Kennedy Stewart

[Northwest Territories Devolution Act, December 5th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I will be splitting my time with the member for Vaudreuil-Soulanges.

I would like to thank the member for Western Arctic for his work on Bill C-15. I have never had the opportunity to be in the north, but I feel that I have been there after speaking with him. He knows that part of Canada intimately and regales us with plenty of stories that let us feel as if we have actually been there ourselves, if we have not had the pleasure. This is why parliaments are essential. They bring people from different parts of the country together to discuss where there is overlap and interest but where there is also disagreement.

A well-functioning Parliament is essential to a well-functioning country. Sometimes I wish this Parliament would function a little better. There are a number of measures before the House, either motions or private members' bills, that I encourage everyone in the House to look at, because we need to make this place work a little better.

I am happy to say that we are supporting Bill C-15 at second reading. We favour devolution for the Northwest Territories. They have pushed for it for a long time, and I am happy to see that we are at least going part of the way to getting this right at the moment. However, there are a number of problems we have with the bill, as my colleagues have pointed out in their speeches. We are looking forward to discussing them at committee.

My colleagues here today have offered a robust discussion on the details of the bill, although it would have been nice to have had more comments and speeches from the other parts of the House, because what we are here to do is share and deliberate. Perhaps some of the questions from the other side will help us work through this a little more today.

There are two things I would like to do in my short time. One is to continue what my colleague, the member for Welland, was speaking about, which was the idea of devolution and what it means. To talk about it in normative terms, what is it we try to accomplish by devolving? What are the themes, and what would we look at to determine whether devolution is a success or a failure? Second, if I have time, I will also look at the Yukon, which has been devolved for many decades now. There are lessons we can learn from that territory that perhaps we could transfer to the Northwest Territories.

Mr. Speaker, if you have free time on Friday night, there is an article you may want to peruse. It is titled “Assessing Devolution in the Canadian North: A Case Study of the Yukon Territory”, by Alcantara, Cameron, and Kennedy. It is from the academic journal Arctic, Volume 65 No. 3, published in September 2002. They actually have a very good case study. They conducted many interviews in the Yukon to ask a number of essential questions and to assess how successful the Yukon had been in devolving its powers. I recommend that to you, Mr. Speaker, and anyone else in the House. Sometimes the ivory tower can be useful, and in this case, it does give a good perspective.

What is devolution? All countries have constitutions, and constitutions lay out who has the ability to distribute resources and make rules. They distribute power within a country. However, if we remove the constitution and just say that we have a whole bunch of people living on a particular land mass, how would we write the rules that would determine who makes decisions?

In some ways, devolution is a reaction to our current constitutional situation. The provinces and the federal government are enshrined in our Constitution. They are actually given, under sections 91 and 92, the statutory authority from the Queen of Canada to execute laws and distribute resources in Canada.

In some ways, territories are not unlike municipalities. Sometimes that offends people, so I want to be clear that, constitutionally, provinces are recognized. They devolve power to the municipalities. Constitutionally, of course, the federal national government is recognized. It devolves power to the territories. However, there are some real differences between territories and municipalities, and there should be. Territories are much more like provinces in nature. For example, as we are seeing in this bill, they have more control over resources, such as a 50% split in the determination of resource revenues, whereas municipalities have much less power.

However, in nature they are similar because both territories and municipalities are not masters of their own fate. Where a province has certain constitutional powers to determine what they want to do without interference from the federal government, territories do not have that luxury.

When the federal government decides what kinds of powers it is going to devolve to territories, and provinces decide what kinds of powers they are going to devolve to municipalities, we have to make sure that the local population is getting the powers and the resources it needs to do the work it needs to do at the local level.

As my colleague from Welland pointed out, devolution has been a major theme around the world, especially in the United Kingdom, for many decades. I had the opportunity when I was living in the U.K. from 1997 to around 2002 to watch as New Labour decided to move ahead with a very aggressive devolution agenda. For example, we had the Good Friday Agreement, which was signed and devolved some powers in Northern Ireland. Considerable powers were also devolved to the Scottish and Welsh legislatures, as well as the City of London, which is treated more in some ways like a province than a city these days.

There was a lot of negotiation about who would get what powers and where. The power to make the change is still with the Queen and with the U.K. Parliament, however these local bodies have become much more autonomous and independent. Universally, across the United Kingdom, this is a good thing. Local people have much more control over their own lives through their own legislatures.

I think devolution continues to be a popular idea, and it should be because, in general, devolution is a good thing. Why would we devolve? What are some of the normative reasons why we might devolve power to a lower level or a government that is closer to the people?

One of the first arguments as to why we would do this is that it increases efficiency. We have heard this from the other side of the House. It does appear in the academic literature. If, for example, there were no territorial government in the Northwest Territories, that would mean all the decisions made in the north would be made from right here in Ottawa. We would debate what is best for northerners with a couple of representatives here in the House, and the vast majority of people who do not live in the north would be making decisions for the north.

That is why a devolved legislature with distinct powers in the north is essential. It allows northerners to make decisions about their own lives. The extent to which these decisions can be made, the decisions that are determined by the federal government and/or the NWT government, is what is at the core of what we are discussing here, both in this act and I am sure, in subsequent acts as we move to devolve more powers.

The argument is that sub-national authorities, here territorial governments, are better positioned to access and make use of local knowledge and context when they are making decisions. If there were no Northwest Territories government and I was asked every few days to make a decision for people in the north, I would feel unprepared to do that, because I have not visited.

This is why it is so great that there is a very well-functioning legislature there. Devolution would lead to more efficiency within government. Therefore, efficiency is one reason to do it.

The second reason is that, most importantly, devolution encourages government responsiveness. Local people can hold local representatives to account. The more power that these local politicians and local governments have, the more people will take interest and participate in their own governance.

I will close by looking at voter turnout, for example in the NWT. In the late 1990s, it was around 70%. It was around 60% in the 2000s. Northerners are already very engaged in their own governance. I think devolving will increase interest in governance in the Northwest Territories, and for that reason alone it is a grand idea to devolve powers.

However, I wish that the government would debate more on this. I hope that it will encourage discussion and witnesses to come forward so that we can make sure that we get it right the first time around. This one has been a long time coming. We do not want to wait another 20 or 30 years before we do it again. We have to get it right, now.

I implore the government to at least listen to our side of the House as we move forward with the bill.

[Parliamentary Science Officer Act, December 3rd, 2013]

moved for leave to introduce Bill C-558, An Act to establish the position of Parliamentary Science Officer.

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise today to introduce my very first private member's bill, Bill C-558, an act to establish the position of parliamentary science officer.

Science in Canada is at a crossroads. For too many years we have heard that scientific evidence is often ignored by policy-makers and that federal scientists are being unduly prevented from sharing their research with Canadians.

My bill calls for the creation of an independent office tasked with providing Parliament with sound information and expert advice on all scientific matters of relevance. This would revitalize the exchange of knowledge between scientists and politicians and give public science a more robust voice in the legislative process.

Modelled after the U.K.'s Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy and our very own Parliamentary Budget Officer, my proposal aims to help ensure decisions made in Ottawa are informed by the best scientific evidence available.

A parliamentary science officer would be a significant improvement on the previous Office of the National Science Advisor, which lacked the institutional independence from the government of the day.

As science is fundamentally a non-partisan issue, I hope this legislation will receive the support of members from all sides of the House.

(Motions deemed adopted, bill read the first time and printed)

[Petitions, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the second petition is with respect to Bill C-201 regarding the right of tradespeople and indentured apprentices to deduct travel and accommodation expenses from their taxable income.

I have many friends in the building trades who I know would support this petition, and I really urge the government to take it seriously.

[Petitions, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I have two petitions to present today. The first petition is signed by dozens of citizens from my riding concerning genetically modified alfalfa.

The petitioners note that contamination from genetically modified alfalfa is inevitable. They are calling upon the Government of Canada to impose a moratorium on the release of genetically modified alfalfa.

[Ethics, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians really need the truth about this issue. For weeks we have been getting farcical answers about lemonade stands and pizza delivery. I will ask a question and I hope I can get a straight answer.

On Tuesday, the Prime Minister told the House that he first became aware of the Conservative Party's Mike Duffy payoff on May 15. Therefore, why did the Prime Minister not tell the House about the payoff until five months later when Mike Duffy brought it up in the Senate on October 28?

[Respect for Communities Act, November 28th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, the questions are good today and I really hope they add to the debate.

Safe injection sites, again, are a flashpoint for debate just because they are new. They are new because people's thinking on them has started to change, mainly because of the great scientific evidence that we have had. Again, these are peer-reviewed studies that are in international scientific journals which stem from the work that has been done in the Vancouver site, as well as sites all around the world.

We have to pay attention to this evidence, because people are suffering. It is not just the people who are immediately affected by addiction, it is the communities. If we were in the downtown east side before the safe injection site was put in place, we would see a community that was in real pain and chaos. After the safe injection site, it is not totally fixed, but the harm has been reduced.

That is really the key here. When we went from thinking about it as a criminal matter to a health matter, that was when the debate started to change and we had a more mature debate about it. I hope we can do that in the House.

[Respect for Communities Act, November 28th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my grand colleague from Sudbury, who I enjoy working with on the industry committee.

He is exactly right. It is important to know that this facility is not just a place where addicts go, inject and then leave. It is also a place where they can get help. If we talk to people who are or have been heroin addicts, the last thing they want to do is continue with this. They do not want to be heroin addicts. It is not something that they choose; it is usually because of depression or other reasons why people get addicted to these drugs. They desperately want to be able to manage their problem to get their lives back under control and, ultimately, reduce their dependency.

That is exactly what facilities such as this do. They give people options that they do not think they had. They keep people alive. They stop people from taking water out of mud puddles and injecting it into themselves.

It really is a win-win and it saves significant amounts of money, if that is important. It should be a consideration.

[Respect for Communities Act, November 28th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise today to speak to Bill C-2, an Act to amend the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. In listening to the debate in the House, it is good we are having it.

Today, I would like to talk about the history of the Vancouver safe injection site, or the harm reduction site, because it adds to the debate on of how we might move forward with future sites.

If I have time, I will also talk a bit about the scientific evidence that backs up the creation and continual operation of these sites because as a science and tech critic that is something I look at quite regularly.

In looking at the history of the safe injection site in Vancouver, the theme would be local choice. I have lived very close to the site. I know people who manage the site. When I was a professor at SFU, I would take students to the site when there were no clients there. I have known people who have used the site.

Sometimes when we talk about the facility in the House, we tend to overstate what it is. I am not sure if any of my colleagues on the other side have had a chance to visit the safe injection site, but I think they would be amazed at how innocuous it is. There is a lot to look at when walking down Hastings Street because it is a very active community. However, one would walk right by the site because there are no flashing lights which say “Inject heroin here”. It is a medical facility.

When one enters through its doors, it looks kind of like a hair salon. It has maybe up to 15 stainless steel booths with mirrors in front of them, bright lights, chairs and a nurse's station so when people are injecting there they are using clean needles and are being supervised. If they overdose, they can be rescued. There is also a room where they can relax and adjust to the effects of the drug. Then they move out. It is not a scary place. It is a place of comfort for a lot of people. That is why the history of this site is so important.

The safe injection site was created in Vancouver because there was a policy problem that emerged in the late eighties and early nineties where hundreds of bodies were being pulled out of hotels in the downtown east side. I know this because I had spoken with Senator Larry Campbell, who was the coroner. He said that he would go into hotels in the downtown east side and would pull dead bodies out. This was happening over and over again, mainly because of overdoses.

The mayor of Vancouver at the time was Philip Owen. He was in the Non-Partisan Association, which is the name of the party. It is a coalition of federal Liberals and federal Conservatives. He was a three term mayor at that point. I would describe him, and I think he would agree, as a very Christian man. He has a predilection for ballroom dancing, but is a deeply religious man who, as mayor of the city, felt that he had to address this. What had happened simultaneously was that a number of addicts had started the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users, which was an unofficial safe injection site. Mayor Philip Owen, who was a good policy maker, decided to meet with those people and ask them what their problems were. I do not want to speak for him, but some of the questions he was facing were some of the questions my colleagues on the other side have. The idea of providing a safe site for people to inject clashes with the values they hold.

Philip Owen is a brave man. He commissioned a study on harm reduction and put it through council as official policy. It was voted through Vancouver city council. I believe the party then kicked him out as leader. It said that there were people with other ambitions who decided to move against him. It became the main debate of the 2002 civic election in Vancouver, which featured Larry Campbell, who had moved from coroner to mayoralty candidate, versus Jennifer Clarke, another mayoralty candidate. The debate throughout that whole election was about this safe injection site.

Larry Campbell ran for a party called COPE that had really never in the history controlled an absolute majority on council. He won, and that is why we have InSite today. Larry Campbell championed this cause, won an election on it, convinced all the local area residents and merchants, police, emergency services, that this was necessary and, as we heard, in 2003, this site was created.

The bill is problematic because it is too prescriptive.

If we listen to the story about how InSite was developed in Vancouver, it was a local choice. However, these local choices sometimes need some flexibility in terms of development. The are really driven locally anyway.

If we look at the funding of who provides these facilities, this is also co-operative and negotiated. We have federal, provincial, municipal agencies. We have police forces. We already have the local community negotiating. I can tell members that if a local community does not want a safe injection site, it will not get it, whatever federal regulation because it is solely driven by a local policy problem.

What now we have in Vancouver I think has been around the world in other places too. It is not like we invented this in Vancouver. We borrow from other places around the world. We have a facility where people can go and inject their drugs safely, under supervision, and then get on with their lives.

Heroin is a bugaboo. It is an illegal substance. However, I think the question that Philip Owen would have asked himself is what the alternatives were. I think the other side perhaps would prefer abstinence.

If somebody is a heroin addict and has perhaps other mental health issues and has a low income, it is very difficult, impossible actually, to safely go from being a heroin user to a non-heroin user overnight, especially because there are hardly any facilities for that person to do it.

It is about management. That is really what these sites do is help manage these problems that keep people alive.

My core belief is an idea called “intrinsic equality”, meaning that everybody's life is worth the same. Wayne Gretzky is not worth five drug users. Everybody's life is worth the same. It is found in many religions, but I am not coming at it from a religious perspective, but more of a philosophical perspective; all lives are of equal worth.

I think this is the problem Philip Owen would have faced. I believe life, in his perspective,would have been a sacred thing that is worth protecting. “If I do not go forward with this policy, people are going to die. Can I have that on my conscience?” I think the answer was no. This safe injection site is a simple policy solution to manage our problem that could not be eradicated.

It is a very mature way of looking at things and I am very grateful.

It is not for every community because there is not the need. This is why a local community choices are so important.

I would have believed the bill was a genuine attempt if the other side had not tried for so many years to shut down the safe injection site in Vancouver, indeed, writing fundraising letters about how it was shutting it down and so forth.

If this had been entered much earlier in the debate, it would have been something I would have considered,. However, my colleagues are right, that this is not a genuine attempt to open this debate. It is disappointing.

Again, I would ask my colleagues to reconsider, to visit the site themselves to see how innocuous it is and how it is helping people and bringing the community together in a positive way, in a community that is suffering greatly at times.

[Petitions, November 27th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to present a petition today signed by dozens of citizens in my riding of Burnaby—Douglas.

The petition concerns new pay-to-pay fees that many telephone, Internet, television and banking companies have introduced. The petition notes that these charges effectively force Canadian consumers to pay an additional fee just so they can pay their bills.

The petitioners call upon the Government of Canada to prohibit pay-to-pay fees and ensure that consumers are not charged for receiving bills in the mail. Many articulate and well-meaning constituents have come to my office to discuss this issue and I urge the government to take this petition seriously.

[Ethics, November 27th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, Conservatives arrived in Ottawa promising Canadians they were going to fix the ethical morass Liberals left behind.

It has been seven long years, and now things are even worse than when they got here. Now even long-time Conservatives are sick and tired of these scandals.

Former Conservative staffer David Sachs penned a strongly worded warning to Canadians:

[The] Prime Minister...has long employed the cynical strategy of total denial when faced with controversy, disregarding the public’s right to the truth.

He said that he wanted his own party to demand answers from the Prime Minister. Well, Mr. Sachs, welcome to the team. The New Democrats have been demanding answers for over six months. We believe Canadians deserve the truth about the Senate scandal and the PMO cover-up.

I implore the Prime Minister and his parliamentary secretary to put aside their evasions, put aside their farce, and come clean with Canadians today.