Children's Hospital Fundraising Event  Mr. Speaker, I recently had the privilege of attending a fundraising event here in Ottawa for two very worthy causes. There is a group of Newfoundlanders and Labradorians living here who formed a volunteer committee to raise funds for the Janeway Children's Hospital in St. John's

Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency  Mr. Speaker, my question concerns ACOA and I guess my question will be for the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans. I think we are on our fourth minister of ACOA at this point. The minister wants to stop MPs from representing our constituents. I will again cite the article that sug

Fisheries  Hopefully with a little more success this time, Mr. Speaker. When the Minister of Fisheries and Oceans was a member of the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans, he tabled a report demanding a limited fishery off the northeast coast of Newfoundland. The rural fishing comm

Fisheries  Mr. Speaker, last week at a summit on fisheries in Newfoundland and Labrador, hosted by our premier, the vast majority of stakeholders, including local plant workers and of course the leadership of the FFAW, all called for an early retirement program for our aging workforce. The

Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency  Mr. Speaker, the reason why it took him half the time is because he is a part-time minister and the reason why it took us longer is because we did it right. At a political rally for a Conservative candidate, the minister said when he was talking about the Conservative candidate,

Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency  Mr. Speaker, a short time ago when I asked about the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency, the Minister of Veterans Affairs pretended they were taking politics out of ACOA. However, when a Liberal member of Parliament expressed his concerns about ACOA, the minister told him, righ

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, I can only assume that is probably the sixth commitment that the Conservative Party would like to bring, and that is to move toward some greater goal of cultural enhancement, which we have yet to see from the government as to the vision which it wants to put out ther

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, I would like to go back to what I said earlier about the price people have to pay to express their culture across this country. This is merely a small price to bring to the world what it is we have. When Bryan Adams was a struggling artist I am sure he would have sa

Business of Supply  Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the honour to stand here today to talk about culture and Canadian content. I want to pick up on the question that was asked earlier by the hon. member for Calgary West on Canadian content rules and regulations. As a former broadcaster myself, I remember

The Budget  First, Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate my hon. colleague on becoming minister. I served with her on the heritage committee. It was a great time and we did some good work. That being said, the current chair of the heritage committee brought up a point in committee just

The Budget  Mr. Speaker, that program I spoke about earlier, the extra weeks at the end, was an initiative brought in by us. It was an essential first step. The other step we brought in at that time was the 14 weeks for qualification. It was another essential first step. Were we going to go

The Budget  Mr. Speaker, I appreciate my hon. colleague's comment. Let me go back to the point I made earlier. I do appreciate the fact that there is to be a tax credit to help workers. However, the situation in my riding is grave to the point where the job itself is essential. The governmen

The Budget  My hon. colleague just said they are smart kids. With all due respect to the minister across the way, they are smart kids, and to take them from us simply out of necessity and forget what they are coming from is a shame. As well, the licence buyback was not addressed in this bud

The Budget  Mr. Speaker, I watched with interest the exchange that took place. I propose that we take the temperature down just a little so I can talk about my wonderful riding. As this is my first speech in this Parliament, I would like to thank the voters of Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—W

The Budget  See, I told you we could bring the temperature down, Mr. Speaker. How about that? I want to start by talking about the dynamics of the riding. I also want to talk about rural Canada and in particular, rural Newfoundland and Labrador. My riding has over 200 communities, an incre