Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join this debate, although at times it can seem rather obtuse and obscure. There are all kinds of adjectives, I suppose, to describe it from the perspective of even parliamentarians who may not be as well versed as my colleague from Hamilton Mountain around the idea of regulatory change and what those regulatory statutes actually mean.
As someone who used to be a municipal councillor, I know all too well that when we pass things like a safe water act, for instance, in the province of Ontario, when the act comes to municipalities, it is not the act that scares us but the regulations. When the act comes down, it is about two and a half to three pages, and then the book comes, and it is sometimes really quite thick with the regulations that one now has to put into force or enact or find a way to do. It is those pieces that ultimately make that piece of legislation work and that form the backbone of the legislation, if you will. In fact, it would be the nuts and bolts. That is how it makes all of these things work.
Many of us in this place, I would suggest, know that we pass legislation and debate it in this place, but then off it goes somewhere else where the regulations that go behind the legislation to give it teeth or put meat on the bones are put in place, so it can go forward and actually mean something.
The regulations get drafted in different ways and it all becomes part of that bigger piece that the general public would see as that maze of government bureaucracy they say they deal with. They do not actually necessarily deal with the act specifically; they deal with the specific regulations, nine times out of ten. When they come to our office to complain about something, it is the regulation of the particular act they are complaining about, not the act that may have been passed in this House.
What I found quite astounding was the number of regulations. We are literally talking about thousands. At the moment there are at the federal level approximately 3,000 regulations comprising 30,000 pages of text.
For folks to wade through that material to find out what the regulations are that might impact them in whatever sphere of life they are in, whether it be business or other things they are partaking in as a general part of their lives, is quite a daunting task when they come up against something and they try to figure it out.
We find, to give it some sense of context, there are about 450 statutes of 13,000 pages. Again, the acts themselves that we pass here are such minor pieces of the overall legislation when the regulations are finally written and enacted and put behind it. That speaks to the volume of material that folks would have to navigate to try to figure out what they need to know, what they do not need to know and what their obligations and their rights are, because obviously regulations give us certain rights as well as obligations.
What if some folks breached one of the regulations? They need to understand the regulation because, as a traffic officer explained to me when I used to sit on a municipal police association board, going through a stop sign and saying we did not see it is not a defence. Ignorance of the law is no defence. If we did not see the traffic signal and just kept driving, that is not a defence. The same thing happens with regulations. The fact that we do not know about them is not a defence, because there is an obligation for us to know and understand them. It also gives us the right under the regulations to do certain things, whatever that happens to be, based on the regulations.
Ultimately it is a dual piece of rights and obligations. One needs to find a way to understand them, but to understand them, we have to be able to find them. When we talk about this incorporation, whether it be a static piece or an ambulatory piece, and lots of folks have gone through definitions of what are they, what they are not, and how they would change, how do those folks who actually look at them know that they have changed and say that they will act accordingly?
I know that I need to put x number of green books on a table, as they are in front of me here in the House, followed by three white books at the end. That is the regulation. Then somebody changes them, because it is an ambulatory piece of regulation. It is not static. We can take the three white books off the table and add two orange ones. New Democrats like orange, so we are going to put two orange ones down. Then we test everybody by asking them if they know how many green books are on the table and whether the three white ones are at the end. They would say yes, but they would fail, because we put two orange ones there. That means that they are out of office now, because they voted wrong, and the orange ones are going on the other side, which will probably happen in 2015, quite frankly. There was a change that nobody really knew about, and it was as simple as moving three books and putting two orange ones there.
What if we were to do that to food safety regulations? We have reciprocal agreements with our largest trading partner, the United States, and we have them with other countries around the world. They stand us well in a lot of different ways. We understand that we have a robust safety system in the agriculture sector at the producer level and when it comes to food processing and food handling. We accept that the United States also has a robust system. We accept as quid pro quo that what they do and what we do is good. We accept their standards and they accepts ours.
We get into this idea that we can change the regulations. Canada has regulations on our side and the United States has regulations on their side. We have similar regulations with our other trading partners. What if folks start changing food safety regulations? Most folks would say that they trust our American trading partner. They say that we do not have to worry about it. That country makes some changes that are probably okay and we will be fine. What happens if it is a country that is less trustworthy? I will not point the finger at any one country, but lots of us could identify a country where some of its food products have been less than safe, whether that be melamine in milk or other things that have happened.
What happens if those countries change a regulation and we change our regulation as well? Have we done our consumers justice by ensuring that the system is safe? We said that it was safe, and we changed the regulation, because it was an ambulatory regulation. We allowed it to be changed, because someone else changed it. We initially accepted a system that accepts other country's regulations. They changed one and we just accepted it, because we can do that now. No checks and balances are in place to make sure that we do not do that.
My colleague from Hamilton Mountain asked a question of my colleague from York South—Weston. We already know that a number of regulatory changes have been made, even though there was no authority to make them. I think she said that there were 170. It was not once or twice. My colleagues on the other side who sit with her on that committee also know that this is the case. They heard the testimony. It was not an issue of somebody slipping up and forgetting. One hundred and seventy times is a pattern. That is not a mistake. That is not a matter of somebody forgetting and forgetting to call the minister. The House should have looked at the information. It should have gone through the process and it should have had its due course. It does not seem as if that is right.
If we are now, as my colleague has said, changing legislation to cover off that period, and those 170 plus go forward, how do we ensure the rights of this House and of parliamentarians to do the job people want us to do? Our role is not just overseeing the public purse to hold government to account. If regulatory changes are coming down from different boards or agencies within the federal government's domain, then surely we should have the right to ensure that we have input.
My colleague from Okanagan—Coquihalla spoke quite eloquently about the idea that this is a non-partisan committee. It is made up of all kinds of folks who do not actually vote. It has a sense of building consensus. I am not too sure that the legislation says that. What happens if it becomes the executive that takes on that role and the rest of us do not have an oversight role? We are looking for answers to some of those questions.
That is why we want to send it to committee and look at amendments. Even though my friends across the way may not be happy about it, we want to send it to committee to try to make it better. They would be pleased with that rather than upset by the fact that we may not be saying the nicest of things about it. One would think that it is what they would want us to do, even though we are pointing out what we do not think works well. We will help them out, unlike my friends down at the end who do not want to vote to send it to committee and do not want to study it. That is their choice. Earlier I heard something about an open mind. I guess it is a closed mind on this particular issue, but that is the way it goes. They have decided against it, and that is okay. That is the great choice with democracy. One gets to decide whether to say yes or no. In this case, we will vote to send it to committee and study it. Ultimately, it is about democracy. It is about our right to have a say and have input with respect to legislation and its regulations.
As I said at the beginning, the regulations are quite often more important to people than the bill. Ironically, quite often, we get tied up looking at the bill. It is very important, no question. I would never want to suggest to the drafters of the legislation that somehow it is not important. There might be some parts of the legislation that the other side drafts that we would not find important or would vote against, and have. Budgets come to mind. However, regulations clearly have an impact on people's lives and that is what they run up against quite often, not the specifics of an act. That is where folks have difficulty.
I recognize that the other place exists, at least for now. If Canadians were allowed to vote probably over 70% would vote. We know that there is a constitutional requirement to have seven provinces and 50% of the population and so forth. We all know that. However, if we asked Canadians tomorrow if they wanted that place, they would want to get rid of it. My friends down at the far end still want to defend it in some sort of beleaguered way, since their leader said just two weeks ago that they just need better guys in there, not better people, which would include women. I can see where he is coming from when it comes to that. I certainly can tell him that I know a lot of women who were not pleased when he said that.
Bill S-12 started in the other place. One of my colleagues earlier talked about bills starting there or here, but they always have to come here. In my view, they all ought to start right here. There should be no bills starting with an “S”. They should all start with a “C”, and we should deal with them. This is the people's House. We will pass them if indeed that is the will of the people's House. We do not need the Senate to either rubber-stamp bills or throw them out. That is what they did to my good friend and leader Jack Layton. It did not even take the time to look at the bill. It tossed it aside. That is not democracy when the Senate tosses aside a bill that this House has passed twice.
If that is their attitude, not to mention the latest shenanigans that have gone on over their expenses, then it is time for them to go. It is long overdue. The time is long since past.
I said something months ago in the debate on what was the Senate reform bill, which seems to have disappeared. It has gone off to the Senate now, it seems. At the time I said this to my colleagues across the way, it just happened that one of Canada's favourite coffee houses, Tim Hortons, was having its roll up the rim contest at the same time as we were debating. I was standing right here, as a matter of fact, and I said, “Mr. Speaker, it is time to roll up the red carpet”, just like we roll up the rim.
Canadians will be the winners when we roll up the red carpet. Every single Canadian would not have to worry about rolling up the rim and maybe winning a donut or a coffee or a car. Not everybody gets one; I have rolled up many a rim and not gotten too many winning roll-ups, I must admit. However, without a doubt every Canadian would win if we rolled up the red carpet.
We would roll up that red carpet and wish them all well. I would be the first to stand in line, shake all their hands and wish them well. I would not have a problem doing that and I would do it with a smile on my face and a sincere thanks to many of them.
There are many good folks down there. Hugh Segal is a prime example. I think Senator Hugh Segal is a remarkable individual, a remarkable Canadian who does remarkable work. Unfortunately, it is time for Senator Segal to go.
Senator Kirby was a remarkable man down there as well, and he did remarkable work. He left on his own. Romeo Dallaire is also in the Senate. There are a great number of them. We have identified three, but over the years there have been a good number of them. We have given three examples; finding three is not bad for New Democrats.
However, we cannot find a New Democrat down there, probably because they do not want to go there.
I see my friends down at the end are a little restless. Clearly they are worried about the appointment that is never going to come, so the hour must be getting late. It truly must.
I would invite my colleagues down the way to come with me. In fact I invited my colleague from Winnipeg North last fall. He probably does not remember, but I invited him to come with me. Let me try to quote myself again. I invited my colleague to come arm in arm with me to walk down the hall together, roll up the red carpet, wish them a Merry Christmas and send them on their way, never to return. It is not Christmastime, but we could wish them happy holidays and ask them to not ever come back.
Oddly enough, if we had had regulations and had done it the way that this government suggested and that place was regulated, we could just have changed the regulations and gotten rid of them all. Unfortunately, we do not.
I have less than two minutes left. I really want to thank my colleague on the other side. I say this with great sincerity, because he has been the person who is really keen on this legislation. He has been up asking questions and he debated earlier. I give credit to the member for Okanagan—Coquihalla. He actually answers.
He and I also have an affinity for wine. We have the two greatest wine regions in the country, Niagara being the finest and his being after that.
However, what I would like to say is that there are a whole pile of others on the other side who really have not been bothering with the legislation. They do not seem to want to bother with the legislation, so let me just say this to them: I would love to give them the opportunity to discuss their own bill. Therefore, I move:
That the House do now adjourn.
