Tony Martin

[National Volunteer Week, April 29th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, this is National Volunteer Week, a chance to pay tribute to a precious resource in our communities.

Much of what we take for granted is delivered to us by volunteers. They serve on boards and service clubs, help out in schools, churches, health care, arts and culture, and minor sports. The list is endless. Volunteers fundraise, feed and comfort.

Just today, five Canadian Red Cross volunteers from the Sault Ste. Marie and District branch left for Thunder Bay to work in shelters set up for evacuees from Fort Albany.

This weekend, Johnson township will pay tribute to coaches and other volunteers helping in an outstanding recreation program.

This Friday, I will attend a Volunteer Sault Ste. Marie and United Way dinner honouring 337 volunteers, outstanding representatives of many more who give of their time and talents.

Volunteers are the heart and soul of Sault Ste. Marie and Algoma and I want to thank them.

[Criminal Code, April 17th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I just wonder if the member would share her thoughts on what the Liberals' position is on the bill.

[Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, April 16th, 2008]

That is right, Mr. Speaker. As I said, we have a number of under-resourced programs with well-meaning professionals who are trying to provide the support, advice, treatment and counselling that is necessary, but they are unable to access resources anywhere.

I spoke of Mr. Willard Pine, the aboriginal elder in my community, who s trying to provide support. He said that he could provide all kinds of support if he only had the resources to give the people who came to him what they needed, for example, the kind of housing they so they could get their lives back on track and begin to participate.

To crank up the criminal justice system and to think that minimum mandatories will make any kind of dent in the huge challenge of trying to ensure everybody who calls themselves a Canadian citizen has the wherewithal to make a decent life for themselves will not be done with Bill C-26.

[Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, April 16th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, we already have the laws in place to deal with that. What we need in some instances is more police on the street, which the government does not seem to be interested in providing, and we need to ensure that the courts work.

[Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, April 16th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to put on the record a few thoughts that might differ somewhat from those of the previous speaker. I do not necessarily think that simply getting tougher when it comes to these kinds of behaviour and simply providing for minimum mandatory sentences is actually going to do the trick. I do not think that is actually going to respond to what everyone knows is a serious, complicated and difficult challenge confronting us, our communities, our families and people who are trying to live ordinary lives by going to work and looking after themselves.

On this side of the House we are not saying that there is not a problem, but it is a question of how we define that problem and how it is we go about trying to fix it.

We look across the border and into the backyard of our neighbour, the United States, and we see the results of the war on drugs that has been playing out there. There are very mixed results, most of which from what I have read are not as positive and as substantial as one would expect, given the focus that has been on that tact.

Will the approach in Bill C-26 fix this problem? On the one hand, yes, Canada has an underworld, a crime scene that benefits the availability and the trafficking in illicit drugs. On the other hand, we have communities of people who are affected by this and get themselves mixed up in it for a myriad of reasons, not simply because they want to do drugs. There are other approaches that would better respond to some of the very difficult challenges that oftentimes are the forces behind people who find themselves engaged in a behaviour that is not in their best interest or supportive of their health and well-being.

Recently I went to Calgary on a poverty tour. That city is the epitome of the new economy that is growing in this country, an economy that is driven by big oil and big gas. I remember discovering at the bottom of the huge buildings this terrible culture of poor people who cannot find housing.

I spent some hours one evening in one of the big shelters that has been put in place to try in some small part to deal with this problem. In Calgary on any given night, there are some 3,500 to 4,000 people sleeping on the streets, while the city of Calgary, recognizing that it has a problem, is passing laws to make it illegal for them to sleep in places that might be available to them.

In Calgary, there are people who have risen to the challenge and are providing some beds and shelter for folks. They are providing enough shelter for some 1,500, and on a really cold night when parked and idling buses are used, perhaps there is enough shelter for 1,600 or 1,700, but this leaves over 2,000 people still looking for a place to protect themselves from the cold, looking for a place to get a meal so that they have the sustenance to survive the next day.

When I was there I watched one shelter bed down some 1,200 people on gym mats. Many of those people are struggling with addictions. Many of them are struggling with mental health issues.

A significant number of young people went out there because they were attracted by the new economy and jobs about which everybody had talked. Some found work, but did not find a place to live and sleep. There was no housing.

What I discovered later on in the evening was some of those folks, in their attempt to deal with the very difficult and often frightening situation in which they found themselves, to deal with hunger after a day of snacking on food that was neither sustaining nor nutritious and to deal with some very severe weather, had turned to drugs. I am told that with crack and crystal meth, which is the drug of choice, they would not feel the cold or hunger and they would not be afraid.

Is the answer to this situation to bring in harsher penalties in the criminal court system, or is it to deal with these folks and invest in programs of harm and risk reduction, treatment and counselling? Maybe it is like missing the nose on one's face, but would it not make sense for the government to take some of the energy and effort that it puts into this place and begin to invest in housing, ensuring that people have decent, affordable and safe housing, as suggested by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities? It seems every other week the government brings in yet another tough crime bill to deal with social, societal and community issues and the failures of communities. If people have this housing, they can then cook for themselves. Maybe they can get some training and get into a job. Would that not make more sense? It certainly does to me.

If we are going to try to deal with particularly the real victims of an industry that is out of control at the moment, this it is the kind of thing one might want to do. In my community, as the member from London just suggested, we have a number of agencies trying desperately to respond to difficulties, to the needs of citizens, of brothers and sisters and of family members who need some help with all kinds of issues. Those issues ultimately may lead to them to abusing or misusing drugs to survive from one day to the next. It would make more sense to spend money on those issues rather than the way it is spent now.

My staff has told me that Canada is spending 73% of its drug policy budget on enforcement rather than putting money into treatment, where we spend 14%. We spend 7% on research on some of these issues. We spend the least amount on prevention and harm reduction.

From talking to people in my community of Sault Ste. Marie, for example, we have a program run out of the Indian Friendship Centre. Willard Pine, an elder, spends hours and puts in all kinds of effort into working with people who find themselves and their families caught up in addictions of one sort or another. He told me that if he had the resources to bring in more people and to build a better program, he could save more people. He said that he could get more people back on the straight and narrow and into housing and training programs. After that, he could get them into the workplace. They could then look after themselves and contribute in the way that we know they want to. When we sit down and talk with them heart-to-heart, we know they want to do that.

I am not suggesting for a second that we do not have a big problem and that we do not have challenges in our communities. However, we have ways we could be responding that would be more effective than simply cranking up the criminal justice system, putting in harsher penalties and ensuring that anyone who would come before the courts would find themselves in jail longer, which is what this will do.

There is really no proof that mandatory minimums are effective and appropriate measures to reduce drug use and crimes related to drugs. Most evidence shows the opposite. Bill C-26 does not address the core issue of why people use drugs which is what I was just saying.

Bill C-26 would increase the imbalanced and over-funded enforcement approaches to drug use in Canada without reducing crime rates or drug use. It would abandon successful measures such as harm reduction and grassroots education programs. It would move toward the expense of a failed U.S. style war on drugs, which spends tens of billions a year on enforcement and incarceration while crime rates and drug use soar. It would lead to greater incarceration rates and greater burden on the courts.

I suggest there are other approaches. They may take more creativity and effort on behalf of all of us, but if we put our efforts and our resources behind those kinds of treatment, harm reduction and prevention, I believe we would be further ahead than the result of Bill C-26 will provide to us.

[Controlled Drugs and Substances Act, April 15th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, from the statistics I have read and the information that I have at hand, I know that harsher penalties and putting people in jail longer actually increase recidivism, repeat offenders.

By putting money and resources into treatment and prevention, the chance for success is much enhanced. What we find in Canada today is that we are spending 73% of our drug policy budget on enforcement but only 2.6% on prevention, 14% on treatment and 2.6% on harm reduction.

Looking at those statistics and that information, how could we actually be entertaining a bill such as the one that is before us here today?

[Canadian Environmental Protection Act, April 10th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I was intrigued by the member's comments with regard to the impact that this will have on the food supply and food security, particularly when we look at the whole world.

Many of us who paid attention to what happened in some of the third world jurisdictions, particularly Central and South America, will understand what happened when North America decided it was going to respond to its craving for coffee. Whole tracts of land were taken over to grow a crop that was a cash crop, the product that came to North America, but really did not provide for the local folks who used to have that land to grow their own food, vegetables, fruit and so on. We saw the impact that has had on the world and some of our poorer countries.

That could actually happen here in Canada in our backyard if we are not careful. That is why we are asking for greater scrutiny on this brand new initiative, one that is taking us places we have never been before. The member might want to comment further on that.

[Canadian Environmental Protection Act, April 10th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, he is absolutely correct. That is why, in our areas, we are trying to pull the various interests together to not only look at both the benefits and the opportunities but also the impacts. Some of them are very negative.

We are taking ourselves--

[Canadian Environmental Protection Act, April 10th, 2008]

First of all, Mr. Speaker, I am told that cellulosic ethanol has not been proven to be economically viable yet. It will be like the road that the folks who got into ethanol in the first place have found, in that it is fraught with difficulties that they are now trying to chase. This speaks to the issue in front of us here today, which is that we have to be really careful and cautious.

The member spoke of Brazil. I am told as well that Brazil is into ethanol fuel, but at the expense of the rainforests. Is that what we want?

[Canadian Environmental Protection Act, April 10th, 2008]

Mr. Speaker, I have to say at the outset that I did enjoy the speech by the member for Malpeque. He made some valid points and certainly laid out in a fairly clear fashion the complications that exist in this bill and this initiative going forward.

It is not a simple piece of public business. It is very complicated. We really do need to pay close attention to it and make sure we put in place all the necessary checks and balances so that we monitor and assess as we go forward and minimize the negative impact of this seemingly very positive initiative by government and industry.

I want to say right off the bat that I am certainly standing in support of, and am going to actually speak to, the amendment put forward by my colleague from Western Arctic. Earlier I was pleased to hear the Bloc also joining us in putting in place this further check and balance on this rather large and, I would guess as it rolls out, very impactful piece of business that will take us in a new direction and open up some avenues and opportunities, but which on the other hand will create some real difficulties for some folks.

I do not think we really know what all those difficulties will be yet. I do not think we have been able to quantify the impact. As was said by the member for Malpeque and the member for Western Arctic, who spoke earlier, we have not been able to quantify the impact on our food policy: security of food for all people, the cost of food, and the sustainability of our farm and agricultural industries.

I also do not think we understand the impact it is going to have on both energy and the environment. When the whole concept and idea of biofuel was first put out there, everybody was gangbusters to come on board to support it, but in some jurisdictions, particularly across the border, we are seeing that it in fact is not the elixir that everybody thought it was perhaps going to be.

I think it is really important to have this in the bill. My colleagues participated in the evaluation and the process of amendment in looking at this bill when it came before the committee after second reading. They made a number of amendments that were not accepted, so I think it was only the rightful duty of the member for Western Arctic to take this opportunity yet again.

This amendment was found to be in order and it is an amendment that will give us an earlier opportunity to see what is going on. If it is not in the best interest of the public out there, which is what we are about here, protecting the interest of the public and putting forward good public policy that benefits the most people, we need to have the opportunity to actually take a look at it.

I have served in public office for 18 years now, first at the provincial level and now at the federal level, and there are many people in this House who have been around for a long time. We understand that oftentimes the devil is the in the details. When moving large pieces of legislation that have widespread impact out there, we really need to pay attention to the regulations. It is in the regulations where we find the real meat in these kinds of bills and initiatives.

We have to be concerned when, holus-bolus, the development of regulations is turned over to the government, a government, I have to say, that is lobbied and that speaks regularly with the large corporations and multinationals out there. It runs up some red flags for a lot of people. Somebody has to be there to speak out loudly and clearly on behalf of the smaller entities that can get caught in the crunch or be bulldozed or rolled over in these instances.

What we are asking for is really not a big deal. As the government rolls out its regulations, which will be the highway down which the new initiative will go, we are asking that this be brought back to the committee to be reviewed so we can see that it turns out to be all that it was hoped to be in the first place. I think this is a good move. It is a smart move. It is in the public interest to do it. I commend the member for Western Arctic for doing the work necessary to bring it forward and have it accepted.

In the last number of years, particularly when I was in the provincial realm, we looked at biofuels, but we were looking at products that were not in the food stream and could be grown on farmers' fields, or at waste that could be gathered in forests and in the varied territory that exists across the country. That could be gathered and used. Perhaps it could be turned into oil, chips or different types of fuel sources and used to provide energy that would heat our homes. Wood pellets are used in some parts of Canada to heat homes and buildings in a very progressive and environmentally friendly way.

In my area, a very important and good debate was initiated by a local maker of particleboard when he said we should just hang on for a second. He said we would be taking his raw material, for which he pays good money and which he uses to make products. That creates jobs in the area and contributes to the local economy. He said we would be taking it to start making energy out of it. He asked what he would do then and said we were robbing Peter to pay Paul, so to speak.

This is the kind of impact that a good idea can have sometimes when we do not look at all of the ramifications. If we simply allow this kind of public policy to roll out without an opportunity to look at it as it develops through regulation, we may end up at the end of the day missing somebody, not hearing from somebody, or witnessing an outcome that we did not expect to happen in the first place.

Everything in this new venture that we are into now, where energy, fuel, new fuels, biofuels and the environment are concerned, is very interconnected and complicated. It requires the close attention of all of us in this place, who have been elected to give leadership and to be responsible for what will happen in those realms, particularly where energy and food are concerned.

Yes, I am concerned that this will drive up the price of food. We hear from across the way, particularly from the Liberals, that they want to move away from a cheap food policy. I do not know exactly where the line is there and who we are talking about when we talk about cheap food. Anybody who knows of the work I do around here knows that I have a great passion on the poverty front in regard to trying to make sure that all people who live in Canada and in fact around the world are able to feed themselves and their families.

What we may see as cheap food and cheap food policy may be quite different from what the people in a neighbourhood in downtown Toronto, let us say, might consider cheap food or expensive food. I am not arguing for one or the other. I am just saying that we really need to be careful about how we do this, because it is already having and will continue to have a huge impact on the whole food supply system.

We have heard from across the way that the Americans are moving lock, stock, and barrel with great energy, investment and enthusiasm in this direction. The facts actually tell a different story, certainly in some sectors of the U.S. I have a press release that came out on February 28,2008, not all that long ago. It states, “The ethanol boom is running out of gas as corn prices spike”.

The article states:

Cargill announces it's scrapping plans for a $200 million ethanol plant near Topeka, Kan. A judge approves the bankruptcy sale of an unfinished ethanol plant in Canton, Ill. And that was just Tuesday. Indeed, plans for as many as 50 new ethanol plants have been shelved in recent months, as Wall Street pulls back from this sector, says Paul Ho, a Credit Suisse investment banker specializing in alternative energy. Financing for new ethanol plants, Ho says,“ has been shut down”.

So is the government going to get into the financing of some of these things in a big way? Are we going to find out, if we do not have access to some of what is going on, that in two years, when we actually get to this review, the government has spent a ton of money and is now in a place where some of these plants are not economically viable any more because of the impact they are having in other ways?

I also want to share with members the fact that there is another article, this one in the Edmonton Journal, entitled “Green gold or fool's gold”. I think we have to be really careful about this. We are not saying that we should not move forward. Biofuel makes a lot of sense in many ways, but it is fraught with landmines.

That is why I stand shoulder to shoulder with the Bloc to support the amendment by my colleague from Western Arctic. I am supporting him and inviting the Liberals in particular to join us in making sure that we put yet another other check and balance in place so that we do not end up in the same place as some of these American firms.