Monique Guay

[Kosovo, June 4th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the Yugoslavian parliament's acceptance of all G-8 conditions is perhaps the most important development pointing toward a return to peace in Kosovo since the conflict first began.

Does the Deputy Prime Minister not think that a temporary halt to the bombing would send the Yugoslavian population a clear signal that NATO wanted peace in addition to facilitating the speedy and verifiable withdrawal of Serbian forces from Kosovo?

[Personal Information Protection And Electronic Documents Act, June 2nd, 1999]

Madam Speaker, I trust that the next speeches by my Reform Party colleagues will address the bill itself and not how many criminals they have in their ridings.

The Bloc Quebecois has always set itself the fundamental mission of defending and promoting the rights of the Quebec people here in Ottawa. In reading Bill C-54, I realized once again how vital the Bloc Quebecois presence here in the House is for Quebec.

Bill C-54 is once again clear evidence of the incompetence of this centralist government, and of its lack of understanding and total arrogance toward Quebec and its people. First of all, I add my voice to those of my colleagues in the Bloc Quebecois in condemning and strenuously opposing Bill C-54.

Bill C-54 is entitled an act to support and promote electronic commerce by protecting personal information that is collected, used or disclosed in certain circumstances, by providing for the use of electronic means to communicate or record information or transactions and by amending the Canada Evidence Act, the Statutory Instruments Act and the Statute Revision Act.

Instead of that title, the government ought to have called it Bill C-54, an act to promote electronic commerce at the expense of privacy. It could have called it Bill C-54, an act using electronic commerce as a pretext to invade the jurisdiction of Quebec and the other provinces. This is one of the many fundamental realities of the bill.

Bill C-54 would introduce measures to protect personal information in the private sector, to create an electronic alternative for doing business with the federal government and to clarify how the courts assess the reliability of electronic records used as evidence.

Bill C-54 is a component of the Canadian electronic commerce strategy announced by the Prime Minister on September 22, 1998, which seeks to recreate in cyberspace the best conditions that currently exist in ordinary commerce to promote confidence and reliability.

The government's stated objective is to establish Canada as a world leader in electronic commerce by the year 2000. This bill is one of the measures that would allow us to achieve that objective.

On this issue, the federal Minister of Industry purposely decided unilaterally to introduce the legislation on personal information without waiting for the outcome of the consultations with the provinces that he himself had undertaken. Let us look at the chronology of events.

On June 12, 1998, the ministers responsible for the information highway met in Fredericton and agreed to consult each other at the appropriate time when reviewing the opportunity to legislate the protection of personal information in the private sector.

On September 21, 1998, the federal Minister of Industry sent a draft bill to his provincial counterparts, asking them for their comments on a bill that the federal government wanted to introduce.

On October 1, 1998, the Minister of Industry introduced Bill C-54 in the House of Commons, without waiting to hear from his provincial counterparts.

On October 30, 1998, the 12 provincial and territorial justice ministers unanimously called on the federal Minister of Industry to withdraw his bill, which is a major intrusion into provincial and territorial areas of jurisdiction.

On November 11, 1998, Quebec's minister responsible for relations with the public and immigration and Quebec's minister of culture and communications respectively criticized this unacceptable interference by the federal government in Quebec's jurisdiction.

What justification can the minister give today for introducing this bill? Quebec is the only government in North America to have passed legislation protecting personal information in the private sector and it did so in 1994. The legislation in question, Bill 68, an act to protect personal information in the private sector, has to do with personal information that anyone collects, holds, uses or communicates to a third party in the carrying on of an enterprise within the meaning of article 1525 of the Civil Code of Quebec.

In other words, Quebec's legislation applies to all activities in the private sector, for profit or not. And I would point out that it is regularly mentioned by the experts as being cutting edge.

How do we explain Bill C-54? How do we explain such an infringement upon these areas of provincial jurisdiction? The Constitution clearly stipulates that privacy is a matter of provincial jurisdiction.

Also, for the people of Quebec, Bill C-54 represents an incredible step backward in the protection of personal information. For instance, where consent is required for the release or use of personal information, this bill does not protect consumers because its ambiguous statements of principle lend themselves to a broad interpretation.

Let me quote what Claude Masse, the former president of the Quebec bar association and a consumer law professor at UQAM, had to say:

Having carefully read Bill C-54—and in my view, it is clearly a huge step backward for Quebec—this regulation, or this type of voluntary standard which will be given a legal connotation through a schedule, I can tell you it is not strong enough to protect consumers. It is chock-full of loopholes for businesses. It is largely based on a completely outdated approach to consumer protection, and any recourse is practically non existent.

Having read Bill C-54, I realize that it will apply to Quebec, which means that the people and the businesses of Quebec will be subject to two systems for the protection of personal information. What sense will the people make of all this confusion?

Thus, a Quebec company that would like to transfer information outside Quebec will have no choice but to abide by two different systems for the protection of information, the Quebec system and the federal one.

When the Bloc Quebecois says that the federal government is doing everything it can to hinder Quebec's economic development, this example is proof positive. Here is what the representative of the Alliance of Manufacturers and Exporters of Canada said:

If we are trying to promote e-commerce...the last thing we need is a patchwork or layers of regulations, private standards and legislative frameworks that would only make things more difficult for business people. I do not think our members are convinced that we should have a national framework that would be incompatible with the systems already in existence in Quebec or other provinces.

Those words show clearly that the federal government should go back to the negotiating table with the provinces in order to come up with more adequate legislative proposals to bring about harmonization in the whole area of the protection of people's rights.

In short, Bill C-54 as it stands now has too many flaws from the constitutional, democratic, and legal points of view, and it does not adequately protect personal information. It is almost unenforceable, it lacks clarity, it will created unneeded complications for Quebec companies, and it substantially reduces the rights of Quebecers to protect their personal information.

For all those reasons, the Bloc Quebecois disapproves of this bill, and it is absolutely out of the question for us to support it.

[Tainted Blood, May 28th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, we will refresh the minister's memory.

The CDC's 1984 annual report mentions the expiry of a Connaught contract with the Red Cross representing 14% of its sales. An annual report always mentions the year's highlights, as well as being approved by the board of directors.

Does this not shoot the minister's defence all to pieces?

[Tainted Blood, May 28th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance is still maintaining that he does not recall discussing the Red Cross's contract with Connaught, a subsidiary of the Canada Development Corporation, on whose board of directors he sat at the time. However the minister's name appears at the end of the CDC's 1984 annual report.

Does the minister still stand by his statement that he does not recall discussing blood, Connaught, and its contract with the Red Cross when he was a CDC board member?

[Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, May 27th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to the motions Group No. 3, which deal with toxic substances.

One could certainly talk at length about what is going on with toxic substances at the federal level. However, before trying to give teeth to this bill, I think we should first look at what the federal government has done in the past regarding toxic substances.

We need only think of the Irving Whale , the wreck that lay on the ocean floor off the Magdalen Islands for years before the federal government finally decided to raise it. However, 90% of the PCBs on board seeped out and nothing was done to recover them.

The government did not do everything it should have. It was very important to raise the wreck because there was a major risk that all the oil could have been spilled. Everything was done so fast and without any consideration for the possibility that the BPCs could seep out that eventually 90% of these substances were spilled. We do not know the extent of the damages, nor the middle and long term effects, and nothing is being done to correct the situation. As far as the government is concerned, the problem has been dealt with and that is the end of the matter.

However, there could be a very significant impact on marine wildlife, shellfish and fish in that region, and 10 years from now we will be told “Yes, there are problems. We will have to conduct more studies and stop fishing. There are problems with marine wildlife in that region”. Once again, this will be because the government has not taken its responsibilities.

There is also the famous Irving Oil Limited, which, as members know, is a very powerful company in Canada. In fact, it does not even pay taxes here, because of a promise made by children to their parents. That company is responsible for the Irving Whale disaster, and the government could easily have made sure that Irving foot the bill, instead of making the taxpayers pay once again.

This is just one case involving toxic substances where the government did not go as far as it should have. This will come back to haunt us in the years to come. There will be problems because of these PCBs that remained at the bottom of the ocean. We will then realize that something should have been done, but it will be too late.

Another important issue relating to toxic substances is the use of MMT. The government tabled a bill to ban the use of MMT in gasoline. At the time, we fought against that legislation and asked the government to conduct a very simple study to determine whether MMT is indeed a toxic substance. There is still no evidence to that effect. On the contrary, there is evidence that using MMT in gas is a good thing and that, in some way, it protects the environment.

Until a solution is found, we will be faced with the same problem. We would love to get rid of greenhouse gases and everything else that is toxic. But right now there is no proof that MMT is a toxic substance.

We therefore asked the government to do a study. It has not been done. Once again, our recommendations have been ignored. Now I hear that the government wants to reintroduce the same bill to ban MMT. My impression is that something is getting in the way, because precious time is being wasted. Let us do things properly, as they were done in the case of the Irving Whale and MMT, commission a public or private study, it does not matter which, and convince people—and convince me—that MMT is a toxic substance and we will react accordingly.

But this has still not been done. In fact, the company recently won a court case and is still allowed to use MMT.

All this is costing a lot of money. And to what end? To indulge in petty politics, keep a few friends of the party happy, make the government look good?

This is not how the environment works. I am sorry, but the environment is our future, the future of our children and of our grandchildren. The government must invest in that future now, and it must do so in a concrete and logical way, consistent with what is now taking place in the provinces. We already have environmental legislation.

Another example is that of environmental assessments. This bill was passed in the House during our last term of office. It is still very contentious. There is a case before the courts involving Quebec and the federal government.

Quebec has the BAPE, which is an agency that does environmental assessments and ensures that any proposals meet Quebec's environmental standards.

Now, the federal government is duplicating and overlapping what is already being done in Quebec. For example, an entrepreneur who wishes to develop a project of some sort has to submit to a battery of studies. He has to apply to the BAPE and hope he meets the necessary standards. If the federal government then steps in and says that it is not happy and the process must start all over again, costs are doubled. An entrepreneur will probably go under, or close to it, because these things can take years to resolve. Environmental lawyers will have an opportunity to make a lot of money.

I can assure members that with the entire bill before us now, if provincial jurisdictions are not respected, serious problems will occur. The only thing the government will be able to brag about is that it gave environmental lawyers the opportunity to make a lot of money.

Common sense must prevail in all this. I agree that the environment absolutely must be protected, but I also agree that common sense must prevail. Agreements must be made between the federal government and the provinces, because there are some provinces that are doing their part. Perhaps there are some that are not, but I do not want Quebec to be penalized because the federal government has decided to put everyone in the same boat.

I am sorry, but this is not the way things work. We brought forward some amendments. I would ask the government to consider them carefully, to ensure that somewhere there will be some harmonization, some agreement.

Finally, instead of quarrelling about which level is responsible for the environment, I say that everyone should be responsible for it in a normal fashion, in an appropriate manner, without constantly quarrelling and going before the supreme court, before the Quebec court, for decisions that will take years and that will not help the environment in the least. Quite the contrary, this will delay all the work that should be done now.

[Canadian Environmental Protection Act, 1999, May 27th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, it is with pleasure and great concern that I stand today to speak to a very important bill, Bill C-32, an act respecting pollution prevention and the protection of the environment and human health in order to contribute to sustainable development.

I am very much aware of environmental issues, having been the Bloc Quebecois' environment critic from 1995 to 1997. I am therefore very much interested in environmental issues debated in the House.

All the more so that in the last Parliament and especially in 1995, I had the opportunity to participate, as a member of the Standing Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development, in the review of the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, also called CEPA.

After hearing the witnesses who came before the committee, I and other members were appalled by the seriousness of issues raised by witnesses and by the urgent need to develop realistic and viable solutions to fix the CEPA.

The problems in the act are of several types. One has only to think of the double safety net, duplication of responsibilities with provinces and the constant tendency of this government to centralize all powers and deal with provinces as second class entities.

Thus it is for those reasons, among others, that the Bloc Quebecois felt compelled to table a dissenting opinion in the report entitled

It's About Our Health: Pollution Prevention.

As the old saying goes, it's six of one and half a dozen of the other. It is as though we are still in 1995 debating Bill C-74 that died on the order paper during the last Parliament. What a glaring example of the do-nothing attitude of this federal government. It is appalling.

Let us look more closely at Bill C-32 and we will see why it is so inappropriate and centralizing. You can count on me to demonstrate it.

What it is important to know about this bill is that it replaces the Environmental Protection Act. With Bill C-32 preventing pollution becomes a national objective, as if the provinces and Quebec were incapable of protecting their environment.

When I think of the Kyoto treaty, there is room for doubt about the federal government's policies and great national intentions. We shall get back to that a bit later.

The main objective of Bill C-32 is to replace the federal-provincial CEPA committee with a new national advisory committee. This will advise the federal government on drawing up regulations, managing toxic substances, and other issues of mutual interest.

Second, Bill C-32 puts in place a framework of action which assigns the ability to require planning of pollution prevention in connection with the substances declared toxic according to CEPA.

Thus pollution prevention also becomes a national objective, as does the creation of a national pollution prevention information clearing-house.

As well, where biotechnology is concerned, the bill establishes a federal safety net, as well as the authority to implement regulations aimed at the safe use of biotechnology.

As for protection of our water, the bill is aimed at protecting the marine environment from pollution sources on land or in the atmosphere. Bill C-32 will beef up the authority of CEPA concerning the regulation of fuels and fuel additives.

The bill will give the government the authority to establish national fuels marks. To protect the atmosphere, Bill C-32 provides for the establishment of national marks for emissions meeting the standards. It contains provisions to limit emissions from motor vehicles in general, including pleasure craft, construction equipment, farm machinery, snow blowers and lawn mowers. Also, the bill gives the federal government more control over the transborder movement of hazardous and non-hazardous waste, including household garbage.

As my second last point, I will say that aboriginal peoples are represented on a national advisory committee, as the provinces and the territories. They will have the same rights and responsibilities as provincial and territorial governments.

Finally, there will be a greater input from and greater protection of members of the public acting as whistleblowers regarding violations of the CEPA.

The Liberals have often used the environment as the perfect example of progressive, open and decentralized federalism. If I may, I will quote the Prime Minister of Canada, from the February 27, 1996 throne speech:

The federal government will propose to the provinces a much strengthened process to work in partnership, focussing on such priorities as...environmental management—

The bill talks about a national committee, national goals, a national centre, a federal net, and so on and so forth. What became of the provinces in this bill?

Let us be clear: Although in theory Bill C-32 recognizes that responsibility for the environment is shared between the federal government and the provinces, in practice it delegates no powers to them, including Quebec, and this runs counter to real environmental harmonization between the various levels of government. Bill C-32 aims at strengthening the federal government's preponderance in the field of environmental protection.

Therefore, it is easy to understand why the Quebec minister of the environment has always refused to sign the January 29, 1998 environmental harmonization agreement of the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment.

The purpose of that agreement was to improve the protection of the environment in the context of sustainable development, while respecting the jurisdictions of each government. The Bloc Quebecois has always supported harmonization between the federal and provincial governments when it would serve to eliminate administrative and legislative overlap and duplication between two levels of government.

Considering the contents of the environmental harmonization agreement and of Bill C-32, it is crystal clear that the federal government does not want to acknowledge its own constitution, which states that the environment is an exclusive or primary jurisdiction of the provinces.

How can this government claim to be in a better position than the provinces to protect the environment of Quebecers? Let us see what the federal government has done to our environment following the Kyoto agreement. Let us also look at what Quebec has done to eliminate greenhouse gases, by comparison to the federal government.

At the Rio summit in 1992, 154 countries, including Canada, signed the UN framework agreement on climatic change, thereby undertaking to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions at the 1990 levels by the year 2000. Seen at the time as a leader and champion in eliminating greenhouse gases, Canada has now lost all credibility.

Even Canada's environment ambassador, John Fraser, quite rightly had very harsh words for this government and its greenhouse gas policies; he accused it of lacking conviction and leadership. This is a disaster.

By the year 2000, Canada's greenhouse gas emissions will have increased by 13%. How are we to explain this, when the federal Liberal government made a commitment in Rio to stabilize its emissions during this decade and then progressively reduce them? Let us talk about this reduction: 3% up until 2010. That is how concerned this government is about the environment. Not.

It is therefore obvious that the federal government wants to use Bill C-32 to substantially increase its environmental powers when, under the Constitution, environment is a jurisdiction that is shared by various levels of government.

Through its paternalistic and centralizing attitude, this government is trying to relegate the provinces to a back seat. For all these reasons, the Bloc Quebecois has no choice but to vote against the bill.

[Kosovo, May 10th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, we know that the Canadian embassy in China is located in the vicinity of the U.S. embassy. In fact, it is in the same security sector.

Chinese protestors encouraged by the communist regime have targeted a number of symbols of the west, and have done considerable damage to the American embassy.

Can the minister tell us whether the Canadian embassy has been affected by the recent demonstrations, and what steps have been taken to ensure the safety of our embassy staff and of Canadian nationals in China?

[Kosovo, May 10th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

According to our information, the Minister of Foreign Affairs held a meeting with the Chinese ambassador to Canada this past weekend in connection with the Chinese reaction to the accidental bombing of their embassy in Belgrade.

In light of the events of this past weekend, can the minister bring us up to date on the changes in the Chinese position with respect to the peace process?

[Election In Scotland, May 7th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday the people of Scotland took a decisive step toward their future. Today, after 300 years, the Scottish parliament is alive again through democratic process and the resolute political will of an entire people.

We congratulate all parties involved in this exercise, including the Labour Party, which was victorious, and the secessionist Scottish National Party, which will be the official opposition and will defend and promote its option. This historic event is the expression of a will to debate calmly and democratically the future of a people and all the legitimate choices available to it.

The day will come when Scotland, like Quebec, will find its place among nations, thus sharing with other sovereign states its common values and proffering its differences to the world as a whole as an equal partner. Maîtres chez nous is the expression that defined the Quebec situation 30 years ago. It transcends the borders of Quebec. Still relevant today, it underlies the rise of peoples in the coming millennium.

[Supply, April 27th, 1999]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise in this House to debate with you the motion by the New Democratic Party, which reads as follows:

That this House call on the government to intensify and accelerate efforts to find a diplomatic solution to the crisis in Kosovo through the involvement of Russia and the United Nations, and to urge NATO not to take actions that expand the conflict and stand in the way of a diplomatic solution.

First off, I would like to inform this House and my NDP colleagues that we will support this motion.

We support this motion because it is very similar to the position the Bloc Quebecois has upheld and encouraged before and during the conflict in Kosovo, namely, a diplomatic solution that would involve the United Nations, Russia and, why not add China. We must not forget China. It is still a member of the UN security council and has a veto. China alone could paralyze all the actions of the UN.

The Bloc Quebecois has always hoped that the current conflict in the Balkans could be resolved under the aegis of the United Nations, as was Iraq's aggression against Kuwait, in 1991. Unfortunately, the close historical ties between Russia and Serbia, like the special relationship Yugoslavia maintains with China, has made the diplomatic route increasingly difficult.

The conflict we are currently witnessing in Kosovo is the product of many years of instability in the Balkans, fomented primarily by a single man, or should I say dictator, Slobodan Milosevic.

For more than ten years, Milosevic has played with the nerves of the people of Kosovo and the international community. Patience has its limits. Before this conflict began, members will agree, a number of diplomatic attempts were made. The diplomatic impasse has lasted for over a year.

Over and over again, the international community tried to come up with a diplomatic solution to end the war and repression in Kosovo.

There were UN resolutions 1199 and 1203, as well as the October 1998 accords between the OSCE, NATO and the former Yugoslavia, which were never enforced. We could also include the Rambouillet agreement, but the refusal of Yugoslavian authorities to sign this agreement was at the root of NATO's offensive against Milosevic and his war machine.

After all the foot-dragging, discussions and negotiations, the situation in Kosovo became unbearable. In fact, we now know that Milosevic's strategy was to play for time in order to complete his ethnic cleansing of Kosovo.

For all these reasons, the Bloc Quebecois supported NATO's military intervention in Kosovo and in Yugoslavia so as not to let the situation in Kosovo worsen further, and the present situation there shows that we were right.

UNHCR estimates that close to 585,000 Kosovar Albanians have taken refuge in neighbouring countries. Seventy thousand of them had already fled to these countries between March 1998 and the first NATO air strikes on March 24.

There are over 120,000 refugees in non-neighbouring countries, mainly throughout Europe, which, according to UNHCR estimates, brings to over 700,0000 the total number of refugees who fled Kosovo since 1998. Not to mention the rapes, physical atrocities and mental anguish a whole people has had to endure.

In the light of these atrocities, it was appropriate for the Bloc Quebecois to support an intervention by NATO. This did not mean diplomatic efforts had to stop. There is always room for diplomacy.

It is in times of crisis that the strengths and weaknesses of an organization become apparent. In this respect, Canada's foreign policy has showed its weaknesses through its lack of vision and direction and, as a result, its lack of credibility.

Canada has been a member of the UN security council since January 1. How then can we explain that Canada, through a lack of initiative, did not intensify its efforts to give the UN its rightful place in this conflict? Once again, Canada's international relations policy has been dictated by the United States and countries in the alliance.

Not to mention some mind-boggling improvization. Last Friday, the Prime Minister said that a UN negotiated solution to the conflict in Kosovo was not foreseeable in the near future. However, three days later, he now hopes the UN will participate in an international force to be deployed in Kosovo when the war is over.

Could it be that the Prime Minister just remembered Canada is a member of the UN security council, and that it is about time it used this influential position to find a diplomatic solution to the conflict? After 34 days of conflict, Canada has finally woken up.

It is Canada's duty to use every means possible to try to provide the security council with a draft agreement reflecting the main thrust of Rambouillet. Or yet again, the Minister of Foreign Affairs could take advantage of his visit to Russia on Friday to push the German peace plan.

As the saying goes, it is best to strike while the iron is hot. With the new open-mindedness that seems to be developing in the Yugoslav government, whose deputy prime minister has said that his government was prepared to accept a peace plan which called for deployment of a UN force to Kosovo, is the Canadian government going to have the presence of mind to pass this proposal on to NATO as well as to the UN security council?

A breach seems to be developing on the diplomatic front. Canada therefore has a duty to intensify its diplomatic discussions in order to restore the UN to its rightful place in this conflict.

What is more, with the massive exodus of refugees into the various humanitarian aid camps, where there was such chaos initially, coupled with the fact that Albanian gangsters were diverting donated food supplies, the difficult political situation in Macedonia and Montenegro, and the logistical complications in Albania, is the Canadian government going to carry out a thorough examination of roles and responsibilities, and of how the work of the humanitarian organizations and the military ought to be co-ordinated in future?

According to the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees, there seems to be a blurring of roles between what is humanitarian and what is military, since the army is administering the refugee camps.

Naturally, we must tip our hat and express our gratitude for the vital help the military has provided in the various refugee camps.

Military logistics were essential in setting up the various refugee camps. However, as Jacky Mamou, president of Médecins du monde, has stated, the organization considers military forces turned humanitarian unhealthy.

Mr. Mamou is concerned as well about practical organization, and I quote:

Will there be a NATO co-ordinator? Will they put themselves at the disposal of the HCR? Whose role it is to protect refugees? That is the real problem.

And the European commissioner for humanitarian aid, Emma Bonino, agrees. Here is what she has to say:

The military can help us in an emergency, but we have very different roles, the management and co-ordination of humanitarian aid activities must be left to humanitarian agencies.

She too referred to a certain cultural clash between the employees of humanitarian agencies and the NATO soldiers.

Will Canada, as a member of the United Nations security council, take the initiative and propose thorough consideration at the UN and in NATO of the distribution of roles and the co-ordination of humanitarian aid activities in the event of another conflict of this size? We must learn from our mistakes and make sure this confusion does not recur in the future.

Canada could, if it wanted, be a leader in humanitarian aid. Up to now, in the conflict in Kosovo, Canada has been content to simply provide troops and aircraft.

Let us hope that the meetings the Minister of Foreign Affairs has on Thursday and Friday this week with the UN secretary general and his Russian counterpart will turn Canada into a credible player on the world diplomatic stage.