Fisheries and Oceans  Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans cannot continue to speak out of both sides of his mouth and expect to retain his credibility. The government cannot on one hand shut down the Fisheries Resource Conservation Council and at the same time say it supports science.

Dr. Richard Taor  Mr. Speaker, today I rise to honour the distinguished 44-year career service of Dr. Richard Taor. For 34 of those years, Dr. Taor served the people of Channel-Port aux Basques and surrounding communities in my riding of Random—Burin—St. George's. He cared for his patients with immense compassion and devotion.

G8 Summit  Mr. Speaker, today we learned that the mayor of Huntsville is embarrassed about the emails that he sent on the G8 legacy fund. Unfortunately, he is mostly embarrassed they left a paper trail leading right to the current President of the Treasury Board, documenting his abuse of power.

Ways and Means  Mr. Speaker, the Liberals will be voting no.

Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act  Mr. Speaker, clearly Bill C-4 would do nothing to help those who are seeking refuge. That is my concern with the bill. There are legitimate concerns. People are being persecuted, and they need to look to a country like Canada to deal with their concerns and to be there when they are looking for a place of refuge and safety.

Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act  Mr. Speaker, I think my colleague is absolutely right with respect to this piece of legislation. It is very much in keeping with the ideology that has been put forward by the government on other pieces of legislation. We are talking about not treating people with respect. We are talking about sending people back to a country where we know they will be persecuted further.

Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act  Mr. Speaker, I welcome the opportunity to speak to Bill C-4, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act and the Marine Transportation Security Act. I have listened with great interest to the debate on Bill C-4. The Conservatives claim that the bill will crack down on human smugglers.

Search and Rescue  Mr. Speaker, Canada's search and rescue response time is one of the worst in the world. The government's lack of funding is to blame. Response time between the hours of 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. is 30 minutes, but if a vessel is in trouble outside of banker's hours, it must wait up to two hours before search and rescue is off the ground.

Search and Rescue  Mr. Speaker, while the Minister of National Defence treats our search and rescue as his personal limousine service, inadequate funding to search and rescue has resulted in one of the slowest response times in the world. The government closed Maritime rescue centres in St. John's and Quebec, and it claims that its increase to military funding will make up for it.

G8 Summit  Mr. Speaker, the President of the Treasury Board refuses every day to answer questions in the House about his actions regarding the G8 legacy fund, but says now that he will appear before a committee. Canadians will be outraged if this is just another ruse to avoid scrutiny. When the minister does appear before the Conservative-controlled committee, will all of his comments be in a public session?

Safe Streets and Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, since the previous governments, mainly Liberal, introduced the whole idea of dealing more effectively with crime, statistics have pointed to the fact that crime is decreasing. Clearly, we have made the right decision to go down that path. The government is trying to fix something that is not broken.

Safe Streets and Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, I do not think there was a question in that dissertation. I acknowledge that the hon. minister has the right to say whatever he feels he must say. However, the situation is one where as a country we cannot afford to spend untold billions on a crime agenda nor should we victimize the most vulnerable in our society.

Safe Streets and Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, my hon. colleague and I both know of the situation in the prison in St. John's, which also houses federal prisoners. At this point, it cannot possibly house any more. There are two or three inmates sharing a cell. That is unhealthy under any circumstances. We need to do more in the way of prevention to ensure we do not have to build megaprisons to house criminals.

Safe Streets and Communities Act  Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak to Bill C-10, erroneously entitled the “Safe Streets and Communities Act”. Bill C-10 is comprised of nine stand-alone justice bills that died, for good reason I might add, during the previous parliamentary session. These nine bills, justly negated then, are back to haunt Canada in the form of an omnibus mega-bill, or what some have referred to as an ominous bill, seeking to destroy the fair and equitable justice system Canadians from coast to coast to coast have come to rely on for their justice and protection.

Safe Streets and Communities Act  Madam Speaker, it is interesting to listen to the minister talk about all the debate and discussion that has taken place on this bill. Obviously, what has not taken place is the Conservatives have not listened to Canadians when they have talked about the impact Bill C-10 would have on Canadians from coast to coast to coast.