Jay Hill

[Points of Order, November 7th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, on the same point of order a couple of things come to mind.

First of all, as the Chair is well aware, not all standing committee meetings can be televised, so the cancellation of the televised proceedings of that particular committee could have been done for any number of reasons. We have some 20 to 25 standing committees and only three rooms have televised capability.

Second, as far as the extended sitting for this particular committee, as you know, Mr. Speaker, committees are masters of their own destiny. They make their own decisions about when they meet, how often they meet, and how long they meet. I would expect that the House would want to uphold the right of the Standing Committee on International Trade to do exactly that.

[Business of the House, November 7th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, again, there have been discussions among all parties and I think you would find unanimous consent for the following motion.

I move:

That, notwithstanding the Standing Orders and usual practices of the House, the adjournment proceedings, pursuant to Standing Order 38 be taken up today immediately following the deferred recorded divisions followed by the debate in Committee of the Whole of all Votes under NATIONAL DEFENCE in the Main Estimates.

[Business of the House, November 7th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I apologize to my colleagues on all sides of the House for interrupting the proceedings on this debate. I would like to move a couple of motions.

Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions among the parties and I think if you seek it, you would find unanimous consent for the following motion.

I move:

That, when ways and means motion number 10 is called today, a recorded division be deemed requested and the vote deferred to 5:30 pm this day.

[Committees of the House, November 6th, 2006]

(Motion agreed to)

[Committees of the House, November 6th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, there have been discussions among all political parties and I think you would find unanimous consent for the following motion. I move:

That, notwithstanding the order made on Friday, October 27, twelve (12) members of the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs be authorized to travel to Ottawa on November 8 and to Montreal on November 20 to visit hospital facilities in order to gain better understanding of the service and care provided to Canadian Veterans, and that the necessary staff do accompany the committee.

[Canada Elections Act, November 6th, 2006]

That is very true, Mr. Speaker. It is probably not as much as I would like, but with all due respect I welcome the comments of my colleague from the Liberal Party, who rattled off about five questions, any one of which I could spend considerable time trying to address adequately. He talked about floor crossing, the appointment of Senator Fortier, the issue of the Minister of International Trade, income trusts, and confidence motions. I do not know which of those I can pick to try to address in a few minutes, but let us deal for a moment with the issue of confidence, because it pertains to the bill we are discussing today.

During earlier debate on Bill C-16 when it was before the House, we spoke quite extensively about this whole issue, because an interest was expressed by members of the Liberal Party and others that under this bill we should somehow restrict what would or would not result in confidence and thus could result in the minority government falling, in the minority government losing the confidence of this chamber and the Prime Minister being required under our system to go to the Governor General and request that an election be held.

At that time, I pointed out that in addition to the traditional or historical confidence motions dealing with the budget, as the member mentioned, or motions dealing with money matters, whether it is the supplementary estimates procedure in the House, the budget itself or the business of supply, the view is that if the government loses those particular votes, that does, by extension, express a non-confidence in the government and the government falls. I will grant that right at the outset.

In addition, though, I raised the issue that from time to time there are very important issues that come up, and to my knowledge the Prime Minister has indicated only one other issue thus far in this Parliament that would be a confidence measure, and that is the softwood lumber agreement. I think that is appropriate, because that particular agreement is so inherent to the economic well-being of the nation that individual members of Parliament should be required to state very clearly how they are going to represent their constituents on that issue. If the government cannot carry the day on an issue of such importance, then indeed we should go to the people and let them decide how important that is.

There are always going to be special issues, whether it is to extend our mission to Afghanistan or whether is international defence treaties or those types of issues, special issues that we believe will constitute confidence in the government, and we must carry those votes if we are going to stay in office.

[Canada Elections Act, November 6th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, could you indicate to me how much time I have?

[Canada Elections Act, November 6th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a pleasure to rise today to join the debate on Bill C-16.

I wish to indicate at the outset of my remarks that I will be splitting my time with my colleague from Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre, the parliamentary secretary to the hon. government House leader.

I have had the privilege of serving as the chief government whip in Parliament and the honour, as well, of serving on the procedure and House affairs committee which was the committee to which Bill C-16 was sent for further deliberation following second reading in the chamber.

I was pleased with the work that the procedure and House affairs committee did on this piece of legislation. I commend members from all four of the political parties, not just from the government side but from the three opposition parties, which dealt quite expeditiously with the legislation and I think quite thoroughly. They looked at it, called witnesses, and debated it at some length, as my colleague from the New Democratic Party just alluded to. Amendments were brought forward that provoked further debate and some great comments, I felt, from colleagues from all four parties as we worked through this piece of legislation.

Indeed, it exemplified the way Parliament should work. There was a need identified on the part of the government, but as colleagues from other parties have said, not just on the part of the government. It is something that many people have worked on over the years and have highlighted that there should be further change to our democratic process and institutions.

It reminds me, if I needed any reminding, that I started out in this political business as a Reform Party of Canada member of Parliament. Really, when I was first attracted to the Reform Party back in the late eighties, I was attracted on three big platform issues. I was a farmer at that time raising three young children. I was trying to look forward to what life would be for my children. My children are now all in their mid-twenties. I was concerned then as I am today, as are many Canadians, about what kind of world and what kind of country we will be leaving the next generation.

I focused in on three issues. The first was the need for fiscal reform because I was concerned about the debt load that we would be passing to future generations. That is one of the reasons I am very proud of the steps that the government has taken already in the recent announcement of reducing our national debt by some $13.2 billion. That money was assigned out of the surplus to better enable our country to tackle the issue of our national debt and to ensure as much as possible that we do not see this intergenerational transfer of wealth that could result in reduced services and reduced opportunities for the next generation. Any parent, and indeed any grandparent, is concerned about that type of thing.

The second issue, moving on from fiscal reform for which I was attracted to public life, was the need for judicial reform. Here again, I am very encouraged by steps that the justice minister and the new Conservative government have taken. We have brought in 11 bills already thus far in this Parliament since it got under way in April. I am very proud of that fact. Even if they do not all pass, it has prompted further debate about the need to restore not only justice but the perception that justice is done in our country and that criminals will be held accountable for their actions.

As I travel throughout the beautiful riding of Prince George—Peace River and indeed across Canada, I hear this all the time from Canadians from all walks of life. They are very concerned with what they perceive to be an inherent injustice in our judicial system.

It is important to try to do what we can as parliamentarians to restore that faith in the justice system and, to give one example, in the fact that the most violent and most vicious of criminals will be held accountable and will serve their proper time in jail, not under house arrest.

The third area of interest for me is democratic reform. Here we come to the bill that we are debating. As part and parcel of the need for democratic reform--and the member from the New Democratic Party has just put forward thoughts about proportional representation--we have already taken some steps in this regard. We have legislation in the other place that deals with limiting Senate tenure, because Canadians have expressed concern that under the present system senators are appointed sometimes early in life and serve until the age of 75. Canadians feel that perhaps should be changed, so we brought forward legislation to deal with it.

We also have a bill before the House which I hope we will be debating later this week, Bill C-31. Again, it is on something that was raised at the procedure and House affairs committee by colleagues in all parties. There seems to be a general consensus that something further needs to be done with our electoral system to ensure that, as much as possible, voter fraud is eliminated. I noticed while watching television last night that there is concern about the voter fraud issue in the election that will be taking place tomorrow in the United States. As much as possible, we want to improve our system to ensure that it best serves the needs of Canadians.

On Bill C-16, certainly it has been indicated that we do have general agreement among the parties on wanting to eliminate the potential for abuse, either by prime ministers or, in the case of provincial legislation, which we already have in some provinces, by premiers, by having fixed dates for elections. We all need to be very careful when we refer to this that we do not talk about fixed elections. During the last debate in the House, a few people misspoke. We in the government are certainly not interested in fixing elections, but we are very much interested in fixing the dates of elections.

Already during the debate, we have heard about the fact that if the government were to be sustained until then and in actual fact did not lose the confidence of this place, under our electoral system the next election would not take place until Monday, October 19, 2009. I think that type of clarity is very welcome. I know it is welcomed by the constituents I represent, the people of Prince George—Peace River.

Why do I say that? Because British Columbia does have fixed election dates. It was the first province to do so, in 2001. Indeed, like other countries around the world, it was very quick to see the value in having a fixed election date that brought clarity and certainty to all political parties. It levels the playing field for all participants and indeed for all voters, because it is known well in advance when that election will take place.

In 2001, British Columbia brought this forward and we had our first fixed election date on May 17, 2005. A lot has been said about the possibility that if we have fixed election dates, they somehow will produce lame duck governments, but that has not been the experience, not only in British Columbia but also in other jurisdictions and countries around the world. That has not been the case. I think a strong argument can be made that, with this type of certainty, governments, whether they are majority or minority, will keep governing and working right up to the day of the election. Indeed, far from being a lame duck government, it will be a very effective government and will work in the best interests of its people.

I am almost out of time, but I will note the other argument we have heard, which is that by having a fixed election date the legislative agenda of the government somehow will be held hostage, or that somehow the government could fall suddenly, especially in a minority government situation. That is true, certainly in a minority government situation. We recognize that.

There has been some criticism that under our system the premier of British Columbia and the Prime Minister of the country still will have the power to call an election. That is true, because we have to build that into the system, especially in the present situation because of the minority government. Indeed, it might come about that the government could fall, but I do not think, and I made this point in the last debate, that a prime minister would dare call an election before that date unless he had a very good reason for it. He would be held accountable by the people, because their expectation, through the legislation itself, would be that the date was off into the future.

I of course welcome any comments or questions from my colleagues on this important piece of legislation.

[Criminal Code, November 3rd, 2006]

You mentioned arson.

[Criminal Code, November 3rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to take a moment to remind the member that over the past 10 years that conditional sentencing has been in place, I and many other members of Parliament have had growing concerns about it.

In fact, it was in March 1998, over eight and a half years ago, that I first brought forward a motion to exclude certain crimes from a judge's discretion in the application of conditional sentencing, basically house arrest. A year later, I took it a step further when I introduced a private member's bill that clearly listed what crimes should be ineligible for conditional sentencing, house arrest. I and many Canadians across the land could see how this system was being abused. When the Liberals brought it forward it was supposed to be for minor property crimes in an attempt to turn some wayward youth who had maybe committed the crime of some graffiti or of shoplifting. However, it was very rapidly abused by the courts and the judges that the hon. member would like to give such great discretion to.

Conditional sentencing was being used for so-called property crimes but it was also being use for crimes of arson, which is what the hon. member mentioned. We just saw in the news a few days ago where an arsonist in California set fires that took the lives of five firefighters. That is a pretty serious crime. If he is found guilty, he will be dealt with severely because arson is a very serious crime in the state of California.

With the amendments that are being proposed to Bill C-9, the Liberals are still soft on crime despite the claims to the contrary from the member. I would remind him that when I put forward private members' legislation to restrict the use of conditional sentencing, his government, which was in power for the last almost 13 years, did nothing to restrict conditional sentencing. It was only with the election of the Conservative government last January that now we are finally seeing this issue addressed.