Murray Rankin

[The Environment, June 9th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, to sum up, hundreds of scientists are calling on the Conservatives to reject—

[Canada Pension Plan, June 9th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, as I foreshadowed in my question for the hon. member for Chatham-Kent—Essex, New Democrats say categorically that we as the official opposition will be supporting this bill. This is a bill that closes a very obvious loophole, but for reasons that I will describe, in my judgment it does not go far enough.

This bill is remarkably similar to legislation initiated and introduced in 2011, over three years ago, by my colleague, the member for Hamilton Mountain. New Democrats are pleased to see that the Conservatives are finally recognizing the need to address this issue and to close such an obvious loophole. An unfortunate failure of the current Canada pension plan legislation is that survivors' pension death benefits or orphans' benefits may be made payable to those convicted of murdering their spouse or parent. I am sure that to 100% of Canadians that will sound bizarre in the extreme. That it has taken a private member's bill and the government three years to respond to the private member's bill of my colleague from Hamilton Mountain should seem equally strange to Canadians.

When the member for Hamilton Mountain introduced a similar bill, she was responding to this letter from a constituent, which stated:

I have a relative who killed his wife, served very little time for manslaughter, and is (and has been) collecting CPP survivor benefits for over 10 years. Since 1-2 women per week die at the hands of their partners, how many more men are collecting this? How is this legal?

That is an excellent question, but, as we will see, as in many cases of this kind, the constituent was talking about manslaughter, not simply first or second degree murder, which is the sole ambit of the private member's bill before us today.

A few days ago, on CBC TV, in my part of the world, British Columbia, the following was said:

A North Delta woman, whose father killed her mother, wants the federal government to plug a loophole that allowed him to collect pension survivor benefits for 28 years until his death.

Susan Fetterkind's mother Vivienne was stabbed multiple times by her estranged husband.... [He] collected Canada Pension Plan benefits until he died last year.

She went on to say:

The government is enabling killers to profit from murdering their spouse. You're not supposed to be able to profit from murdering somebody.

That is so obviously true. Once again, the largest proportion of family-related homicides are spousal murders, and of those, a great number result in a plea bargain and a reduced conviction of manslaughter. Ms. Fetterkind is hoping that this Parliament, aware of this initiative before us today, will embrace not just first and degree murder, but also manslaughter, which I will talk about in a moment. Correcting this error and ending the ability of those convicted of murdering their spouses or parents to collect survivor or orphan benefits is obviously something that the official opposition will strongly support. That is, of course, why New Democrats introduced legislation long ago.

As my colleague from Winnipeg North alluded to a moment ago, it is quite surprising that this initiative is taking the form of a private member's bill. I say that for two reasons. The Canada pension plan and old age security are the subjects of enormous debate right now in Canada. The need for income retirement security has never been greater, yet the government is not addressing that. All it has done on OAS is to increase the age of collection until 67, and refused to act in a comprehensive way on CPP. Therefore, it is surprising that this is not part of a comprehensive reform that is so desperately required in both of those contexts.

However, equally surprising is that this is a private member's bill. The government routinely introduces—I do not know how many times now—omnibus budget bills, what we call “everything but the kitchen sink legislation”, of which this could readily be a part, yet it is now in the form of a private member's bill. Having said all of that, I do not want the form to triumph over the substance. The substance is critical and long overdue, although it is rather strange that it is taking the form of a private member's bill.

In June 2011, the member of Parliament for Hamilton Mountain reintroduced Bill C-206, an act to amend the Canada pension plan in relation to pension and benefits. It would have amended the Canada pension plan to prohibit the payment of survivors pension, orphans benefits, or death benefits to a survivor, child, or orphan of a deceased contributor if the survivor, child, or orphan had been convicted of the murder or manslaughter of the deceased contributor. That bill quite categorically embraced the category of manslaughter, unlike the bill before us today.

As my colleague from Chatham-Kent—Essex pointed out, many would assume that the long-established principle in law would be that no one should be able to benefit from a crime and that this principle would also be enshrined in the eligibility criteria for government benefit programs, but that was not the case for CPP benefits and old age security benefits. This loophole is obvious and needs to be closed, and that is why the legislation was introduced before.

In response to what my colleague said about manslaughter, while I appreciate that he wants to keep the bill clear and easy to put into legislation, I would urge him to consider including manslaughter in the bill when it goes to committee, for a couple of important reasons.

I do not believe there is any reason a court could not, as part of the sentencing on manslaughter, take a look at the circumstances. Among the things the judge could look at is whether, in his or her judgment, CPP and OAS benefits ought to be denied to the survivor, the person who committed the murder or manslaughter, when convicted. It could readily be part of a court order. There would be no privacy concerns whatsoever, as the statement would be made in open court.

I confess I do not have statistics for it, except the experience of all criminal lawyers as they plead their client down from murder to manslaughter, but if I am right that it will be a larger category, it seems ridiculous that we would not include those convicted of manslaughter within the ambit of this legislation. In other words, to put it baldly, if a person is convicted of murder, they cannot collect these benefits, but if they manage to get plea-bargained down to manslaughter, that is just fine.

I do not believe Canadians would accept that. I do not believe the two people whose direct experience I cited earlier would accept it, because in both cases their father was convicted not of murder but of manslaughter. We are not doing the right thing by Canadians if we limit ourselves to that. Most crimes of passion would be manslaughter, not premeditated murder, so it seems to me that we are missing the boat in a massive way if we do not close that loophole as well.

I commend my colleague for bringing this measure forward to embrace the category of murder, but to not embrace manslaughter seems rather ridiculous, given that culpable spousal or partner homicide is most likely to result in manslaughter, not murder. If I am wrong on my statistics, I of course will stand to be corrected, but I believe that to be the case, just based on common sense and experience in the courts.

I think that is the only thing that would be in the way of our providing unanimous and immediate support for this measure. We should decide to make it more inclusive than it is.

In terms of validators for a position that we are taking, needless to say, it is common sense. If we asked Canadians how they would feel about someone collecting these benefits if they have been convicted of spousal homicide, obviously clearly they would agree with the bill. The Woman Abuse Working Group's action committee supported Bill C-206 and commended the member for Hamilton Mountain for bringing it forward, and I am sure that women's groups would also accept this measure as well.

In conclusion, I commend the member for bringing the bill forward. It is an overdue initiative. I just hope that at committee stage, we will be able to persuade the hon. member and the government to expand it to find a creative way to include manslaughter within the ambit of this important initiative.

[Canada Pension Plan, June 9th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by thanking my colleague from Chatham-Kent—Essex for his contribution with this private member's bill. It closes an obvious loophole that I am sure will be closed with the support of all, if not most, members.

Mr. Speaker, my question through you to the member is relating to his decision in the bill to exclude manslaughter from the ambit of what I think he is very properly trying to do with respect to the Canada pension plan and the old age security benefits.

Section 232 of Criminal Code says:

(1) Culpable homicide that otherwise would be murder may be reduced to manslaughter if the person who committed it did so in the heat of passion caused by sudden provocation.

It seems to me, without evidence before me to substantiate that, much of the spousal homicides that occur would be either the subject of manslaughter, or perhaps a plea bargain, where a first or second degree murder charge is reduced to manslaughter.

I ask the hon. member whether he would consider an amendment at the committee stage to address, in some way, the underinclusive nature of his bill.

[Instruction to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women (violence against women), June 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I am so pleased to rise today to speak to Motion No. 504, concerning violence against women.

The motion asks:

That the Standing Committee on the Status of Women be instructed to undertake a study on the subject of best practices in education and social programs in Canada that prevent violence against women, and report its findings to the House within one year of the study's initiation.

I appreciate the work of my colleague from Sault Ste. Marie in bringing this important matter before the House. I would also like to take a moment to commend my brilliant colleague from Churchill, who has also been the official opposition critic on the status of women, for her passionate speech today and for her tireless and excellent work on promoting women's equality and rights and putting an end to violence against women.

Although the rates of violent crime in general have been dropping for 40 years, the rates of sexual assault and domestic violence have not changed. Canada can and must do more to address the serious crime of violence against women and the need for the security that women deserve in our communities.

We continue to see high prevalence rates of violence against women, along with low police reporting rates. We believe that to obtain real results for victims, we should instead be addressing the underlying reasons that prevent victims from reporting assault and abuse in the first place.

Motion No. 504 is well-intentioned, but, in our view, it does not go far enough. Violence against women, as I will discuss in a moment, is a huge problem in Canada. That was acknowledged very powerfully by the member for Sault Ste. Marie from the perspective of his constituents, and I would like to do the same for mine.

We need a comprehensive and co-operative solution, so while this motion is well-intentioned, we believe it is too narrow. Gender inequality is the root cause of violence against women, so I was concerned to learn that Conservatives have taken the word out of the very mandate of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women.

Here are some sobering statistics. Half of all women in Canada have experienced at least one incident of physical or sexual violence since the age of 16. Women are 11 times more likely than men to be the target of sexual offences, and three times more likely to be experiencing criminal harassment.

A full two-thirds of all Canadians, 67%, say that they personally know at least one woman who has been sexually or physically assaulted. That is the statistic that I found to be the most shocking.

Indigenous women are seven times more likely to be murdered than non-indigenous women. As of 2010, there are 1,200 known cases of missing or murdered indigenous women in Canada. That is absolutely staggering.

Both Amnesty International and the United Nations itself have called upon the Canadian government to take action on this issue, without success. According to the Native Women's Association of Canada:

...if this figure were applied proportionately to the rest of the female population there would be over 18,000 missing Canadian women and girls.

On any given day in our country, more than 3,300 women, along with about 3,000 of their children, are forced to sleep in an emergency shelter to escape domestic violence. Every night, about 200 of those women are turned away because the shelters are full. Each year, over 40,000 arrests result from domestic violence. That is about 12% of all violent crime in Canada, but since only about 22% of all incidents are reported to the police, that figure is obviously much higher.

Canada has clear domestic and international obligations to address violence against women, including the UN call for a national action plan to end violence against women to be in place in all countries by 2015. I was shocked to learn from the speech given by my colleague from Churchill that Canada does not have such a plan, in contrast to many of our partners around the world that do. That is really disturbing.

We must look at best practices from around the world, not just within Canada. Not doing so prevents us from learning the best practices employed elsewhere. Other countries have had success addressing violence against women. Why should we not take advantage of that expertise? In the absence of a national action plan responsive to violence against women, our education and programs are fragmented and inconsistent. We must do better.

It has to be noted that multi-sectoral cuts by the Conservative government have been devastating to the Status of Women agency. Not only that, the whole violence against women sector has been left crippled by financial insecurity and lack of capacity to effectively respond to women's needs.

The Conservative minister who changed the women's program mandate said, rather unbelievably:

We don't need to separate the men from the women in this country. This government as a whole is responsible to develop policies and programs that address the needs of both men and women.

It is unbelievable.

The cuts that the Conservatives have made affect organizations advocating for women's issues, such as antidote, the non-profit organization in my community of Victoria that works for the social and psychological well-being of racialized girls and women. The organization's executive director called the changes shocking and asked, “How do you create change when you can't advocate for change?”

Other women's groups, such as the Victoria Status of Women Action Group, SWAG, were forced to close completely, thanks to the government's cuts.

Obviously a national action plan to address violence against women is being called for by the vast majority of service providers and advocacy groups across the country.

Recently, I had the opportunity to hold consultations with great organizations doing excellent work in my community of Victoria. They also called upon us to get a national action plan in place.

In April, I had the great honour of hosting a public forum in Victoria on equality and ending violence against women. I was joined by the official opposition critic for the Status of Women, the member for Churchill. We also had representatives from the Victoria Sexual Assault Centre, the Bridges for Women Society, the BC Association of Aboriginal Friendship Centres, and many others. An engaged crowd of more than 150 people also enjoyed incredibly powerful performances by two local poets, Jeremy Loveday and Morgan Purvis. The evening was emotional, inspiring, but more than anything else, it was a siren call for action.

We should seize the opportunity to study the possibility of creating a comprehensive national action plan that would make a tangible difference in women's lives.

We do not need to reinvent the wheel. The Canadian Network of Women's Shelters and Transition Houses recently reported that a high-level review of policies, legislation, research, reports, action plans, and statistical data from across Canada, relevant to the development of national violence against women legislation, is available.

The network is currently working with 30 partners to create a template for a comprehensive national action plan. We should listen to civil society on this issue and build upon the work they have done. They are two steps ahead of us. Let us get on with it. Canada is doing poorly compared with other OECD countries in preventing and treating sexual assault and intimate partner violence.

In conclusion, New Democrats will support the motion, but if the member is serious about addressing violence against women, we would hope that he would accept going further.

We are calling for stronger and immediate action to deal with the serious issue of violence against women, and particularly violence against aboriginal women in our country.

We are calling upon the government to immediately pick up the motion tabled by the member for Churchill, that is, Motion No. 444, and consult with civil society in order to create a multi-sectoral, comprehensive national action plan to address violence against women, which would include prevention and education strategies. I am pleased to see today that policies would be included.

We want the government to immediately commit to funding legal aid, shelters, transition houses, social housing, health services, and advocacy and research, in order to prevent and treat violence against all women in Canada, including, in particular, indigenous women, recent immigrants, and refugees.

The important work of violence against women service providers and advocacy organizations in Canada must be fully supported, so the incredible organizations like the Victoria Sexual Assault Centre, antidote, Bridges for Women Society, and the aboriginal friendship centres can continue their important work.

In order to obtain real results, we must address the underlying systemic reasons women face violence in the first place. We must address women's equality from a holistic perspective to end this violence and take action now.

[Privacy, June 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, no wonder the government hand-picked the new Privacy Commissioner, who specialized in defending the government against the previous Privacy Commissioner.

Privacy experts all recognize that the Conservatives' arguments on this file are bizarre and unbelievable. Warrantless searches go far beyond general scrutiny, and while some companies are releasing the number of requests they are getting, Canadians still have no idea how far this collection of their private data is going.

Will the government finally explain what it is really doing with the private information of more than one million Canadians?

[Privacy, June 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, Canadians are only now starting to see the full extent of government demands for our personal information. Rogers Communications, one of Canada's largest Internet providers, said that just last year they received over 170,000 requests for customer information. This follows previous statistics showing that telecom companies received more than 1.2 million data requests in 2011. We all know that there are not 1.2 million terrorists. What possible reason could the government have for collecting so much of our personal information?

[Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act, June 6th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, many lawyers, such as members of the Canadian Bar Association and others working in this field, have been concerned about the concentration of power, in this bill, in the hands of the minister. In particular, when a minister, or delegated staffer, concludes on a balance of probabilities that a person has obtained citizenship by fraud, currently he or she has the ability to move that person on their own. The United Sates has a court process that could attend such an event, where naturalization is to be forfeited. That has been the practice in Canada in the past.

Does the hon. member share the concerns of so many lawyers and constitutional experts about the constitutionality of that and the propriety in a democracy of concentrating so much power in one individual?

[Natural Resources, June 5th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, first nations, municipalities, and British Columbians have overwhelmingly said no to northern gateway. Now we have 300 scientists from around the world saying that the joint review panel has so many errors and omissions it cannot be used to make decisions about the pipeline. In fact, they have urged the Prime Minister, and I quote, “...in the strongest possible terms to reject this report”.

What is it going to take for the government to finally say no to northern gateway?

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, June 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my colleague and friend from Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques for his excellent intervention.

As he indicated, there are so many elements to this omnibus budget bill. I would like the member's views on one that he talked about in passing. Canada's venture capital industry has warned that the changes to the labour-sponsored venture capital corporations could have dire consequences for the rejuvenation of our venture investment sector in Canada, critical to high-tech and bio-tech, the jobs of the future.

However, without any reason, it appears that the government is phasing out the federal tax credit for these labour-sponsored venture capital corporations.

I would like the member to elaborate, if he would, on why he thinks that has occurred and what the consequences might be.

[Economic Action Plan 2014 Act, No. 1, June 4th, 2014]

Mr. Speaker, at the finance committee, of which we are both members, an official from the Department of Finance confirmed that one million people in Canada, so-called dual citizens, would be affected by FATCA and the government's implementation of that.

At the finance committee, the New Democrats moved two important amendments, one that would confirm that this bill would not override the Privacy Act and the charter and another requiring notice before personal financial information would be sent to the U.S. IRS.

Would my colleague comment on those amendments and would he be in a position to support them?