Jean Chrétien

[Foreign Affairs, May 13th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, Parliament has been consulted. A committee of the House of Commons has been studying this problem for months and months. What is he complaining about?

We are now preparing the legislation and it will be tabled. That is very simple. When he has it, he will vote on it. If he wants to vote on the day that the bill is tabled because he seems to be in favour of changing the sentencing on marijuana, that is fine. We will vote in the House as quickly as possible. He should ask his people not to speak too much.

[Marijuana, May 13th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the law is not completed by the government as of yet. We cannot table something that does not exist. When the law is ready, it will be tabled in the House of Commons for first reading, second reading and third reading. He knows that. He has been around for a long, but probably he has nothing very serious to ask about, so he has tried to create a problem again.

[Marijuana, May 13th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I have nothing to add. There will be legislation that the members can debate. There have been recommendations from both the House of Commons and the Senate.

We will be introducing a bill on this whole issue. Very soon, there will be a bill to modernize sentencing for offences involving marijuana.

[Marijuana, May 13th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, there will be a bill, and at that time the member can say, “this line comes from the Americans; this line comes from the British; this line comes from the Bloc Quebecois; this line comes from the Liberal caucus”.

When the bill is before the House, he can make all the comments he wants. However, there will be a bill to modernize sentencing for marijuana.

[Marijuana, May 13th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the matter has been examined. Reports have been received from the House.

The best proof of the independent nature of our decisions is that, when we reached a decision not all that long ago in connection with the war in Iraq, our position had been clear for the past year, and we stuck to it despite protests from some, because this country is capable of making its own decisions, since we are independent.

[Marijuana, May 13th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, the minister has regular contacts with the U.S. Attorney General, and this was one of their meetings.

As for the matter of changing and modernizing penalties relating to marijuana, it will remain illegal, but the penalties will be different.

Of course, if the Americans want to know more about our bill, I have no objections to telling them, once Parliament has decided.

[Justice, May 12th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I think that is a very unacceptable and disgraceful approach. For example, to talk about partisanship, the first woman chief justice in Canada was named to the Supreme Court by a Conservative government. When he talks about partisanship he has an example of how objective we can be. She is doing a great job and she was named to the Supreme Court by my predecessor.

We always go for the best and we do not want any political debate about it. We are judged on the quality of the appointments and when they are there they are secure until 75 years of age.

[Fisheries, May 12th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, I said that I did not want to start a constitutional debate in Canada. I had my load of constitutional debate when I became Prime Minister and I decided that there were other things to debate other than constitutional changes. That is why we have not talked a lot about the Constitution for the past 10 years, but we have talked about the economy, balanced budgets, and job creation. And that is why Canada today is the leader of the western world in terms of economic performance.

[Fisheries, May 12th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, it is always difficult for the government to have to cut the quota of fishermen because we know they are making their living out of that industry. We have to do that to protect the future of the fisheries. Nobody likes to do that sort of thing, but I think that the federal jurisdiction is well established in the Constitution.

In the past there was some discussion about changing the Constitution on these matters. There was no agreement among the maritime provinces. Members will know that fish swim from one province to another and it would be very difficult to cut the fish in half.

[Auberge Grand-Mère, May 12th, 2003]

Mr. Speaker, this has been looked upon by everybody for years and I have never received a cent from this company at all in my life, not a cent. It was looked at by the ethics counsellor and by the police. There is some document that was falsified and some people do not want to give this document back to the police to complete their inquiries.

I have been in public life for 40 years and I have never been accused of anything. I have a proud record. I have never received any money from anybody. It is my word after 40 years, so I am very surprised that the Leader of the Opposition would try to dig in dirt like that.