Preston Manning

[Health, June 11th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the government may think that the questioning of its conduct on this issue will stop when question period stops, but this summer these questions will grow louder and even more insistent.

For each Liberal MP out there trying to wash the stains of the government's record on this issue from the Prime Minister's hands, there will be hundreds of victims telling the truth.

What are Liberal MPs supposed to say at the barbeques and the town hall meetings when these victims ask “Why did you betray our interests?”

[Health, June 11th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, this week as parliament comes to a close the government may be thinking that it can finally close the file on hepatitis C victims, but the hands of the Prime Minister like those of Lady MacBeth are stained with his treatment of tainted blood victims.

“Out, damned spot” is what she said. “This file is closed” is what he said. But the victims will not be so easily silenced.

Does the government really believe that it can get away with its shameless treatment of the victims of tainted blood?

[National Defence, June 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, everyone in this House wants to believe that progress is being made in dealing with these complaints. They want to believe that there is zero tolerance. We want to believe that there is somebody somewhere in the government who is going to take up the concerns of rank and file soldiers and treat their complaints with dignity and with speed.

How can we believe that the government is taking any of this seriously when every day brings new allegations of wrongdoing, like those of Private Dickey?

[National Defence, June 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, female soldiers have no faith whatsoever in either the government's commitments or its procedures for dealing with sexual harassment or assault in the military.

The minister has appointed an ombudsman and that is good. But that ombudsman's investigators are exactly the same people who told Private Dickey not to raise a fuss. The minister fixes one link in the chain but it is the chain that is the problem. How can this ombudsman do his work when the government itself just wants to sweep these problems under the rug?

[National Defence, June 10th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, Ann-Margaret Dickey was a soldier in the Canadian Armed Forces.

Today she courageously stood before a press conference to allege that two years ago she was sexually assaulted four times within a 10-day period at a military base in Quebec. She said she reported these assaults to the military police and the medical people but her complaints were ignored and she has been told not to raise the issue again.

My question is for the Prime Minister. Why did Private Dickey have to go public today, revealing painful personal information in order to get this government's attention to her complaint?

[Hepatitis C, June 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, it is no wonder this issue is confusing. Day after day the Prime Minister has claimed that the working group of officials is trying to find a way to help compensate these victims and he has pretended to be sincere. Now it comes out that the Prime Minister thinks these victims are no more deserving of government compensation than cigarette addicts or junkies on illegal drugs.

If that is what the Prime Minister really thinks about these victims, is it not obvious that this working group and this supposed negotiation is a complete farce?

[Hepatitis C, June 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, people who smoke cigarettes know about the risks of cancer. It is written on the label. These hepatitis C victims were infected innocently. They trusted the government to make sure the blood supply was secure and when they went into a hospital for surgery they had no idea that they would come out with a deadly disease.

How is it that the Prime Minister cannot see the difference when everyone else can?

[Hepatitis C, June 9th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, yesterday a student asked the Prime Minister why he was abandoning the victims of hepatitis C infected through tainted blood before 1986. The Prime Minister answered by saying that from the government's standpoint these innocent victims were really no different than people who got cancer from cigarettes.

Would the Prime Minister mind explaining to the House exactly how he thinks these are the same?

[British Columbia, June 8th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the federal government has had a treaty negotiating process going in British Columbia for seven years and has not produced one concrete treaty as a result.

Everything the Liberal government has done in British Columbia on the land claims issue has made things worse rather than better. Now Delgamuukw puts a legal caveat on every piece of land in B.C. and the minister's excuses and inaction just make things worse rather than better.

Will the minister of Indian affairs put an end to this uncertainty by legislating a definition of aboriginal title which addresses the interest of all British Columbians?

[British Columbia, June 8th, 1998]

Mr. Speaker, the Delgamuukw decision has created economic uncertainty in every sector of the British Columbia economy that requires land or resources: mining, the fishery, ranching, agriculture and tourism, all of them.

The decision has created a potential taxpayer liability of literally tens of billions of dollars. These impacts alone are big enough to cripple the British Columbia economy.

Why has the federal government done nothing concrete to address or correct these impacts?