John Duncan

[Energy Costs Assistance Measures Act, November 1st, 2005]

Yes, the fact is that we are in a minority Parliament and we have the fourth party in this place continuing to run as a coalition with the government. It is most astounding. We have the NDP continuing to prop up the Liberals under any excuse, in any disguise and for any manufactured reason. All of this is an insult to representative so-called democracy.

With that, I will talk about Bill C-66, if I may. Bill C-66 is another example of legislation inspired by a crisis. The crisis of course was the run-up in prices at the pump. The crisis was the fact that natural gas has gone from $2 per unit to about $13 per unit for Canadian consumers, based on a government that cannot get its act together in terms of an energy framework or strategy for the country.

We have constrained supply because we do not have our northern pipelines sorted out, and with these guys in charge, we are not going to get our northern pipelines in order on any kind of timely basis. What we had was a price at the pumps that led to a huge spike as a consequence of some shortages due to hurricane season and hurricane Katrina and all of that.

Parliament was set to resume sitting in the last week of September. We received a request from the government chair of the Standing Committee on Industry, Natural Resources, Science and Technology to have an emergency meeting on September 22, in order to have a televised discourse with witnesses on what to do about fuel prices.

I wanted ministers to take part in that meeting because ministers more than anyone else in this place can influence what happens. There was not a single minister whom I suggested who could or would make the commitment to appear on September 22. Many committee members were inconvenienced, especially the ones who had to come from farthest away to arrive in Ottawa on a Thursday. We had to change all our plans. Those days were important for members of Parliament prior to returning to Parliament after the summer break. That is when many constituents are back in their regular duties and it is a good time for members to carry out their functions.

September 22 turned out to be the day hurricane Katrina was hurtling toward the southern gulf coast in the U.S. At that meeting we witnessed government members finding every reason in the book to point fingers. They thought up inventive ways of suggesting that it was a conspiracy that did not involve the government, that it was because of the oil companies or some other factor that the prices were ridiculously high on that very day, and of course they were because it was a one week event.

The real crux of the issue is what has the government been doing? Where is it headed when it comes to taxation issues surrounding what Canadian consumers pay at the pump, or for heating oil or natural gas? Let us not forget industries such as the air transportation sector, the trucking sector and agriculture and resource industries that use huge amounts of fuel as part of their input costs. What is the government's approach to all of this, other than doing everything possible to protect maximum extraction of tax revenues to the detriment of consumers of every stripe?

We heard witnesses from the finance department. They did not act like witnesses from the finance department. What became very clear is that this announcement comes to a very small portion of government revenues. The portion is so small that the finance department officials said if that same amount of money was reflected in a tax decrease, it would be insignificant.

The government is still protecting its revenue sources. The government still has no strategy on how it is going to deal with all of this. The government takes this revenue, puts it into general revenues and returns 2¢ on the dollar for highway infrastructure. It blatantly transfers a very small amount to the municipalities with the future promise, which the Conservative Party is also committed to, of eventually getting to 5¢ a litre.

[Energy Costs Assistance Measures Act, November 1st, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, I am going to be splitting my time with my colleague from Saskatoon--Humboldt.

I had a short conversation with my Liberal colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Finance, who asked me if my speech would have anything to do with Bill C-66, which is the energy package. I said it certainly would. He said that he assumed I might want to talk about the Gomery report because that is the issue of the day and people are primarily focused on it. It is not my intention to do that. I do want to talk about Bill C-66, the energy bill.

I did find it rather inventive that the parliamentary secretary, in his question to his other Liberal colleague who just spoke, did try to suggest, in a strange fashion, that the Bloc would somehow run this scheme along the same lines that the sponsorship scheme was co-opted by the Liberal Party of Canada, which fleeced the Canadian taxpayer and contributed to the largest scandal in Canadian history. I do not think there is any analogy there whatsoever.

It is typical of the Liberals right now to try to invent any excuse to diffuse attention away from what should be, in any setting, in any democracy anywhere, the demise of the government and the demise of the party. Instead, we have a Prime Minister and a government hanging on by their fingernails, refusing to leave and pretending that all is well when all is very bad indeed. Our international reputation and stature are going down the drain over and over again.

[Forest Industry, October 26th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, for three and a half years the Canadian forest industry has asked the Liberal government to approve its proposal to allow Export Development Canada to back U.S. imposed softwood lumber tariff payments.

Now the government is saying that it needs more time, as if this is a brand new proposal. If the government really wants to backstop the industry, why does it not approve the proposal?

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, in the response that the member just provided, he said that the columnist for the National Post talked about the Prime Minister speaking with conviction. I would like to know which conviction because yesterday there were four different Canadian Press Wire stories in the national general news: The Prime Minister suggests he is open to negotiations on some elements of the softwood dispute. The Prime Minister has indicated he is open to negotiations over the softwood lumber dispute with the U.S. The Prime Minister says he will not negotiate the dispute resolution panel decisions under the NAFTA. The Prime Minister told an Ottawa news conference that he might negotiate other aspects of the softwood dispute.

There are four different statements saying four different things. Talk about mixed messages. If this is speaking with one voice, I do not know how many tongues it is in. How is this conducive to resolving the softwood dispute when on October 24 we heard “open to negotiations”, “will not negotiate”, “might negotiate” and then today in question period he went from there to “will not negotiate”? This is all most puzzling to people who watch this closely. The only people who are showing any degree of being impressed with the performance are those who are only paying attention a quarter of the time so they only hear one story.

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, this is a continuation on the same theme in my question for the member for Burnaby—Douglas. The concern I think all of us share is the whole question of mixed messaging from the government. That can create a real problem in delivering the message we want to deliver.

I heard the trade minister during question period talk about the return of $5.1 billion. I heard the Deputy Prime Minister and the Prime Minister in the very same question period talk about the return of $3.5 billion. It is as if they are on two separate sets of talking points.

Did that strike the member for Burnaby—Douglas the same way it struck our caucus?

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, my question for the member for Etobicoke North is very simple and straightforward. I know the member for Etobicoke North thinks about these kinds of things. Why did the Prime Minister only ask for $3.5 billion to be returned? What about the other $1.6 billion? Where did this come from, what does it mean, and why did he do it? The member must have an answer.

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, just as a side bar, I notice that the member for Kenora continues to be called the member for Kenora--Rainy River by many of my colleagues from all parties who were here before this Parliament, because that was the name.

My question for the member is related to the fact that we often talk about how long this dispute has been really going on. I think we are into what most people term lumber four. However, this is the first time that we have dealt with the lumber dispute in the context of the Byrd amendment and all of the provisions of the North American Free Trade Agreement. That changes the entire equation. That is why the government needed a strategy, a plan, an approach. That is what has been lacking.

Now after three and a half years of wandering in the woods we have some of the Liberal caucus saying that it is in favour of loan guarantees. We have ministers saying they are still looking at it. We have other statements that perhaps there is going to be some other plan that is delivered.

Is there no shame, embarrassment or sense of urgency on the other side to say, “This is long enough. We're going to deliver. This is what it's going to be”. Can we not have some expectation of a timeline on all of this?

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Speaker, this is unbelievable. I have just gone through a whole speech in which my preamble dealt with the fact that we cannot put words in people's mouths. These envoys are to communicate at the highest level. This is not negotiations. The NDP has tried to portray them that way for its own political purposes. Now we have my colleague from the Liberal Party stating that I have said we should be negotiating. I did not say that at all. I am profoundly disappointed that this thought is being kicked around. It is obviously something that we have never stated and I refute it in every way.

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, I will be very quick. The first time that this was proposed, all of the opposition parties combined actually accepted our invitation to present the joint submission through a press conference on the EDC backing of these cash deposits as receivables. That occurred in 2002, but it occurred at a time when the government had a majority. There was no interest at all from the government. Now we are in a different circumstance. I think the dial is turned up a certain amount on the government.

To answer the second question on moneys that have been returned under the softwood arrangement to American industries, that amounts to about $14 million. That $14 million represents moneys collected from companies that were fed up with filling out the legal documents that were required to stay in the game of being able to eventually recover this money. There were many smaller companies involved. This is one more argument for why we need the government to provide some umbrella in terms of some way to reimburse on the legal fees front to preempt this unfair distribution of their tariffs.

[Softwood Lumber, October 25th, 2005]

Mr. Chair, I heard the member's clarification on the riding names. I would like to say that I called the member for Kenora the member for Kenora—Rainy River simply because the member for Thunder Bay—Superior North called him the member for Kenora—Rainy River. That used to be the name of the riding. I am not at my normal desk and there does not happen to be a seating plan on this desk. These things happen.

However, on the questions, municipalities are an important level of government. I think they are asking some very important questions. We are finding more and more advocates that are signing on to this whole issue of EDC backing, because it treats the entire industry the same and does not pick winners and losers. It makes a neutral decision. That is the best kind of decision the government can promote. I think that is an important event.

I agree with the member that most of what the ministers and Prime Minister have been saying most recently on this issue in the Canadian context or even in the famous speech in New York is primarily seen, heard or thought about by only a Canadian audience. There has been some very strong work done by members of Parliament and some of our senators.

A group of us from Canada and U.S. were in New Brunswick on the weekend. We were with 10% of the Republican caucus, with 6 members out of about 60. I thought we made some real progress, but when I came back to Ottawa and witnessed what our non-leadership leadership was doing, I thought that all of our good work had actually dissipated within a day or two of our return because of some very unfortunate and inconsistent positioning.

Finally, on the question of the usefulness of envoys, I do not know if the member was here when the leader of the official opposition spoke earlier, but he gave an example of a time when we had a very intractable situation on acid rain. Envoys were appointed from the two governments and they came to some resolution on that very intractable situation, a resolution which is standing the test of time fairly well, so there is a living example. We think it could be very useful.