Peter Van Loan

[Riding of Mississauga--Streetsville, January 30th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I know the members of the Liberal Party are very unhappy with the fact that the member for Mississauga—Streetsville found that his views did not find a home in the Liberal Party. I also know the member for Scarborough—Agincourt had difficulty asking questions that were in order in the committee.

However, it is quite clear that this government is reaching out to new Canadians. We see that on all fronts, which is why we had the positive outcome there. We welcome the member for Mississauga—Streetsville to our caucus.

[Business of the House, January 29th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to designate Thursday, February 1, as an allotted day.

[Points of Order, January 29th, 2007]

Mr. Speaker, what we are getting into here is clearly debate. There is no doubt that there was the provision and potential for that to be done by the government. We have been told by many people that it was the only way that the Liberals could possibly have met the Kyoto commitment. I, therefore, do not see that we have any issue to discuss.

[Business of Supply, November 23rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, this country has been a tremendous success. It is the project that was the vision of the bringing together of English and French, the vision of Sir John A. Macdonald and George-Étienne Cartier and those who worked with them as Fathers of Confederation, who saw the possibilities and the potential of a united Canada that included those founding cultures.

There were some at the time who opposed it, including some from Quebec. In fact, a fellow named Sir Wilfrid Laurier was one of the fiercest opponents of Confederation, yet he too, over time, came to see the benefits and the opportunities that this country presented to his culture, to his home and to the Québécois.

We have seen what has happened since within a united Canada. We have had un épanouissement of the culture of Quebec, something that could never have happened had Quebec been alone in North America, when the Québécois culture might have been reduced to something little more than the Cajun culture in terms of the French Canadian tradition. It is the fact of the Canada of Quebec, a Quebec in Canada, and the Québécois being in Canada that has allowed the protection of that culture, the blossoming of it, as I have said, and the opportunities to build the greatest country.

Does the member opposite really believe that the cultural opportunities and the strengthening of Québécois culture that have occurred would have been possible had that people been subject to the ebbs and flows of North American culture and the strength of American culture? Or would they have been reduced to little more than what we see among the Cajuns today?

[November 2nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I think the member for Davenport, before he poses those questions, has to look deep within his own party. The member for Etobicoke—Lakeshore, who will likely be his next leader, has spoken and written at length about the issue of torture. It is a position that seems profoundly different from that of the member for Davenport. He said:

To defeat evil, we may have to traffic in evils: indefinite detention of suspects, coercive interrogations, targeted assassinations...

He also wrote:

I do not see any trumping argument on behalf of the rights and dignity of security detainees that makes their claims prevail over the security interests.

In May 2004 he wrote in the New York Times, when he was still living in the United States, the following:

--defeating terror requires violence. It may also require coercion, secrecy, deception, even violation of rights.

I appreciate the heartfelt sentiments of the member for Davenport. Perhaps he should speak to his next leader, where I think his real problems lie, someone who seems to sympathize with torture.

[November 2nd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the government is firmly committed to international efforts to prevent and eliminate torture in all its forms. Our core values in relating to the world are clear. We stand for freedom, for democracy, for human rights and for the rule of law.

An examination of our track record on the international stage reveals strong, consistent support for international measures designed to investigate allegations of torture, support victims, bring perpetrators to justice and strengthen the protections afforded to persons deprived of their liberty.

Canada was one of the first states to ratify the convention against torture and has accepted the competence of the committee against torture established under the convention to consider individual complaints. Canada supports the resolutions on torture adopted by the United Nations, as well as the work of the UN Special Rapporteur on torture, and Canada contributes to the United Nations fund for the victims of torture.

Closer to home, Canada has many mechanisms to protect persons in places of detention from torture at the federal, provincial and municipal levels. These include correctional investigators, police oversight agencies, human rights commissions, the courts, ombudsmen and others.

Canada supports the principles of the optional protocol on the prevention of torture and Canada voted in favour of its adoption, first, by the Commission on Human Rights on April 22, 2002, and then by the United Nations General Assembly on December 18, 2002. Since then, 28 states have ratified the optional protocol and it entered into force on June 22.

Since coming into power, the government has taken up the issue and is considering becoming a party to the optional protocol, which requires state parties, as a main obligation, to establish or designate one or more domestic bodies which would conduct regular visits to places of detention in order to prevent torture.

As the hon. member is no doubt aware, Canada's reputation on the world stage is grounded, in large measure, on the fact that when we undertake an obligation, whether it be our mission in Afghanistan, our work in Haiti, or treaty obligations, we take those obligations very seriously. We say what we will do and we say when we will do something, but after we say it, we go out and we do what we say. That means doing the homework necessary to ensure that we live up to our word. Our track record of strong, consistent support for efforts, both internationally and domestically, to prevent and eliminate torture speaks for itself.

On this issue, that is precisely the task that the new government is undertaking, ensuring that we live up to our word and preserve our international reputation.

[Arms Trade, October 23rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, I think I stated quite clearly that we will be sponsoring the resolution at the United Nations. What could be more clear than that? We are going to be sponsoring this process to work toward an international agreement, as Canada traditionally has. In terms of small arms trading, we think that is important.

[Arms Trade, October 23rd, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's information is incorrect. Canada is in fact going to be a sponsor of that resolution. We have spoken for some time about the importance of stopping the trading and trafficking in small arms, especially in conflict areas. We are happy to be putting our weight behind that at the United Nations today.

[President of Latvia, September 25th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it was 15 years ago that the Conservative government of Brian Mulroney was among the very first in the world to extend diplomatic recognition to the restored independence of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. For half a century, the three Baltic nations were held captive under a brutal Soviet Communist tyranny. Tens of thousands, including some of my family, lost their lives in Stalin's Siberian gulag. During this occupation of terror, freedom was extinguished, but hope was not.

Here in Canada, tens of thousands of expatriates, who fled Communism, also kept hope alive, working to maintain national cultures in the dream of freedom.

One of those remarkable people is with us today. Vaira Vike-Freiberga was born in Latvia, but lived most of her life in Canada. A true Canadian success story, this childhood refugee became a leading Canadian academic, but her work on Latvian culture made her a natural choice to become Latvia's president.

An uncompromising champion of freedom, an embodiment of Canada's potential to promote democratic values, and a respected world statesman, we salute Vaira Vike-Freiberga, President of Latvia.

[Development Assistance Accountability Act, September 19th, 2006]

Mr. Speaker, it is a pleasure to speak to this private member's bill on the very important issue of development assistance.

We in this government share a view on the importance of ensuring the government does what it can to help others abroad in alleviating poverty and addressing those issues in developing countries. That is why in our budget last spring we committed to add $320 million to our international assistance funding and that was in addition to already budgeted increases over five years. This puts Canada on track to more than double international assistance from 2001-02 levels by 2010-11 at which point it will amount to over $5 billion per year. It is an important amount, particularly in light of the many competing domestic and international priorities.

However, the bill, unfortunately, although it is very well intentioned, is naive in terms of some of the unintended consequences. I read from the legislation which says, “Development assistance may be provided only if the competent minister is of the opinion that it contributes to poverty reduction”.

Canada's international development assistance has historically, even under the previous government, and I give it credit for this, gone well beyond poverty reduction into other very important areas: democracy promotion; the training of judges on how to run a proper judicial system; good governance support like that; and helping former communist countries translate their statutes into other languages so they can get accession to the European Union. These are all examples of financial support we have given to other countries and they are consistent with Canadian values. They are certainly consistent with the values of this government of promoting freedom, promoting democracy, promoting human rights and the rule of law.

To say that we are going to shut it down so we can no longer promote democracy around the world, to say that we can no longer help countries, which are struggling to develop their institutions, by supporting them in developing good civil service and good governance and by helping train promising new parliamentarians on how a democratic system works and so on, programs we have done in the past to help countries overseas make that advance, all of which we think is very important to make them good, stable parts of the world, none of that would be permitted under this legislation. That is unfortunate.

It is important for Canada to continue to play that important role. Think of all the projects around the world. In Afghanistan, which is our principal recipient of foreign aid, we are involved in things that go well beyond poverty reduction. We are training civil servants. We are helping people develop the institutions they need to run government. We are helping people with schools. Is a school part of poverty reduction or not? Is creating civil servants part of poverty reduction or not?

An argument could be made that those are not strict poverty reduction. The concern is that we will run into realm where that kind of activity to help people develop those institutions simply will not be permitted. For our government, those priorities of freedom, democracy, human rights and the rule of law have to remain paramount.

To illustrate this, Canada has been providing development assistance in some places to help people in civil society, for example to help women become more involved in their community and to defend their rights. That is nothing to do with poverty alleviation necessarily. It has to do with fairness, equality and justice, but those are issues we should be allowed to encourage and continue to support.

Similarly, in countries which continue to have authoritarian regimes that resist democracy, should we not be able to provide support for elements of civil society whether they wish to promote the environment or other democratic development? Should we be allowed, through our development, assistance to give opportunities for people to learn, to study, to acquire education elsewhere so they become more effective when they return home to their countries?

All these are important priorities and part of the tradition of development assistance for Canada and something that we should continue to do in our tradition of promoting democracy, human rights, rule of law and freedom, great Canadian values that should not be ruled out by this well-intentioned, but poorly written legislation.