Pat Martin

[Federal Accountability Act, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I concur with most of the remarks my colleague from Quadra made about his experience on the committee. It did transpire in the way he remembers it.

However, to complete some of the comments he made, I think it would be fair to say that more than one attempt was made to correct this idea that some people would seek to circumvent the donation limits of the Canada Elections Act by laundering money through, not just a child's bank account, but anybody's bank account, which would be against the law.

It would be fair to expand on that issue to include the fact that the NDP also had an idea, which was voted down by the Liberals. We were not totally against having minors take part in politics by making a modest donation, but that the donation should be deducted from the donation limit of the parent or guardian. We felt that that was a better approach simply because the approach the Liberals put forward did not really speak to the fact that it would be wrong to use anyone's bank account to circumvent the Canada Elections Act and there are already controls in the act to preclude that. People are breaking the law if they do, whether they are minors or of legal age.

What we are trying to avoid is children being exploited but not preclude children from participating. If they were 14 or 15 years old and wanted to join the Liberal Party of Canada, and chose to donate $50 to the campaign fund of my friend from Quadra, I see no harm in that as long as it is not used as a way to exceed the donation limits. Would that be fair to say?

[Points of Order, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, in the interest of trying to get the attention of my colleague from Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, I did in fact raise my finger and perhaps that was misinterpreted by my Bloc colleagues as an insult. If they saw it that way, I certainly apologize.

My colleague from Notre Dame knows I have great respect for her and I would never use an obscene gesture in the House.

[Points of Order, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I was going to rise on a similar point of order to speak to the comments made by the member for Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine. I believe that in the context of her question she made a very uncomplimentary and even unparliamentary comment about me. I take it as a class issue. She is an academic and a lawyer and I am a blue collar worker and a carpenter. She was trying to imply that being a busboy is somehow a derogatory remark. I take it as an insult and I think she should apologize to me.

[Federal Accountability Act, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I think we are coming to a consensus on what we are trying to achieve with Motions Nos. 17, 18, and 19. The NDP is willing to cooperate with the idea to simplify things. I understand the motion is in the name of my colleague from Acadie—Bathurst. Therefore, I do not believe I am authorized to withdraw Motion Nos. 17 and 19. Perhaps after question period the House can have our assurance that we will do that to expedite the process.

[Federal Accountability Act, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for clearing up the misinformation that is abounding in western Canada, certainly in Barbara Yaffe's column in the Vancouver Sun. She quotes the member for Vancouver Quadra saying that the NDP voted down his floor-crossing amendment. The big bad NDP could have punished the member for Vancouver Kingsway, but we chose not to. There is a big difference between not voting for the member's amendment and voting to uphold the ruling of the chair. I too shared the chair's opinion that my colleague's amendment was out of order. It does not mean I did not support the content of his amendment.

I had two floor-crossing amendments, both of which were ruled out of order. I liked ours better. If both of mine were ruled out of order and if his were in order, I would have supported his. Therefore, there is some misinformation abounding in the country. It does a disservice to this debate and a disservice to Canadians to have this bantering back and forth.

Let us all agree on one thing. Bill C-2 has great merits and should be passed expeditiously for the well-being of the whole democratic system and to keep those who would violate and breach the public trust in check. Those who would violate the public trust, as we saw in recent history, should be held in check and should be barred and blocked from ever doing so again should they ever form government again.

[Federal Accountability Act, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I was only making my remarks in my first opportunity to speak at this stage of this bill. I felt it was important to clear the air and to begin from a basis of the same body of information and facts.

First of all, some of the Liberal propaganda is absolutely false. No one voted for or against the floor-crossing amendments because those amendments were ruled out of order. I ask them to perhaps send a second press release into western Canada and stop accusing the NDP of sabotaging the floor-crossing amendment. The truth is that the Liberals crafted it in such a way that it could not be entertained in committee. It was out of order, plain and simple.

We will do the general public a good service and we will do justice to this bill if we begin from the same informed base of information. These technical amendments in the first grouping should not trigger a great deal of gnashing of teeth or rending of garments. I think they should be accepted.

[Federal Accountability Act, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker. we are dealing with the amendments. It is our first opportunity to deal with the amendments of Bill C-2 at report stage in the House of Commons. It is important to frame the context in which this debate will take place. There are enemies of this bill who are conspiring to undermine the implementation of this bill. That should be exposed with the same frankness as my colleague from the Bloc spoke of when he was trying to accuse the other parties of undermining his right to do a thorough job and study of this bill.

I do not think the Senate needs to take any longer than we did to deal with this bill. We rolled up our sleeves and did the grunt work, if I can speak plainly. We worked extra hours. We worked into the night. A week's worth of witnesses and a week's worth of committee stage should be all the Senate needs.

I am disappointed when I hear Liberal members of Parliament saying that we should be talking about this well into the fall, well into the winter. One Manitoba Liberal senator is saying that Christmastime and beyond is not unrealistic for the Senate to do a thorough analysis of this bill.

That is the kind of sabotage talk that we heard from the Bloc earlier on too, that we should still be hearing witnesses into the spring. That is crazy. We all know what needs to be done. It is not that tough. Honesty and ethics are not concepts on which we should have to start from scratch. We all know the difference between right and wrong.

There are some people who are so steeped in the tradition of unbridled patronage and rum bottle politics, learning at the feet of Allan J. and people like this. They just do not know anything else. There are some parties that cannot survive in a climate of transparency and accountability. They would strangle in that atmosphere. It is poisonous to them.

We are trying to create an atmosphere where ethical standards rule the day. We are trying to create an atmosphere where ethical standards dominate. There is a downside to the culture of secrecy that allowed corruption not only to flourish but to rule the day, to dominate. It is an end to that era.

This first set of amendments to the report stage of Bill C-2 is beginning to lay the foundation of a whole new era. It is like moving from the Mesozoic era to another era.

I am optimistic that we are going to hopefully get all this out of our systems early on, that we do not hear the cheap potshots from my colleague from the Bloc, and that we do not hear grandiose revisionist history from the Liberals.

I saw a press release put out by the Liberal Party in western Canada that said that the NDP voted down its recall amendments, its floor-crossing amendments. That is untrue. The floor crossing thing was ruled out of order. Nobody voted for it or against it because it was ruled out of order. It is a complete fabrication. It is an--

[Federal Accountability Act, June 20th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I rise to say a few words about the first group of amendments at this stage of Bill C-2. I note that the ruling has been made to delete some of the amendments and to allow others, then to cluster them into what seem to be logical groupings. I cannot find fault with the methodology here. They seem to be along the same themes. There is some logic and flow to the methodology.

I must begin by taking offence with some of the comments made by my colleague from the Bloc. If we are going to deal with Bill C-2 properly and do justice to it, we must begin from the same base level of information and, hopefully, from the same base level of truth and facts. I notice that my colleague never misses an opportunity to open his remarks with a certain sarcasm and even a certain level of insult to some of us who were on that committee. The member tries to imply or to lay some foundation that there was a prejudice toward him being able to do his job properly.

I think we should put it on the record that there was ample time for all the witnesses who wanted to be heard to be heard. In fact, the committee ran out of witnesses. The committee had dedicated hours left vacant as it were and regularly, habitually, members ran out of questions prior to the end of the questioning period allocated for the witnesses.

Anyone who implies that the compressed period of time that we used to study the bill was in fact a shortened period of time is simply misleading the public. It should be put on the record that we should begin this study with honesty and in a forthright fashion with all the facts.

Bill C-2 is all about transparency, ethics, et cetera. It would be unethical to imply that anyone was denied the right to do a proper and thorough job in the study of the bill.

Some of the amendments put forward in Group No. 1, as I say, the NDP finds no fault with their technical nature dealing with the conflict of interest act. As I say, we are going through it in a thematic way. The first topic as we come to it in Bill C-2 is dealing with the Conflict of Interest Code, to codify the code. This will move the code into the act to make it statutory in nature, rather than a guideline and expanding the application of the conflict of interest act to ministers of state who may find themselves in conflict as well.

The NDP does not oppose that. Our party finds that there have been ample examples in recent history, within the last Parliament certainly and possibly even this Parliament, where it would have been logical to have the application of the Conflict of Interest Code apply to a broader base, to more members.

It should be explained to members that there is great public interest in Bill C-2 and in the speedy passage of the bill. There is a method to our madness in trying to ensure that the bill gets through the House in this session of this Parliament. There are people who are opposed to some of the fundamental principles of the bill, especially the election financing section as we come to that later.

One of the political parties is claiming that this is some conspiracy to disadvantage them. Legislation is not crafted for the partisan interests of any one of the four political parties in the House of Commons. All of the political parties had their executive directors and president appear as witnesses before the committee. None raised the fact that they should get special privileges or that we should craft this legislation with the health and well-being of any one particular party in mind. We crafted the bill for everyone and we apply it equally, fairly and universally to everyone.

We should not delay the implementation of the bill to accommodate the greed of one political party. I say greed because the only problem it is running into is the fact that it charges $950 for delegate convention fees to its convention. That party would not have a problem if it was not trying to make money on its convention.

We in the NDP are also having a convention this fall. Our party's convention fees are $135. It is $95 if the person is an early bird. That party is the architect of its own problems, as usual.

I caution the Liberals that if they are considering conspiring with their Liberal-dominated Senate to delay, block, undermine or sabotage this bill, we will expose them in the House and outside the House. We will cry from the highest rooftops and condemn them for--

[Business of Supply, June 19th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Skeena is absolutely right. The honour of the Crown is at stake. Those very words are part of today's motion, I believe.

It took me a number of years to realize that when aboriginal people talk about making treaty, they are not just talking about signing a contract. They are entering into something that is a relationship. There is no other way of describing it. It is a sacred trust.

[Business of Supply, June 19th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Winnipeg South has given me the opportunity to add a point that I should have made in my speech.

It is true that the plight of the urban aboriginal, the off reserve aboriginal person, is the most desperate. Even what paltry support mechanism they may have had in their home communities is often not available to them when they move off reserve. They often get lost in the inner cities.

One of the heartening things about the Kelowna meetings was that the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, which represents off reserve aboriginal peoples, and the Métis National Council were represented at the table and were given equal status to first nations and Inuit people. We took some comfort in that it was not only the provincial and territorial leaders who were with the prime minister around that table, but the Native Women's Association of Canada, the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples, the Métis National Council and the Assembly of First Nations were represented.

In retrospect, it was almost a miracle to get those diverse interests together in one room for a common purpose. I am really reluctant to let that slip away. Even though I often accuse the Liberal Party, I heard the former minister of Indian affairs outline the steps that got us to Kelowna. It sounded that exactly what was wrong with the whole administration managing poverty, I call it, of Indian affairs is that it goes around and around to round tables that lead nowhere, to more studies, et cetera. That all seemed to stop at Kelowna when a collective enlightenment, a kind of collective consciousness dominated the room. Everybody was bobbing their heads at once saying, “You are right. The time has come. No more debate. No more prizes for predicting rain. The prize is only for building arks”.