Linda Duncan

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

Mr. Speaker, I also look forward to the members on that side speaking in support of our sadness at the passing of Nelson Mandela.

Some years back, the House made him an honorary Canadian citizen. Why was that? It was because he was revered around the world for standing up for the right of the peoples of a territory to voice how they should be governed and have equal rights and opportunities.

That is precisely what this legislation should do, not just this bill before us right now, but particularly this bill, because it is talking about the devolution of powers. We must always make sure that we are moving forward with a consistent principle, and that is toward greater self-government. That was the promise of the government: to move toward respecting greater self-governance by our indigenous populations.

Therefore, it is critical that we carefully consider any concerns raised by indigenous peoples in the Northwest Territories about this bill.

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

Mr. Speaker, I very much appreciate the opportunity to rise in the House to speak to the bill. In one of my previous incarnations I was assistant deputy of resources for Yukon and I had the privilege of participating in some of the devolution negotiations for Yukon.

I also had the privilege of working in the Northwest Territories back in the 1960s. I know that dates me, but I worked at a fishing camp in Great Bear Lake. That was the moment in time that vested a deep love of the north in me. I look for every opportunity that I can to visit the north and for every opportunity to meet with representatives of northern Canada when they come to the Hill.

I have a high level of respect for all three governments in Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut. I admire the determination in seeking independence and governance of their own peoples and I have incredible respect for the hard work that has been invested in the settlement of first nation final agreements and in moving toward their implementation. Unfortunately, some of those remain unresolved, and I certainly wish those first nation peoples the best in resolving the outstanding issues. They can know that we are behind them so they can move toward self-governance as well.

It is important to understand the governance of the north. Much of the north is also under first nation final agreements and self-government agreements, so there are really three levels of governance. The federal government plays a role in the north. There is the Government of the Northwest Territories and then there are the governments of the distinct first nations and Inuit peoples who have moved forward toward their own system of self-governance. That is why these negotiations take so long: it is because it is important to show respect and due consideration for the rights and interests of all peoples and to carry out consultation.

With regard to Bill C-15, as my colleagues have said clearly, we have every intention to support moving the bill forward to committee for review. I will be encouraging my colleagues who sit on that committee to call for part of the review by the committee to occur in the communities of the north. I make this call in every committee I sit on.

I was very pleased that when I was the environment critic, we did a review of the impact of the oil sands on water. Our committee actually travelled to several communities in Alberta, including Fort Chipewyan, which has borne the brunt of a lot of the impacts of the development there. It is very important that those people who are most directly impacted have the opportunity to participate, not just as witnesses, but to attend and hear first hand what their friends, neighbours, and leaders are saying and what other interested parties are saying on the bill.

I know a good number of the communities of the Northwest Territories are tuning in and watching this debate. Toward the end of my brief comments, I intend to share some of the comments that they asked me to pass on directly, and I will be most pleased to do that.

This is indeed a complex bill. As we have heard, there has been some level of frustration by the peoples of the north of the decision to combine together the legislation moving forward on devolution of powers to the Government of the Northwest Territories with other measures, in particular the measures in part 4 that will provide for changes to the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act. Most of my comments relate to part 4, because it is on those measures that we have heard the most concerns and have heard the hope that there may be amendments at committee stage and later in the House.

It is important to keep in mind that there has been devolution of powers previously. I believe it was almost 30 years ago that powers over education, health care, transport, forestry, and wildlife were devolved to the Northwest Territories government, so clearly the NWT government was found even three decades ago to have the competence and the capability to deliver governance. We should therefore move forward and further devolve those powers, because the governments for the first nations, the Inuvialuit, and the other peoples of the Northwest Territories deserve to have a government close at hand that they can speak to and that they can influence in making decisions about their future, including the exploitation of resources.

The devolution provisions clearly will be very important because the government of the Northwest Territories will be able to shift away from simply getting a transfer from the federal government, having to bow and scrape and say, “We will do thus and so; can you please transfer resources to us?” I think the government would now be able to appreciate at least up to 50% of the dollars that come from revenue from resource extraction, as it should. I am sure that into the future the Northwest Territories hopes that it too will become a full provincial entity, fully controlling decisions about its peoples, its lands, and its waters.

It is also important to point out that the statute would amend up to 42 statutes, including the Canada Student Loans Act, the Territorial Lands Act, the Dominion Water Power Act, the Divorce Act, the Privacy Act, the Canada Oil and Gas Operations Act, the National Energy Board Act, the Northern Pipeline Act, the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Act, the Canadian Human Rights Act, and the Canada Water Act. Clearly it is a very complex bill that merits very careful review and understanding by all the members of this place and certainly at committee, so that members feel fully competent and informed in order to pass judgment and to vote yea or nay on the eventual bill.

Part 4 is the area where most of my colleagues in the House have raised concerns. Part 4 deals with the many changes to the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act, the most significant being the devolution of a system of co-management between the first nation peoples and other governments.

I know from my direct experience in working on these matters in Yukon that for the first nations and indigenous peoples of this country to have a right to have a say in the management of wildlife, water, and other resources in their territories is a matter that has been fought for long and hard. They do have their own distinct territories, and then they have the right for traditional harvest in additional lands. It is very important that they have the opportunity to have a direct say.

Those are the significant provisions that we are hearing from peoples of the north. They wish potential amendments to be tabled in committee and debated, and it should be their right and privilege to come before the committee and to suggest amendments to the bill that would then be given due consideration.

The issue has been raised of the inherent potential contradiction between part 1 of Bill C-15 and part 4, in that part 1 provides for the devolution of powers to the people of the north and then part 4 pulls back the rights and powers of northern peoples to actually make decisions in a lot of matters, including water, wildlife, and so forth.

There has been particular concern with shifting decision-making from the peoples of the north to the federal ministers and cabinet. It has been pointed out that there are specific provisions whereby federal ministers and the federal cabinet would have the power to direct that the Commissioner of the Northwest Territories must withhold final assent to any legislation that is brought forward by the legislature in the Northwest Territories for up to a year.

A lot of concern has been expressed about that. Either they are going to be given the powers to move forward or they are not going to be given the powers to move forward.

I took the time to phone some of the first nations in the north and I want to share some of their feedback.

This comes from president Robert Alexie and vice-president Norman Snowshoe of the Gwich'in Tribal Council. They wish to have their comments on part 4 shared in the House:

The Gwich'in Tribal Council fully supports the Devolution of authority to the GNWT and strong economic development in its region and in the NWT. The MVRMA amendments, however, increase the authority of the federal Minister at the expense of regional decision-making. The Gwich'in have less authority over their Settlement Area now because of these amendments. The residents of the NWT have less authority over the regulatory system under these amendments. Therefore, the Gwich'in support NWT Devolution and reject the MVRMA amendments.

In closing, I will say that a number of other first nations governments express the same concerns and wish to have the opportunity to come forward and share their concerns at committee.

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

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his speech on this matter and particularly for standing and being an additional voice in this place for the indigenous peoples of the Northwest Territories.

I am sure the government members on the other side read the same media we do. Hopefully they also reached out to those communities to see if they actually supported the legislation coming forward. Had they done that they would know that both the Gwich'in Tribal Council and the Tlicho have said resoundingly they totally oppose the part of the bill that would change the Mackenzie Valley Resource Management Act. They say, definitively, their people have spoken and what Canada is proposing is clearly unacceptable.

That does not sound like consent. It does not sound like the Conservatives have even accommodated what the people of the north have asked for, which is to have a direct voice in matters, not to have some central superboard.

[Economic Action Plan 2013 Act No. 2, December 3rd, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I noted the hon. member mentioned that we are going to vote against the bill. One would be led to presume that the Conservatives intentionally draft their bills so that we will oppose them. If one takes an action, one will get the predictable response.

Clearly one of the strong arguments that we continue to make in the House on behalf of Canadians, who are equally fed up with the way the government operates with its budget bills, is the inclusion of legislation that should be tabled independently.

One strong example is the long-awaited legislation to afford a level of protection for offshore workers in Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia. Grudgingly, Conservatives allow the review of that briefly. We waited 12 years for that legislation to come forward. Surely that merits a separate debate.

I can simply quote the now Minister of Justice in 2004 who said:

The speed with which the government has acted in this fashion in bringing about closure is a true signal as to how the Prime Minister and the government are going to treat the so-called democratic deficit that the Prime Minister has had a revelation on in discovering that a democratic deficit exists in the country.

That was the current government complaining about the previous Liberal government. The Conservatives changed sides of the room and they changed their attitude to parliamentary democracy.

[Financial Administration Act, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, at the outset, I want to congratulate the member for Charlesbourg—Haute-Saint-Charles for her leadership in tabling the bill in this place today.

My colleague who spoke before me has raised a litany of issues on gender parity that have yet to be addressed by either Conservative or Liberal governments in the past. In a couple of years from now, when the New Democrats take control of government, I am looking forward to addressing these matters from the House of Commons. I would point out that given the large proportion of women in the chamber represented by our party, we can have full confidence that the government will also be represented by a lot of women, including in cabinet.

It is important to point out that my colleague has tabled a bill addressing a clear power of the government—that is, its power to make appointments to crown corporations. The bill is very laudatory, because what she is saying is that government should lead by example. In a notation in budget 2012, the government simply encouraged private corporate boards to include more Canadian women, and that was good business sense, but it took no measures itself to increase the number of women on the boards to which it controls appointments.

Of course, the members will remember that the government of the day made great promises for open, transparent, participatory government and tabled its accountability bill. What it has not delivered on, and what it struck down without striking down the payment is its appointments secretariat, which for many years continued to have millions of dollars budgeted when it in fact did no business.

Therefore, there is no clear mechanism whereby members of Parliament can come forward on appointments to make recommendations to encourage more names of women to come forward. The only time members of Parliament can do that is when the speaker refers the matter of appointments to committees and if in the wisdom of the committee it decides that it will address that matter. It is always after the fact. It is after the government has already decided who it is bringing forward as appointments.

Therefore, I fully congratulate my colleague for her very progressive step, which is very clearly based on the information she provided to the House today in keeping with other G8 nations. To represent the interests of all Canadians, we should of course turn to the G8 nations when they are taking more democratic measures.

I think also that the bill is very wise, because it does not recommend that we immediately provide parity on all crown corporations for men and women. There is a very phased increase over time, which is reasonable.

There was opposition by the government member speaking against quotas, saying that somehow women have to have quotas or they will never get appointed, which is an absurd statement. One of the reasons governments turn to quotas is that governments have not voluntarily gone in that direction. We note from past experience, whether it is a private corporate board or a crown corporation, that once someone is appointed to one board, that person is seen as credible and is then appointed to other boards. One merely needs to look at The Globe and Mail each day to see who is being appointed, and then see the long list of boards that the new appointee has been appointed to.

At what point in time can women get an equal foot in the door? At some point in time, the governments have to take certain measures. The measure that my hon. colleague has brought forward is a very reasonable one, and it is in keeping with precedents set by other countries around the world.

Let us look at the record. My colleague was very fair and reasonable in doing an averaging of the number of women appointed to crown corporations. I believe she said it was 27%. I think what the Library of Parliament said was far less than that, less than 20%.

However, let us look at the actual boards. How many women are on the board of Atomic Energy of Canada? The answer is zero. For the National Energy Board, it is 20%. For the Bank of Canada, it is 23% women.

In Canada Post Corporation, we know a lot of posties are women. I think they probably have the direct experience. They could potentially sit on the board. They are good business managers: 18%.

There is the CBC. Both men and women listen to the radio. They can offer sage advice on what would make for good public programming: only 33% for women.

There is the Standards Council of Canada. Women nowadays have all kinds of backgrounds and credentials that they could offer for establishing common standards for the country: a mere 27% are women.

We might be able to defend that there is no necessity for quotas. We might be able to defend that there are so few women on our crown corporations because they are not educated or they do not have the credentials. In my alma mater, the University of Alberta, enrollment in the Alberta School of Business MBA program is 42% women. Maybe that is an indication that there are women of high calibre.

In the University of Alberta faculty of law, the percentage of women enrolled has been a consistent 48% to 51% since the year 2000. I can fully attest that each year the women graduated with the highest percentage of marks from those law schools. Therefore, it is clearly not a matter of women not having the credentials.

Maybe they graduate from university and they do not go on to have any practical experience. I took the time to look at the membership in the law societies across our country. What is the percentage of insured members of the bar in Alberta who are women? It is almost 50%. Almost 2,000 women are registered, practising, insured members of the bar society. In Ontario, almost 7,000 women are practising members of the bar.

Let us look a bit deeper. Maybe they are just new entrants. Maybe this is a new phenomenon that women have decided to enter the professions. Maybe they have the qualifications to actually serve on crown corporations. We look at practising members of the bar in Alberta for 16 to 20 years: 573 women; in Ontario, 2,200 women. Let us look at 26 years and more of women who have practised at the bar: in Alberta, over 700 women; in Ontario, more than 2,400 women.

Therefore, is it a situation where women do not have the qualifications or do not have the experience? One simply raises the question of why the government, in its wisdom, cannot seem to find any qualified women to appoint to its crown corporations.

One of the mechanisms to use, which has been used around the world, is the use of establishing quotas. As my colleague very validly pointed out, around the world various countries have chosen mechanisms to make appointments and many of them have chosen specific quotas.

I am deeply troubled in hearing the comment across the way by the member responsible for the Status of Women in suggesting that because my colleague has tabled a bill recommending that there be quotas, that therefore the member does not believe women are qualified. Nothing could be further from the truth. The very reason she has stated in the House and why she feels it is necessary to bring forward this bill is because there are so many qualified women in the country who are being given short shrift by the government.

In closing, the most important point is the comment made by the government member about the fact that these were stand-alone boards and that the government had nothing to do with them. It is the government that chooses whom to appoint to every federal crown corporation in the country. The members of the government are the ones who make those very choices. In their wisdom, they have decided that they will not look to our chambers of commerce, our places of business, our small businesses, large corporations or to women who are in management to find women who might be able to serve.

It was suggested in a review by the United Nations a few years back that it would serve democracy better around the world if governments would move to ensure greater gender parity in all institutions of government.

[Financial Administration Act, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to follow up on a comment from the other side. We commonly hear that the crown corporations are at arm's length. What is not at arm's length is who gets to make the appointments to boards. It is cabinet. It is the Conservative government that makes the appointments to boards.

We have had the Conservatives in power for quite some time, and we still see women being stalled and not being appointed. I wonder if my colleague could speak to that.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, another of my colleagues is going to address the question about the need for more educational programs.

However, the issue of deterrence is different. Prevention means there are education programs in schools and communities, in the government, on websites and so forth. Deterrence means there are provisions and penalties in law that will deter.

However, the most critical piece is that there has to be some kind of reasonable probability that the crime will be detected. That means there needs to be some kind of strategic risk-based strategy on how the government is going to focus its resources on enforcing this bill. That is what we have not heard from the government. Frankly, we have not heard that from the government in every bill it has brought forward and that I have spoken to. A law is fine, but if the appropriate resources and a strategic plan are not in place to target the crime and provide a deterrent, then it is all for naught.

One of the things that the government might consider adding is innovative sentencing. That occurs in regulatory offences, and maybe it would be appropriate in this case as well.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, that is a very fair question. I spoke to those matters, but I am happy to address them again.

We are hearing the government state that it has majorly shifted and that the bill now requires warrants. The issue that is still outstanding is what the burden of proof is for those warrants and whether the government is inventing a different burden of proof in these matters. That is a matter that merits legal expertise and discussion at committee, to give reassurances to Canadians.

On the matter of recommendation four from the intergovernmental report, I will note specifically that it recommends improved judicial oversight. That is exactly the matter that we wish to discuss. Is it in fact the same level of judicial oversight that we would normally anticipate in the judicial process, or is it being varied? If we can be reassured on that, then I think there would be fewer objections to the bill.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to rise in the House to speak to Bill C-13.

The first part of the bill is very clearly a critical issue that we have been dealing with in Canada. I would hope that every member in this House would support expedited action, across the board, to prevent cyberbullying and the inappropriate, illegal, non-consensual distribution of sexual information, in particular related to children.

I welcome the fact, as do my colleagues, that the government is finally coming forward with a more reasonable bill, and that we do not have the slinging of insults. We appreciate the respect being given to this matter and the more respectful bill, and perhaps it is because the bill is now being tabled by the Minister of Justice. We hope we will have a better balancing of rights to privacy and the rights of children, and other people who are harmed by inappropriate acts through the Internet.

I do wish to bring to the attention of the House that this is not the first time that members of the House have sought action on the issue of cyberbullying and action, particularly where youth have been harmed, and in some cases have committed suicide, because of extensive bullying.

I would like to bring to the attention of the House the motion M-385, tabled by the member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord in October 2012. It was debated in this House. The member recommended that there be a broad-based strategy on dealing with cyberbullying.

It is noteworthy that just before I rose to speak a member across the way referenced the report on cyberbullying that was put together by federal, provincial and territorial ministers of justice and public safety. The very first recommendation is that the working group acknowledged the benefits of a multi-pronged, multi-sectoral approach to the issue of cyberbullying and called for action in a comprehensive manner.

That is very appreciated. Obviously, the justice ministers and the public safety ministers across this country recognize that we need to have clarification in criminal law. However, we need a lot more than that.

The member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord recommended that. He recommended a broad-based strategy that all members of the House could develop together and, heavens forbid, reach a consensus on the measures we need to move forward on. Very sadly, the Conservative members all voted down that motion.

Also, members on this side brought forward Bill C-540, a private member's bill, from the member for Dartmouth—Cole Harbour. In that bill, he recommended the creation of an offence to produce or distribute intimate images of an individual without their consent. That was the response to the tragic suicide of Rehtaeh Parsons in his province.

In addition, another member on this side, the member for New Westminster—Coquitlam, tabled Bill C-213, which very succinctly addressed the matter of communication for the purposes of child luring.

Very clearly, the members of the official opposition strongly support action by the government to address child luring and to address and punish any cybercrime that would lead to bullying and could cause serious harm or suicide of our children.

Canadian families would clearly be grateful for expedited action, certainly the families of the victims of previous bullying incidents would. Most importantly, we would like to prevent any such incident from ever occurring again. I think all members of the House would concur with that.

What we want to do is to protect our families from harm. I concur. I join with my colleagues in strongly supporting the first provisions of this bill, which deal with and address cyberbullying. I am certain that we did our best to try to suggest to the government that it would be wise to expedite these measures by dividing the bill.

We may need to strengthen the investigative powers but, as I will speak to later on, we need a lot more than stronger criminal law; we need to make sure that our enforcement officers are fully capable of actually taking action on these matters.

However, as I mentioned at the outset, the most important measures we need are ones to prevent these acts from occurring at all, not simply taking enforcement action after the fact.

Why do we have these issues? Why are Canadians, in particular legal experts and privacy experts, raising concerns with the majority of the provisions of this bill? I am informed that 37 of the 47 clauses of the bill do not directly relate to cyberbullying. Therefore, it appears eminently reasonable that we would have further debate on those provisions to expedite the cybercrime provisions.

One of the matters that was of deep concern to Canadians from coast to coast to coast, in particular legal scholars, was the previous provision of a bill that was tabled in the previous Parliament. It would have allowed for intervention into accessing Internet material without a warrant. When objections were raised, the then minister of public safety accused anybody who had raised any concerns or had proposed amendments to the bill of being pro child pornography. That caused the government to ultimately withdraw its bill, and I think appropriately.

We are encouraged that the government has moved forward now with a more reasonable bill. However, legal experts are raising some concerns with the direction the bill is taking on the way it is imposing conditions on warrants. Those are critical matters.

We have long-standing legal precedents on when it is appropriate to allow for the seizing of material and where it might be a violation of a charter right. The prerequisites to obtain a warrant have been long debated in the courts. If we are to move in any way on shifting the burden on having to show cause before obtaining a warrant, it justifiably merits a good discussion in committee over those matters. However, the government has decided that it does not want to divide the bill, so unfortunately all matters will be going to committee.

I previously mentioned the matter of the warrantless disclosure. An equally concerning matter is the possibility for Internet providers to voluntarily disclose information. I would suggest that is a matter that also needs to be looked at closely. People exchange information of a private matter day in and day out. There should be some level of protection when there is an exchange of that information.

As I only have a few minutes left, I would like to speak to a matter that comes from my personal experience. I was involved for many years in the field of environmental enforcement. One of the lessons I learned from that is that the best way to deter a crime is to have a high probability of detection and punishment.

In order to make that happen, most agencies now, when they are developing legislation, are simultaneously taking a look at the capacities of their enforcement agencies to deliver. They ask whether they have enough personnel and whether they are appropriately qualified. This is an area that police and enforcement officers have been identifying for quite some time, that it takes very special skills and training.

I have not seen the government come forward with a parallel skills, training and capabilities strategy. I would encourage it to move expeditiously on that, so that the moment the bill becomes law, the government is immediately capable of enforcing that law.

In closing, the bill is going in the right direction, generally speaking. However, it will be important for particular matters, including the changing of the burden of proof and warrants, to be explored at committee with the appropriate experts.

[Protecting Canadians from Online Crime Act, November 29th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank the hon. member for his speech on this matter. I know that he has considerable experience in his constituency representing his constituents in the courts. I take very seriously the issues he raises, which are of concern to the bar associations across the country.

There have been concerns that by again bundling matters together inappropriately, the government has not really given appropriate opportunity for discussion and debate. We are supporting moving forward expeditiously to address cyberbullying and the distribution of any inappropriate information or information of a sexual nature, particularly about children. We would love to expedite those provisions, but we have waited long and hard for the government to act.

Could the member speak to the matters relating to the issuance of warrants and so forth that arose in the previous bill, and comment on whether he thinks they are appropriately addressed or if they merit considerably more debate?