Pat Martin

[Supply, March 19th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I doubt I could elaborate at length for two reasons. First, I saw the report for the first time today when it was circulated to my colleague, although I have been aware of the report for quite some time. Second, I have very little time.

What is necessary to point out, and may be the key salient point about the report generated from Holland on the impact of implementing Kyoto in Canada, is that the cost, when one considers the benefits versus the initial outlay, is more like $800 million for implementation, not the $40 billion and $50 billion that we keep hearing. Some people with vested interests have been fearmongering about the cost of the implementation. We challenge that and we now have good research to assist us in that challenge.

[Supply, March 19th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, under the federal building initiative, I believe that out of the 68,000 buildings that the government owns, about 1,100 energy audits have taken place. Of those 1,100 audits, about 100 comprehensive retrofits have in fact taken place, many of them hugely successful, and the benefits have been well monitored and well chronicled.

Rose Technology Engineering wanted to use the Harry Hayes Building in downtown Calgary, right in the heart of oil country and the oil industry, as an example of what one can do with the latest technology in terms of energy conservation without comprising comfort or having to freeze in the dark.

We are missing an opportunity. We have been calling upon the government to actually do comprehensive retrofits on 1,000 buildings per year. It would still take 60 years but we should at least let the private sector put out an RFP on the buildings. The private sector engineers should be allowed to put forward proposals stating “Here is a million square foot post office in Mississauga. We believe that you are paying too much money in your energy costs. We have ideas that we can retrofit that and do it at no upfront cost to the taxpayer”.

Why in God's name would we not act on many of those buildings and show by example to the private sector what can be done with the new energy technology that exists in Canada today?

[Supply, March 19th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, I am very pleased to be able to take part in this opposition day motion on Kyoto from the Canadian Alliance.

Let me start by saying that the member for Red Deer has the toughest job in the whole Canadian Alliance Party. It is not a beach party being a member of that party lately anyway, but frankly he has the job of trying to sell the Canadian Alliance position on Kyoto, which has been one of shifting sands. Since I have been here in 1997 it has been an absolutely moving target. When Kyoto was brought forward to the international arena, the Alliance's first position was to deny it completely, to say that global warming was not the result of human activity on this planet, that it was not a problem. That was its first position. I heard the leader of that party say that a couple of times. Those members were the chief apologists for the oil industry. They were the corporate shills for oil interests or big oil.

They took that job very seriously until the oil industry matured beyond their position. It is kind of embarrassing to be out-greened by the oil industry in North America, but that is exactly what happened. They were forced to shift their position and then they started challenging the science by which the measurements were being taken in terms of global warming. For the next six to ten months they were talking about bad science and how could we commit our country to such a radical change in the way we conduct business when it was based on bad science, as if they had a team of scientists somewhere that was better than the leading scientists in the world who congregated at Rio and then at Kyoto to decide to finally do something about global warming. They had members like the members from Athabasca and Red Deer who were willing to challenge the leading minds of the century on this issue.

Then they were forced to recognize that the Pacific Ocean has risen 12 centimetres. They were forced to recognize that on the Canadian prairie due to global warming the area I come from and the area that those members come from are close to being a desert. We are two or three degrees of global warming away from going from a prairie agricultural economy to the next Gobi Desert. That is the fear in the area I live in, but their narrow, blinkered focus was only on the oil patch. They had their heads deeply in the oil sands. They refused to acknowledge the emergency taking place internationally when the rest of the world was coming to an agreement.

Finally they had to give up on that and start admitting that given the ice storms, given the change in climate, something goofy was happening, that maybe mankind was in fact responsible for some of this global warming. Maybe burning fossil fuels was soiling our own nest to the point where human beings would not be able to live on this planet.

Now they have had to shift their tactics again, to fearmongering about how much it would cost to fix the problem, but not talking about the cost of not fixing the problem. They are trying to sell the fact that there is some immediate negative cash outlay necessary and that is where they find themselves now.

A fourth angle that they have tried to float today is that Kyoto is last century's solution and we are looking for a 21st century solution. Kyoto was agreed upon in the very twilight hours of the last century for implementation in this century, so let us not try to sell it as an outdated ideology or as obsolete in any way. That is completely disingenuous.

Now we find Canadian Alliance members scrambling to find some way to be faithful to their old arguments and still recognize the undeniable fact that this planet has agreed as a global entity that we must do something about our global climate change.

I was lucky enough to take part in a cross-country conference on climate change, in five different locations, with the global task force on climate change which Canada hosted in 1993. Prior to Rio we were dealing with these issues. One of the things that came up at that time is that we are too much concerned with supply side management and that maybe this is how we have to break out of the box: we have to start talking more about demand side management. As a contractor, a journeyman carpenter and the head of a building trades union, for me it was absolute heresy to stand up in any public setting and say that we were against building more hydro generating stations, we were against building more nuclear power plants or we were against building the oil tar sands in Fort McMurray, because that was where the people I represented hoped to get jobs. Therefore we had to do some research.

We had to get some real hard facts to find the trade-off . We were happy to learn something which I am happy to share with the members for Red Deer and Athabasca and the other champions of the other point of view. Empirical evidence now exists that there is far more job creation opportunity on the demand side management of energy resources than there is in manufacturing on the supply side.

If members are interested at all in demand side management they will probably be interested in hearing this. A unit of energy that we harvest from the existing system through demand side management conservation measures is indistinguishable from a unit of energy that we crank out at a generating station, except for a number of things.

First, it is available online immediately. As soon as I turn off the light switch in my house that unit of energy is there so I can sell it to someone else, instead of a five year lag period for building a new generating station.

Second, it creates as many as seven times the number of jobs. A unit of energy harvested from the existing system through demand side management measures creates seven times the person years of employment as a unit of energy created at a new generating station.

The third and most obvious benefit given this argument is that we actually reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions. Surely that is an enormous benefit that we all want to achieve now that we have convinced the Canadian Alliance that greenhouse gas and global warming are in fact issues.

The fourth thing is that we do not have to borrow any money to do it.

The final one is the real sinker. As it pertained to the building trade unions that I represented, we offered a whole program where we would energy retrofit public, private and municipal buildings free of charge by using our union pension fund investment money to undertake the retrofitting. In other words, we would create jobs with our own union pension funds to renovate the building. The property owner would then pay us back slowly out of the energy savings, so it was off balance sheet, zero cost financing to retrofit every building in the country.

We proposed this to the federal government and it agreed. The federal government introduced the federal building initiative, albeit on a painfully small scale, far smaller than we recommended. However there are financiers out there who would be willing to retrofit every one of the government's 68,000 buildings across the country at no upfront cost to the taxpayer. This would reduce operating costs by 40%, reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions by God knows how much and reduce fossil fuel consumption at no cost to the taxpayer. Why are we not doing this right across the country?

Why did the Canadian Alliance not use its opposition day opportunity, a votable day I might add, to call for real leadership in this cold, harsh, winter environment of Canada so that we could be the centre of excellence in energy conservation and show the world how to create jobs, conserve energy and save money all at the same time? Perhaps some of that money that we would save by demand side management energy conservation measures could be used toward implementing our obligations under Kyoto.

That is why it is painful for me to watch the House of Commons seized for the entire day on whether Kyoto is real or not real, whether we should implement or not implement it, and then have to listen to bogus arguments that because we only generate 3% of the greenhouse emissions, even if we cut our emissions by 50% it would be meaningless on a global scale. That is nonsense.

We are a leading nation. We are one of the G-7 nations that could by example show the rest of the world how to conserve energy and reduce their consumption of fossil fuels through demand side management measures. We could export that technology again so that Canada could generate some benefit from the measures that we take to come into compliance with Kyoto.

We call upon the government to ratify Kyoto and sign on despite what the Americans are doing. We call on the members of the Canadian Alliance to get with the 21st century, get their heads out of the oil sands at Fort McMurray and come along with us as we speak for Canadians and for the global community to reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions and hopefully breathe fresh air together.

[Question No. 107—, March 15th, 2002]

Following the 1999 Supreme Court ruling that businesses may deduct fines, levies or penalties as a business expense on their income tax if such penalties were incurred for activities undertaken for the purposes of earning income: ( a ) which, if any, Canadian businesses deducted fines, levies or penalties from their taxes in each of the years 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000; ( b ) what were the penalties and dollar figures each of those companies claimed as a deduction for said penalties; and ( c ) which, if any, Canadian companies have deducted a fine or penalty or levy incurred for activities in another country?

[Aboriginal Affairs, March 15th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the consultation process on the first nations governance has been a failure since day one. The leadership of the AFN boycotted the process and hardly anybody came to the first rounds of hearings. Now we hear that, in an effort to get some bodies out, individuals have been offered financial incentives to attend these hearings. Worse yet, groups have been threatened with having their funding cut if they refuse to co-operate.

Just how much money has the government spent on this sham of a consultation process and is it true that individuals and groups are being bribed and/or blackmailed to take part in the consultations?

[Grants and Contributions, March 15th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, the practice of farming out lucrative contracts to political friends is hardly new to government, but I think all Canadians would agree that the Groupaction fiasco set a whole new low.

Yes, we finally found the mystery document. The real mystery is not where it went. The real mystery is why we spent $550,000 on a ragtag stack of random data sheets in only one language advising government of upcoming sporting and cultural events.

In another separate contract to Groupaction worth $575,000, it was to have carried out two tasks and delivered only one. Then last year, with Alfonso Gagliano still at the helm, the firm received a $615,000 contract to evaluate the quality of its work as a consultant to the government.

Political campaign contributions worth $70,000 have yielded this company nearly $2 million in what appears to be corporate, make work projects. These are not contract awards, they are patronage rewards.

[Canada Elections Act, March 13th, 2002]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for Prince George--Peace River for raising this interesting subject and stimulating the debate we are having which has grown into quite a pluralistic kind of debate.

It quickly moved off the simple goal of the motion put forward by the hon. member and has broadened to a much larger debate about immigration generally, growing our country through immigration, citizenship, and now electoral reform because this is what the motion would entail. It would have Canadians revisit our electoral system to decide whether or not we would allow landed immigrants to vote.

I note from other speeches the point that there is precedence in some other countries that allows landed immigrants the franchise to vote. It is not an outlandish idea. Nor is it a particularly radical idea when we consider that landed immigrants in this country are not allowed to become citizens until they have spent 1,095 days or a full three years here.

If an election occurs during that period of time, it is a full three year wait even if a person had every intention of seeking Canadian citizenship at the earliest opportunity. Perhaps that is another issue we should add to the growing list of subsequential issues to the original motion. Perhaps we should revisit the length of time that landed immigrants have to wait prior to being allowed to become Canadian citizens.

The shocking truth or keynote of a number of speeches was that an awful lot of Canadian citizens do not vote. That is the real tragic issue with which we are coming to grips. So many Canadians have lost faith, hope and confidence in their electoral system that they simply ask why bother and do not show up to vote. The figure used from the last election was that 61% of Canadians voted. In actual fact 61% of registered voters came out to vote. It was only 50% of all Canadians who were 18 years of age and eligible to vote. Only 50% of all eligible voters actually chose to cast a ballot for any political party. That is something that is very worrisome.

I come to this argument from a different angle than perhaps the previous three speakers who spoke against the idea. I like the idea. It would be an important vote of confidence and an important gesture on the part of Canada if we allowed landed immigrants to vote during the period of time prior to becoming Canadian citizens.

The logic I use is that landed immigrants are subject to the terms, conditions and rules set out by the Government of Canada through the political process. They live under those rules. It is a natural justice issue. They should have some right to influence the terms, conditions and laws under which they live.

As soon as they get here they start paying taxes. As soon as they get here and achieve landed status virtually all the rights and benefits of Canadian citizenship are available to them except for the right to vote.

I do not believe it would end there. I honestly believe that we would be better off and would get a more honest input in terms of whether the country is serving their needs as it should. That would be a valuable contribution and an enabling measure, a gesture to the world, that we value their presence in our country, that we want them to come to our country and help us grow this great land.

When I was a member of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration we dealt with the citizenship bill. We wrestled for a long time with what it means to be granted the right to be a Canadian citizen and how much we value it.

All member should be aware of the conclusion we came to, that when we extend rights to a certain group it does not diminish the rights of others. In fact it strengthens the rights of others. The idea of rights is not some finite pie that if I give someone else too much I have to accept less. It does not cheapen or diminish my Canadian citizenship to extend the rights of citizenship to others, even prior to their actually taking out that piece of paper. I think it is an excellent debate and it helps us to achieve our immigration goals.

The Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration also dealt with the very compelling fact that without immigration we are at a below zero population growth. At the current level of population growth in Canada we would be a country of 18 million people in 50 years without immigration. We would have shrunk from 33 million people to 18 million people or about the size of Minneapolis in 2050.

It is critical we encourage more and more people to choose to make Canada their home. If they are to have this three year waiting period of 1,095 days prior to which they can actually get Canadian citizenship, surely in the interim we should be able to tell them that they will enjoy the rights and privileges of all Canadians as soon as they become landed immigrants, including the right to cast a ballot or vote in a federal election.

Landed immigrants are free to take part in the political process. They can join political parties. They can make political campaign contributions. They can be elected delegates to political conventions. They can go to nomination meetings and choose candidates. They can do everything short of voting.

It has become a bit of an emotional argument or there must be some kind of a sentiment that it will somehow diminish or cheapen my citizenship to offer the right to vote to landed immigrants. I urge members to get beyond that point of view. It is not positive and it is not helpful to the larger debate.

As the hon. member mentioned, the issue of electoral reform is critical. We should all be concerned with these terrible numbers, that only 50% of eligible voters cast their ballots. The issue of proportional representation has been raised. Our political party has been doing some work on that by meeting with the fair elections league which advocates PR for the simple reason that votes are not wasted.

In other words, if I were an NDP voter living in Edmonton my vote would be lost in the haystack. With PR one's vote counts no matter what because if one's party gets 10% of the vote nationally it gets 10% of the seats.

It would encourage more people to come out and vote if they knew their vote would not be wasted or lost. Whatever political stripe, they would be comfortable that their vote would actually mean something and they would not just be going through an exercise.

I know we will not get a chance to vote on this motion because unfortunately it has been deemed non-votable. It is something Canadians should address in a far more serious way.

I encourage members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration to look into this area of study. Standing committees have a right to choose what areas of research they undertake. I think they should dig into this area more deeply and perhaps they will be motivated to do so because of the debate we are having today.

At least two out of five speeches agree that it is an excellent idea. I think it is an idea that has enough merit. It should be dealt with further at the standing committee and perhaps adopted and introduced. It would be a very proud day for Canada to be able to announce to landed immigrants that in the next federal election they will be asked to cast their ballots and that their views will be valued in our electoral process.

[Budget Implementation Act, 2001, March 13th, 2002]

Madam Speaker, I just arrived and I heard most of my hon. colleague's speech. There is one thing I would like some additional information on. I was recently at the executive council of the Canadian Labour Congress. They were speaking about the new air transportation security agency and the composition of the board of directors.

At the transport committee meeting they had reason to believe and they were led to believe that there would be labour representation on the 11 person board of directors of the air transportation security agency. I am wondering what happened.

I am at one meeting and I get a report that even though people are apprehensive about the creation of this new arm's length agency, at least they are kind of relieved that they will in fact have proper representation and an opportunity to get labour's points of view put forward as this agency moves forward. Then I come to the House of Commons where I work and find out that the rug has been pulled out from under that idea. The transport committee recommended it and had a tacit agreement from all parties. Then what happened?

Perhaps the hon. member, because she is a member of the transport committee, could tell me what the heck happened there and how did we lose those seats on the board?

[Motions for Papers, March 13th, 2002]

Mr. Speaker, in light of what the parliamentary secretary tells us, I agree to withdraw my motion for the production of papers.

[Supply, February 28th, 2002]

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for Regina--Qu'Appelle for his comments. It is a shame that the hon. member only had 10 minutes to deal with the very comprehensive action plan put forward by the NDP. The plan has as a vision to save the very nation state of Canada as our sovereignty is eroded bit by bit and inch by inch.

I know the hon. member is well known around this place and around the country for the work he has done to strengthen the whole democratic and electoral process. He has asked for either parliamentary reform in the House of Commons or electoral reform. He has challenged and wants to revisit the way we elect politicians, and has introduced the concept of proportional representation.

Would the hon. member expand somewhat on how that would enhance democracy and the sovereign state of Canada?