Jean Chrétien

[Employment, December 11th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, it is very true that the government has put order into the affairs of the nation. I said that we could not put everybody on the federal payroll. Is that what the leader of the Reform Party is proposing?

We have set the conditions for people to find and create jobs in Canada because the conditions are now the best. When we started, the interest rates were much higher than they are today. Today they are the lowest they have been in 40 years and people can start to work. It is why three-quarters of the jobs have been created by

small businesses in the last three years, and 672,000 new jobs have been created in Canada since this government came to power.

[Employment, December 11th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, we said that jobs were to be the priority of this government. Over the last three years 672,000 new jobs have been created in Canada.

We have worked very hard to put the finances of the nation in good shape. We have been very successful. Today we have the lowest interest rates in Canada in 40 years. Because we have turned the fundamentals the right way, yesterday we read in the press that last month housing starts rose by 17 per cent. People now believe that they have a future and can borrow money at the lowest rates they have ever known. We have done what is right.

Nobody can promise that there will be a job for everyone in Canada tomorrow. There will always be some unemployed people. What is important is that the government have a priority to create jobs and give everyone an excellent chance to find a job. That is exactly what this government has done.

We wish that we could have created a million jobs, but 672,000 jobs were created. That is the best record of all G-7 countries other than the United States.

[Port Of Trois-Rivières, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I very seldom use my privilege. The member was absent on Friday. I spoke with the mayor of Trois-Rivières and on CHLN. The member is three days late.

I said that once the bill is passed, the government will want the port to maintain its present status. If the bill is passed as it was proposed by the minister, Trois-Rivières will qualify.

The member's information is exactly three days late.

[National Unity, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, we have political programs when we have elections. I know that the Reform Party will have one. To deny the reality that in Canada 25 per cent of the population speaks French is denying a reality that it is a source of strength in Canada.

They are different in Quebec because the majority of the people speak French. They have a French culture and the civil code which was given by the Fathers of Confederation in 1867, making them different from the rest of the country.

Some of the provinces have some special rights when it comes to education. For example, last week we voted to change some special rights that exist in the Constitution for education in the province of Newfoundland. There are some special rights for education in Quebec too in the Constitution that were put there by the Fathers of Confederation in 1867 as there were at the time of entry into Confederation in the late fifties of Newfoundland.

[National Unity, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I think that the hon. member was not in the House when we tabled the speech from the throne in February where we gave a full plan of changes in Canada. Many of these plans and ideas have been implemented so far.

For example, we have signed an agreement with the province of Alberta on manpower training. We are out of forestry now. We are out of mining. We have transferred most of the airports to municipalities and are in the process of doing that with some of the ports.

A lot of the plans that were in the speech from the throne have been implemented but of course the hon. member did not know that. We are doing it program by program, idea by idea. That is the best way.

As far as a distinct society is concerned, we voted last December and for somebody who wants to keep the country together it was noted in Quebec that they voted against it.

[Distinct Society, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I never said that it would be approved by a nationwide referendum. But when I see that the provinces subscribe to what the House of Commons voted for last December, they recognize the reality of life in Canada; that in Quebec there is the French language, the French culture and a different system for citizens in law. It is in the Constitution.

As I said, in P.E.I. there is a guarantee that whatever the number citizens in P.E.I. there will always be four members of Parliament and they will always have four Senators. Some might say that is a special status for P.E.I. Yes, but it made that deal and we are respecting it. We are not saying that privileges have been given to P.E.I. because it guaranteed to give the House of Commons four good Liberal MPs.

[Distinct Society, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, when the member asks for change is she not aware that last Friday the Minister of Human Resources Development was in her own province signing an agreement to change the status quo for a more improved situation in Canada, that it was the Government of Alberta that signed the first labour market accord in Canada last Friday?

This example shows that this government has the right approach. We are changing Canada one program at a time. I know the Reform Party does not understand that. The member does not even know that the premier and the government of her own province agreed to a new formula for manpower in Canada.

[Distinct Society, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, this House of Commons voted a year ago on distinct society.

Again we have the Reform Party and the Bloc Quebecois together. Distinct society is very clear to me and it is something I have subscribed to all along. Everybody recognizes that the language in Quebec is different but perhaps the member does not know that. Quebec also has its own culture. Already in the Constitution the civil code of Quebec is the civil law in that province but not in the rest of the provinces. This was done in Canada in 1867 by the Fathers of Confederation.

I know the Reform Party does not want to respect the wishes of the Fathers of Confederation who wanted to have a civil code which was different for Quebec than for the rest of the country. This was among many other distinctions they gave in the Constitution.

[Transfers To Provinces, December 9th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, this is a committee report. The Minister of Finance will table his budget in February.

Regarding transfer payments to the province of Quebec, I would like to point out that, while some transfer payments from the federal government have gone down, equalization payments have increased. At the moment the amount being transferred to the province of Quebec is about the same as it was when we came to office. In the case of Quebec, there has been no change, unlike richer provinces perhaps.

The Minister of Finance is going to prepare his budget and we will see. Usually, he brings it down in February. The Leader of the Opposition will have to wait two months, and then he will have his answer.

[Krever Inquiry, December 4th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I have already replied to that question.