Wayne Easter

[Supply, June 19th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I was pleased earlier to hear the member for Frontenac talk about the objective of the Canadian Wheat Board which is to maximize the sale of Canadian wheat and the return to producers. It is good to hear one of the opposition parties talk in a positive way about a couple of the great institutions we have in this country: the Canadian What Board and the Canadian Dairy Commission and hear him put a proposal to build on those institutions rather than destroy them.

Earlier I raised a question with the member for Kindersley-Lloydminster who would in essence destroy the wheat board with this motion and I could not seem to get through to him that the lowest seller sets the price.

I will put the question of the member for Frontenac. When one is selling products and people are competing against one another to bring down the price structure-the member for Frontenac is well aware of the beef industry and how sometimes prices are brought down in that industry by the fact that one producer wants to undermine another-and I wonder if he could tell us if the same thing might happen to wheat growers.

The ultimate impact of this motion would be that we could in essence have greater than 100,000 producers competing against each other and trying to undercut the price structure. The hon. member claims that would not happen. A producer might be in some financial difficulty-and I know the Reform Party does not seem to be concerned about that-who when the option is there for that producer to say to his banker that there will be a final payment in which returns are maximized under the Canadian Wheat Board, but now under this motion he would be forced to sell now and undermine the price structure.

I wonder if the member for Frontenac has any concerns that the negative competition being promoted by the member for Kindersley-Lloydminster might undermine the price structure and force farmers into greater financial difficulty?

[Supply, June 19th, 1996]

The member says it scares the hell out of me. It scares the devil out of farmers. There is no question about it because they support strongly the Canadian Wheat Board system.

The Reform Party's proposal would destroy the ability of the Canadian Wheat Board to work effectively in producers interests. Anybody with any sense in terms of economics knows the lowest seller establishes the price.

Does the Reform Party not realize this motion will destroy the ability of the Canadian Wheat Board to operate effectively in producers' interests, thereby undermining farmers as a whole in terms of maximizing returns?

[Supply, June 19th, 1996]

Madam Speaker, we really have to stretch our imagination to come to any kind of conclusion to support this kind of motion. The member talks about if the minister acted on the motion. If the minister acted on the motion we would be irresponsible as a government in terms of what the member is proposing.

The member talked a lot about choice. What Reform is really prepared to do in terms of the choice here is throw an entire industry with a worldwide reputation for reliability and quality into chaos. That is what it is prepared to do with this motion in order to satisfy the short term demands of a few law breakers.

His proposal would not take us forward, as he is proposing. He should learn a little from history. It would move us back to the late 1800s and 1920s when the grain robber barons and the railway monopolies were able to take advantage of farmers. That was why the Canadian Wheat Board was created in the first place. I think the member knows this.

I have have a unique experience in that I am from eastern Canada and when I was president of the National Farmers Union I could not at first understand why western farmers were so enamoured with the Canadian Wheat Board. They were so supportive of it. I examined in detail the Canadian Wheat Board. Perhaps the member should examine in detail the Canadian Wheat Board.

He talked about dual marketing. He talked about moving barley to the United States. Does he not recognize that yes, there was more barley moved but in the final analysis it was shown it was sold at a lower price.

Does the member not recognize the advantage of single desk selling? We cannot have orderly marketing and dual marketing working side by side. It does not work that way.

If we move away from the single desk selling of orderly marketing what we are really allowing is Canadian farmers to compete against each other in terms of driving prices down. The orderly marketing of single desk selling gives strength and marketing power to producers, and the hon. member should recognize that.

Does the member not recognize that the pooling system allows all producers to take advantage of the booms and to limit bad prices when they occur and that the nation as a whole benefits?

I want to table some facts. We did not get many facts from the member in his presentation. I encourage him to read the Kraft, Furtan and Tyrchniewicz report. It concluded based on the analysis of the Canadian Wheat Board performance that additional revenues for wheat sales averaging $265 million per year, or $13.35 per tonne, would be lost if the single desk were replaced by multiple sellers.

It estimated that the Canadian Wheat Board added between $557 million and $690 million per year, or $27.84 per tonne to $34.50 per tonne over what multiple sellers would have realized in wheat marketing between 1985-86 and 1993-94. The member should realize those are some of the facts.

Dual marketing, to which the Reform Party's proposal would lead, would destroy-

[Petitions, June 19th, 1996]

Madam Speaker, I have several petitions which I wish to present. They contain approximately 4,000 signatures from all across Canada. The petitioners draw to the attention of the House that Canadian consumers are against the legalization of rBGH for injection into dairy cows.

[Farm Debt Mediation Act, June 17th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, before speaking on Bill C-38 I have to respond to a couple of remarks made by the last speaker.

The Reform Party continues to use every opportunity it can to attack the Canadian Wheat Board. It does so using selective facts. I want to underline those selective facts.

Let me say that if one stacks up the record of the Canadian Wheat Board, the orderly marketing system versus the open marketing system, the Canadian Wheat Board over the past 20 years has shone every year. When one takes all the facts and looks over the years, it will be found that the Canadian Wheat Board has maximized returns back to producers like no other agency anywhere in the world.

I want the member to recognize that. I know it is hard for him to admit he is wrong on that point, but eventually he will have to. We will debate the issue at committee and I hope we can clear up his mind on that matter.

I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on Bill C-38 which will repeal the Farm Debt Review Act and introduce a new act to facilitate financial arrangements between insolvent farmers and their creditors.

Let me suggest up front, and I agree with my colleague from Lisgar-Marquette on this point, it is a sad commentary that we need such acts as the farm debt mediation act that will help insolvent farmers gain a settlement with their creditors. It implies that there are financial difficulties on the farms at times, and there certainly are.

Some are caused by management difficulties and many others are caused by problems unrelated to the primary producer's ability to manage. It may be international monetary flows. It may be global prices in terms of commodities. It may be rapidly changing interest rates. Many of us, myself included, who are in the farm community have faced those kinds of times in the past.

In debating this bill this evening thus far, very little has been said about the extreme trauma farm families go through when they face insolvency. I raise this point because the reason, in part, to change the act is that there are far fewer hard financial cases coming forward to the Farm Debt Review Board today than there were 10 or 12 years ago, which is a good thing. When we deal with this issue, because times are a little better now, we in this House tend to deal with things in the abstract. Being in farm financial difficulty is very hard to explain. It is something people cannot understand unless they have experienced it.

For each farm family that is involved in a serious farm financial crisis, it is very troublesome and difficult for them, for the man, his wife and their children, in terms of the loss of pride and in many cases in terms of losing their heritage, in terms of loss of faith in oneself, even though it may not have been a management problem. It might have been an international marketing problem or some such thing that has put these people into financial difficulty. It is extremely painful and troublesome. There have been many suicides in the past in the farm community as a result of the farm crisis.

Whatever we do with this bill, we have to ensure that the bottom line is that we protect those farmers, those families and those rural communities that find themselves in financial distress. We have to ensure there are ways and means within this bill to protect the human aspect beyond the dollars and cents from the difficulties caused by the financial problems.

Eleven years ago, as president of the National Farmers Union, I led a farm finance lobby to lobby on this very issue on this very Hill. Yes, we asked for more power. We asked for an appeal process. We went far beyond where this bill takes us. But this bill does move us a step in a positive direction by putting in legislation some of the powers and by establishing an appeal process where formal appeals can be made.

I said earlier that we must strive to ensure that farm returns continue to surpass farm expenses. In all the other legislative matters we pursue in this House we must ensure that marketing agencies, supply management, the Canadian Wheat Board remain strong to ensure that the government through its agencies is working the best it can to maximize prices and returns to producers from the marketplace.

I mentioned that the government cannot knuckle under to a few law breakers who are trying to violate the laws of the land in terms of surpassing the Canadian Wheat Board. We cannot knuckle under to the few Reformers who are speaking out against the good marketing institutions we have in this land.

Allow me to move to Bill C-38 itself. I agree with the general thrust of the bill. I certainly am in favour of this bill moving to committee to be debated further. Many of the points in the bill were outlined in the Liberal Party document "Food Security for Canadians and a Fair Return for Canadian Farmers" in which we talked about the commitments we would make with respect to farm debt review boards.

The original and current role of the Farm Debt Review Board was outlined in the most recent Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada estimates on page 99. It said: "Farm debt review boards were established in 1986 in each province to ensure that farmers in financial difficulty or actually facing a farm foreclosure are afforded an impartial third party review of individual farm circumstances". That is important.

As my colleague from Dauphin-Swan River said earlier, this bill moves us toward focusing on farmers in insolvent situations. It applies through legislation an impartial administrator and opens up an appeal process.

On initial examination of the bill, the provisions would appear to limit rather than to expand access to the farm debt review process. I have concerns about that and I will be talking about this at committee.

One question which should be addressed is that according to the estimates for the department on page 99, since 1986 there have been 24,000 applications to the Farm Debt Review Board. The two sections applied under were section 16, farmers in financial difficulty, and section 20, insolvent farmers.

How many of these would have been excluded from the process had the insolvency rule applied since the inception of the Farm Debt Review Board? According to Agriculture Canada officials, approximately one-half of the applications under the former act were made for insolvency and the other half under the provisions of financial difficulty.

However, some of those in financial difficulty were found to be insolvent. The point is that perhaps one-third of the applications to the Farm Debt Review Board would never have qualified given that they were not insolvent. I maintain that the fact they were able to go before the Farm Debt Review Board and get mediation services and assistance is why many of them were able to keep their farms and are on the land today.

The bottom line as we debate Bill C-38 is it is important to remember that other things have to come into play as well. I believe we have to re-examine-

[Tourism, June 14th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Industry.

Tourism is the key growing economic activity in Canada. In 1995 more than 777,000 people visited the wonderful province of Prince Edward Island, adding $178 million to the province's economy. This is a growth industry.

Given that the Prime Minister committed $50 million to the Canadian Tourism Commission to promote tourism across Canada, can the minister report on the progress of this initiative and how these funds are being spent?

[Questions On The Order Paper, May 28th, 1996]

What agreements, operating or otherwise, exist between the federal government, Canadian National (CN) and Canadian Pacific (CP) with respect to the railways' right of first refusal in terms of any sale of the government's grain hopper car fleet, including but not limited to the agreement signed between the federal government and the railways in 1993?

[Employment Insurance Act, May 14th, 1996]

Mr. Speaker, I know the hon. member for Souris-Moose Mountain was in Prince Edward Island with the committee studying youth last weekend. We were most fortunate to have him with us. When he was there he was also talking to quite a number of islanders. Could he tell us the islanders' views on the new EI legislation? I will give the member a little background. Earlier this morning the hon. member for Lévis left a mistaken impression of what the minister of economic development for P.E.I said at committee.

I quote for the benefit of both the hon. members for Souris-Moose Mountain and Lévis what the minister of economic development for P.E.I. said: "We were never afraid from a Prince Edward Island perspective to change the existing system. We have gone through that a number of times".

He went on to say: "I do hope you have some influence on government members who sit on the committee as well, because I think it is very important that you take the opportunity to hear from some people within the seasonal industry".

He concluded by saying: "We in Prince Edward Island certainly support the government's move to address the situation you identified. You have the support of the Government of Prince Edward Island and, I would assume, of all the political parties in Prince Edward Island".

Based on the hon. member's assessment, does he believe that the people at the meeting in Prince Edward Island view the changes made as being very positive and forward looking, contrary to what the member for Lévis tried to indicate earlier?

[Employment Insurance Act, May 14th, 1996]

Madam Speaker, the member is just about filibustering. The amendments that we accepted concerning community organization were important. We saw them as such. They are two very important words.

We did listen to the discussion of Bloc members opposite on the gap and we fixed it.

I want to get to the point-

[Employment Insurance Act, May 14th, 1996]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak on third reading debate of Bill C-12, the employment insurance act.

I feel most privileged to have worked on the human resources development committee examining the bill. I enjoyed the thrust of debate with members opposite as we strove to improve the bill for the benefit of all Canadians. I sincerely believe the bill and the process undertaken speak well for democracy.

In my experience as a farm leader I appeared before many parliamentary committees and in my experience as a parliamentarian I have never seen such substantial changes made to a bill in the interest of the people from whom we have heard. Improving the bill to address the concerns of people is what this process was all about. It has been a very long process.

The green book on social security reform was tabled a little over two years ago. When that paper came down I held a couple of public meetings. People were very concerned about the direction that might be taken by human resources development in terms of social security review. A committee went all across the country with members from all parties in attendance. The committee heard over 600 presentations. It heard a lot of concerns about the two tier system and where we might be going on UI. It came back with what I think was a wonderful report, on which part of this legislation is based.

A seasonal industry task force was set up. Its report mentioned how important seasonal industries are, that seasonal industries do not work only during one season but create economies downstream. They create full time jobs in industries other than their own in terms of the products and services they need within the seasonal industries. Seasonal industries are made up of full time workers who are highly skilled and much needed in those seasonal industries. The government took that to heart and took those issues into account in terms of the preparation of the final stages of Bill C-12.

When Bill C-12 was introduced I held public meetings in my riding, as did many of my colleagues. We expressed as members of the government our concerns internally and publicly on the bill. We said publicly that there was a problem in terms of some areas as they impacted on the seasonal industries, and we moved to correct those changes.

We also recognized some very good points in the original bill. It is an hour based system. It gets rid of the 15 hour job trap. The part II benefits include $800 million for reinvestment in such programs as wage subsidies, earning supplements, self-employment assistance, job creation partnerships, skill loans and grants. Those are important points.

I have made it clear from the very beginning that scrapping the bill was not an option. We are dealing with the realities of the turn of the century. We need improvements to the bill and we will try to achieve them. We must work as members of Parliament toward improvements. The former minister and the current minister agreed and showed an openness for change.

We heard concerns. One was from Jacinta Deveau:

At a time when corporations are making record profits and yet still laying people off, now is not the time to start increasing qualifying times or decreasing benefits particularly for those people who must resort to applying for benefits, must do so for longer periods of time and in greater numbers; add this to the competition for fewer and fewer numbers of jobs sought only not by those people caught in the corporate downsizing and adjustment but those in seasonal and non-full time job occupations and you have a recipe for disaster in the Atlantic region generally and P.E.I. in particular.

We did not bury our heads in the sand when we heard that concern. Government members moved to correct that concern. We corrected it in several ways. That concern we corrected by fixing the gap and improving the divisor. We are certain the employment measures will move some distance to improving the job situation.

We did not take the position to scrap the bill. We listened and moved to make improvements. That is very different from what I have heard from members opposite.

The hon. member for Mercier, the critic for the Bloc, talked about the lack of debate. On the night of the filibuster those of us sitting on the government side wanted to debate the substantive issues to see if there were other areas of improvement. Is the hon. member asking us to do away with the employment measures which will help people to get jobs? Is the hon. member asking that we scrap the benefits for low income families? Is the hon. member asking us to go back to a system which had within it a 15 hour job trap that trapped mainly women in part time jobs? This bill improves that situation. Members opposite should recognize that.

I will list some of the other improvements we have been able to accomplish through this debate. Members on the government side have fixed the gap, the dead weeks. We have managed by making amendments to the legislation to take out of the calculation base those weeks that would have been considered as zero earnings. We have fixed that gap to the benefit of seasonal workers and of workers generally.

We have changed the divisor to make it more uniform across the country. It will be the regional rate plus a divisor of two. That does two things. It sets some stability and it ensures for business that there is an incentive out there for people to find work instead of simply going on UI.

We have fixed the intensity rule to a great extent. We have ensured the intensity rule does not apply to low income families with dependants. There will be a method of receiving an intensity rule credit for those who work while on unemployment.

This is in part based on the concerns raised by some of the people who have been demonstrating. In order to ensure that these good amendments that Liberal members have made are secure into the future, the power of a future minister to change the divisor by regulation has been deleted from the bill. In the future changes will be made in the House and not by the executive.

I am pleased with what has been accomplished. I will admit that one good amendment was moved by members opposite. We supported and it was incorporated in the bill. It goes to show what can be done if the opposition is more co-operative instead of saying "scrap the bill". We really do not want filibusters. We have made great strides forward.

The minister said that the bill is not perfect, that there are some areas of concern. However, as a government we do listen and we make changes to meet the needs of people.

In closing, I would like to quote Alice Nakamura. I think she is right on target:

You have proven wrong all those who told me this reform effort was a waste of time. Bill C-12 tackles the serious problems with our present UI program, making use of the best available research about how our labour markets and social programs function. And it is a bill that pays careful attention to the real life problems of transition. It strikes a careful balance between the desperation of people who cannot find enough work and have depended on the income from UI benefits and the desperation of economic analysts who recognize the threat which trends in our present UI program pose for our economy and the future employment prospects for Canadians.