Mauril Bélanger

[National Flag of Canada Day, February 15th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, in September 1964, Prime Minister Pearson and opposition leader Diefenbaker agreed on the creation of a special committee on the flag. On October 29, the committee tabled a report with a recommended option. A lengthy and vigorous debate ensued. At 2:15 a.m. on December 15, a free vote was held in the House. The result was 163 for and 78 against. A royal proclamation was given on January 28, 1965 and on February 15, 1965, 48 years ago today, our beautiful flag was first raised over Parliament Hill and across the country.

Prime Minister Pearson firmly believed that the adoption of a new flag would strengthen national unity. He was right. We love our flag and proudly fly it in front of our homes, schools, community centres, hospitals, government offices and just about everywhere.

One of the members of the multi-party parliamentary committee on the flag was John Ross Matheson, a former Liberal member of the House. Mr. Matheson is now 95 and lives in Kingston, Ontario. We thank him and all those involved in giving us such a powerful and respected symbol.

[Business of Supply, February 14th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the speeches by the last two members. I sincerely thank the member for Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou for his comments, as well as the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan, for whom I have great respect.

I have been on two committees in this 41st Parliament, one of them that has basically done no good work and one that approved unanimously my recommendation on co-operatives and ended up doing good work. However, initially, the government wanted total control of the proceedings and the work of this committee.

I would hope that my colleagues who are going to support the motion when we vote on it will also carry that same spirit into the workings of the committee. I am wondering if the member for Nanaimo—Cowichan shares my concern. If she does, would she care to express that so that everyone here can take notice that this is a serious matter that we cannot play political games with?

[Tunisia, February 12th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, I have twice had the opportunity to visit Tunisia. I discovered a wonderful country, rich in history and full of warm, respectful people who are starved for justice and freedom. In 2011, the Arab Spring was born there and, shortly thereafter, Tunisians exercised their right to vote.

Now the situation is deteriorating, to the point where destabilizing forces assassinated Chokri Belaid as he was leaving his house on the morning of Wednesday, February 6. He was the respected secretary general and spokesperson for the Democratic Patriots' Movement and a member of Popular Front, a coalition of opposition parties.

Violent protests broke out that same day. Two days later, hundreds of thousands of people joined the funeral procession as it made its way to the Djellaz cemetery. Our condolences go out to his wife and two daughters.

Violence has no place in democracy, except to defend it. We hope that the people of Tunisia will find the path to freedom, and we hope that path is a peaceful one.

[Conflict in Mali, February 5th, 2013]

Mr. Chair, I am not sure if there was a mistake in the translation, but I did not talk about soldiers. I talked about police forces. This has often been done in many countries to ensure a minimal level of protection. I did not say it was absolutely necessary to send 500. I was giving an example of what has been done elsewhere. It could be a different number.

If we invited members of the diaspora, people who have become Canadian citizens and who understand how a democracy works, a large number of them would probably be willing to return to their country of origin to take part in observation missions, for instance.

Why is the parliamentary secretary being so negative? What a wet blanket. We are having a take note debate in order to explore ideas. We are proposing solutions and he reacts negatively to them, saying that maybe we should be more minimalist.

His Minister of Foreign Affairs has said that humanity's greatest challenge is terrorism. In the current situation in Mali, terrorists have practically taken control of the entire country. Yet he tells us not to overreact, not to stir things up too much. I find that attitude quite disappointing.

[Conflict in Mali, February 5th, 2013]

Mr. Chair, I am pleased to have the opportunity to discuss this issue.

If the government is really saying that it wants to work with a democratic government and that there is a road map for an election in July, there are many things that the Government of Canada, NGOs and Canadian government agencies can do to ensure that democracy is restored in Mali and Bamako.

I mentioned observers earlier. Canada has taken part in such an exercise before by sending nearly 500 observers to Europe to observe the election in Ukraine.

If Canada really wanted to express its desire to see democracy restored in Mali, could it dispatch a rather sizable observation mission? Could it send police officers with such a mission? Of course, we can expect that the election will not go smoothly in certain parts of Mali, especially given the terrorist groups who do not support democracy.

These are two simple ideas that the government must consider. It must come back to Parliament and tell us what direction it wants to take. It could even take the opportunity next week at the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development to indicate what it intends to do.

[Conflict in Mali, February 5th, 2013]

Mr. Chair, I am a bit disappointed with the way this so-called take note debate is going. During a take note debate, we are supposed to explore possible avenues and measures. We certainly need to determine our objectives.

The government side mainly spoke about the historical background of the situation. They talked about things that happened far in the past or in more recent weeks, but they spoke very little about the future. I get the impression that the government is using this debate to see what the opposition parties want. It is unfortunate because, if we want to have an honest take note debate, the government has to put forward some options and listen to the opposition parties' reactions. That is not exactly what is happening, and that bothers me.

It is important to put this into context. I am going to share with the House what the Minister of Foreign Affairs said. He was in Washington not too long ago, on January 28. A journalist asked him:

Turning to the crisis in North and West Africa, do you believe that al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb’s expanding control of northern Mali presents a threat to Canada and Canadian interests?

Here is what the minister responded:

I think the great struggle of our generation is the struggle against radical extremists and international terrorists wherever they are in the world. That’s not an issue exclusively about Mali’s neighbourhood. It’s an issue for all humanity.

I totally agree with the minister on that. It is indeed one of the great struggles of our time and it is a struggle, as the member for Toronto Centre said, in a diminishing world where everything is linked.

If we indeed believe that we have to counter the terrorist threat when it manifests itself by taking hold of two-thirds of a country in West Africa, where the series of neighbours, Niger, Burkina Faso and Mauritania, have borders that are very porous and are a stone's throw from Europe, one would have to wonder, if indeed that is the philosophy of the government, why it is not acting more. It may translate to boots on the ground, but it may not have to. However, it certainly has to translate to help in the funds, which have not occurred, to fight this situation. It can translate into training, which has been talked about both by the Minister of National Defence and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. It can translate into other means and so forth. However, I am a little worried about this disconnect between the philosophy that animates the government, and on the other hand, the seeming timidity in responding to a real threat.

There are three things I want to bring up very quickly, which I hope the government would take note of and explore. First, it seems that the major cities have been cleared, but there is a vast territory to look into now. There are 3,000 forces from ECOWAS.

ECOWAS will provide 3,000 soldiers and Mali itself will provide 6,000, which represents an average-sized deployment over such a vast territory. So they will need help.

Does Canada, through ECOWAS and the African Union, plan on doing something to stabilize the situation in Mali and maybe even continue to counter the terrorist forces?

And what will we specifically do to help with the upcoming election, which seems to be a very important reason for the government to resume negotiations with or reinstate direct assistance to the Malian government? Will we unfreeze some of this money to help run a real election? Some things could be done from Canada. Elections Canada, New Brunswick, Élections Québec and Ontario all have French-language capabilities. They may be interested in participating.

Will there be an observation mission and will we participate if there is another one organized by an organization like La Francophonie, for example? These are things to explore. Perhaps the minister will come speak to us later. I think that is important.

We have not heard this evening about the Malian diaspora here, in Canada, and elsewhere in the world. There are hundreds of thousands of refugees—390,000, I heard.

Of that number, some have families here in Canada. We could have been talking about family reunification or speeding up the immigration and refugee process to help the diaspora and the people of Mali. There has been no talk about that. The government has not proposed anything to that effect, where in other circumstances, it wanted to help by speeding up the process, but maybe not in Africa.

We have not heard the government talk about that and I would like it to say a few words about that.

[Conflict in Mali, February 5th, 2013]

Mr. Chair, I want to see if I can get more precision on the numbers that we hearing.

I heard that Canada's annual contribution to Mali was $90 million, but now I hear it is $110 million. It was frozen after the coup.

First, how much of that has not been spent? If it is not spent this fiscal year, what will happen to it?

Second, with respect to the $13 million that was announced by the Minister of International Cooperation last Tuesday in Addis Ababa at the UN-convened meeting, does it come from that pool of money, or is it fresh money coming from somewhere else? If so, where?

To get a precise picture of the aid that is being given, I would appreciate it if we could get some precision on those numbers.

[Co-operatives, February 5th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday, I asked the government if we could expect that some of the $400 million in new funding for venture capital would be earmarked for co-operatives. In its response, the government basically ignored the question and made mention of a fund. But the fund in question is available only to Quebec co-operatives.

If that is the solution for funding co-operatives—an issue that the government has acknowledged—when can we expect to see a fund that is available to all co-operatives in every province and territory and not just in Quebec?

[Privilege, February 4th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, what did not come through perhaps clearly in what I said, and you will recall the first time I raised this last June, was it was directly related to my duties to prepare for question period. In obtaining information as the Liberal advocate for co-operatives, I needed information through CMHC, which I could not then obtain because it was not allowed to provide the briefing. There is one issue where there is a direct link to my parliamentary responsibilities which cannot be avoided.

The same can be true because I intend to raise questions about this massive development of a military base which has been ceded to the Canada Lands Corporation, but in order to do so, I need to obtain information. Therefore, the two are intrinsically linked.

In you judgment, Mr. Speaker, I hope you would consider also equality of access to information because I did mention, and I would hope you would look into that, that in all my conversations with members on the government side, never have I heard anyone complaining of their inability to access information from the government, just as members of this party and I gather from the House leader of the NDP, members from his party have been impeded from obtaining.

There are two issues here that are directly linked to my parliamentary duties as a member of Parliament representing constituents.

Finally, just on the morality of anyone in the riding that I represent can access information directly from public servants and they have been told by the government that they cannot give me that information. There is something that is untoward and unacceptable in a functioning democracy. I would hope, Mr. Speaker, in your judgment that you would weigh these three matters.

[Co-operatives, February 4th, 2013]

Mr. Speaker, last week, in its response to the report by the Special Committee on Co-operatives, the government acknowledged that the capitalization of co-operatives was problematic. Two weeks earlier, the government announced $400 million in venture capital for Canada's small and medium sized enterprises.

Since the government did not see fit to extend the one and only program for the capitalization of co-operatives, which terminates next month, is it fair to expect that a portion of the $400 million announced two weeks ago will be earmarked for co-operatives so that they can grow and create employment?