Peter Stoffer

[Criminal Code, November 3rd, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I admire the passion my hon. colleague from the Conservatives has for this event. He is correct when he says that nobody in Canada and nobody in this House wishes to see any monuments defaced in any way, shape or form.

We all know about the incident a couple of years ago, I believe, when some rowdy teenagers, who were drunk or stoned, urinated on the National War Memorial and how that caused national news. They did not go to jail. The Legion asked for a chance to talk to them, and it did. Now these kids are the biggest protectors of war monuments in the country. The bill proposes that we incarcerate them immediately.

We heard testimony today in our veterans committee about how a Japanese monument in Vancouver was continually defaced and defiled. Eventually, the Legion and other groups got together with the people who did it. Now those kids are the biggest protectors of that monument.

I understand what my hon. colleague is trying to achieve but, if the Royal Canadian Legion and other groups believe that education and an opportunity to explain to vandals why their actions are wrong and to convert them into protecting these monuments, would that not be a more cost-effective and humane manner to deal with this issue?

[Veterans, November 3rd, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, in February 2000 the current member for Edmonton East said in a motion that he presented to the House that the government should take a leading role in banning depleted uranium from the world's militaries because of its harmful effect on veterans and our environment.

If the current member for Edmonton East, a Conservative member of Parliament, knows that, then why does the government not know it? As the Minister of Veterans Affairs knows all too well, he alone can apply the benefit of the doubt to help people like Pascal Lacoste and many other veterans who are suffering the effects of depleted uranium.

Will the minister do that now, before November 11?

[Parliament of Canada Act, November 2nd, 2011]

I was not elected as a Conservative, a Liberal or a Green member. I was elected as a New Democratic member of Parliament.

If, for whatever reason, I could no longer sit as a New Democratic member of Parliament, either I was being a real rabble-rouser and the party members said that I was being a major pain in the buttocks and that I could not be here any more, or I could no longer live by the philosophy, I would have several solutions to my problem. I could sit as an independent until the next election and make my choice known or I could quit. The premise then would be to seek the nomination of the new party, fly under its flag and seek election under that banner.

It is the people who decide our fate. There is nothing worse than sitting in the House of Commons listening to a new member of Parliament, for whom I have great respect, read bureaucratic notes that are handed to her. Does she not remember what the Prime Minister said when the former member for Kings—Hants joined the Liberal Party and became a cabinet minister? He said that any person who crosses the floor for a few pieces of silver has more or less sold their soul. He was very angry that it happened.

I remember when the great Belinda Stronach left the Conservatives and went over to the Liberal Party. Not one Conservative said that it was a wonderful thing she did. Not one Conservative sent her flowers and said, “Good for you, Belinda, that was great. You exercised your member of Parliament's duty”. No. What they said was very vile. What they said was extremely rude, because she was a woman and she was well known in this country. However, the comments from the Conservative members of Parliament and the Alberta Conservative members of Parliament were beyond the pale. Besides the tone of those comments, they were justified in their anger because a person left the party to sit as a cabinet minister in another party.

I will use the great David Emerson as an example. The beauty of being here for a while is that we get to remember some of these things. David Emerson was a minister in the Liberal government. There was an election in 2006, and the Conservatives won the election.

In February 2006, the cabinet of the Conservative Party was sworn in, and rightfully so, and the beauty of our democracy is that not a shot was fired. However, an hour before the Conservatives took over the government, the former member for Vancouver Kingsway, who was a Liberal cabinet minister when Paul Martin signed off, was sworn in as a Conservative cabinet minister with a better pension, better pay and a car. That was a Liberal cabinet minister who had said that he would be the Conservatives' worst nightmare, and it turned into a dream for him.

Would David Emerson have crossed the floor if he were to sit in the backbench with no critic area or anything? I do not think so.

The reality is that this is not my seat. It belongs to the people of Canada in my riding.

I cannot thank my hon. colleague for Pontiac enough. For the Liberals to stand up and say that they do not like this, they should get real. If we do not start disciplining ourselves, more and more people will not go to the polls. Canadians are telling us that they do not like the fact that we are entitled to our entitlements. The last thing members of Parliament should do is Dingwall the Canadian people. We should stop that.

If a member wishes, for whatever reason, to join another political party while sitting as an elected member of Parliament of a current party, it is quite simple: the member should sit as an independent until the next election, or quit, seek a byelection and explain to his or her constituents why he or she now needs to have another flag over his or her home. That is constitutional responsibility, and that is being true to democracy and to one's constituents.

The Conservative member spoke with bureaucratic notes without really thinking. There are four reasons that members get elected: first, to throw bums out; second, for their leader; third, for their party; and fourth, for themselves. In most cases, being oneself is the last reason people vote for a person.

The member talked about giving too much party discipline to the leader and the party. I remember a certain Conservative defence minister from Central Nova who said, “We don't kick people out of our party for voting against the budget or voting against the wishes of their constituents”. Guess what? Bill Casey, the former member for Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, voted against the Conservative budget because of the Atlantic accord and, before that man sat his derrière on the seat, he was out of the party. He was gone.

The Conservatives exercised discipline because they triple-whipped the vote. We understand that parties do that time and again, but we cannot have a senior minister, who joined the Conservative Party, say publicly in the House of Commons, “We don't kick people out for voting against us and doing what they wish”, and then, before the member could sit down, kick him out. That is party discipline. We understand party discipline. It happens. It s is what all members of Parliament need to understand when this happens. If members take chances, they take the consequences.

We have a party system, but, and I am talking about the ladies and gentlemen across the way, how many of them would have gotten elected as independents? I ask them to put up their hands right now if they could have been elected as an independent in the House of Commons. I do not see any hands going up. The reality is that it does not happen. It is rare that it happens.

Therefore, we should stop abusing the trust of our constituents. Our constituents are the ones who put us here. We tell our constituents which political banner we are being elected under. For whatever reason, it happens all the time. There are legitimate reasons for members to leave their parties. I will bet that members who are here long enough may think maybe it should. However, the reality is that members have a couple of beverages, forget about it and move on.

The truth is that we should never abuse our constituents. This bill would enact more discipline among ourselves and, more important, it is a private member's bill. We would hope that the Conservatives and the Liberals would enact a free vote on this measure, get it to committee and have Democracy Watch and others from across the country attend. I can honestly say that I have been working on this legislation since 1999 and the overwhelming majority of people I have spoken to, not just New Democrats but a lot of Conservatives, Liberals, the Green Party and former Bloc members are fully supportive of this legislation.

They do not want us treating the House of Commons as the no-tell motel, where people check in under an assumed name. This carpet is very expensive. We cannot just keep tramping back and forth when we want to. We need to have respect for the institution, but, most importantly, we need to have respect for our constituents.

This is what this bill is all about, and I am very proud of my hon. colleague from Pontiac for introducing this legislation once again. All the Conservatives and Liberals should send ten percenters or householders into their ridings and ask their constituents about floor crossing. They would be surprised at the answers. I have already done that and I know the answer. The overwhelming majority of Canadians want us to stop that practice, stop the entitlement of entitlements, behave ourselves, be more responsible and understand that the seats do not belong to us. They belong to the people of Canada.

[Parliament of Canada Act, November 2nd, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I am completely shocked. I thought the Conservatives were a party of democracy, as were the Liberals. I did not know that even though my name is on the seat here it is not my seat. I do not own this seat. It does not belong to me. It does not belong to my party. It belongs to the 91,000 people I represent in Sackville—Eastern Shore.

I was elected as a New Democratic member of Parliament. However, if in an hour I called the leader of the Liberal Party or maybe the Prime Minister and asked if they wanted me, I could be a Conservative member of Parliament or a Liberal member of Parliament in an hour or even less than that.

[Veterans, November 2nd, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the hon. Minister of Veterans Affairs for his kind words.

On November 11, we will gather at cenotaphs, Legion halls and army, navy and air force halls in communities right across this country from coast to coast to coast to pay special tribute to the over 118,000 men and women who will not be with us on that day, as they have made the ultimate sacrifice and are buried in over 70 countries around the world, and, as the media reported just recently, we have lost a few more.

These men and women sacrificed themselves for peace, freedom and democracy and for the liberation of the free world. We will also remember our troops who served in Afghanistan, Libya, Haiti and everywhere else.

Just like my father once said, when he met a Canadian soldier during the liberation of the Netherlands, they were looking up at Canadian service personnel and saying, “My God, what kind of country do they come from“. We live in heaven and most of us do not even know it.

The reality is that the men and women of the services and those in the RCMP gave us our democracy, gave us the country that we call home and gave us the country that we can proudly call number one in the world. We will never apologize for that. We truly have the best armed forces in the world. We also have the greatest veterans in the world. However, just as important, we also have the greatest family support for our veterans.

Yesterday, the veterans affairs committee went to the Canadian War Museum and we were given a very special gift, the gift of remembrance from one of our own here in the House of Commons, the hon. member for West Nova, whose great uncle, John Chipman Kerr, received the Silver Cross in the Battle of the Somme. We saw Mr. Kerr's photo done by A.Y. Jackson. We saw his Silver Cross medal and other medals donated by the family to the Canadian War Museum. We thank the member for West Nova for sharing his family history with all of us. It was very kind of him.

I could single out so many veterans and armed forces personnel, but there is one that I would like to single out today. I would like to recognize a sad chapter in our military history.

In 1944, a bunch of Canadian airmen were shot down over Paris. Unfortunately, 26 of them were taken, against the Geneva Convention, to the Buchenwald concentration camp, where they were not supposed to go. For quite a while, they were interrogated by the Gestapo. Those men not only showed bravery and courage in what they did, but survived.

There are only four of those 26 brave Canadian airmen who were in the Buchenwald camp and we are blessed and honoured to have one of them with us today. Mr. Ed Carter-Edwards of Smithville, Ontario, is with us today, as was recognized by the Speaker earlier. He has shown tremendous courage and bravery. It is his wish that the story of what he and his comrades went through is never forgotten. Just as important, there is no way Mr. Ed Carter-Edwards could have come back to Canada, lived a normal life and raised his family without the loving support of his wife of over 65 years, Lois, who is with him today. We thank her very much for that.

Ed Carter-Edwards and the many other veterans who are still with us from World War II and Korea are examples of the very best of Canada, the very best of what this country had to offer the world. When the world asked, we came calling. Our veterans sacrificed themselves. Those men and women volunteered.

Our aboriginal people were exempted from wars but they went anyway. They formed the greatest fighting force of all time. They showed the true spirit of the maple leaf. Unfortunately, many of them laid down their lives so that we can sit in the House of Commons and debate the issues of the day and look after our families and call Canada number one.

All of us in the House of Commons salute Ed Carter-Edwards and all the current service personnel, those who have served in the past, those who are serving today and the young cadets who will be serving in the future. We thank them and love them all. We cannot thank them enough for all the work they have done. God bless them.

Lest we forget.

[Association of Consulting Engineering Companies, November 1st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, members of Parliament on both sides of the House, today I rise to greet the Association of Consulting Engineering Companies of Canada, which is here today in Ottawa for the annual Parliament Hill Day and Awards Gala. It will be presenting awards for the best engineering projects in Canada over the past year to some outstanding engineers.

Whether it is a bridge or a building, if people have been on it or in it, it is probably designed by one of the finest engineers in world. These are Canadian engineers. Tonight they will be honouring the best of the best.

It is absolutely wonderful that we in Canada have some of the best professional engineers in the entire country. Those in the past built this country. Those today are building this country. What they are asking is that all parliamentarians work together to improve the infrastructure fund past 2014 so that these engineers can do what they do best--that is, build the best country in the entire world.

[Newfoundland and Labrador Fishery Rebuilding Act, October 21st, 2011]

Madam Speaker, I thank my hon. colleague from Newfoundland and Labrador for his intervention. I also thank the people of Newfoundland and Labrador for allowing Canada to join Newfoundland and Labrador in 1949.

I would say that what salmon is to British Columbians, what pickerel and bass are to central Canadians, what Arctic char is to northern Canada, cod fish is to Newfoundland and Labrador. It is a symbol of heritage. It is a symbol of the people. In fact, many Newfoundlanders and Labradorians can trace their ancestry to people who have fished the great seas in the past for their livelihood.

With Remembrance Week coming up, it would be fair to say that the people of Newfoundland and Labrador have not only fed the world, they have also fed many great soldiers, airmen, airwomen and sailors not only in Canada but our Allies in other countries throughout the war effort as well. Many a soldier ate bully beef as well as salt cod.

We also know that trade between the Caribbean and Newfoundland and Labrador ran from cod to rum. I thought that was a balanced trade deal.

However, I believe the reason why the Conservatives do not want an inquiry is because they do not want to know the truth. They do not want to know the facts.

I was on the fisheries and oceans committee for over 13 years. We studied all aspects of the fisheries in this country to death to come up with reports, of which 95% were unanimous, meaning members of the Reform, Alliance, the PC Party, the Bloc Québécois, NDP, Liberals and the Conservatives at the time supported those recommendations, only to have them fall flat on the desk of the minister of the day.

In 1998, I asked for a full judicial inquiry into the practices and policies of the management of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for Canada.

Hutchings and Myers are the best oceanographic and fishery scientists in Canada and the world. They said very clearly in their report when they came to Parliament Hill that in their opinion science had been manipulated at the highest levels when it came to the cod crisis in this country. What party was in government at the time that happened? It was the Conservative Party of Canada. Those are the facts.

In my mind, it was the Kirby report of 1982, which formulated the companies of Fisheries Products International and National Seas, that started the over aggressive fishing of those stocks which caused the downfall of the outports of not only Newfoundland and Labrador but also the provinces of P.E.I., New Brunswick and Nova Scotia.

People anywhere who believe that the management of Canadian fisheries is any good at all are fooling themselves. We and the Conservatives know that is not the case. I can quote numerous interventions wherein Progressive Conservatives, Reformers and members of the Alliance were slamming the Liberal Party for the mismanagement of the fisheries in Canada. They were good at it too.

I remember a certain John Cummins of British Columbia who was probably one of the most vocal critics of fisheries management in this country. He did a fantastic job at it because he was a commercial fisherman. Even his own party did not like some of his criticisms. However, he was not only standing up and fighting for the fishermen of his province but also for their way of life. On some parts I obviously disagreed with him but I could not knock his passion and desire to stand up for the men and women whose livelihoods were made from the sea.

Right now both the provincial and federal governments are concentrating on oil resources, the so-called non-renewable resources of this country, the petro-economy. Time and again I have asked, what will happen when oil and gas resources are gone? No response is forthcoming. There is only silence on that side.

If the fisheries are managed correctly and properly, seven generations down the road will be able to access a renewable, natural, healthy, vibrant food-based resource, not just for the people of Canada, Newfoundland and Labrador but for the entire world.

Why, in the life of any parliamentarian, would we not want to do everything possible, everything within our power, be it federally, provincially or municipally, including opposition members, to ensure the sanctity and the survival of that renewable resource?

I have tremendous respect for my good friend and hon. colleague, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. He is one of the nicest people I have ever met, but he quotes from and talks about the FRCC report. I have worked for a long time with the FRCC. Its members are fantastic fishermen, scientists, environmentalists, et cetera. However, what did the government just do to the FRCC? It cut its funding to the point where it no longer will exist.

One second the Conservatives will quote its report and hand it up as a litmus of sound management and advice and then cut its funding. Why do they do that? How many scientists now within DFO across this country are about to lose their jobs? When we heard the parliamentary secretary speak, I felt like buying a fishing boat. I felt like quitting my job, selling everything and going out fishing because, according to them, I am going to be well off. That is what Crosbie said in 1992. I remember when Pierre Pettigrew introduced the TAGS program so people would get five years of employment subsidy and payment subsidies and retraining so those who were left in the fishery would be well off. The folks were told not to worry, that they would be given bit of money, with a few shackles here, and they could train to be barbers. We had five barbers one time train for one small town of a couple of hundred people. That turned out really well. The fact is that it failed.

What did Premier Dunderdale say the day after she was elected? She said that they would need to deal with the fishery and reduce the number of fishermen and plant workers in the province. Not necessarily like that, but she said words similar to that. It is funny that she never spoke like that during the campaign. She only spoke like that after the campaign.

I am not blaming anyone here. It was not the Conservatives alone that mismanaged the fisheries. It was the federal Governments of Canada, the provincial governments, the fishing industry, the international fleets and NAFO. Everyone is partially to blame for this, including, I may say, the opposition, at times pushing for extra resources to help people get through the bad times, to get their EI, et cetera. We are all responsible for the downturn in the fishery. It is also our job to hold them to their fire, not just the Conservatives but the Liberals and previous governments before that. It is not a question of pinning one blame against the other. That is easy to do.

However, an inquiry would get everything out in the open and find out where the problems were, what the government and others have been doing to this point and where the road map to the future leads. That is Canada's national shame and the world looks at us saying that we had one of the world's largest, abundant, prolific protein fish stocks on the planet and now it is minuscule compared to what it used to be. Over 20 years and more, it is still the way it was in 1992. That is the shame.

I just want to thank my hon. colleague from St. John's, Newfoundland, for bringing this forward. I ask the government to reconsider, call for the inquiry, get the facts on the table and truly help the good people of Newfoundland and Labrador.

[Newfoundland and Labrador Fishery Rebuilding Act, October 21st, 2011]

How many have been ignored?

[Newfoundland and Labrador Fishery Rebuilding Act, October 21st, 2011]

Madam Speaker, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans asked why we should spend millions of dollars on an inquiry. His province is spending millions of dollars on an inquiry into a salmon run that failed miserably.

My hon. colleague from Newfoundland is absolutely correct. I was the NDP fisheries critic for over 13 years. I asked for a national federal inquiry into the practices and policies of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans. In the period 1998 to 2000 the Hutchings and Myers report came out, which the hon. parliamentary secretary should know, and those two scientists indicated that there was science manipulation at the very highest levels within DFO when it came to the collapse of the cod stocks. The government of the day was warned that the cod stocks were in trouble and it ignored that warning.

That is just one tiny element of why we need to get to the bottom of the serious mismanagement of the fisheries and oceans in this country. I would like my hon. colleague to comment on that, please.

[Veterans, October 21st, 2011]

Mr. Speaker, the truth of the Conservative Party's record on veterans affairs is rather quite dismal when we look at the fact that more and more veterans are now using food banks. In the city of Calgary alone, there is a food bank for veterans only. In 2005, it had 58 members and in 2010 it had over 200.

More and more veterans are becoming homeless, more and more veterans are frustrated with the system. Instead of streamlining the system to the point where veterans get more of the benefits, the government is cutting the department by $226 million.

If it really wants to do something, it should cut the Veterans Review and Appeal Board, get rid of the political appointees, and deal with the veterans—