Jay Hill

[Privilege, October 27th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, since we are talking about questions of privilege, I am not rising on this particular question but on a point of order arising from the discussion that we have just had.

When I was remarking to the Speaker about the subcommittee of the Board of Internal Economy, the member for Ahuntsic was sitting there and she said, “And you refused to sit on that subcommittee”.

Mr. Speaker, you know very well that what takes place at the board is in confidence. I would wonder, given the seriousness of this, how the member was apprised of the information of who was sitting on the committee and who chose not to sit on the committee.

[Privilege, October 27th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, while I do not have the information available to me, which is the reason the member for Bourassa has come forward with his question of privilege, I wish to remind the Chair that this whole issue of ten percenters has been before the House a number of times. Not one party in here has escaped accusations of printing stuff that is erroneous, including the Liberal Party, the governing party. The issue of ten percenters and their use is currently before a subcommittee of the Board of Internal Economy. I know the Speaker himself is well aware of that issue and that it is being looked at.

The member for Bourassa said that the deeper he digs into this issue the more he finds. I would remind him that the same thing could be said for the sponsorship scandal itself.

[Business of the House, October 27th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, it being Thursday, could the government House leader identify what legislation he plans for the House of Commons for next week?

Perhaps while he is on his feet, he could take the opportunity to explain to Canadians why, after sitting 19 days now, the House of Commons has yet to see an opposition day. Could it potentially be because the government has yet to act on any of the opposition days that were passed by this place last spring and winter?

[Petitions, October 26th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, it is indeed a pleasure for me to rise yet again to present a petition as I have done at every opportunity, this one on behalf of citizens from Hamilton, Burlington, Port Colborne, Halton Hills, Oakville, Mississauga, Waterloo and Kingston.

The petitioners wish to draw to our attention that on average about 2,000 children are adopted each year from countries abroad and brought to Canada by adoptive families here. Despite the fact that in the United States and Great Britain these young children would receive automatic citizenship, they do not have that privilege accorded to them in our country.

Therefore, they call upon Parliament to immediately enact legislation to grant automatic citizenship to those minors adopted from other countries by Canadian citizens, with this citizenship being immediately granted upon the finalization of the adoption.

As I have done on other days, I call upon the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to uphold his commitment to the Canadian people to do this as soon as possible.

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, the speaking slots are somewhat limited tonight and I think I speak for members of all four parties when I say that many MPs would like to have had a chance to speak to this important issue. They obviously will not get that chance other than in questions and comments.

I want to take a moment to pay tribute to the working men and women and the families who are affected by this not only in my riding of Prince George--Peace River, but the thousands of families who have seen some really tough times and continue to see tough times all across the country. These families are suffering. By and large they have seen an immense amount of inaction on the part of the government.

I do not want to be overly partisan or critical tonight. The Minister of International Trade is sitting here tonight and I commend him for staying through the debate and listening to the points of view. He knows how these families are suffering because I am sure they have communicated with him and that he has listened.

I also want to pay tribute to the industry which has brought down the unit cost. As the leader of the official opposition stated in his remarks, the unknown thing that transpired through these countervail duties is it actually forced our industry to become even more efficient. We were already efficient in our production of wood products, but the industry has become even more efficient. The unknown consequences for the Americans is that our wood products are flooding into the United States. As my leader said, this should prove to the Americans that this is a failed policy and that it is not working. It is not having the desired effect of protecting the American industry from a highly competitive, efficient, effective Canadian industry, and good on the men and women in the companies in Canada who have been able to do that under such adverse conditions.

The Conservative Party recognizes that we cannot communicate as often as we need to head of state to head of state. Obviously that would be the ideal. That is why we were urging the Prime Minister for quite some time to communicate directly with the President of the United States when it became clear that the Americans were going to ignore the latest ruling.

We have advocated that special envoys be appointed on both sides. These envoys would not negotiate because we have already won. We are all in agreement on that. We want these envoys to communicate to the Americans at the highest level possible that severe ramifications are at stake here, not just for the 3% of NAFTA that is softwood lumber, but for the other 97% that affects the economies of both countries.

Why will the government not at least look at appointing special envoys, not to negotiate, but to raise the level of debate and awareness?

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, there is more than a shade of irony here tonight that the NDP members get up and ask questions about respecting NAFTA and ensuring that the Americans respect NAFTA when their party position is that we should tear up NAFTA. Only the NDP would believe that somehow we solve trade disputes with our largest customer by taxing more of our exports.

The member, who is from the same province as myself, British Columbia, should take a little history lesson and look at the NDP government that we had and the bitter failure it was in British Columbia, to the point where its last leader was thrown out and it was reduced to only two seats by the people of British Columbia because they recognized that the NDP was crippling the economy of British Columbia through its ineptness and incompetence. What is unbelievable is that its leader ended up as a cabinet minister here at the federal level.

I do not know how the member has the audacity to suggest that somehow the Conservative plan of assisting our companies through loan guarantees and assisting our industry by covering the legal bills, which the federal government should be doing for our companies that are going through these disputes, is not a plan. These companies have had to spend millions of dollars.

I could not believe what I was listening to. The one thing I would agree with him on is that the real hurt is with the people, the people in British Columbia especially but all across the land, the people who work for our softwood industry. He cannot see the forest for the trees, which is so typical of the NDP. The reason the working class in Canada are working so hard is to pay their taxes in this overtaxed economy, which the NDP only wants to tax more. When the NDP negotiated its $4.6 billion last spring, Bill C-48, it somehow forgot all about softwood lumber.

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Madam Chair, I know that time is very short so I will make this real simple.

The leader of the official opposition laid out a plan to get tough with the Americans and to point out to the Americans that by ignoring the latest rulings in this dispute, they were jeopardizing everything in our trade dispute under NAFTA. It was a month after the leader of the official opposition did that before the government picked up on that theme and started communicating that to the Americans.

Why do the Liberals not at least pick up on the other theme that the leader of the official opposition proposed in that particular speech in Halifax in early September and suggest to the Americans that we are prepared to put forward a special envoy to raise the level of debate on this issue and bring it to resolution?

[Petitions, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, as I have been doing at every opportunity this fall, it is again my pleasure to present a petition, this one on behalf of citizens from Dorchester, Ingersol, Guelph, Ajax, London, Pickering, all from Ontario, and Saint-Léonard and Lachine from the province of Quebec.

All of the citizens wish to draw to the attention of the House that every year there are about 2,000 young children adopted from foreign countries and brought to our land. In spite of the fact that other nations, specifically the United States of America and Great Britain, grant automatic citizenship for these young children, our country does not.

Therefore the petitioners call upon Parliament to immediately enact legislation to grant automatic citizenship to those minors adopted from other countries by Canadian citizens with this citizenship being immediately granted upon the finalization of the adoption.

I note that the Minister for Citizenship and Immigration has committed to the Canadian people to introduce stand alone legislation to accomplish this, and I would hope that he would do it post-haste.

[Income Tax Act, October 25th, 2005]

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

That, when private members' business is called later today, the motion for second reading and reference to the Standing Committee on Finance of Bill C-271, an act to amend the Income Tax Act (tuition credit and education credit), be deemed moved by the member for Westlock—St. Paul and seconded by the member for Cariboo—Prince George.

For clarification, the sponsor of the motion, the member for Westlock—St. Paul, would retain the right to speak again for not more than five minutes at the conclusion of the second hour of debate or earlier if no other member rises in debate pursuant to Standing Order 95(1).

[U.S. Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, October 24th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, one of the issues that I raised earlier in the debate tonight, out of concern not only for myself but indeed for all members of Parliament from all four political parties, is the lack of resources that the federal government is committing to the passport office itself. I wonder whether my colleague from the Bloc Québécois is experiencing similar difficulties than I am up in the rural riding of Prince George—Peace River in northeastern British Columbia.

We do not have a passport office that is close by. We have a lot of physical impediments. My riding straddles the Rocky Mountains. It is very difficult for constituents to get the assistance that they need to ensure that their passport forms are filled out properly. I know that I am speaking not only for myself. I have had many conversations with other members of Parliament from all political parties that have found that almost all of the time of one of their constituent assistants in their ridings is taken up trying to assist constituents with passports, with properly filling out the applications, getting it sent away and assisting them in getting a passport in a timely manner.

I wonder whether the government realizes that in not making a strong case to the Americans against this. Unless they are prepared to put a lot of resources into it, suddenly every Canadian, to say nothing about every American, who crosses the border is going to need a passport. What type of problems will that create, just administratively, not only for members of Parliament obviously but for the passport office itself?