madam Speaker, I have a question for the member in regard to the establishment of these marine parks.

There was one plan a number of years ago for my riding of Charlotte. It was referred to as the Fundy Isles Marine Park. It was to include areas of Campobello Island, Deer Island, Grand Manan and the surrounding area. One of the concerns expressed at the time was the question of the marine park versus the traditional fisheries and what impact that would have on traditional fishing areas.

For example, would lobster fishermen be restricted in the areas they could trap lobster, or scallop draggers restricted? This collision between the park and the traditional fisheries was there. It was a major obstacle at that time. Other matters had to be taken into consideration as well the debate between fisheries and park officials about the park concept, somewhat like the debate which is taking place this very day between the aquaculture fisheries and the traditional fisheries.

Has consideration been given to that? And is it being debated at the local level in Nova Scotia?