1971-09-27

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Mr. Speaker:: On Friday last the hon. member for Annapolis Valley filed, in the usual manner and before the prescribed hour, a notice of motion to amend Bill C-262, an act to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect. Inadvertently, that notice of motion was omitted from today's order paper.
As hon. members will notice, a revised notice paper in regard to this bill has been prepared and placed on all desks. I wish to apologize to the hon. member for Annapolis Valley. I can assure him it is my hope that the action that has now been taken will repair any difficulty which may have resulted from this inadvertent omission of his notice.



PRIVILEGE


Mr. Speaker:: Is the hon. member for Ontario rising on a question of privilege?


Mr. Norman A. Caiik (Ontario):: Yes, Mr. Speaker. Pursuant to Standing Order 17 I rise on a question of privilege. Notice of this question was given to you last Friday morning to fulfil the conditions of Standing Order 17(2).
My question of privilege relates to statements made on Thursday in the House of Commons by the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis). I realize, Mr. Speaker, that such a question must be raised at the first available opportunity. At the time these statements were made in the House I had left the chamber for a brief period to attend an important meeting in the government lobby to discuss possible lay-offs in the automobile industry, which is a matter of deep concern to myself and to the people I represent. Consequently it was impossible to raise my objection at that time. Last Friday the hon. member for York South was not present in the chamber, and as my question related to his statements I felt that the honourable thing to do was to ask for a deferment.
The hon. member for York South is reported in Hansard at page 8106 as having said:
-because it has those rows of men who are governed by their
loyalty to a party and to the bagman of the party rather than any loyalty of conscience.
Such a statement is clearly unparliamentary, untrue and highly insulting, and as such should be withdrawn and an appropriate apology given.
A question of privilege was raised at the time by the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grace (Mr. Allmand). However, in his response the hon. member for York South said: "I was not talking in general about hon. members opposite supporting the government". But this implies, Mr. Speaker, that in this specific case he still meant what he said. I find this kind of explanation unacceptable.
Equally important is the fact that such intemperate outbursts degrade the House to a level which I think all of us would find far too low. Such a statement would be more understandable if it came from an inexperienced parliamentarian in the early part of his career as opposed to an inexperienced parliamentarian in the latter part of his career.
I cite May's 17th edition, page 448, which says in part:
A member, while speaking to a question, may not introduce matter which is irrelevant to that question . .. speak offensive and insulting words . .. make personal allusions to Members of Parliament-
His statements are irrelevant, offensive, insulting, certainly constitute personal allegations in respect of Members of Parliament, and on these counts alone I respectfully submit they should be withdrawn.
In Beauchesne's Fourth Edition, citation 134 further states that members are not permitted to impute to any member or members unworthy motives for their action in a particular case. In my view, Mr. Speaker, the hon. member's statement clearly imputes motives of the highest possible kind in the lowest possible way to Members of Parliament which I feel, in justice, should not even be made in the streets, never mind in the House of Commons.
Further, in Bourinot's Fourth Edition at page 363 it is made clear that one cannot say or state that any member of the House of Commons is a servile servant of the government itself, a point which is implied in the statement of the hon. member for York South. As an individual Member of Parliament I am sure that all other members of this House consider our first obligation and primary loyalty is to our own consciences, and I believe we are entitled to an apology.
The second point I wish to raise, Mr, Speaker, stems from a statement in that same speech as recorded on page 8107 of Thursday's Hansard, in which the hon. member said:
They are guilty also of blackmail-
Later he repeated this allegation when he said:
-I say that that is clear blackmail which is unworthy of any government-

September 27, 1971
Statement by Member for York South
In Beauchesne's Fourth Edition, citation 136 cites a case which took place in the House on July 24, 1944, in which a member declared that a measure before the House was a bribe. The Speaker ruled this accusation to be unparliamentary and asked the hon. member to withdraw. When this was not done the member was suspended for the balance of the day's sitting. The hon. member's allegation of blackmail is equally as unparliamentary as the case cited in Beauchesne and as such should be withdrawn.
Citation 138 states that the House of Commons will insist upon all offensive words being withdrawn and upon an ample apology being made which shall satisfy both the House and the member to whom offence has been given.
I believe I have cited a prima facie case of privilege affecting members of this institution itself. I request through you, Mr. Speaker, that the hon. member for York South withdraw his offensive remarks and make an appropriate apology. In the event the hon. member does not wish to do so and you rule that I do in fact have a prima facie case of privilege, I am prepared to move a motion to send this matter to the Standing Committee on Privileges and Elections.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Ontario did give notice last week of his intention to raise this matter by way of a question of privilege. This has given the Chair an opportunity to give the matter serious thought. The hon. member knows that the Chair does not take lightly a question of privilege. I have on numerous, perhaps even countless, occasions suggested to hon. members that it is not easy to establish a prima facie case of privilege. In fact, such a case has not been established for many, many years. I am inclined to reach the same conclusion in respect of the case brought to my attention by the hon. member for Ontario.
I think one of the most important aspects of privilege is that the matter should be raised at the first opportunity. The hon. member says he was outside the House when the words to which he takes exception were spoken. With respect, I suggest to him that is not a sufficient explanation. What he proposes now is that members who do not happen to be in the House at the time words are spoken could receive Hansard the next day and then take exception to the words by way of a question of privilege. If an hon. member happened to read Hansard three days later he could then say that was the first opportunity he had of bringing the matter before the House. I do not think that in this regard the explanation of the hon. member is quite satisfactory.
What is relevant and important in this case is that when the words to which the hon. member takes exception were spoken in the course of debate, the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grace took exception to them and rose by way of a question of privilege. I was in the Chair at the time and my impression was that the hon. member for York South explained what he had in mind when he made the statement. Whether his explanation was satisfactory to all hon. members and whether it was satisfactory so far as the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grace or the hon. member for Ontario are concerned is perhaps another matter. What I had to be satisfied about was whether improper motives had been imputed. The hon. member for York South explained what he had in mind and the

way he had intended to apply the words he had spoken. I did not think he was addressing his remarks to any particular member individually.
If hon. members will consult the authorities they will note that words which are addressed to one member or two members individually which might be considered unparliamentary are not judged unparliamentary when addressed to a group of members or to a party. I cannot say that I consider there is a question of privilege or a prima facie case of privilege when a member accuses another party of blackmail. It seems to me I have heard that accusation levelled by one party against another very often toward the end of a session. We hear the suggestion that the government is introducing legislation and using blackmail to get its legislation adopted before the end of the session, and the opposition is accused of blackmail because they refuse to have the House recess until certain legislation is adopted. It seems to me that this kind of accusation is part of the political life of the House. I must say it has never scandalized me and does not at this time. I doubt that this is a question of privilege which ought to be considered by a committee of the House. On that basis I would suggest that the matter should not be pursued further.



ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, under Standing Order 43 and in relation to pressing and urgent circumstances which are so well known to the House as to be notorious, I would ask leave to put the following motion:
It is the opinion of this House that if the government does not forthwith comply with the law as set out in the Temporary Wheat Reserves Act, and purge its contempt of Parliament and the people, it is not fit to govern or to have the confidence of this House.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: The motion of the hon. member requires the unanimous consent of the House. I shall now inquire whether there is unanimous consent.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: Apparently there is some dissent and the motion cannot be put.



LABOUR RELATIONS


Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 43 I should like to put a motion and ask
September 27, 1971

for unanimous consent that it be accepted. The matter of urgent and pressing necessity concerns a particular company, Wholesale Homes Limited. This company, which has either had payments made to it by the Department of Regional Economic Expansion or is in receipt of an offer to make payments, attempted to coerce its employees to work two particular days without pay and then issued each of them a notice under date of September 24 telling each employee that his employment with that particular firm would be terminated on Friday, October 1, 1971. I request, therefore, seconded by the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters), consent to move the following motion:
That the subject matter of payments of money and any offer of payment by the Department of Regional Economic Expansion to Wholesale Homes Limited of Blind River, Ontario, the use to which such money was or may be put, and the employment practices of the said company be referred to the Standing Committee on Regional Development.


Mr. Speaker:: Hon. members know that this motion can be put only with the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimity?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: There is not unanimous consent and the motion cannot be put.



REGIONAL ECONOMIC EXPANSION


Mr. Walfer C. Carter (St. John's West):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 43 I ask unanimous consent of the House to present a motion on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity. This matter concerns the desperate social and economic conditions prevailing in the Placentia area of Newfoundland where unemployment is now near 70 per cent.
The chief cause of the problem is the phasedown of the United States naval base at Argentia, also the government's obvious reluctance to deal effectively with the problems resulting therefrom. I therefore move, seconded by the hon. member for St. John's East (Mr. McGrath):
That this House urge the government to take immediate steps to designate the Placentia area as a special area under the Department of Regional Economic Expansion and that the government immediately undertake a crash program to alleviate the situation in that area.


Mr. Speaker:: The Chair must inquire whether there is unanimous consent to the putting of the motion.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: There is not unanimous consent and the motion cannot be put.
Questions



QUESTIONS ON THE ORDER PAPER

[Stage Direction]
(Questions answered orally are indicated by an asterisk.)

Mr. Southam: Has the government received complaints from Robin Austin of Robin Austin and Company Limited of Montreal, Quebec, and from his attorney, John Fetherstonaugh to the effect that his firm has been denied the right since 1965 to obtain sugar and, if so (a) what action has the government taken to investigate the complaints (b) what remedial action has been taken (c) what is the basis of the denial?


Hon. Ron Basford (Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs):: The government has received a number of communications from Robin Austin and John Fetherston-haugh, Q.C., concerning sugar, (a) An inquiry has been commenced pursuant to sections 7 and 8 of the Combines Investigation Act. (b) and (c) See answer to (a).


CANADA PENSION PLAN-PROCESSING OF MEDICAL CASES
Mr. Fairweather: 1.	How long does it take to process medical cases under the Canada Pension Plan?
2.	Are district offices of the Department of National Health and Welfare advising applicants that cases may take up to six months to process?
3.	Are procedures being studied with a view to decreasing waiting periods?


Hon. John C. Munro (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: 1. It is difficult to give a precise answer since the processing time varies considerably, depending on the circumstances of each case. Every effort is made to obtain the essential information, including medical reports, as quickly as possible.
2.	In cases where delay is anticipated, applicants are so advised.
3.	Yes.


NATIONAL DEFENCE-CONSTRUCTION OF BUILDINGS AND RUNWAYS, COLD LAKE
Mr. Rowland: 1.	Is a new runway being constructed at CFB Cold Lake or are old runways being extended and, if so, what is the total cost of the project?
2.	What has been the cost of (a) refurbishing (b) renting (c) constructing accommodation for the additional servicemen and their dependants appointed to CFB Cold Lake?


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (Minister of National Defence):: 1. No, however normal maintenance work is being done on existing runways and taxiways at an estimated cost of $495,000.
2. No additional accommodation has been provided for servicemen and their dependants.

September 27, 1971
Questions


NATIONAL DEFENCE-PURCHASE OF HOMES AS A RESULT OF CLOSURE OF CFB, GIMLI.
Mr. Rowland: What is the total cost, actual and projected, to the government, of purchasing private dwellings and compensating for early termination of long-term rental agreements resulting from the closure of CFB Gimly?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: The purchase of 44 private dwellings at CFB Gimli was approved in the amount of $419,000. It is anticipated that the cost to the Crown will not exceed $200,000. Sale of the properties through Crown Assets Disposal Corporation also will reimburse the Crown in part for the purchases. A long term rental agreement will be assigned or terminated when negotiations with the owner have been completed.


POST OFFICE-PARRSBORO, NOVA SCOTIA
Mr. Coates: 1.	What is the present staff, permanent and part-time, at the Post Office at Parrsboro, Nova Scotia?
2.	Will the staff be increased when the new Post Office is operative and, if so, by how many?


Hon. Jean-Pierre Cote (Postmaster General):: 1. (a) Permanent, 4; (b) part-time, 1.
2. No.


DEFENCE RESEARCH BOARD GRANTS TO PRIVATE INDUSTRY
Mr. Broadbent: 1.	What programs of the Defence Research Board provide grants, subsidies and other cash incentives to private industry?
2.	What amount was provided to industry through each program in each of the past five years?
3.	What amount, by program, has gone to each of the five major regions of Canada in the same years?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: 1. The Defence Research Board provides contributions to private industry under the terms and conditions of the Defence Industrial Research Program.
2. 1966-67, $4,689,452; 1967-68, $4,483,705; 1968-69, $4,285,618; 1969-70, $4,012,722; 1970-71, $4,479,251.
1966-67	1967-68	1968-69	1969-70	1970-71British Columbia	
$ Nil $ Nil S 3,178	$ 101,975	$ 116,768Prairies	
548,487	416,394	233,932	78,337	97,976Ontario	
2,988,658	1,401,925	2,848,530	2,682,150	2,749,343QueW	
1,152,307	2,665,386	1,199,987	1,150,260	1,515,164Mferitimes	
Nil	Nil	Nil	Nil	NilTotal	
$4,689,452	*4,483,705	$4,285,618	$4,012,722	*4,479,251


Hon. Otto E. Lang (Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: The attached table provides Department of Manpower and Immigration statistics on placements, excluding casuals, by province for the fiscal years 1970-1971, 1969-1970, 1968-1969, 1967-1968, 1966-1967 and National Employment Service statistics for the fiscal years 19651966 and 1964-1965. Placement data for the Northwest Territories and the Yukon are listed for the years 19701971 and 1969-1970. For the fiscal years prior to 1969-1970, the Northwest Territories are consolidated with Alberta and the Yukon is consolidated with British Columbia.


CANADA MANPOWER CENTRES-JOB PLACEMENTS
Mr. Orlikow: 1.	How many job placements were made by the Canada Manpower Centres (excluding casuals) in 1966-67, 1967-68, 1968-69, 1969-70 and 1970-71, in each province and territory?
2.	How many job placements were made by the former National Employment Service or its successor (excluding casuals) in 1964-65 and 1965-66, in each province and territory?

[Mr. Macdonald (Minister of National
September 27, 1971________
Orders for Returns


DEPARTMENT OF MANPOWER AND IMMIGRATION
[Stage Direction]
National Employment Service
Province	Canada Manpower Centres Placements (excluding casuals)	Placements (excluding casuals)	1970-1971	1969-1970	1968-1969	1967-1968	1966-1967	1965-1966	1964-1965Newfoundland	16,164	12,589	10,009	7,806	7,468	9,072	6,219Prince Edward Island	6,648	6,178	4,876	4,170	5,260	6,062	6,336Nova Scotia	29,049	28,693	23,888	22.103	22,586	25,675	26,089New Brunswick 	22,979	22,572	18,738	20,274	24,408	32,852	30,864Quebec	148,836	159,842	156,146	189,924	220,548	274,817	295.411Ontario	239,837	271,338	289,792	268,744	310,887	336,284	320,811Manitoba..	27,929	34,961	37,008	38,011	38,814	41,509	41,883Saskatchewan	
16,811	20,713	24,435	28,275	28,704	29,052	27,912AJl>erta*	
52,416	66,283	67,894	68,852	73,202	77,505	70.758Northwest Territories*	
1,261	858	British Columbia**.	
85.572	97,132	91,919	94,562	108,976	128,167	114,900Yukon**	
1,464	1,673	-	-	-	-	-Canada	
648,966	722,832	724,705	742,721	840,853	960.995	941,183
^Northwest Territories reported in Alberta provincial totals for the fiscal years 1968-1969 to 1964-1965.
"*' u'to" reported in British Columbia provincial totals for the fiscal years 1968-1969 to 1964-1965.
Source: MAN 751, Department of Manpower and Immigration.
been awarded to the owners of poultry flocks which had to be ordered destroyed as a disease eradication measure.

Mr. Mazankowski: 1.	Have any meetings been held by the Minister of Agriculture or his officials with groups interested in the proposed Agriculture Adjustment Program and, if so (a) how many were held (b) on what dates (c) at what locations (d) what were the names of the participating organizations?
2.	In each case, were alternative programs proposed and, if so, does the government intend to bring in legislation to cover these proposals and, if so, by what date?


Hon. H. A. Olson (Minister of Agriculture):: 1. Two meetings took place between the Minister of Agriculture and the provincial ministers of agriculture, one on March 26, 1971, at Ottawa, and one on July 21, 1971, at Edmonton. The Minister of Agriculture met with the representatives of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture and the National Famers' Union on April 21, 1971, in Ottawa. Officials met with representatives of the provincial departments of agriculture on April 14 and 15, in Ottawa, and with the provincial deputy ministers of agriculture on April 28 in Ottawa.
2. At meetings with members of the provincial departments of agriculture alternative methods for the administration of the program proposed by the federal Government were put forward, together with changes in the program details. Decisions concerning legislation will be announced in the usual manner.


NEWCASTLE DISEASE IN POULTRY FLOCKS
Mr. McCutcheon: Has Newcastle disease been discovered in poultry flocks in Southern Ontario and, if so (a) on what date (b) in what municipality (c) what remuneration has been paid to producers whose birds have been destroyed in clean-up attempts?


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: Yes, Newcastle disease has been diagnosed in eight poultry flocks in the Chatham area of Southern Ontario, (a) The first diagnosis was made on July 30, 1971, in a flock located in the Township of Orford, Kent County, (b) The initial outbreak spread to five additional premises in Orford township, Kent County; to one premises in Chatham township, Kent County, and to one premises in Mosa township, Middlesex County, (c) Compensation in the amount of $15,885.66 has


AGRICULTURE STABILIZATION ADVISORY COMMITTEE
Mr. Mazankowski: 1.	Who are the members of the Agriculture Stabilization Advisory Committee?
2.	How many times did the Committee meet in 1969, 1970 and 1971?
3.	What were the topics for discussion at each of the meetings?


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: 1. Mr. Kenneth Carr, Prince Edward Island; Mr. Frank E. Lutes, New Brunswick; Mr. Lionel Sorel, Quebec; Mr. R. Pigeon, Quebec; Mr. Gordon L. Hill, Ontario; Mr. Jack A. Ferguson, Ontario; Mr. J.A. McCallister, Manitoba; Mr. E.A. Boden, Saskatchewan; Mr. L.R. Stephens, British Columbia; Mr. D.J. McKinnon, Alberta.
2.	1968-69, two meetings; 1969-70, two meetings; 1970-71, two meetings.
3.	1968-69: Eggs, poultry, potatoes, oilseeds, corn, dairy and hogs. 1969-70: Dairy, eggs, oilseeds, sugar beets, and marketing legislation. 1970-71: Dairy, eggs, poultry, hogs, wool, apples, potatoes, sugar beets and grains.



QUESTIONS PASSED AS ORDERS FOR RETURNS


Mr. Coates: 1.	How many members of the Public Service of Canada are now involved in courses in bilingualism and, of this number, how many are involved in courses teaching (a) the French language (b) the English language?
2.	Of the total number involved in bilingual training (a) how many are receiving these courses outside their regular working hours (b) how many are involved in courses that require the use of part of their normal working hours (c) how many are involved in courses that require that they remove themselves from their normal employment for a period of time?
3.	Of the total number who are involved in linguistic training for part of each work week, what method is used to replace the man-hours given over to linguistic training?
4.	How many public servants have now been involved in linguistic training that removed them completely from their ordinary employment and, for the fiscal year 1970-71, what was the total number of man-hours involved in this type of training?
Return tabled.

September 27, 1971
Orders for Returns


PUBLIC SERVICE-NUMBER OF ENGLISH SPEAKING PERSONNEL PARTICIPATING IN FRENCH COURSES
Mr. Matte: 1.	How many English speaking public servants took French courses in 1968, 1969, 1970 and 1971?
2.	Where did they take these courses?
3.	How are these courses paid for?
4.	What amount was spent on these courses in 1968, 1969, 1970 and 1971?
Return tabled.


PURCHASE OF HEATING OIL FOR FEDERAL BUILDINGS IN QUEBEC AND OTTAWA REGION
Mr. Comtois: Regarding the purchase of heating oil for all facilities and all federal buildings in the Province of Quebec and in the Ottawa Region (a) during the past three years, who supplied the heating oil for all such buildings and facilities (b) during each year, what was the cost of the oil per gallon (categories 1, 2 and 6) (c) during each year what was the cost of transportation for the oil (d) were the contracts awarded following public or private tenders (e) were tenders called for the purchase of free refinery oil or free destination oil (f) have specific prices been asked for the purchase and transportation of the oil and, if so, what savings resulted?
Return tabled.


FEDERAL PAYMENTS TO GREY ROCKS INN, ST. JOVITE, QUEBEC
Mr. Schumacher: 1.	During the fiscal years 1969-70 and 1970-71, were any payments made to Grey Rocks Inn, St. Jovite, Quebec by the government and if so (a) what was the amount in each case (b) what were the reasons for each such payment (c) to whom was each such payment made (d) for which departments were such payments made?
2.	Who are the owners of Grey Rocks Inn, St. Jovite, Quebec?
3.	To the knowledge of the government, is the ownership a partnership or private corporation and, if so, who are the principals involved?
Return tabled.


WELLINGTON CONSTITUENCY-1971 CENSUS
Mr. Hales: 1.	What are the names and addresses of the Census Commissioners and the Census representatives that were hired by the government to take the 1971 Census in the constituency of Wellington?
2.	What are the names and addresses of those people who checked and scrutinized the Census Returns before they were sent to the Toronto Regional Office and then to Statistics Canada?
3.	What was the salary paid to each?
Return tabled.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Robert L. Stanfield (Leader of the Opposition):: have a question for the Prime Minister arising out of the reported remarks of the United States Secretary of the Treasury expressing his anticipation that some of the tariff restrictions and restraints built into the U.S.-Canada auto pact agreement will be modified. Has the government of Canada received any indication from the U.S. administration that modification of some of these restrictions and restraints is part of the goal of the U.S. administration before withdrawal of the U.S. import surcharge of 10 per cent?


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I do not believe that a condition was attached to the representations, but it is my understanding that at some of the meetings which were held in Washington earlier with our ministers and officials the Americans did raise the question of the auto pact and claimed that it was working too favourably for the Canadian side.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: At that time I think it is correct that our Minister of Finance indicated that this was not a condition and the U.S. authorities were not at that time attaching much importance to this. In view of this most recent statement to the press by the Secretary of the Treasury Connally, is the Prime Minister prepared to say that this is no longer a precondition which the Americans attach to the removal of the 10 per cent surtax?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I do not understand why the Leader of the Opposition says it is no longer a precondition.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: No, I did not say that.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The Leader of the Opposition did say that, with respect, Mr. Speaker. My understanding is that it was never a precondition and that the Americans never indicated that if we modified the auto pact in some way they would take off the surcharge.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, can the Prime Minister tell the House whether his government is suggesting any modification of the restraints now contained in the Cana-da-U.S. auto trade pact or whether, on the other hand, it is the policy of the government to insist on the retention of such restraints and safeguards?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I believe it has been said repeatedly in the House by the Minister of Finance and by 'the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce that the matter was under negotiation, that the auto pact itself was being brought up by the Americans as a subject for discussion, and that we indicated we would gladly sit down and discuss the subject with them.


Mr. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa-Whitby):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Prime Minister. In view of reports that it was the Canadian
September 27, 1971

government which initiated discussion of the possible abandonment of the auto pact safeguards as a quid pro quo or as one concession in order to get exemption from the American surcharge legislation, could the Prime Minister inform the House if in fact this was the case? Was this a proposal put forward by the Canadian government?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: No, Mr. Speaker, there was never any question of a quid pro quo on this subject, and I do not know from where the hon. member is inventing that.



POSSIBLE MODIFICATION OF UNITED STATES-CANADA AUTO PACT-REQUEST BY UNITED AUTOMOBILE WORKERS FOR MEETING WITH CABINET

John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, in view of the absence of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce I want to ask the Prime Minister another question. It is my understanding that the Canadian director of the United Automobile Workers has already sent a telegram, or will be shortly, requesting an early meeting with senior cabinet officials on this issue. Would the Prime Minister assure the House that such a meeting will take place when and if it is requested?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, of course I cannot give an assurance without conferring with the minister, but if it is a reasonable request for a reasonable meeting I am sure he would want to meet it. This government, since it brought in the auto pact, has always been saying that it was one of the very good achievements of the Liberal government. I am very happy to see now that the parties which did not applaud the pact at the time of its introduction are very enthusiastic in saying that we should preserve it.



UNITED STATES ECONOMIC MEASURES-POLICY TO PROTECT CANADA AGAINST BEING ABLE TO EXPORT ONLY NATURAL RESOURCES

Mr. David MacDonald (Egmont):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Prime Minister. In light of increasing American action generally discriminating against the Canadian manufacturing industry and the fear indicated by the Minister of Finance and the Prime Minister last week that we will be placed in a position of being able to export only our natural resources, would the Prime Minister indicate whether he and his cabinet officials are presently developing an over-all, integrated resource and manufacturing export policy to protect us against being placed in a position of only being able to export our natural resources and not our manufactured products?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I made it clear to the House in the very first days of this part of the session that the government was in fact looking at contingency measures to be brought in and announced if ever we felt this was necessary, but that at this stage of the game we were mainly making sure that the Americans understood what effect their policies had on Canada, what choices they were putting in front of us, and that we were making representations to them in every way. In fact, even within the last two hours I met with the NATO delegates from the United States, as other mem-
Inquiries of the Ministry
bers and ministers have previously, to impress upon them the situation as it has developed as a result of the Nixon measures.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Can the Prime Minister indicate to the House whether he feels that the administration in the United States either understands or cares about the jeopardy of Canadian manufacturing interests at the present time?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I can answer without hesitation, as a result of the discussions I had with several United States senators and representatives a few hours ago, that their understanding had improved considerably as a result of representations made by this side of the House to them during the past few days.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for York South. Order, please. I apologize to the hon. member for York South but the hon. member for Egmont is rising on a point of order.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I thank the Prime Minister for answering a question which I did not ask. I should like him to answer now the question I did ask with regard to the American administration, which is not the same thing as these representatives who are here at this time.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair has recognized the hon. member for York South.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: On the point of order, Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: That is not a point of order. The hon. member claims that the Prime Minister did not answer his question. That is not a point of order. I will return to the hon. member and to others who want to ask supplemen-taries on this subject in a moment.



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY


Mr. David Lewis (York South):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Prime Minister. Would the Prime Minister inform the House whether he has seen a wire sent to him by the Premier of Manitoba urging an early meeting of first ministers-I think the dates suggested are between October 22 and October 28-for the purpose of discussing possible programs to deal with the unacceptable levels of unemployment expected this winter? If so, could the Prime Minister tell us what reply he made to the wire?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, could I ask the hon. member to tell me if he is referring to a wire or a letter, because I did receive a letter? Could I ask the hon. member to clarify that?


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, if I may answer, the Prime Minister received a letter and was also sent a telegram on

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the 24th from the Premier of Manitoba. Perhaps his staff has not yet drawn it to his attention.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, may I inform the House and the hon. gentleman opposite that the Premier of Manitoba held a press conference on Friday at which he released the text of both the letter and the telegram. Both the letter and the telegram ought to be within the knowledge of the Prime Minister now.


An hon. Member:: If he sent it.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of the wire but if the member is right in saying that the Premier released the text of a wire and the letter, certainly I have received a letter dated September 22-27-


David Lewis: The 17th.


An hon. Member:: David wrote it; he should know.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I apologize, the hon. member is quite right; the letter is dated September 17, Mr. Speaker. I regret to say that it contains several outrageous statements and I intend to answer the Premier of Manitoba frankly about some of the issues that he brought up which seem to me to indicate a lack of candidness in his approach to this whole problem.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I am sure that Premier Schrey-er can defend himself against this quite unwarranted suggestion of the Prime Minister. I should like to ask the Prime Minister whether he is now ready to call a special emergency conference of first ministers and other ministers, if necessary, before the end of the month of October to discuss possible programs to deal with the unemployment problem this winter, which is likely to be more severe than it is now?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Although I have replied to this before, I think it might be well to set the facts before the House once again, Mr. Speaker. Late in July I wrote to all premiers following the Victoria conference suggesting an early meeting of the federal and provincial first ministers. I suggested two dates in, early or late October, and they were not acceptable to the premiers. I then suggested two dates in November and they were not acceptable to Premier Schreyer-


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -because he was off on some trip to Europe, Mr. Speaker.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


An hon. Member:: He is training to be prime minister.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: So in consultation with Mr. Schreyer's office the earliest date we were able to settle was at the beginning of December.


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


David Lewis: Hon. members are of course aware that Premier Schreyer is not the only person in power who has made trips across the world, Mr. Speaker.


Some hon. Members:: Question!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder if we might return now to the hon. member's supplementary question.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the Prime Minister this supplementary question: is he considering presenting either to Parliament or to the provincial governments as well as Parliament an emergency program of job-creating works across the country this winter and, if so, then may we expect the announcement of such a program?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, if it is done it will not be to secure political advantage as the leader of the New Democratic Party in this House and the leader of the New Democratic Party in Manitoba are trying to do.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for York South rises on a point of order.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I do not wear the mantle on a point of order of saying that what we do in this House has nothing to do with the political situation in the country-


An hon. Member:: Not much.


David Lewis: -but I suggest to the right hon. gentleman that there is no one in this House more adept at political hypocrisy than he is.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Obviously we are not progressing very effectively. I suggest to hon. members that the last few exchanges have not helped the situation at all. We have a number of supplementaries which perhaps are more legitimate. I will recognize the Leader of the Opposition.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the right hon. Prime Minister whether in his letters to the first ministers in July he indicated that he wished to discuss with them programs to attack winter unemployment and whether it is his view that a letter written in July inviting the provincial premiers to a meeting in October indicates any urgent view on his part about winter unemployment in this country?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I had no knowledge in Victoria that the provincial governments wanted to consider unemployment to be written as a matter under provincial jurisdiction-that they wanted it to be in the constitution that unemployment was provincial. When I suggested at Victoria that we have an early meeting in the fall to discuss matters of the economy, taxation, unemployment and all the rest I said I would be writing to them in the following month, which I did, to suggest an early meeting in the fall. Therefore I carried out the request of the conference. That is not to say that the federal government has not been considering all aspects of unemployment

and ways in which it could be remedied. I am not suggesting that nothing can be done or should be done until the provinces sit down here and meet with us.



PROPOSED MEETING OF FIRST MINISTERS TO DISCUSS


Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: In view of the fact that the government has laid great stress on the importance of tri-level conferences, particularly in future decisions affecting cities, has it been the intention of the Prime Minister or has he requested that the provinces request the presence of representatives from the cities at this meeting?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, the question of representation of the cities was brought up at a conference in Winnipeg which was convened by the Minister of State for Urban Affairs. We still have not reached a final set of arrangements with the provinces on the participation of municipalities at federal-provincial conferences. We have, however, certainly taken initiatives which may some day bring a solution to this problem. Once again, this is in the hands of the provinces under whose jurisdiction municipal law lies.



UNEMPLOYMENT-DISCUSSION WITH PREMIERS OF TOLERABLE WINTER LEVEL IN CONNECTION WITH PROPOSED CONFERENCE

Mr. James A. McGrath (St. John's East):: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Prime Minister if the government has agreed on an objective of what it considers to be a tolerable level of unemployment for the winter? Can the Prime Minister tell the House if this objective of tolerable unemployment has been discussed with the premiers in connection with the federal-provincial conference?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: No, Mr. Speaker. It is our object to bring unemployment to as low a level as possible but in my letter and communication with the premiers there was no percentage suggested, if that is what the hon. member is inquiring about.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


Mr. Roch La Salle (Joliette):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Prime Minister.
Since Quebec Provincial Police officers decided, last night, to carry on with their study session, I should like to ask the Prime Minister whether, on the one hand, the Quebec Attorney General has contacted him to seek the services of the Armed Forces, if required, and, on the other hand, whether Quebec may count on such services, should the Quebec Attorney General request them?
Inquiries of the Ministry


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, my reply to the second part of the question can really not go beyond what is stipulated in the act itself, i.e. that if the Attorney General of the province requests the services of the Army as provided for by the act, the federal government has no alternative but to supply the services of the Army and also to send an invoice.
As for assistance at the level of the federal police force, I know federal services would be willing to assist, as much as possible, in the maintaining of order in the province of Quebec. However, we have absolutely no intention to interfere in matters of strike settlement between the provincial authorities and an organization of workers coming under their jurisdiction.


Roch La Salle: May I put a supplementary question, Mr. Speaker? I would ask the Prime Minister whether the federal government has decided nevertheless to send trops to Quebec in case of needs?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I understood that I was asked if we had decided to send troops. I answered that if the provincial Attorney General formally asked for the despatch of troops, we would have no other choice and the troops would be used, as requested by the provincial Attorney General.



FINANCE


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Finance in Washington, may I direct my question to the Prime Minister. Is the government of Canada presenting any specific Canadian proposals to achieve international monetary reform as a way to get rid of the United States surcharge? If so, may we expect a statement from the government in the House before the return of the Minister of Finance, or just what will be the position? I am sure the House would like to know whether there are any Canadian initiatives. This question follows on the question I asked last week.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, we are participating in all the meetings of the Group of Ten, of the IMF and of the Commonwealth finance ministers and, of course we are using what knowledge we have of the monetary system and suggesting ways in which it might be improved. However, I would not want the House or the hon. member to believe that we have in our briefs some sure cure replacement for the gold standard or the dollar standard or that we have thought up some new scheme which would be acceptable for the world.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, the Minister of Finance in an interview discussed wider fixed margins or a moving average. Are these part of the proposals that Canada is making or is there some other formula that Canada might put forward for discussion?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, these proposals have been looked at by Canada and by other countries. I am not sure
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who made the suggestion in the first place, whether it came from Canada or some other country. But it is certain that this and all manner of other proposals are being looked at by the participating countries.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, would the Prime Minister tell us whether the Canadian government has received an official indication that the International Monetary Fund is seeking a change in the valuation of international currencies which would result in Canada's dollar being pegged at about $1.03 U.S.? If that is the case, what is the government's view with regard to this general reorganization?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, there has been no official submission made to the Canadian government, in the terms of the question, to up-value the Canadian dollar to $1.03 U.S. or $1.05 U.S., or whatever it is.



INQUIRY AS TO MAKING OF PAYMENTS TO WHEAT BOARD UNDER TEMPORARY WHEAT RESERVES ACT

Mr. John Burton (Regina East):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Finance I wish to direct my question to the Prime Minister. In view of the fact that the Canadian Wheat Board has invoiced the Minister of Finance for amounts due under the Temporary Wheat Reserves Act since August 1, 1970, and since there has been considerable debate about the failure of the minister to make these payments, have the payments for the 197071 or current crop year now been made to the Canadian Wheat Board from the consolidated revenue fund?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I cannot at this time reopen the debate of last Thursday, but an explanation was given for that by the minister responsible for the Wheat Board.


Gerald William Baldwin: It was highly unsatisfactory.


John Stratford Burton: Mr. Speaker, I was not asking for an explanation. I simply want to ask the Prime Minister again if there has been any change in policy or whether these payments have now been made to the Canadian Wheat Board in light of the debates which have taken place?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, those payments have not been made but, as indicated in the House by the minister responsible for the Wheat Board, they will be in some short length of time if the bill before the House is not passed, and the farmers will be receiving only $60 million instead of $100 million.


Gerald William Baldwin: That's blackmail.



WITHHOLDING BY GOVERNMENT OF PAYMENTS UNDER TEMPORARY WHEAT RESERVES ACT-OBJECTIONS BY WESTERN PREMIERS

Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Calgary North):: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. I think the amount is $90 million. Can the Prime Minister tell us whether there have [Mr. Trudeau.)
been any objections from the western premiers or members of the government in reference to the alleged disobeying of the law and failure of this government to pay to the Canadian Wheat Board the money in question that is owing for storage?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I am informed by the Minister of Agriculture that he knows of no such representations and I must say that, for my part, I have no knowledge of such representations.



SUSPENSION OF CONSIDERATION OF STABILIZATION


Mr. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the President of the Privy Council in his capacity as government House leader. In view of the meeting held last week by the three prairie Ministers of Agriculture, is the minister contemplating withholding further consideration of Bill C-244 until after the three ministers have met with the minister in charge of the Wheat Board this Friday in order to discuss what they have referred to as a most contentious bill?


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, I have made no decision, nor was I aware of the projected meeting on Friday with these ministers. The bill will be brought forward as soon as we can get it forward conveniently for hon. members.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, could I ask a supplementary question. I wonder if the government House leader has conveyed to the Prime Minister the objections raised by the hon. member for Vegreville and the Ministers of Agriculture of the Prairie provinces not only to the bill but to the fact that the law has been disobeyed in that these moneys have not been paid?


An hon. Member:: Whisper it in his ear.


Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Don't send him a telegram.



REGIONAL ECONOMIC EXPANSION


Mr. Adrien Lambert (Bellechasse):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion.
Will new areas in Quebec be designated as special areas within a few months? If so, will the town of Montmagny and its suburbs be included among those new special areas?


Hon. Jean Marchand (Minister of Regional Economic Expansion):: Mr. Speaker, we all know that the present special areas will remain designated till June 1972. We are now negotiating with the province and it is really too soon
September 27, 1971

for me to indicate to the House what areas will be designated.



INQUIRY AS TO PAYMENT OF GRANT TO WHOLESALE HOMES LIMITED

Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. In view of the dismissal notices given to the entire work force at the plant of Wholesale Homes Limited in Blind River, Ontario, a concern which has been approved for a regional development grant of some $50,000, can the minister say if any part of this money has been paid to that company yet?


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, no, no money has been paid at all. If the facts are as reported to me, I am sure that no money is going to be paid under these circumstances. I hope the Leader of the Opposition is going to help me, because this involves a former Conservative candidate. Maybe we can straighten out the situation a little bit.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I am sure the minister knows very well that he can seek my co-operation on any matter involving the interests of the country.



UNITED STATES ECONOMIC MEASURES-SUGGESTED DIRECT TALKS BETWEEN PRIME-MINISTER AND PRESIDENT NIXON

Mr. J. P. Nowlan (Annapolis Valley):: Mr. Speaker, my question is supplementary to some that were asked earlier of the Prime Minister. Since the right hon. gentleman seems to have had some success in conveying the impact on Canada of the United States import surcharge to some congressman and senators now in Canada, does he not think that the same eloquence and/or logic he displayed to those gentlemen in Canada could also be displayed to the man who is responsible for this action, the President of the United States, by seeking direct talks with that gentleman and helping to educate him?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I want to make it quite clear that I did not intend to convey to the House that it was as a result of my representations that congressmen had indicated great understanding of the Canadian position. It is a a result of statements made by the hon. member for Calgary South and various other members of the Liberal party when they met them.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Patrick (Pat) Nowlan: With all respect to these gentlemen, could the Prime Minister supplement their logic and eloquence by direct representations to the President so that the President could be educated as to the serious impact that the surcharge and especially the DISC program are going to have on manufacturing and on the agricultural indus-
Inquiries of the Ministry
try in Canada? Or will he wait until next spring when they come to look at the tulips in Ottawa?


Mr. Speaker:: I believe the hon. member for Egmont has a supplementary.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: I would defer to my hon. friend to allow the Prime Minister to answer.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I was only about to thank all opposition parties for the great confidence they are showing in me in this regard. I want to thank them for this vote of confidence they are extending to me.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We shall be running short of time very soon. I shall recognize the hon. member for Egmont because I told him a moment ago I would do so, but perhaps we should go on to the next subject thereafter.



UNITED STATES ECONOMIC MEASURES-APPRECIATION OF CANADIAN POSITION BY WASHINGTON- ANNOUNCEMENT OF CANADIAN POLICIES

David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Perhaps I can ask a
question which I put earlier to the Prime Minister. Does he now feel that the administration in Washington either understands or cares about the extent of the impact the present trend of their economic policy is having on Canada? Can he also give us any clear indication, if there is no evidence yet that they have understood our situation, as to when he may be announcing specific policies and programs directed to meet this ominous economic threat?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I can only tell the House that if such policies were to be announced they would be very important and they would be announced in the normal way before the House of Commons.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: A final supplementary-


Mr. Speaker:: I will recognize the hon. member for a final supplementary on this subject, but we do have to give other hon. members an opportunity to ask questions.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: We understand that policies will be announced in the usual way, but in view of the importance of the matter, to which the Prime Minister himself drew attention last Thursday evening, can the right hon. gentleman not give the House any indication, it being almost a month and a half since these policies were initiated by the United States, that we have any idea whether or not the President, the Secretary of the Treasury and others realize the gravity of the steps which are being taken as they affect the Canadian economy?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: As the House knows, ministers of the federal government have been meeting with ministers of the United States administration and representations have been made to them both here in Ottawa when Mr. Stans came and at the international meetings when Secretary Connally was in discussion with my colleague, the Minister of Finance. I do not think that I, or any member of my administration, can pry into the minds of these people to see whether they have a complete understanding of the points we have made to them, but I repeat that in the meetings I had a couple of hours ago it seemed to
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me that responsible and important United States congressmen did understand our point of view. I would hope that members of their administration are no less intelligent and enlightened than the representatives to whom I have been talking.



AGRICULTURE


Mr. Rod Thomson (Battleford-Kindersley):: My question is directed to the Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Speaker. As it is several months since the publication of the final report of the Barber Commission on farm machinery, is the minister now prepared to make a statement on whatever plans the government may have with regard to the implementation of those recommendations?


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: No, Mr. Speaker. I cannot give a specific date on which we would be making any further statement, but I have made a number of statements in the House respecting this matter in the past.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Mr. W. B. Nesbitt (Oxford):: I have a question for the Secretary of State for External Affairs, Mr. Speaker. Is it the intention of the government to make a protest to the government of the Soviet Union concerning the massive underground nuclear explosion which apparently took place early this morning?


Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: I have been making a number of statements recently relevant to this issue and I intend to reinforce them this week by calling for a complete ban by all countries on all kinds of testing, including the kind of underground test which has been carried out by the Soviet Union. I say this quite deliberately, because it would be a very great pity if the United States were to justify their underground test because the Soviet Union happened to have carried out this one.


Wallace Bickford (Wally) Nesbitt: Perhaps the Secretary of State for External Affairs misunderstood my question. Is it the intention of the government to make a specific protest to the Soviet Union concerning this morning's explosion, or will it be done in the more general context of the minister's address to the General Assembly?


Mitchell William Sharp: No, it would not be my intention to make any formal protest to the Soviet Union any more than to the People's Republic of China or to France, all of which have been causing nuclear explosions. The reason we made special representations to the United States was the additional problem created by the fact that such a test as was

proposed could have a direct effect on people living on the Pacific coast in both Canada and the United States. Indeed, such a nuclear explosion is to be condemned on two counts: First, it is a continuation of the testing and, second, because it happens to be in an area of difficult terrain where there might be untoward effects.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


INFORMATION
Gerald William Baldwin: I should like to ask the
Minister of Justice a question. In light of the very strong recommendation in the report of the Economic Council of Canada that the government should proceed as quickly as possible to clarify the rights of the public to access to public information without bureaucratic or political strings, is the government planning to bring in a bill to this effect? If not, will the government give consideration to an order that the subject matter of Bill C-250 be referred to a committee? I have to ask these questions, Mr. Speaker, in light of the difficulty we have in getting information in and out of the House.
 * *


POSSIBLE PIPELINE THROUGH CANADA TO TRANSPORT
Mr. David Anderson (Esquimalt-Saanich):: I have a question for the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Was he or, to his knowledge, some other Canadian minister consulted by the United States Secretary of the Interior before Mr. Rogers Morton announced two days ago that he is now willing to consider a pipeline in Canada to carry Alaskan oil between Prudhoe Bay and the lower 48 states?


Mitchell William Sharp: I will have to ask my colleagues whether they have received any representations along those lines. I personally have not.


FISHERIES
Mr. Lloyd R. Crouse (South Shore):: I wish to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of the serious decline in the quantities of many of our deep-sea species of fish because of overfishing by foreign nationals in our waters, is it the intention of the minister to take any action at the United Nations which would lead to the early establishment of a deepsea international control commission designed to preserve our fisheries resources on Canada's continental shelf?
September 27, 1971


Mitchell William Sharp: Canada will be pressing very hard for the convening of a Law of the Sea Conference and certainly a proposal such as the hon. member has put forward, or one to the same effect, would receive strong support from Canada.


Lloyd Roseville Crouse: Since Iceland is contemplating an extension of fisheries controls over the entire length of her continental shelf by 1972, is the Canadian government giving consideration to taking similar action with respect to our own continental shelf?


Mitchell William Sharp: We do feel there are several kinds of questions involved here. As the hon. member knows, we have declared certain exclusive fishing zones, for example, in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and in similar areas off the Pacific coast. We have extended our territorial sea to 12 miles and we are seeking some special regime with respect to the continental shelf where we believe there are very special responsibilities in the adjacent states.


Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, may I put a
supplementary question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Does the government plan any immediate steps this session to introduce into Parliament legislation which will reflect the unanimous report of the fisheries and forestry committee a couple of years ago to the effect that we extend our fishing zones to include the continental shelf and slope?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, this question will be considered. I do not think there is any prospect of any such legislation being introduced this session.


POSSIBLE AGREEMENT WITH FRANCE RESPECTING WATERS OFF SOUTH COAST OF NEWFOUNDLAND
James Aloysius McGrath: A supplementary question, Mr. Speaker. May I ask the Secretary of State for External Affairs whether during his discussions with the French Foreign Minister any substantive agreement was reached with respect to Canada's territorial seas and fishing zones off the south coast of Newfoundland, bearing in mind French jurisdiction in and over the islands of St. Pierre and Miquelon and adjacent waters?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I am very happy to report that we are making very rapid and I think satisfactory progress on a treaty with the French government which will cover a number of these matters.


REGIONAL ECONOMIC EXPANSION
Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. In view of the many reported lay-offs and
Inquiries of the Ministry
production cuts being made in a number of provinces, is the minister considering any plans to curtail federal subsidies to private firms that desire to establish new production facilities elsewhere in the country?


Jean Marchand: Is the hon. gentleman asking me not to give these grants, so that there will be more persons laid off than there are now?


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, what I am asking the minister is whether he is giving consideration to stopping grants for facilities which duplicate facilities where layoffs are taking place in various parts of the country at the present time.


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, every time we award a grant, we are most careful not to enter into competition with an established firm or plant. There might be marginal cases and mistakes can be made, but the general policy rightly tends to avoid what the hon. member has just mentioned.


INDUSTRY
Mr. E. B. Osier (Winnipeg South Centre):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs. In view of a recent allegation that Ford Pinto cars, whose points of manufacture are St. Thomas, Ontario and San Jose, California, are currently being offered for sale in Vancouver for some $19 less than in Toronto and $106 less than in Winnipeg, would the minister look into the Ford Motor Company's pricing policy?


Stanley Ronald Basford: Mr. Speaker, I will refer the information that the hon. member has very kindly supplied me to the Director of Investigation and Research under the Combines Investigation Act.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. H. W. Danforth (Kent-Essex):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of Agriculture. As a result of indications of an unusually low domestic price for our Canadian corn crop now being harvested and representations made to the minister by that industry, would the minister indicate whether the government has formulated a policy to bolster the price and, if so, what might that policy be?


Horace Andrew (Bud) Olson: No, Mr. Speaker, we do not have a detailed' announcement to make.

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VETERANS AFFAIRS
Mr. Jack Marshall (Humber-St. George's-St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Veterans Affairs. Would the minister advise what action he has taken as a result of a resolution from the Canadian Veterans Association of the United Kingdom asking him to review the 12 months' residence clause which denies many Canadian veterans residing in the United Kingdom the right to draw war veterans allowance?


Hon. Jean-Eudes Dube (Minister of Veterans Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, the War Veterans Allowance Act was amended in 1960 to provide for the requirement of at least one year's residence in Canada for those who want to draw benefits overseas. The reason for that was that these allowances are, of course, based on financial need and are very difficult to administer outside the country and this applies to the United Kingdom, France and all other countries in the world where our veterans are residing. This requirement does not apply, of course, to disability pensions which are based on actual disability and follow veterans everywhere they go.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I regret to bring to the attention of hon. members that the question period expired a few minutes ago. I tried to prolong it by a few minutes to give hon. members on the back benches a chance to ask their questions. I have noted those who were not called today and I will try to give them a chance tomorrow.


Mr. Lundrigan:: Mr. Speaker, I wish to raise a question of privilege of very urgent importance which cannot wait until tomorrow. It involves a straightforward, simple question to the Prime Minister. I wonder whether in view of the very critical unemployment crisis facing this nation-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member appreciates that this is not a question of privilege. Essentially, he is asking that we prolong the question period to give him the opportunity to ask a question. Perhaps he might ask it tomorrow. Orders of the day.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House proceeded to the consideration of Bill C-262, to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect, as reported (with amendments) from the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs.
Mr. Speaker:: Hon. members will have noticed on the revised notice paper that there are four motions to amend Bill C-262, an act to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect. I have to advise hon. members that I have qualms about the procedural correctness of two of these motions. Motion No. 1, in the name of the hon. member for Annapolis Valley (Mr. Nowlan), appears, at least at first blush, to be defective in that it purports to introduce into the bill a substantive proposal to a section of the interpretation clause. While I do not wish to rule at the present time on the procedural admissibility of this motion, I would, of course, be pleased to hear argument on the point which would allow the Chair to express an opinion and to make a ruling.
Motion No. 2, in the name of the hon. member for Regina East (Mr. Burton), also appears at first blush to be defective in that it seeks to introduce as an amendment to clause 11 of the bill a provision in relation to an income support grant to farmers and fishermen. It might well be that such a provision is beyond the scope of the bill. This is the impression I have from looking at this proposed amendment. This is why I bring the matter to the attention of hon. members, in the hope that they might be able to enlighten the Chair in this respect.


John Patrick (Pat) Nowlan: Mr. Speaker, since you have raised some objections to motion No. 1 standing in my name, I should like to address myself to it without the benefit of Beauchesne or May but with the benefit of what I suggest is basic common sense, though frankly I would think that that would be the guide in any interpretation, along with the discretion that Your Honour always exercises with such generosity.
Bill C-262 unabashedly does something about employment in Canada and is presented to the House because of the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes. I would point out to Your Honour-and this might be part of Your Honour's difficulty-that the word "industry" per se is not defined in the interpretation clause of the bill. What my amendment seeks to do is to extend the meaning of the word "manufacturer" to include with certainty the products of agriculture, fishing and I think forestry within the scope of the bill, thus making the producers of these goods eligible for application to the board.
This amendment does not establish any new principle of income support or anything like that; it merely enlarges the definition of "manufacturer". I submit to Your Honour that if the word "industry" had been defined in the bill with clarity, there might be more of a problem here. But even the use of the word "manufacturer" in the bill I suggest leaves much to be desired in terms of clarity and finality. Clause 2 defines it as an "activity in Canada whereby any goods, products, commodities or wares are made, fabricated or refined out of raw material or other substance".
Perhaps it would not be reasonable to use the word "liberal" in respect of interpretation when looking at this measure, because it contains a strict interpretation as well as a liberal interpretation. Even the word "manufacturer" leaves many things up in the air. Does an agricultural
September 27, 1971

product come within the scope of this bill or does it not? There is so much vagueness in the bill that, during the first or second night of debate, the minister had to say that agricultural products such as those which are processed could come within the measure if administratively they could be computed and assessed. He said that in respect of other goods there might be a more difficult administrative impact, for example in respect of raw materials, and the Farm Stabilization Act would have to apply.
In view of the fact the wording of the act does not define "industry" but defines the word "manufacturer" in loose and expansive language to include a wider range of products, I submit all my amendment does is remove the uncertainty and spell out with clarity the products to be included. The measure as it is now could apply to primary products if they come within the guidelines established by the act or the terms set out by the board. It will be up to the board to make a determination as to whether assistance should be given in respect of those products.
In looking at the measure we find three key words, industry, employment and surtax. There is certainly a disruptive effect on agricultural products and fish products as a result of the surtax. Everyone will admit this, yet there is nothing being done at the moment in a statutory way to cover these items. The minister admits this bill covers such products of agriculture as are being processed. As I remember what the minister said, there was a suggestion that because of a certainty in the administration, these items would fall within the scope of the bill. I submit there is no new principle involved.
If processed agricultural products come within this bill, why should the bill not also include basic products subject to surtax? We are not debating a bill through which this government is trying to create employment in certain industries. The prime purpose of this bill before the House is to offset the surtax imposed by the United States by assisting certain industries. That is the essential purpose of this bill. That is the guideline and the basic reason for its existence.
Because the word "industry" is not defined and the word "manufacturer" is left wide open, I submit my amendment would in fact define "manufacturer" with certainty. It would extend the scope of the word without running afoul of any rules outlined in Beauchesne's or May's Parliamentary Rules. This would result by extending the provisions of this bill to cover something which perhaps might not be covered through a liberal interpretation.
Let me submit in conclusion that what my amendment will accomplish is covered at this time by the interpretation placed on the measure by the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Olson). He refers to processed agricultural products as being covered. Are frozen blueberries processed and are they covered? They are certainly subject to the surtax. Could apples be considered as being covered? There might be some question in respect of apples in the raw form, but are processed apples covered? How can we ascertain what is a high burden agricultural product? All my amendment does is remove the uncertainty of interpretation in this bill by including the words, primary products of agriculture, fishing and, I suppose, the forest industry.
Employment Support Bill
Because this amendment does not run afoul of the rules, and there is no rule to restrict it, I submit there will be no tampering with the $80 million. I could discuss the fact that the bill is discriminatory as between one industry to be covered and another which is given no protection, but that would be touching upon the subject matter or the principle. At this stage all I am attempting to do is remove that vagueness in respect of the word "manufacturer". This vagueness causes a great deal of consternation not only to the Chair but as well to businessmen, farmers and fishermen across the country. It depends on what type of fishing or farming they do whether they come within this bill. If they happen to be fishermen or farmers who do not process these goods they may be left out in the cold. I am attempting to remove that uncertainty by extending the definition of "agricultural products" and leaving it to the board to define rules and procedures and to develop criteria by which an industry shall qualify. This is being left to the board for final determination.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of the main contention of the hon. member for Annapolis Valley (Mr. Nowlan). I feel that matters he placed before you have been of some assistance. Perhaps I should disagree with my colleague in only one small way. In providing us with this definition he has not really extended the scope of the bill, but has in fact clarified and restricted it. It would be very difficult for Your Honour to say immediately in respect of this bill that any number of amendments could in any way go beyond the scope of its intent. There is a great deal left undefined. Indeed, it is a piece of legislation that could well be regarded as a blank cheque for the minister and his officials to do with as they please, in spite of what the minister and others have said to the contrary. This bill is very open-ended legislation similar to legislation we have been getting more often over the years. In some ways this has restricted the legislative function of Parliament because it has meant in most cases that the real legislative provisions are included in government regulations rather than in any bills considered in this chamber.
The hon. member has pointed out to Your Honour one of the difficulties by suggesting there is no definition of the word "industry". We find in clause 3 that the purpose of this act is to provide a means to support levels of employment when other countries impose certain things. Considering that as the core of this bill, if you like, and this is the government's enunciation of its purpose, many difficulties have been created for Your Honour and other members of this House in attempting to determine the impact and the effect of this legislation. For various reasons the government has not made clear, we are provided with very open-ended legislation in which the key word "industry" has not been defined. It does not appear in the table of interpretation. When we look to the key paragraphs which give us assistance we become further confused as to the exact nature and intent of the bill. The measure suggests that:
"manufacturer" means a person, firm or corporation operating an activity in Canada whereby any goods, products, commodities or wares-
In those terms I am sure we would have to include almost every commercial enterprise in which there is an

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exchange of some article. That would not only include what the hon. member had in mind, but many more things as well. It is in the last three lines of that clause, (a) that we are supposed to find a delineation regarding the exact nature and purpose. It reads:
are made, fabricated or refined out of raw material or other substance or combination thereof.
I suggest it would take the wisdom of many Speakers and Solomon combined to give us a clear definition of what is intended by the words "are made, fabricated or refined out of raw material". In this day and age when we know so much about processing, growth change, transformation and manufacturing, how can you possibly think that this paragraph in any way limits the scope of this bill and, therefore, the agency to be set up to do whatever it pleases under this bill? It does not quite obviously because whether we have in mind a potato growing in the ground, an apple growing on the tree, a fish swimming in the sea or the process that is involved in respect of growing Irish moss, the process of growth in respect of agriculture, fisheries and forestry, as well as the active part of man's intervention in terms of technological circumstances, cannot be subdivided unless they are clearly indicated. I would say they are far from being clearly indicated under the scope of this legislation. I would adopt the words used by the hon. member for Annapolis Valley in introducing his amendment when he said he was indeed attempting to clarify with certainty. I would say to that extent that in this amendment the hon. member is attempting to help the Chair and assist the House in providing the House with a piece of legislation which may be adequate in respect of the problem presently before us.
At this point I believe I might emphasize the fact that the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Olson) and others have been very reluctant to speak about the resources of the industries of farming and fishing. I use that word because it is the word that is used in respect of these industries. We are faced with a government which seems to be seeing one side of the problem. The hon. member is trying to give us an amendment which would give us in context the totality of the problem. In view of the complete uncertainty in respect of this legislation, I think members should at least be allowed to make a determination by way of a vote on whether or not this is an acceptable and improved amendment. It is not an amendment which in any way tries to increase the scope of the bill but rather an amendment which tries to clarify and indicate with certainty what this legislation attempts to do. If members are given an opportunity to vote in the normal manner they will be able to say clearly in this House what kind of legislation they want at this point in time when we are faced with the tremendous impact of the United States surtax which will disadvantage many segments of Canadian industry.


Mr. A. P. Gleave (Saskatoon-Biggar):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to support those who seek to have this amendment accepted as part of the bill and as a part of the discussion we are about to undertake. I believe it is proper to define, within this bill and within this amendment, the things we are going to do and hope to do through this measure. If an amendment such as this, which defines the actual products produced as well as those processed were

not considered then I believe there would be very considerable difficulty in administering this legislation. In an attempt to define what is processed and what is not processed in this area, we find that there are some pretty fine distinctions and some pretty fine decisions which are involved.
The other thing which I believe is important is that unless some amendment of this nature is added to this bill, we are left without any clear direction in this legislation with regard to a very wide range of agricultural products. I know neither the Minister of Agriculture nor the minister in charge of the Wheat Board are in the House at the present time, so I expect we cannot be advised whether or not in their opinion such an amendment is acceptable. This may or may not be relevant to the discussion, since I am very sure Your Honour's decisions are not made on the basis of acceptance by the other side of the House. However, I do urge, Mr. Speaker, that you give all possible consideration to this amendment.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the hon. member fcr Winnipeg North Centre rising to address himself to the motion now before the House?


Stanley Howard Knowles: Yes, Mr. Speaker, if I may do so briefly. Perhaps also I should admit that in arguing for the admissability of this amendment I am putting in one word for it and two words for the next one. Briefly, as I understood Your Honour's remarks from the Chair, you have two questions about the amendment of the hon. member for Annapolis Valley (Mr. Nowlan). First, is it an amendment by which a matter of substance is imported not only into the legislation but into the interpretation section and secondly, is the amendment something which goes beyond the scope of the bill as recommended by His Excellency the Governor General. It seems to me those two points are pretty closely tied together. On the first point Your Honour, of course, will have to make the judgment concerning whether the words the hon. member for Annapolis Valley wishes to put in the interpretation section are substantial in character or merely clarifying. I suggest a good case has been made for the fact that they are simply a clarification of the intent of the whole bill.
On the other point concerning whether this amendment goes beyond the recommendation of the Governor General, I repeat what other hon. members have said. The recommendation contains these key words:
-respecting payment of employment support grants to mitigate the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect;-
As hon. members know, people in almost any walk of life or occupation refer to their occupation as an industry. Certainly in western Canada we hear of agriculture referred to all the time as an industry. There is nothing in this recommendation which narrows that at all and as the recommendation is one which suggests the legislation is of concern to Canadian industry I submit it is proper to make clear in the legislation what is meant by industry. Therefore, I hope Your Honour will see fit to regard this amendment as not importing any substance but simply clarifying the intent of the bill.
If by any chance Your Honour should find this amendment offends because it would amend the interpretation
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clause, I hope the arguments which have been made up to this point on behalf of clarification will be regarded as supporting the next amendment which does not amend the definition clause but tries to clarify what is meant by Canadian industry so far as this bill is concerned.


Mr. J. A. Jerome (Parliamentary Secretary to President of the Privy Council):: I will only take a moment, Mr. Speaker. The precedents are clear, but if, as has been stated, the amendment is of a substantive nature, then it should not be accepted in that classification of amendments covered under rule 75 pertaining to the definition section. I cannot envisage an amendment of a more substantial nature to a bill of this sort which clearly extends the scope of this bill, since it would extend the scope of the minister's duties to make him the minister of industry, trade and commerce and agriculture. There is a separate portfolio for agriculture. There are, in fact, separate measures to deal with agricultural products that run into the difficulty that is envisaged by this legislation if they are, in fact, raw agricultural products.
There are provisions contained in this bill to deal with agricultural products if they have been processed. Accordingly, I submit that the additional words contained in the definition section are the clearest example of a change of a substantial nature to the scope of the bill. An attempt is made to bring about that objective by simply making an amendment to the definition section.
In the Journals of the House, to which reference was made last week in a similar argument on another measure, at pages 835 and 836 on May 21, 1970, there is a very clear-cut reference to Your Honour's ruling on the Canada Water Act. Subsequent to that, in Hansard for October 28, 1970, Your Honour again had the occasion to make a ruling on a proposal by the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) to amend the definition section in the federal court bill. On both occasions, Your Honour pointed out that the change was of a substantial nature and could not be proposed as an amendment at the report stage. I submit that this is the clearest example of exactly the same thing.


Gerald William Baldwin: May I ask the parliamentary secretary a question, since his answer may prevail upon me not to intervene in this interesting argument on a point of order. I should like to ask him whether, in support of his argument, he takes the position that the intent of the bill is that it shall not apply to articles of agriculture.


James Alexander Jerome: That depends on the state of the agricultural products, whether they are raw, or manufactured. That is the purpose of the bill and its distinguishing feature.


Hon. Jean-Luc Pepin (Minister of Industry. Trade and Commerce):: I should like to say a few words on the amendment. The hon. member for Sudbury (Mr. Jerome) said that the hon. member who proposed the amendment made the case that its purpose was to clarify an uncertainty and not to extend the definition of the word "agriculture". If this were so, we might have one of those situations where in clarifying one adds. I think this is the case with the amendment in front of us.
Employment Support Bill
As the hon. member for Sudbury just indicated, there are two classifications of agricultural, forestry or fishery products, one is raw products and the other one is processed or manufactured goods. Only the second case is covered by the present bill. If it is a raw product, it is either subject to a surcharge, a surtax, or it is not. If it is not, we have no problem. If it is subject to a surcharge, the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Olson) will try to take care of it by other means, as he has already indicated he would.
I suggest also that if we were to accept the amendment before us now, we would have to amend also section 14 of the bill which provides that in looking at different cases the board shall take into account all relevant factors, including:
(b) the prices paid by the manufacturer to suppliers for goods that enter into the cost of production of the manufacturer.
So this section 14 aims to protect the producer of the raw materials of fishery, forestry or agriculture so that the manufacturer receiving the grant will not gain from both sides. Section 14(b) is aimed at protecting the sort of people hon. members on the other side are trying to protect in this amendment. But I repeat that others who are subject to the surcharge will be protected by certain measures to be announced by the Minister of Agriculture.
On the word "manufacture"-and I might come back to that later on-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder whether the minister might not agree that perhaps he is getting away to some extent from the procedural point which is before us now. The minister has the right, of course, to argue the point as much as any other hon. member, but I hope that the argument we are having now will be limited as much as possible to the strictly procedural aspect of the matter without going into the substance.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: I should like to take this opportunity to ask the minister a question. He used the terms "raw" and "processed" with regard to these products. I wonder, since there does not seem to be much by way of definition in this legislation and the word "processed" can have a great variety of meanings, whether he is talking about packaging, handling and interim sales. The present legislation is so vague that it is quite possible to see the hon. member's proposal as being not an extension but in fact a clarification, and thus justify the need for this kind of amendment.


Mr. Speaker:: Again the question asked by the hon. member points to the difficulty which I wanted to bring to the attention of the House, that the minister's argument was really more substantive, I thought in any event, than procedural. I do not intend to limit this debate in any way. If hon. members think they might enlighten the Chair, I will listen to them. But it might have been easier if we had had no procedural debate and I had allowed the hon. member to make his point. By this time the debate might have been over. Sometimes I have doubts as to the wisdom of bringing up points of order. I can assure hon. members that I do not do so just out of pleasure but because I realize, especially in this case, that a matter is of interest to all hon. members.

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As has been stated by some hon. members who took part in the procedural debate, this is a judgment decision which has to be made by the Chair. The motion is made by way of an amendment to the bill, proposed for the consideration of the Chair and from the procedural standpoint, the Chair has to determine whether the words in question are words of substance, whether they add substantially to what we have before us, or whether they are simply, as has been suggested by the hon. member for Annapolis Valley (Mr. Nowlan) and others who have argued in support of this point, a clarification of what we have before us.
If I took the liberty to raise the matter in the first instance, it was obviously because I had some thought that these words were more than just clarifying, that they were words of substance. The procedural difficulty stems also from the fact that this proposed amendment comes to us by way of an amendment to the interpretation clause. Based on many authorities in the past, I have suggested to hon. members that it is not competent for any member on either side of the House under any circumstances to amend a bill substantially by changing the interpretation clause. I refer to a ruling reported at page 836 of Journals of May 21, 1970, part of which reads:
-in the opinion of the Chair amendments of a substantive or declaratory nature should not be proposed to an interpretation clause. If such amendments were accepted the clause would not then be an interpretation clause.
I am sure hon. members realize the difficulty of accepting substantive amendments or proposals under the general classification of interpretation. I suggest to hon. members with respect that this is not the place to make proposed amendments or motions which are of a substantive nature. Again, this is based on the assumption that the amendment is of a substantive nature.
Another important aspect is whether this kind of amendment affects the financial initiative of the Crown. The purpose of the motion before us proposed by the hon. member for Annapolis Valley (Mr. Nowlan) would be to relate the provisions of the bill to primary forest produce, etc., and in doing so, in my view, it would expand upon the terms of the financial recommendation.
I would like to refer hon. members to citation 246 of Beauchesne's Fourth Edition, at page 207, which reads as follows:
The guiding principle in determining the effect of an amendment upon the financial initiative of the Crown is that the communication, to which the royal demand of recommendation is attached, must be treated as laying down once for all (unless withdrawn and replaced) not only the amount of a charge, but also its objects, purposes, conditions and qualifications. In relation to the standard thereby fixed, an amendment infringes the financial initiative of the Crown, not only if it increases the amount, but also if it extends the objects and purposes, or relaxes the conditions and qualifications expressed in the communication by which the Crown has demanded or recommended a charge.
Again, I must come to the conclusion that the amendment proposed to us is of a substantive nature which would alter the terms of the recommendation. Hon. members have suggested that this is a matter of judgment for the Chair. I really do not know how I can exercise that judgment otherwise than by saying that this is more than

an amendment explaining the interpretation clause. I would think this might be the subject of an amendment at a later stage; it might be put to the House in the form of a reasoned amendment if it is strictly relevant to what is before us, but I suggest it should be considered by the House not by way of an amendment or proposed amendment to the interpretation clause of the bill which is now before us.
I know how important is this matter, and I have hesitated very much before making this ruling, but I can assure hon. members that I have looked at it as objectively as I could, as fairly as I could, and I do not see, in justice and in good judgment, how I can reach a decision other than the one I have just reached.
So far as the second motion is concerned, I have also expressed reservations. The hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) has indicated that he wants to guide the Chair in this respect. Again I am open to suggestions, and I am prepared to be convinced, if I am wrong in my suspicion that this is a substantive amendment. If hon. members would like to assist the Chair and guide me with respect to motion No. 2 I will hear them with pleasure.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I take it that you have ruled out motion No. 1 and that you are now inviting comment on motion No. 2. Perhaps I should be exceedingly brief because I made the main argument when I was on my feet a few minutes ago. At least motion No. 2 does not offend the rule against importing substantial changes into the interpretation clause, because motion No. 2 seeks to amend not clause 2 but clause 11 of the bill.
The whole point that has to be decided is whether the provisions of motion No. 2 are within the conditions laid down once and for all in the recommendation by His Excellency the Governor General. Once again, I suggest that since the overriding qualification was that this bill was to provide employment support grants to mitigate the disruptive effect on Canadian industry, there is nothing in that which imparts a narrow definition to the word "industry". I suggest that what my colleague from Regina East is seeking to do is to clarify that aspect of the matter in clause 11.
I suppose one of the reasons I am being brief is that Your Honour has already read a citation that it is pretty hard to argue against, but one can still hope that Your Honour might see a difference between this case and the other one, because this motion does not offend twice, as the other one did. Perhaps your judgment might now be that, among other things, its words are very few, and that all it seeks to do is define industry as including agriculture and fishing. That is all one can say, but one can hope.


John Stratford Burton: Mr. Speaker, in supporting the contention of the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) I would just like to say that this amendment attempts to clarify what is meant by "Canadian industry"-the term used both in the recommendation and in the title of the bill. I suggest it is quite relevant to the considerations involved in this bill because it relates to the impact on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect, as pointed out in the recommendation and also in the title. The motion, I suggest, simply continues what is already in
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the bill, and attempts to clarify the manner in which the bill is to apply to Canadian industry and the Canadian economy.
I also submit that it falls entirely within the framework of the bill with respect to the expenditure of money because that is not affected at all by the amendment I have proposed. The $80 million figure is in the recommendation and in the bill, and I repeat that it is not affected by my motion.
In your introductory remarks Your Honour made reference to the fact that I incorporated the term "income support grant" in the amendment which I am proposing. I would like to suggest that this is entirely a technical feature of the proposal before us, and that the principle involved is entirely in accord with what is referred to in the bill and in the recommendation as "employment support grant."
In this particular area of the Canadian economy we are dealing largely with people who are self-employed, rather than with people working in an industry which involves an employer-employee type of structure. In both agriculture and fishing, employment is largely of the selfemployed nature. The term "income support grant" used here is primarily for the purposes of identification because of the recognition that the mechanism involved would have to be slightly different in applying the provisions of the bill to these two industries.
I suggest that the principle in the motion is identical to the principle in the bill, that it is attempting to find ways and means of supporting employment in agriculture and fishing in a manner parallel to what is proposed in the rest of the bill. I suggest that the amendment as proposed is consistent with the present structure of the bill, and I hope Your Honour gives it favourable consideration.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I doubt that there is very much point in pursuing the argument. I would find it very difficult to accept this amendment after having ruled out the one standing in the name of the hon. member for Annapolis Valley. In fact, I think there would be a revolution in the House if I were to take that attitude.
It seems to me that if there was good cause to reject the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Annapolis Valley there is even more cause-I mean procedurally-to reject the one proposed by the hon. member for Regina East (Mr. Burton) for exactly the same reason. The hon. member says that this is not a substantive motion, that it does not affect the financial initiative of the Crown. I regret that I cannot agree with him.
Clause 11 of the bill, as I read it, deals exclusively with the provision of employment support grants. Motion No. 2, standing in the name of the hon. member for Regina East (Mr. Burton) would provide for the payment to fishermen or farmers of an income support grant. I suggest to the hon. member that section No. 3, citation 246 of Beau-chesne's Fourth Edition, which I quoted a moment ago, applies with at least equal force to the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Regina East. His contention is that since the adoption of his amendment would not affect the ceiling of $80 million provided by the bill, his motion would be in order and not affect the financial
Employment Support Bill
initiative of the Crown. Of course, that is not quite right. The citation to which I referred is to the effect that an amendment infringes the financial initiative of the Crown not only if it increases the amount but also if it extends the objectives and purposes or relaxes the conditions and qualifications expressed in the communication by which the Crown has demanded or recommended a change.
For these reasons, and with regret, I must reach the same conclusion as the one which I reached in relation to the previous motion. If hon. members wish me to do so I would now be prepared to put for their consideration amendment No. 3, unless there are further procedural objections at this point. Having looked at the motion, it appears to be in order so far as the Chair is concerned.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, may I ask one question so that we know where we will stand for the day. Is motion No. 4 all right?


Mr. Speaker:: Of course, I am open to suggestions from hon. members but the motion appears to the Chair to be in order unless when it is called there is such strong objection to it that I am convinced it is out of order. I should say, in all honesty, having looked at motions Nos. 3 and 4, they appear to be acceptable procedurally. The hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald).


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Mr. Speaker, this is raised as a point of order and perhaps might be presented by way of a grievance or problem that has arisen out of the use of the new rules. It perhaps has been raised before, but it has come to my attention forcibly this afternoon.
We find ourselves in a situation where two hon. members have filed somewhat similar amendments with reference to a very important aspect of this legislation. Many hon. members who have had fair warning of one or both of these amendments may have considered that they would have been acceptable here this afternoon, and we would have had the opportunity to deliberate upon them in the normal way. Now, these two amendments have been set aside because they were, in the view of the Chair, unacceptable. We find ourselves prevented therefore, from bringing forward any other amendments at the report stage of this legislation. We are left then with only the reasoned amendment at any stage of the bill. This creates a number of problems in terms of full and sufficient deliberation of an important aspect of this legislation.
While I realize that it is impossible for Your Honour alone to review this aspect of the rules, because this matter has arisen again I would ask if there might not be some way to refer it to the Committee on Procedure and Organization so that hon. members are not placed in the position of moving into the report stage with the expectation of being able to deal in a substantive way with two amendments put before them, only to find that they are not procedurally acceptable and thus they are not able to deal in any way with the substance of the matters contained in them.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, on that point, may I just say that in anticipation of a negative ruling on motion No. 2 my friend the hon. member for Regina East (Mr. Burton) already has a third reading
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amendment which will deal with this issue when we get there.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: That does not meet this problem.


Mr. Speaker:: I hope, with the hon. member, that his third reading amendment will be in order.


Stanley Howard Knowles: It is.


Mr. Speaker:: The point made by the hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald) makes sense, especially in the case of the hon. member for Annapolis Valley (Mr. Nowlan) who did not even have his motion on the notice paper because of an error for which the Chair and perhaps the table take full responsibility.
I see the difficulty faced by hon. members coming before the House this afternoon with the expectation that they could debate a motion, which is No. 1 on the order paper. Unfortunately, there is not very much I can do about that except to admit that it does perhaps cause a difficulty or unfairness in some cases. It is of course, up to hon. members to consider and perhaps debate this problem when they meet at the very high echelon of House leaders. I gather that from time to time they meet to consider matters which are of concern to all of us. Perhaps this is one of the matters they might consider when they meet again. Having said this, I am now prepared to put the motion which stands in the name of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert). The hon. member for Edmonton West moves motion No. 3 as follows:
That Bill C-262, An Act to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect, be amended by adding the following immediately after Clause 18 at page 7:
"19 (1) In the event that Parliament shall then be sitting:
(a)	An Order in Council authorizing the issuance of regulations with respect to any assistance period or periods or other matter pursuant to section 18 consequent upon the taking by any country of such action as referred to in section 3 shall not be made until the proposed text has been laid before both Houses of Parliament by a member of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada and the making of the Order in Council has been approved by the affirmative resolution of both Houses of Parliament.
(b)	Where the proposed text of an Order in Council has been laid before the Senate and the House of Commons pursuant to subsection (1) (a) a motion in both the Senate and the House of Commons by a member of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada in accordance with the respective rules of each House, praying that the making of the Order in Council be approved, shall be debated in each House for not more than seven hours respectively after which time the question shall be decided in accordance with the rules of each House as the case may be.
(2) In the event that Parliament shall not then be sitting by reason of adjournment, prorogation or dissolution:
(a)	An Order in Council as hereinabove described may be made as deemed necessary subject to the said order being laid on the Table of both Houses within fifteen sitting days of the next ensuing session of Parliament and the making of the Order in Council has been confirmed by a resolution of Parliament within the first thirty sitting days.
(b)	Where an Order in Council has been laid before the Senate and the House of Commons pursuant to subsection (2) (a) confirmation of the said Order in Council shall be governed as in subsection (1) (b)."

and my renumbering subsequent clauses accordingly.-


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: I did not want to get into the previous discussion, Mr. Speaker, but I think the only way that these motions could be handled would be for them to appear on the order paper so that if Your Honour has any doubts those doubts may be discussed in public, in this chamber, and not left to discussion derriere les rideaux in somebody's office. I think it is better that they all come here on the order paper and that we deal with them publicly. I think that is the answer to the problem faced by my colleague from Eglinton-


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Egmont.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: -Egmont-I have transferred him from one metropolitan area to another metropolitan area.
I have proposed this motion for a very good reason. As we will see, the proposal is divided into two circumstances, one when Parliament is sitting and the other when Parliament is not sitting. This bill requires an order in council pursuant to section 18 in order to describe, as shown in that section, the assistance period or periods and the level or levels of unemployment that are to be maintained, the information to be submitted and presumably a description of the action to be taken by whatever country may be involved. This cheque, as has been admitted by both the minister and his parliamentary secretary, is a blank cheque in many ways. The bill has been refined, so does not specify any particular country nor does it limit the action being taken by the trading partners to a surcharge. There are valid reasons for this, perfectly valid reasons. I say that the order in council must come before Parliament to be subject to affirmative resolution, and debatable, as indicated in the amendment, for a period not exceeding seven hours in this House and then in the other place for a period not exceeding that time, subject to the rules of the other place.
It is provided that in the event Parliament shall not be sitting, either by reason of adjournment, prorogation or dissolution, then the order in council may be passed but within 15 days of the next ensuing session the order must be tabled and brought forward for debate leading to confirmation within 30 days.
I put this amendment forward in a rather more limited form before the Committee. It was discussed and there was criticism, the majority of criticism being concentrated around the question, "What if parliament is not sitting and you need rapid action?"I have provided for that in the second portion of my motion. Under the second portion of the motion the government would take action immediately. Actually, the government would be better off while Parliament is not sitting, because they could pass the order in council and everything would be effective immediately. When Parliament is sitting, the order in council must be brought forward and be subject to an affirmative resolution. I must point out, however, this does not mean that any positive action shall be deferred while the matter is being discussed and an affirmative resolution is being sought. The act provides that the appropriate period shall relate back to the date of the action taken by the foreign country. Therefore, that par-
September 27, 1971

ticular period described in clause 18(a), the assistance period, is determined by the date of the action of the foreign country, as in this particular case.
There is no clause in this bill which spells out, for instance, that the employment support arises out of the consequences of a diminution in employment due to the American government's surcharge. All this starts as of August 15, when the surcharge was imposed. We are now coming to the point at which the legislation is likely to be passed, and the regulations will be brought down which will govern the type of assistance that will be given. But all of these will relate back to the period starting on August 15. Nothing is lost. For instance, say, and I am taking a hypothetical example, that the common market, Japan, or some other country with which we have fairly extensive trading relations were, for its own purposes, to take some sort of action not necessarily involving a surcharge. That action could be a heavy import quota against Canada or some sort of other non-tariff barrier which has the effect of eliminating imports.
For instance, it could be required by common market countries that pulp and paper products must be carried from Canada to the port of destination in the common market country in a common market country bottom, in other words, in a ship belonging to one of those countries. This would cause very serious dislocation. These are the types of non-tariff barriers I mean. There could be a stipulation that financing shall be arranged through certain types of financial agencies in a particular sort of way, and the practice stipulated might be followed only by common market country financial institutions. In other words, it is like calling for tenders and then writing specifications in such a way that only one type of machinery can qualify. These are ways in which the actual nontariff barriers operate.
The bill contemplates something of that kind. The action taken by the other country will have to be described in the order in council and all I say is, Parliament must know about it. Parliament cannot be put in the position of forever writing blank cheques.


Some hon. Members:: September 27, 1971
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tions and I would have to qualify to no end everything that I would say in answering.
That gives the reasoning. If the government is going to take action on this bill, it has to pass an order in council, and that order in council must come before this House for an affirmative resolution when Parliament is sitting and, for confirmation when Parliament is not sitting. What kind of action? The minister does not know. Yet we are asked to give the government a blank cheque for 20 years to do something the government has not yet determined and, according to the bill, whatever decision is made does not have to come before this House. As for the Statutory Instruments Committee, it would meet only long after the event with limited powers of review; the government would not need to explain its action one iota. But that is the type of administration we are getting, and this is why I say that Parliament should have power to review-not as in Bill C-207, where the confirmation or the affirmative resolution is limited to the House of Commons-I think that was a terrible affront to the other House.
It is Parliament-and until the constitution of this country is changed the other House forms an integral part of Parliament-that approves something that is happening; it is not a law of the House of Commons, it is law of parliament, notwithstanding that some hon. members have inflated egos as to the relative importance of this chamber and believe that only the temporary majority as expressed by their presence here need confirm the acts of government. The constitution of this country says "Parliament". Parliament means the Senate, the House of Commons and the Crown. There has to be the consent of the Senate in matters of this kind. We are not a uni-cameral Parliament but unfortunately Bill C-207 was written in that way. So I have proposed that change.
I think my amendment is an improvement of the bill. From the viewpoint of Parliament and of this House of Commons it is certainly an improvement, because I defy any hon. member to tell me that he is in the habit of delving into orders in council. As a matter of fact, 95 per cent of the members of this House would not even know where to go for orders in council, or whether they can get copies. Most of them do not even get the Canada Gazette or, if they do, their copies go into the waste basket. This is why I say that in matters of this kind decisions of the government or recommendations or proposals of the government must come back to Parliament. Debate would not be expensive, but the government would be able to state its case and if there were to be opposition or criticism, that case could be stated. I hope members of this House will be so convinced that they will accept this amendment.


Mr. Max Saltsman (Waterloo):: I should like to support the amendment of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert). I think it is a very good amendment, particularly in the light of the experience we have had recently regarding economic policy in Canada. The happy assumption, perhaps the happy, incompetent, assumption that the people in Canada once had that all was well because the Liberals were in power has been badly shaken over the last number of years when they displayed an incomparable incompetence. The people could no

longer go on the basis that they could leave it to the Liberals, because they know what they are doing, since obviously they do not. This bill is about as good an illustration of how little they know about what is going on as any. It is an additional proof. With that kind of situation facing us I think it would be extremely dangerous for us to give this government, perhaps any government, the power to amend by order in council, to change the rules as they go along.
I say this with the greatest of seriousness. It is time we became somewhat more political about economic matters in Canada. I am sure that the argument the minister, or any other ministers of the Crown will raise, is that these matters arise very quickly and there must be freedom to act quickly in the best interests of the country. He would say they have been given a mandate by the electors and that therefore they have the power to behave in that particular way and that if this House were to accept the motion of the hon. member for Edmonton West many of those changes, many of those regulations would become political and subject to debate. I think that is exactly what should happen. The hon. member for Edmonton West has put in a seven-hour debate feature which means that debate would be limited. I think this is a worthwhile part of the motion and should satisfy some of the objections of the government that the debate might get too prolonged. I would say this is one motion which should meet with the approval of hon. members of this House.
I was interested in a remark made by the previous speaker when he paraphrased the minister who said that the purpose of the bill was to enable the government to react promptly. There is almost no evidence that this government has reacted promptly to crises in Canada, including the ones they have brought on themselves. For instance, we have had serious unemployment in this country for two years now. Where is the prompt reaction of the government? All we keep getting are assurances from the other side of the House that the situation is getting better, that the indices would start improving, only to be met with a new set of excuses when their promises do not materialize. Therefore, I think the change the hon. member seeks to make would have the additional effect of assuring that the government reacted promptly. After all, the party in power already has full power to act; certainly, they have all the power they need to do something about unemployment; they have all the power they need to do something about the United States surtax, to change the direction of our trade policy, yet despite the possession of all this power they have done very little about it.
The other question is that although they can take action and sometimes on the odd occasion they do act, there is little evidence to indicate they have done so in particularly wise fashion. Therefore, there is great advantage in ensuring that the action they are contemplating does come before the House for open discussion. It may be that debate sheds light on the subject under discussion. It may be there are occasions when the opposition does not materially assist in developing ideas. On the other hand, there are many occasions-I think most occasions-when the, opposition performs a very useful role in the sense that it brings ideas before the government. Whether the government accedes to those ideas at that moment or retreats to its little recesses to think about them is not
September 27, 1971

terribly important; the important thing is that these ideas are aired and, furthermore, that the public itself becomes involved in the debate, which in turn means there is feedback both to Parliament and to the government.
On the whole, the more we can do to ensure that government action is subject to political scrutiny and to make the government responsible to Parliament, the better off this country will be and the wiser will be the decisions emanating from this House. For a long time there was great concern that what was wrong in Canada was that we had a succession of minority governments; that all we had to do was to provide the Liberal party with a majority government and all would be well. The minority governments were pretty hair raising. I was here during the term of office of two of them and it was not easy for the government to govern; there was much criticism of it. But looking back on it now, those minority governments were infinitely better, more responsible and more productive than the majority government that sits on the government benches today. Therefore, I think the motion before the House is a good one. I am prepared to support it and I hope all hon. members will do likewise.


Norman Augustine Cafik: Mr. Speaker, with regard to the specific motion put before the house by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert), may I say I was present in the committee while this matter was being discussed. Although the hon. member has made an adjustment in the motion he has presented to the House today by recognizing that once in a while this House is not sitting and has offered a provision whereby under such circumstances this matter can be dealt with, I personally will not support the motion for a number of reasons.
The first reason is this. The argument put forward is that the opposition, indeed perhaps the whole House, would like to have an opportunity to discuss the content of the regulations before they are in fact implemented when the House is sitting and, in a case where the House is not sitting, at least to discuss them after the event. I suggest that any Member of this House has an opportunity to do this under the present rules. For example, when an order in council is made and tabled, the opposition in particular is quite free to use one of its many allotted days for the purpose of discussing it. If that is so, and if the opposition feels strongly about it, it can move a motion of non-confidence which may result in the end not only of the regulation but of the whole government.
If we were to allow this sort of motion, every regulation that is passed would have to be discussed in this chamber for seven hours, and I think we would be doing nothing else but debating such matters. We all know how urgent many of our problems are today. This Bill C-262 is designed to deal with an urgent situation brought on by the surcharge applied against goods entering the United States. I am sure that in a rapidly moving society like ours, this kind of thing may well happen again. Therefore, I think we should empower the government to deal with these matters effectively and speedily.
Frankly, I see no reason to bring the regulations themselves before the House in this specific way. We do have the bill before the House, but we do not have the regula-
Employment Support Bill
tions. We are presently considering the bill with a view to passing it. Why would we do so if we felt we needed the regulations first?
The purpose of this bill is spelled out, the reasons for it, as are the general provisions for handling given situations. I suggest that we follow the pattern of the past and allow these regulations to be put forward by order in council. Then, if members of the House wish to debate them, they are perfectly entitled to do so under a motion of non-confidence on an opposition day. This gives them and the rest of the Members of the House ample opportunity to discuss the pros and cons of the regulations which may well come forward if some other penalty is placed upon our exports by any other country in the world.
I also think that one of the virtues of this legislation is that it is not directed solely and entirely toward imposition of the U.S. surcharge. I do not think there is any doubt that the surcharge has given rise to it; I do not think that anyone denies that. But the legislation itself is designed to deal with this or any other kind of situation of similar nature brought upon our economy by any other country. If we were to pass this motion we would be saying that the bill is designed really only to deal with the U.S. surcharge, and I do not think that this is the bill's purpose. I want to speak to some other points later on third reading, but at the moment I wanted to express my reservations in connection with the motion before the House and to indicate that I will not support it.


Mr. G. H. Aiken (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, I should just like to say a word in reply to the comments of the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Cafik) in order to make a debate of this in some sense. The hon. member stated in his reasons for opposing this motion that he did not see why Parliament should be asked to pass upon every regulation which the government brought in by order in council. Although I would agree with him on that point, this is not an ordinary order in council. Neither is the bill an ordinary bill. This is a bill which can alter and affect international trading patterns. Our trading relations with other countries can be changed by straight order in council and without the direction of Parliament. It bypasses all the established practices and procedures that have been built up over the years regarding tariffs and trade with other countries. In general it is out of spirit with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade; it is out of spirit with world-wide trading patterns.
The hon. member stated that we were not here dealing just with the United States surtax on manufactured goods. I would argue that point with him. I say we are, that that is the only reason the bill is before us at the present time. Such a bill would not be before us if we were not confronted with the situation that has been created by the United States.


Jean-Luc Pepin: That is one occasion.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: The minister says that this is one occasion. I do not want to engage in polemics with him; I do not back down from what I have said, namely that if we were not faced with the imposition of the 10 per cent United States surcharge we would not have this bill before us, and we

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Employment Support Bill
would not be passing it as quickly as I hope we will. The fact is that we are faced with a situation that must be met.
I support 100 per cent the fear expressed by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) that the power given this government in this bill can go on and on for years into the future, to other governments and other ministers, thus increasing the stranglehold that government in general is gaining over Parliament. The benefit of this motion is that it makes sure this temporary bill, to meet an immediate situation, does not become a permanent tool of the government, free of Parliament, to direct, alter and control international trade policies and tariffs to the benefit of certain elements of Canadian production. At this time under these circumstances we know why the bill is being passed, and we know in whose favour it runs. This is not a general support bill as the minister has stated, otherwise the government would have accepted motions Nos. 1 and 2 on the order paper, or it would have made provision in the bill to cover the situations to which they were directed. If it were intended to be a general bill benefiting Canadians who export, this would have been the case.
That is not what this bill is. It is directed toward a certain sector of the Canadian economy. While it meets an immediate situation, it could most certainly be used in the future to redirect the whole system of foreign trade and tariffs which has been set up over many years of negotiation. I do not think anyone should object to Parliament being insistent in this case about looking into other situations at different times in the future.
From where will the next threat to Canadian industry arise? Will the next threat come from the European economic community? If it does would we in this House accept, without any debate or discussion, a government move to deal with that situation by way of order in council, without any reference to Parliament and without any need for discussion? That is an entirely different situation from the one we are discussing today. It is in fact in the nature of more than a blank cheque to pay money, it is a blanket authorization to alter trade patterns with the whole world. There could be some secret orders in council under this bill which would be very difficult to locate. Undoubtedly they would come to light as they began to be employed, but by that time Parliament would be met with a fait accompli and, in fact, would be powerless to change the situation.
At this time, with the proposed orders in council and regulations which have been outlined to us, the bill is not only acceptable, it is urgent. The minister has advised the country of the direction of this bill and the direction of current orders in council and regulations. We know what we are talking about if we pass the bill today and when we contemplate immediate orders in council. In that regard, it is urgent.
Let me refer particularly to the forest products industry where some relief is essential to maintaining employment in many of these plants. Forest products plants operate in large part on very narrow margins, relying on volume to maintain operation, staff and employment, as well as the provision of foreign dollars for Canada. These plants have just recovered from a terrible set-back as a result of
(Mr. Aiken.]
the value of the dollar rising in relation to the U.S. dollar. A year ago our manufacturers who export had an advantage of roughly 7 per cent when the exports were paid for in U.S. funds.
Within the last few months this rate has hovered around one and one half per cent, and today I am told that the exchange rate is less than one-half of one per cent. This involves a range of 7 per cent, which is more than the margin of profit in many forest products manufacturing industries. In one way or another, by laying people off, by cutting profits and by short-cutting systems, the manufacturers have managed to meet the immediate situation and stay alive. Now, they are being met with another difficult situation. In many cases they are faced with further tariffs of from 8 per cent to 10 per cent. This bill is essential to those who have survived in order that they may continue to make deals with United States buyers, maintain employment in their plants and draw U.S. currency to assist in maintaining our balance of payments. This is a very necessary objective.
In this situation, and with the knowledge that several plants in my region are struggling to maintain themselves in business, keep their staffs going and their workers employed, I am glad this bill is before us and I am prepared to see it approved quickly. But we are faced with this long-range problem referred to in the motion. I think in all honesty the minister should consider this motion and accept it. I see nothing wrong with it. It is not limiting the government's authority or power at this moment, and it certainly does not limit further orders in council. It does permit Parliament to consider and debate a new situation. The only reason for refusing this would be that the government rejects the efforts of Parliament when it attempts to keep control in some way over the type of order in council which could alter our trade pattern and tariff relations with other countries.
I should think the minister would welcome this motion. He has not said yet that he does not, but I hope he will consider it seriously. I would feel very much better about the bill if I knew we were not sacrificing a principle in our anxiety to help those people who have been so severely damaged by a series of events over the past year or two.
In conclusion, I wish to say that under the present government Canada has adopted a very wobbly attitude in its relationship with the United States, in its attitude toward Canadian manufacturers, in its attitude in respect of United States capital coming into Canada and in its political attitude toward the United States. I think the people of the United States and the United States President particularly must have some real doubt about where our government is leading us. We in this House have great doubt about what our relations are with other countries in so many matters. In this particular situation, I rather expect the United States government must be saying to itself that it cannot see any reason on earth to give Canadians a break because our government has indicated no sympathy for what they are doing in the world. Therefore, I believe we must ask ourselves where we are going, not only in respect of the United STates but in respect of various other countries of the world who are left with great uncertainty on where this country stands in its
September 27, 1971

political relationships, its political alliances and, by definition, in its trade patterns.
For all these reasons I support the motion and hope we can have a vote on it so that we can get it out of the way as quickly as possible and proceed with the bill. I hope the minister will consider this motion and let it go through.


Mr. Mark MacGuigan (Windsor-Walkerville):: Mr. Speaker, because of the importance of the subject which has been brought to our attention by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) in this proposed motion, I should like to direct a few comments to it. I think I may say I agree with the hon. member opposite that orders in council which are required in respect of statutory instruments in general should be open to debate in this Parliament. Indeed, that was one of the principal recommendations of the Special Committee on Statutory Instruments which reported earlier to this Parliament, recommendations which indeed were accepted by the government. Like other members of the House, I am anxiously awaiting introduction by the government of changes in the rules which will enable us to have a permanent scrutiny committee either of this House, of the Senate, or of both Houses together, which would enable Parliament, through an agreed on means, to find an efficient way to deal with problems of this kind.
As I say I agree with what I believe is the intention of the hon. member for Edmonton West, but I have two reasons other than those offered by the hon. member for Perry Sound-Muskoka (Mr. Aiken) for suggesting I do not agree with this motion as it appears here. First of all, I believe the solution ought to be a general solution and not one we attempt to work out on a statute by statute basis. Now we have reached the point of having a recommendation from the committee on this point, and the government has given its acceptance to that, I hope we can expect changes to the rules to be introduced in this Parliament to bring about a scrutiny committee. I would much prefer to await the introduction of those changes so that we would have a generally satisfactory system of achieving this purpose.
Secondly, I would not in any event be very happy with the requirement of an affirmative resolution. The general scheme I would envisage is rather the opposite. Parliament would have the right to negative a statutory instrument which the government had made but in very few, if any, cases should Parliament have the right to pass on a resolution before it was made. I am sorry-not a resolution but rather the passing of a statutory instrument before it is made.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the hon. member a question.


Mark R. MacGuigan: Yes.


Gordon Harvey Aiken: I am wondering how he could perceive of Parliament passing on an Order in Council before it was promulgated by the government.


Mark R. MacGuigan: I was not thinking about an Order in Council before it was promulgated by the government. As I understand this amendment, before the affirmative resolution by both Houses is promulgated the Order in Council would not take effect. My proposal would be just the
Employment Support Bill
reverse. Parliament should have the right to negative generally. In cases where a scrutiny committee would report that a statutory instrument was not acceptable or was a very unusual departure from the ordinary method of procedure, if Parliament were to have a right of recourse it should be a right to negative what the government has done rather than stymie the whole administrative process by requiring approval in advance. To require approval in advance really eliminates the largest benefit of the whole regulation making process because one of the very important purposes of making regulations by the executive is to allow not only the development of greater expertise on the part of those making the regulations but also to enable this Parliament to free itself from the encumbrance of having to pass statutory instruments which are being made.
I realize the hon. member opposite will suggest this is a special case and that as such perhaps there should be an exception, but I do not believe there should be a special case here. I believe this should be treated on the same basis as other statutory instruments, and I hope we will have a general policy forthcoming from the government in explicit terms on this question.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I had intended to intervene briefly in any event, but the hon. member who has just resumed his seat has made it easier and more palliative for me to say what I intended to say. The hon. member of course was the chairman of the special committee appointed to inquire into the matter of statutory instruments and what should be done about them. This was a very good comittee. It came up with a number of very useful recommendations. I must say, however, that when I look at the order paper I find item No. 96 to which the hon. member referred. It reads:
That Standing Order 65 (3) be amended by adding thereto the following:
"(c) On Regulations and other Statutory Instruments, to act as members on the part of this House on the Joint Committee of both Houses established for the purpose of reviewing and scrutinizing statutory instruments standing permanently referred thereto by section 26 of the Statutory Instruments Act, to consist of 12 members;"
This motion stands on the order paper because of the persistence of myself and other hon. members-I give credit to some members on the other side-in making sure that something is done about the Statutory Instruments Act. We have the act, but there has to be a useful, vigilant and ingenious committee. In this case, I have no objection to a committee of both Houses. My hon. friends to my left might take exception to this. It may, of course, be that we should have a committee of this House alone, but it is much better to have a committee of both Houses than no committee at all. When are we to get this new standing committee? I asked about the business of the House not so long ago and the intimation by the government House leader at that time was that the House would deal with the matters on the order paper in respect of which bills had reached the report stage.
This does not preclude the possibility of this particular committee being established. But there is no intimation of that from the government House leader, and having in

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Employment Support Bill
mind the disorganization and the incapacity of this government to deal with its legislative program, its utter incompetence and failure to bring forward matters which are so urgently required, I think I am entitled to be a pessimist about it. If the government House leader or anyone in authority on the government side would stand up and say that this matter will be brought up for consideration, I am quite sure that on this side of the House- certainly speaking for this party-we would be prepared to agree to exceedingly limited debate. I hope that my friends on my left, who are equally involved in this particular issue, are prepared to see a scrutiny committee established.
If we had a reasonable hope of getting a scrutiny committee sometime before the session is over, I would go along with the hon. member. But I am just not able to thrust this government, surprising as the statement may sound coming from me. Within the twenty minutes which are allowed to me I would not be able to chronicle even one twentieth of all the reasons that I cannot trust this government-


Jean-Luc Pepin: Dispense.


Gerald William Baldwin: It is sufficient on this issue to say that the failure of the government, despite the pressing which they have had from this side, despite the requests, the pleas and almost the prayers, to get this scrutiny committee established, is evident. If we had that committee, the motion of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert), a very good motion, would not be necessary.
So I say to my friend that I accept what he says in principle, but as to ways and means, if he were honest he would say to me that he, too, has very grave doubts about when this particular committee will be established. It has been a long, tortuous process stretching back into years of trying to bring ourselves up to date with other modern legislative assemblies and secure some means of dealing with the very sort of thing which the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Pepin) proposes. This, I think, makes us sit very low on the totem pole so far as issues of this kind are concerned. Perhaps before this debate is over the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) may speak on the matter. I am not blaming him for not being here today. If I were sitting in the cabinet I would stay away from my place also, Mr. Speaker.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh.


Gerald William Baldwin: To be part of a law breaking team must break the heart of the Minister of Justice. I am sure that this must concern him, and this is one of the reasons he is not here today. But if before the debate is concluded, the Minister of Justice were to stand up in his place and say "I give my undertaking on behalf of the government that the debate on item No. 96 to establish a scrutiny committee will be commenced, with a reasonable undertaking from the opposition that debating time would be limited to a speech from each party", I think that would be acceptable. The committee would then be established before this debate has been completed and we would rest a lot easier. The very valid reason offered by the hon. member for Edmonton West would then be dissolved.
Before I leave this particular aspect, I should like to say also that I disagree with the suggestion that these Orders in Council should be the subject of a negative resolution rather than an affirmative resolution. The problems which face the opposition and this Parliament of securing an opportunity, a time and a place to debate, place too great a handicap upon us and, hopefully, any member on the government side who might be prepared to stiffen his backbone and say that he does not like what is being done, so is prepared to demand that this particular issue come forward by an affirmative resolution.
There is an obvious difficulty-and I made this case at the time we were debating the government organization bill C-207-which faces an opposition party and a private member in securing the ways and means in the House to debate a negative resolution. Do we have to wait until we have an opposition day? Do we have to put it in the form of a private member's motion? I do not need to illustrate to Your Honour the many pitfalls and difficulties which face us. If, on the other hand, the government cannot secure the implementation of its order in council until it is approved by an affirmative resolution, then the minister and hon. members on his side will be vigilant, alert and very prompt in bringing the order in council before Parliament and securing its approval. I am sure that is what prompted the hon. member for Edmonton West to suggest an affirmative resolution. For these reasons-and there are many others but I will limit myself to these two since the others have been well expressed by the mover of the motion and other hon. members-I say we should support the amendment.
There is another aspect, however, and that is the opportunities which this motion would provide for securing a greater degree of knowledge as to the basis behind the particular order in council which the government might see fit to bring forward. From time to time I have described this government as a very secretive government which hides behind orders in council and behind its refusal to come into the House and answer honestly, faithfully and truthfully questions which are asked. We have had an example of that today. Every day in the House my friend, the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Stanfield) and other members of this party have pressed the minister and the Prime Minister on the particular issue of the situation of Canadian trade with the United States. We have received non-answers. We have been told that there are various contingency plans which this government has and that if the situation arises they will produce them like a rabbit out of a hat. They will tell us what they will do at the appropriate time but we should be good boys for the time being, and there is no reason why they should tell us what they are going to do or what plans they have afoot. This causes some of us to suspect that they do not have any plans afoot and they do not know what they are doing. I may be wrong. I admire the smiling amiability of the minister, although I am afraid I must limit my admiration to that. However, that is a great gift. If any member of this government can smile at the present time, it is a tremendous thing. But it is this refusal to give us facts and information with regard to the particular problem which makes it so essential for the motion proposed by the hon. member for Edmonton West to be accepted.

September 27, 1971

I have here the last report of the Economic Council of Canada "Design for Decision-Making". One of the strongest and most useful recommendations contained in that report appears on page 231, and I quote part of it. I concur in it, and I offer it as an additional reason to hon. members opposite who may see the light and support this motion. It reads:
In chapter 5, we emphasized the need for a more open approach by all governments, and public boards and agencies-
Which is what we will have here, a public board and agency, particularly public because it will be dominated by appointees of the government.
-particularly in relation to information about government policy issues. This point was made by the Task Force on Government Information which asked for new government policies reflecting "the right of Canadians to full, objective and timely information and the obligation of the State to provide such information about its programs and policies-"
On this particular issue, Mr. Speaker, in relation to this bill the government waffles and procrastinates in the House, and waffles and procrastinates outside the House. Representatives of the media have no more success than we have in getting the minister, the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) or any member of the government to tell us what they are going to do, how they are going to do it, and why.
The need for a means by which this information can be secured is essential to the effective operation of this bill. The hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) very ingeniously has fashioned at least one means of securing that information. I continue with the quotation from the Economic Council Report:
One of the important considerations reinforcing "the right of the people to know"-
I would like that to be engraven on the hearts of the members opposite.
-is that many Canadians, singly and in groups, are making it clear that they want to play a larger, more active and direct role in influencing the decisions made by their governments.
If the minister were to adopt the very useful and very valid motion put forward by the hon. member for Edmonton West for the establishment of this means of securing information, this would be a way by which Canadians, acting through their representatives in this House, would be able to play a larger and more direct role in influencing the decisions made by their government with regard to the difficulties of our trading community in Canada brought about as a result of the action which has been initiated in the United States.
As governments at all levels become increasingly sensitive and responsive to this development in the democratic process, the need for more factual and analytical information as a basis for constructive and relevant public comment becomes more urgent. In past years, the timely publication of commission and task force reports, the use of "White Papers", and studies containing factual and analytical appraisals of alternative policy options have contributed to the quality of discussion about public policy. Much more can be done, however, at every level of government to use published official documents.
I ask Your Honour to cast your mind ahead to what would happen if the motion proposed by my hon. friend were accepted. There would be an inquiry in this House,
Employment Support Bill
and the government would have to initiate a debate in the House. The onus would be upon the government, as it always must be, to justify the passage of the order in council in question. In order to do that it is essential that it should have adequate public support. The government would then be compelled to release the facts and information in order to secure that form of support. Without this the government operates secretively, in darkest holes. No knowledge is made available until the matter has become a fait accompli. I suggest that that is not good enough in this day and age.
I will now conclude because I understand there are many other hon. members who wish to speak. I am also sure that the minister will want to make a defence, although he will have great trouble doing so. It will take him at least the amount of time allotted to him to start a defence. Finally, I quote the last paragraph in the recommendations from the Economic Council Report:
The Task Force discussed practices in a number of countries. They did not, and we do not wish to, make specific legislative recommendations in this regard. We would, however, endorse their conclusion that "Canada must devise some federal-provincial means to guarantee that the citizens get unvarnished facts about the activities of their governments (and).. . clarify rules for fast and efficient access to government information." This is clearly a difficult and delicate subject, but one to which governments must give increased attention. We therefore recommend:
-that governments proceed as quickly as is prudently possible to clarify the rights (and limitations) of the public to access to government information, and to ensure that bureaucratic or political constraints do not operate so as to inhibit such access.
I have been after the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner). I have been after the Prime Minister. I have made a lot of suggestions, and I even placed before the House a private member's public bill, based to some extent upon the Right to Information Bill of the United States, and based to some extent on the practice in effect in Sweden and other European countries. I admit that it is not perfect. Not being a member of the government I am prepared to admit imperfections, and I am perfectly prepared to see the bill improved. But it is a start.
It is about time that, with respect to matters of this kind and the whole gamut of government activities, the public was told what is happening. The secrecy, the hiding from people, the refusal to divulge information all are making people cynical and suspicious about the whole processes of government. It is for that reason, as well as the others I have advanced, that I would urge hon. members opposite to support this particular motion standing in the name of the hon. member for Edmonton West.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, one of the conditions for a good debate is that there should be good arguments on both sides. I am not willing to say that the arguments presented by the opposition this afternoon were not responsible ones. As a matter of fact, members of the opposition have a great advantage over me in that they can afford to be more eloquent, more passionate, being on the side of Caesar's wife. I, too, would prefer to be on the side of Caesar's wife rather than to be on Caesar's side.
This motion has given the opposition a nice occasion to talk about the sanctity of the law, the rights of Parliament, and the dangers of strong government. It also gave them a chance even to talk about the government's arro-

September 27, 1971
Employment Support Bill
gance, as if all governments in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and everywhere in the world were not arrogant. When the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Stanfield) was the prime minister of Nova Scotia there were a few people who thought he was arrogant.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Oh, not very many.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, every government is subject to being called secretive, to being called arrogant because the pretense of being able to run a country is the very essence of arrogance. Mr. Speaker, give the hon. member for Waterloo (Mr. Saltsman) a chance and he will even make a case for minority government. One can make any case if one is as eloquent as the hon. member for Waterloo.
The motion suggested by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) would impose an obligation on the government to obtain the anticipatory consent of parliament to the text of any regulations before they were proclaimed. The members talked about the government asking in this bill for a blank cheque. In some ways, Mr. Speaker, each piece of legislation is a blank cheque-


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Oh no.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Yes it is, in the sense-


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Some are blanker than others.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Yes, some are blanker than others indeed, but I mean in the sense that it gives the right to the government to do whatever is approved in the law. So, it is a blank cheque to do what is permissible, not a blank cheque to do anything.


Gerald William Baldwin: Then, how about the Temporary Wheat Reserves Act?


Jean-Luc Pepin: If hon. members are not pleased with what the government is going to do about Bill C-262, they can vote against it. That is one possible way. And, as the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Cafik) said, they can criticize the government, ask questions, and bring down the government on a vote of non-confidence. There is more than one way to skin a minister, and more than one way to skin a government, and all these ways are available to the opposition. If they have not made good use of these means, that is their problem. It shows they are a poor opposition, but they should not accuse the system for not giving them the right to do what they should be doing.
This bill, from any point of view, is not different from all other bills. Somebody says that it was brought on the occasion of the surcharge. I will not deny that but this bill is of a permanent nature. It comes in to fill a hole, to cover a need for possible government action.
The hon. member for Parry Sound-Muskoka (Mr. Aiken) indicated a number of situations that might arise. Indeed, a number of situations may. The hon. member for Edmonton West added to the list.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: But you have to come and tell us about it. Why are you doing it?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Can all situations be anticipated? Wfry would reference to the House not be requested for any other bill? Sending a man to prison for the rest of his life is a pretty dramatic gesture, too. Why would all life sentences under the criminal law not have to be approved by Parliament? Of course, I am exaggerating here to prove my point.
The hon. member for Edmonton West comes from Alberta. A number of decisions taken by the National Energy Board, for example, are subject to orders in council by the government with respect to the export of gas to the United States and with respect to the construction of oil pipelines. These are pretty important decisions. They can affect the whole economy of Alberta, the whole economy of Canada, and yet there is no obligation in the National Energy Board Act to bring this order in council back to the House for debate and approval by resolution.


Gerald William Baldwin: There will be when this motion on the order paper is passed.


Jean-Luc Pepin: On a post facto basis, not on an anticipatory basis.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: On this particular example, would the hon. minister permit a question, Mr. Speaker?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Yes.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Does the minister know that there is not one cubic foot of gas that can be exported from Canada under a permit from the National Energy Board without permission first having been obtained from the Oil and Gas Conservation Board of Alberta which issues the original permit and looks after the province's rights in the first instance?


Jean-Luc Pepin: No, on the contrary, the government would like to bring back to the House any new application of Bill C-262 for authorization by the House. What I am saying is simply that there is no such obligation in the National Energy Board Act and that decisions taken under that Act are as important as decisions taken under Bill C-262.
The member postulates that the government is going to be crooked, that the government is going to be dishonest, that the government is going to be secretive, that the government is going to be all these awful things. I suggest, Mr. Speaker, that this is possibly a good debating point for opposition parties but this is not the basis on which government is conducted.


Gerald William Baldwin: Have you not read the Statutory Instruments Act? Do you not know what that does to governments?


Jean-Luc Pepin: My main point is really that decisions to bring in situations under this bill are indeed important. I am not saying anything contrary to that. They will be very important. What I am saying is that there are 10, 15, 20, 25 other bills where orders in council are important also that do not anticipate the procedure recommended in the motion procedure. I do find all kinds of things under the Import Export Permit Act if I were a crook but I am not doing them because these things are not done in a democratic parliamentary system. This would be against the purpose of the bill as expressed at one time in the past by
September 27, 1971

the Canadian Parliament. If I were to do that I would expect to be chastised publicly in the House and on television by the hon. member for Edmonton West, and I would know that my political future would come to an end because of that accusation. I know too that I would be embarrassing the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau)-and that is the last thing I would like to do.
Under the textile bill I could do a number of unorthodox things, too. Then there is the Canada Shipping Act and the Fisheries Act. All those acts could be used wrongly if ministers were so inclined. The point I am making and it was made already by a number of people is that if we are to change the methods by which orders in council are handled it should be done in some other way and not by the employment support bill.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: This is a specious argument.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The hon. Leader of the Opposition.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I must admit that I learned something from what the minister said. I finally get the explanation of the government's behaviour under the temporary wheat reserves legislation. The minister just told us that in his view, and I suppose it is a view shared by his colleagues in the government, all legislation is a blank cheque.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Robert Lorne Stanfield: That is what he said, every piece of legislation is a blank cheque. That is what the minister said.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Under the law. To do what is provided under the law. If you are going to quote me, quote me properly.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: I do not want to misquote the hon. minister. I was very surprised by what he said.


Gerald William Baldwin: I was not.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: I must admit that it threw a little light on the behaviour of the government when he said that every statute and every law is a blank cheque. How do you interpret that?


Jean-Luc Pepin: I didn't say that.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: What did the minister say, Mr. Speaker?


Jean-Luc Pepin: I said, and I will even read my own words-I am sure I did not say anything different-that, "Every bill is a blank cheque to do what the bill allows the government to do".


An hon. Member:: That is different?


Gerald William Baldwin: It is worse.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, "Every bill is a blank cheque". What the minister says has not changed anything a bit because the government has interpreted how it proposes to go about accomplishing the purpose of the Temporary Wheat Reserves Act and it chooses to feel it has a blank cheque to choose its own methods. We finally have an explanation of its extraordinary behaviour.
Employment Support Bill
I want to repudiate as strongly as I can the philosophy expressed by the minister today, that every bill involves a blank cheque to the minister or the government to carry out the purpose of the bill. This obviously is an absurd and very dangerous doctrine for a minister to put forward.


Jean-Luc Pepin: If I had said it.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Just checking the minister as he now put it-I suspect he reads Hansard and he will find it was a considerably narrower statement that he made before. But taking the statement that every bill provides a blank cheque to the minister and the government as to the manner in which to carry out the bill-


Jean-Luc Pepin: To do what the law says.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: To do what the bill says-a blank cheque. I repudiate that. I regret very much that a minister of the government of Canada finds it possible to stand up in the House of Commons and make a statement such as that.


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


An hon. Member:: There are lots of things you can have a look at.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: There are lots of things we can have a look at, including this government, and you need a pretty strong stomach to do it, too.
As to the amount of discretion involved in legislation, of course it varies from bill to bill. There is no question about that. The minister dragged in some red herrings. He dragged in the National Energy Board suggesting that, reductio ad absurdum-what an argument-if you are going to put forward the kind of argument the hon. member for Edmonton West put forward, then you are going to say that all decisions by the National Energy Board are going to have this particular difficulty. This is about as irrelevant to the discussion as anything one could mention. No one is attempting to suggest that this House should pass judgment on every decision of the National Energy Board or every decision of the Canadian Transport Commission. We are talking about regulations of the Governor in Council under a very vague and general piece of legislation. I am sure the minister would agree that this motion has nothing to do with proceedings before the National Energy Board. It has nothing to do with whether a minister tries to be crooked or not. It has nothing to do with the personal behaviour or ethics of the minister. The fact is that this is a very wide ranging bill in terms of the discretion of the minister. Frankly, it has shocked me that we should contemplate passing a statute of such wide and sweeping purposes. Perhaps its purposes are not so sweeping. I am shocked that we should contemplate passage of a bill which provides so little in the way of direction and so much in the way of discretion to the government.
I am not suggesting that it is possible or practical for the minister to present to the House a bill that is more precise, and that can effectively narrow the discretion required in the regulations if the bill is to accomplish its purpose. That is not the point I am making. If this bill is to stay on

September 27, 1971
Employment Support Bill
the statute books in its present form it will enable this government or, on some future occasion, other governments of a different nature, perhaps, to apply the expenditure of public funds to measures affecting individual industries, and to do so, virtually, without any direction. Frankly, I see no justification for leaving such a statute in its present form on the statute books, a statute, involving as this does, such wide ranging discretion on the part of the government.
With all due respect to the minister, and the minister is a man whom, in general, I respect, his arguments respecting the National Energy Board have nothing to do with the case. It is nonsense for anyone to stand here and simply say that a measure like this is justified because every bill gives the government a blank cheque to carry out the purposes of that bill. If the bill is to be placed on the statute books and applied in future to some new situation, there is every reason, surely, for the government to be required to bring its regulations or its orders in council before the House and seek approval.
Frankly, I find it difficult to accept legislation of such general nature as this legislation. I accept the purpose of the bill. I accept the urgency with which the bill is required. In all seriousness, Mr. Speaker, this is a bill involving wide discretion. It is a bill that should not stay on the statute books indefinitely without the kind of requirement proposed by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert). I most urgently ask the minister to reconsider his position and agree that it is only appropriate that the hon. member's amendment be accepted and reassure the House, or hon. members on this side of the House at least, that this government in future or any future government when attempting to use this bill to meet some new kind of situation will at least need to get the approval of the House before putting into effect regulations which would involve not only the expenditure of public funds but which might very well affect very substantially industries and employment in this country.


John Stratford Burton: Mr. Speaker, I had not intended taking part in the debate on this motion. After listening to the remarks of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Pepin), I felt that I should say a few words. I felt that some of the minister's remarks raised some of the concerns regarding the amendment we have before us as well as other, similar amendments and moves which have been made in the House from time to time.
The minister, as I understood him, suggested that each bill gives the government a blank cheque to do whatever the bill allows. If I interpreted the minister's remarks correctly it seems to me that, when using the word "allows", he was implying that there is some degree of discretionary authority. I quite agree that discretion is given to the minister in the bill now before us and in other legislation. There are, certainly, many laws which involve the giving of powers of discretion to the government. These permit the government to take actions or not to take certain actions, or to decide on a wide range of possibilities. It is quite clear that, in many instances, that is the case.
I think it must also be pointed out that in some acts which are the law of this country there is a mandatory requirement. No discretionary authority is given. Those

acts say that the minister or the government "shall" do such and such. That is the case in the Temporary Wheat Reserves Act which has been discussed in this chamber many times in recent weeks. No discretionary authority whatever is given. Its language is mandatory. Regardless of what bill may be before Parliament, or what the government may have proposed, or of the merits or demerits of one or other proposal that may be before Parliament at any one time, that act is mandatory in effect. Certain laws spell out most explicitly what the government must do until such time as the act is repealed. Thus it seems to me that statements such as those we heard the minister making just now raise some of the concerns which have been expressed by hon. members from time to time.
Speaking on this bill, I do not argue that the point that any piece of legislation such as this, regardless of its merits or demerits, adequacies or inadequacies, must have in it some flexibility. There must be some area of discretion provided to the minister. I think that has been acknowledged and recognized. I think it has also been recognized that the guts of this bill really involve, to a great extent, the regulations which are passed within the framework of the bill itself. Thus hon. members, and particularly hon. members on the opposition side of the House, have from time to time requested that the regulations or the draft of the regulations be made available to hon. members of this House and, particularly, to the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs which was studying this bill. Actually, the minister recognized the point by tabling before the committee the draft of the regulations, as they had been prepared up to that point in time. Those draft regulations were discussed by the committee, and properly so. My saying this does not involve any judgment on my part or anybody else's part regarding their adequacy or inadequacy. They were discussed, and validly so, because it would have been impossible to discuss this piece of legislation adequately without looking at the regulations the government had in mind. Thus, it seems to me that the type of amendment we have before us is simply an extension of the government's recognition that we had to have some discussion of the regulations if we were to consider this piece of legislation fully and properly.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


Mr. Speaker:: Order. It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 40, to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Lambert)- Finance-Quebec-Alleged unfair treatment with regard to student loans; the hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald)-Pollution-Threat from sunken "Irving Whale" and "Irving Lake"-Request for progress report on removal; the hon. member for Selkirk (Mr. Rowland)- Taxation-Estate and gift tax proposals-Response to provincial requests for delay.
September 27, 1971



EMPLOYMENT SUPPORT BILL


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of Bill C-262, to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect, as reported (with amendments) from the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs, and the amendment thereto of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert).
Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I confess that the remarks of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Pepin) have prompted me to say a few words in this debate before the House reaches a decision on the motion before us. In doing so, I should like to make it clear that I believe the House should adopt the motion in the name of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert).
The main argument used by the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce seems to be this: We have power under scores and scores of acts to do what we want to do by Order in Council. Why change it? Why limit us?


Jean-Luc Pepin: I did not say that.


Stanley Howard Knowles: The minister says he did not say that. He did not use those words, but that was the idea he was putting forward-that the government operates on the basis of areas of permission which are given to it by Order in Council. He does not need to tell us that-we know it. We know this is the way in which things are run around here. But one of the realizations which have been dawning on people lately is that maybe this power should be limited. This realization has come not only among members on this side of the House; there have been references to it on the government side.
I would remind the minister that earlier this session we passed Bill C-182, known as the Statutory Instruments Act. When that bill was before the House, the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) made much of the desire of the government to involve Parliament more intimately in the details of legislation and in the approval of statutory instruments. This bill did, of course, provide for a special committee to be set up, and there is a motion on the order paper that a certain committee should be established on a permanent basis to review statutory instruments after they have been put into effect. But there was also in Bill C-182, clause 28(a) which reads in part as follows:
(1) In every act,
(a) the expression "subject to affirmative resolution of Parliament", when used in relation to any regulation, means that such regulation shall be laid before Parliament within 15 days after it is made or, if Parliament is not then sitting, on any of the first 15 days next thereafter that Parliament is sitting, and shall not come into force unless and until it is affirmed by the resolution of both Houses of Parliament, introduced and passed in accordance with the rules of both Houses-
Employment Support Bill
I did not draft that; the hon. member for Edmonton West did not draft it. This is a piece of government legislation. The government placed its imprimatur on the idea that there are occasions when a regulation or Order in Council ought not to go into effect until there has been an affirmative resolution of the House of Commons. It is fine to hear this nice idea preached to us by the government. But when will the government begin to practise it? Is this something simply put in a book so we can be told it is there, or will it become of practical application?
There is a version of that provision right in Bill C-207, put there after a delay of some considerable time, regarding the establishment of ministries of state. At least there is recognition that there are certain things which the government cannot really do before coming back to Parliament and attaining affirmative approval. I could not stand here and say that this should apply to every last regulation involved in the processes of government; Parliament would be snowed under completely if that were the case. But, surely, if we are to rely at all on the good faith of a government which gave us the clause I read from Bill C-182, there must be some occasions when a matter is of such importance that it ought to come before Parliament before it is implemented.
If I were to say to the minister that every regulation or order should be anticipated by Parliament, he would probably say I was crazy, and he would be right. But I do say there are important things which should be handled in this way, and this is one of them. I would say that the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce, out of his desire to be known as a progressive type, should welcome the application of the principle which was written into Bill C-182 to his own legislation.
I think it was a good idea which was laid before the House this afternoon in the name of the hon. member for Edmonton West. We have had a good and useful debate, and I believe the government would be taking a correct step by accepting it.


Mr. Speaker:: The House has heard the motion in the name of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert). All those in favour will please say aye.


Some hon. Members:: Aye.


Mr. Speaker:: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


Mr. Speaker:: In my opinion the nays have it.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: On division.
Motion (Mr. Lambert, Edmonton West) negatived.


Mr. Speaker:: The House will now proceed to consideration of motion No. 4, in the name of the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent), as follows:
That Bill C-262, an act to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect, be amended by adding the following immediately after line 7 at page 8:
"21. (1) The minister shall within fifteen days after the end of each month prepare a report on the amount of each grant, the levels of employment and production at the beginning and at the end of the assistance period at the plant and such report shall be

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Employment Support Bill
laid before Parliament forthwith upon the completion thereof or, if Parliament is not then sitting, on any of the first fifteen days next thereafter that Parliament is sitting."
and by renumbering clause 21 at line 8 as subclause 2 of clause 21.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker,
I should like to deal, as is not entirely the practice in the House, rather narrowly with the specific amendment we have before us.


An hon. Member:: Amazing.


John Edward Broadbent: I should like to establish that the real title or description of this bill should be not what it presently is, namely, "an act to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect", but "a corporate welfare assistance act."


Stanley Howard Knowles: Carried.


An hon. Member:: Will you vote against it?


John Edward Broadbent: Indeed, as will other members of the New Democratic Party. This has been made clear at every stage of the debate on this legislation.


Mr. Prud'homme:: How much did you pay for your foreign car?


John Edward Broadbent: As is not infrequently the case, the hon. member's information is incorrect. I am the proud owner of a Pontiac made in this country.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


John Edward Broadbent: We have here a bill, as I hope to make clear in my comments on the amendment, which will certainly not guarantee employment to Canadians. There is no such guarantee in the bill. It is the stated intention of the legislation, but there is no guarantee that we shall obtain this result. What it does guarantee is the maintenance of corporate profits to certain enterprises which will be able to apply for assistance.
At the committee stage I introduced an amendment which would at least have had the effect of curtailing some of the discretionary power given to the board by insisting that a minimum of 80 per cent of the employment level existing prior to the assistance period would be maintained. In my judgment, whatever criticisms one can make of this bill-serious criticisms can be made of this paltry sum of $80 million, but that question aside-if we had a guarantee in the bill that provided effective control over the dispensation of funds to ensure that the funds would go to maintain employment levels, then this at least would be something that the New Democratic Party could accept in principle. But such provision is entirely lacking from this bill.
The spokesmen for the government, including the minister, rejected in committee stage a proposal that would have ensured that the discretionary authority of the board would be restricted to an 80 per cent level of employment so as to ensure funds would not be given to any company simply to renovate its capital equipment at public expense and lay off many workers. However, I will come back to

this point in a moment. I turn to the final clause in the bill as it now stands, which provides:
The minister shall as soon as possible after the end of each fiscal year prepare a report on the administration of this act during that fiscal year and shall cause such report to be laid before parliament forthwith upon the completion thereof or, if Parliament is not then sitting, on any of the first fifteen days next thereafter that Parliament is sitting.
What is wrong with that clause? The first thing that I say is wrong with it is that the report is to be an annual one. There is to be an annual report made on emergency legislation, legislation that dispenses millions of dollars of public funds to private corporations. I submit that such provision is not at all adequate. Parliament needs to be kept informed, as I shall illustrate in a moment, of all details on a regular basis, certainly more frequently than annually. In such case we would be able to see what is happening in terms of this legislation that the government has brought in to deal with the current economic emergency. An annual report would give us lots of time to see what went wrong afterwards, perhaps, but would give us no opportunity to assess in mid-course what is going wrong, particularly in reference to employment levels.
The second thing that is wrong with the final clause as it stands is that no reference is made to the inclusion of a list of firms who will receive this money. If the common practice of this government prevails, we will not be provided with such a list even in the annual report. I say that is wrong for this reason. Over the past few years the federal government, along with the provincial governments of this country, have provided hundreds of millions of dollars to private corporations without in any way making a serious assessment of whether the money so disbursed benefited the public. To my knowledge, no study of this kind has ever been carried out. We have had pious hopes frequently expressed by the minister, as well as good will, to the effect that public money that is spent on aiding private enterprise will somehow have a spin-off effect and we will all benefit in some wonderful way.
I would refer the minister to an article which appeared in Canadian Forum some two months ago dealing with a serious assessment of the province of Ontario's financial give-away program, a program dealing with what are called forgivable loans. This article points out that millions of dollars have been spent by the province of Ontario on private corporations, with little or no direct, causally related benefit in terms of employment patterns, and having a very definite effect on the encouragement of further takeover of Canadian business by foreign corporations, specifically United States corporations.
I suggest it is time that the minister's own department did a study of the effect the kind of assistance this government is providing, this kind of corporate welfare assistance, as I referred to it earlier. This is another reason why I object to clause 21 as it now stands. We need a list of the companies that are to be given grants and we need it at monthly intervals. It seems to me that if such a list were provided we would discover the following. I shall have to look at the annual report, because I do not expect that my motion will be accepted by the government, but I expect to find that most of this money will be given to foreign-
September 27, 1971

owned companies. I suggest that is a fantastic piece of irony.
This legislation has been forced on the Canadian government as a result of action taken by the United States, yet most of the funds dispensed under the legislation will go to the same U.S.-owned firms that are now causing much of the problem. As the minister well knows, a very high percentage of the 70 per cent of exports that go to the United States is in respect of intracompany exports. Now we will have the subsidiaries of U.S. firms in Canada applying for grants to subsidize their own exports to their United States parents in the U.S. A tremendous deal! I suggest this bill will be contributing in some way to the perpetuation of the very problem that in part it was set up to solve, that is to say, it will further encourage the growth of foreign-owned firms in this country. I am not saying that there is an easy way out of this problem, but I am saying that by the monthly provision of information that lists the firms in receipt of funds we will know exactly what is going on. In the committee the minister refused this proposition, and I suspect he is going to refuse it again.
I now come to my third reason for saying that this clause is inadequate. It does not give us the amount of money that is being spent, which seems to me a relevant question. Although only $80 million is being spent, how is it to be distributed? Are half a dozen firms in Canada to be given 80 per cent of that sum? Or is the money to be equitably distributed among many firms? Is it to be equitably distributed among the provinces or regions? I think it is very important to know how much money is to be given to these companies and on what basis.
My fourth criticism is that this final clause calls for no regular report on production and, above all, employment levels of the companies receiving the grants. In committee the minister made reference to the fact that he would expect some report on a sector of the economy in this respect. But that completely avoids, in a fundamental way, it seems to me, the question at hand, which is: If firm "X" is to be given a grant, the public has a very legitimate interest in knowing what are the production and employment levels of that firm-not of the whole industry-prior to and during the period of the grant.
At this point I should like to refer to the testimony given by the minister on this issue. This is to be found in Minutes of Proceedings No. 47 of the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs. When I pressed the minister about what I felt to be the real danger of this bill, namely, the discretionary authority being left so broad-I acknowledge the need for some discretionary authority if the board is to function effectively-I argued in addition that if the board is to function effectively in terms of employment levels, there should be an insistence in the regulations and in the bill upon the maintenance of what I proposed should be an 80 per cent employment level.
Let us consider an example such as I proposed in committee. A company which currently employs a thousand people may get a grant of $2 million. However, it uses the money to renew its capital equipment rather than the number of employees, even at the 80 per cent level, and
Employment Support Bill
decides to reduce the number by 50 per cent. It then lays off half its employees.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Then it would not get the grant.


John Edward Broadbent: If I heard the minister correctly, he said it would not get the grant. This is a complete contradiction of what the minister said in committee, but I hope he is right. I hope the minister will get up and tell the House he has changed his mind.


Jean-Luc Pepin: If the company does what the hon. member suggests, it will not get the grant unless there has been an agreement between the company and the board as to a specified level of employment. That is what I said in committee. The objective is really to maintain employment at the 100 per cent level.


John Edward Broadbent: If I heard the minister correctly, he has confirmed my point; he has said that the board has discretionary authority to make a grant on the conditional basis that the company maintains a certain level of employment. The point is that according to the act and regulations, we are not saying to the company that it can act only in a certain way. We are not saying to the board that it must insist that 80 per cent of the employees remain. Therefore, we reach the conclusion, which the minister admitted, that it is possible for the board to decide to give a grant even though half the employees are to be laid off.


Jean-Luc Pepin: For good reason.


John Edward Broadbent: The minister nods his head. Apparently that is correct.


Jean-Luc Pepin: I said, "For good reason."


John Edward Broadbent: I cannot hear the minister very well, but he can comment later. I should like him to elaborate when he replies. I think this is of fundamental importance and I cannot understand why this kind of leeway should be given the board. The history of this country is replete with examples of corporations getting money and using it for their own interests. In a commercially competitive economy, these companies are out to maximize their profits. We all understand that.
It seems to me to be highly irresponsible for this Parliament, which has an interest in the public good and in public spending, not to specify in this bill-the title of which is, in effect, an act to maintain levels of employment-certain restrictions of some sort on the discretionary authority of the board in order to ensure that the purpose of the bill is maintained. I am sure that when we receive the annual report, if we do not accept this amendment which would allow periodic statements, we will find all kinds of examples of companies which have renovated their capital equipment at public expense and have laid off a lot of people in the process.
Those are the four faults in clause 21 as I see it. There is provision for an annual statement instead of a periodic, monthly statement. It does not provide for a list of the names of companies receiving millions of dollars in public funds. It does not call for a statement of the amount of each individual grant and, most important of all, there is no insistence that we are to be publicly informed about

Employment Support Bill
levels of production and employment of the firms receiving those grants.
Before I resume my seat I should like to deal with one argument presented in committee by the minister. It may be he will refer to it again and I will not have a chance to comment; therefore I will do so now. The minister suggested that if we provided all this information in detail it could affect the competitive position of the company concerned. I fail to see why this should be so.
In the amendment we are not asking for the profit picture of the company; we are not asking for pricing policies; we are not asking for a statement as to the amount of money being put into research and development. In short, we are asking a number of questions which, if fully answered and made public, could not affect the firm in terms of its competitive position in Canada and, more particularly, in terms of its competitive position in international markets. That is what we are concerned about here. We are merely asking that the government insist that the names of the companies be listed so the people of Canada will know whether a corporation is receiving public money. We are insisting that these recipient corporations make known to the people of Canada their levels of production and employment. These are the basic facts we want and, I suggest, need if Parliament is to reach any kind of sensible conclusion or estimate of the efficacy of this bill. These facts would not affect the competitive position of the firms and it is for the minister to show us in a serious way how the availability of this information would affect the position. He has not done so.
Instead of raising his normally Socratic questions and reductio ad absurdum arguments, as he does so genially and pleasantly-and without logical effectiveness, I might say-I hope he will define the government's position and show how to the slightest degree my amendment may be wrong and unacceptable to the government.


Mr. Speaker:: It being six o'clock, I do now leave the Chair.
At six o'clock the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.
Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, my remarks at this time will be extremely short in respect of the amendment of the hon. member for Oshawa-Whit-by (Mr. Broadbent). I am one of the casualties of redistribution. When I occupied the chair I knew the names of all the constituencies, but as a result of redistribution that was all changed for me. The hon. member presented this amendment in committee and advanced basically the same arguments he has advanced here today. At that time, of course, it was not so much in the way of an amendment but, rather, a suggestion for consideration or what-have-you. We are not as concerned about the difficulties of procedure within the committee system as we are with the essence of the motion before us.
In matters of this kind, personally I want to see what useful purpose might be served by having such a report

September 27, 1971
from the government to the public or from an individual to the government. In many instances I find it absolutely ludicrous that governments should require reports from the public. The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Basford), for instance, in respect of the Corporations Act now makes businesses and corporations report on certain matters. He does not have the authority to collate the information and does not know what to do with it even when he has it. This is a complete waste of time.
In the same way, I find it would be a complete waste of time to require government departments to make reports of a nature such as would be required under this amendment because, frankly, I do not know of anyone who could put this information to a useful purpose. Although I do not know, I suppose it might strengthen the hand of some labour union in attempting to negotiate a contract. The hon. member who is proposing this amendment is notorious for proposing this sort of thing. He and his colleagues have used every subterfuge in an effort to obtain this information, not for themselves but for somebody down the line. I do not consider this to be a useful purpose.
In the same way, if the government jumped by 50 per cent its requirements for reporting, I do not think business would be any further ahead-because once the reports are in, no one knows how to use them; it has become a habit. It is just an extra expense to business. Therefore, without any other reason I suggest there has not been proven the value there would be in having these reports provided as requested by the hon. member. I am satisfied that the report should come to Parliament on the basis of once a year and then we could see what had happened. I am prepared to reassess my view in this regard.
I am sorry some of the other amendments were lost, but that is a decision of the House.


Jean-Luc Pepin: That was a good performance.


Mr. Bruce Howard (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry. Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to make a few comments in respect of one of the points raised by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent): The amendment he proposed has been commented upon by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert). He made a valid point and one which I believe should be considered by all members. However, there are some other points which need to be made in connection with the proposed amendment.
In connection with the aspect raised by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby about guaranteeing certain levels of employment, this of course refers back to clauses 11 and 13 of the bill. Clause 11 refers to the likelihood of a significant reduction in employment, and clause 13 outlines conditions under which the board must take into consideration certain aspects of the levels of employment and provides:
-to the extent that in the opinion of the board was possible under the circumstances, the manufacturer has maintained the level of employment throughout the assistance period in accordance with the specifications of the board or at prescribed levels if the board did not specify any levels of employment for that manufacturer.
September 27, 1971

In other words, if the level is not specifically stated by the board, then the level specified in the bill must be followed. But there are some special circumstances that I think should be taken into consideration that could affect such a situation and I should like to draw to the hon. member's attention the possibility of seasonal factors in employment. Let us suppose that a company has been engaged in the manufacture of a seasonal commodity. One most obvious example is toys. Then let us suppose the board decides to specify some kind of employment level that would suit the particular period in question. The toy manufacturer might have a high level of employment during the summer or fall of the year, but in the spring the board would want to be able to specify a lower amount of employment which would be required under the act. This seems to me to be a reasonable flexibility which the hon. member has not taken into consideration.
There is another factor in respect of whether the board and the manufacturer should have some flexibility. I remind the hon. member of the possibility, which occurs frequently, where an industry might attempt to keep up levels of employment but be prevented from doing so because of a strike among the suppliers of raw materials. In such a case the board would want flexibility in allowing the manufacturer to adapt to such a situation.
I would also remind the hon. member that however much we may be anxious to maintain a fixed level of employment in a particular industry-and we have designed the act for that purpose-the world goes on and we cannot expect manufacturers to exist always in the status quo. It may be necessary for that manufacturer to implement technological changes in the plant. He cannot wait forever. He cannot wait perhaps for three months, six months or for a year-if the regulations were in effect that long-to make those changes. So there must be some flexibility to allow for changes in the manufacturer's world. We cannot expect him to live in yesterday's world, nor can we expect him to be efficient and productive if he has to live with yesterday's methods of manufacturing. So the board must have some opportunity to allow for that kind of flexibility.
The hon. member seems to be particularly concerned about the possibility that the manufacturer might make a profit as a result of the measures provided in this bill. It has been stated in committee and in the House, in connection with this bill, that the prime purpose is the maintenance of employment. But if in the process the manufacturer is able to maintain his profit level, this government does not shy away from that possibility.
I am sure the hon. member is well aware of elementary economics, the fact that if a manufacturer is to maintain employment in his industry he has to reinvest profits- and profits is the seed money that makes possible jobs in our society. This is particularly true of the kind of manufacturing industry with which we are concerned here. I am sure the hon. member is aware that the usual form of distribution of profits in a company is for the government to get the first 50 per cent and the second 50 per cent to be divided perhaps equally among the shareholders and for the replacement of equipment, modernization and the
Employment Support Bill
improvement of the employment capability of the manufacturer.
This is the pattern of capital investment that we endorse and encourage. We hope it will go on, because without it the workers about whom the hon. member is so concerned, as we are, will not have the jobs that they need. We have to look at not just today but at tomorrow and the day after. So we do not shy away from the possibility of the manufacturer making profits, even though that may not be the principal objective of this bill. The principal measure is the direct maintenance of employment right now, but if in the long run we are able to foresee and to aid the development of employment in the future as a result of the maintenance of profits, which have been all too low in the last few months among manufacturing industries, then we do not shy away from that.


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, would the hon. member permit a question?


Bruce Andrew Thomas Howard: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


John Edward Broadbent: I should like to ask the hon. member how his comments bore specifically on the amendment that is currently before the House. It seems to me that he was discussing points that were raised in committee. How is the point of disclosure, which is the essence of the amendment before the House, affected in any way by the arguments the hon. member has now been advancing?


Bruce Andrew Thomas Howard: I was not dealing specifically with the matter of disclosure. That question will be handled in a moment by the minister.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, before I do so I should like to comment on another point which the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) made which, if I understood him correctly, would result in grants being paid only to Canadian-owned companies. I hope I am reflecting his views well: if not, I apologize and will allow my hon. friend to repeat his case.


Max Saltsman: He said we should know-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. This situation is very difficult for the Chair. The Chair was under the impression that the minister was seeking the floor to participate in the debate. The minister's participation has turned into a question directed to the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) who has already spoken in the debate and cannot speak again. The Chair allowed the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby to direct a question to the parliamentary secretary, but at this time I think the solution might be for the minister to take part in the debate, and if the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby has a question he may ask it of the minister.


Max Saltsman: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I understand that the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) permits me to respond to that question. In that way perhaps we will avoid some of the difficulty. I listened very carefully, and with a great deal of admiration, to the speech of the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby. What he was trying to say-and I think he said it

September 27, 1971
Employment Support Bill
rather well-was that we should be aware of to whom these grants are going so that we can make decisions based on this information. I do not think that at any point in his remarks to the House has he said that one group of companies or another should be excluded from receiving grants. He did make a very strong case for disclosure and for knowledge on the part of the Canadian public and members of the House so that we could make decisions based on that knowledge.


Mr. Maclnnis:: Mr. Speaker, I have a point of order with respect to whether or not the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) could answer the minister's question. Clarification is needed by the House. Certainly in this case clarification is needed from the minister. It is quite permissible for the hon. member to explain his position.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The Chair does not want to enter into a discussion with the hon. member, but it was up to the minister to decide whether or not he wanted the floor. The hon. member did not have the floor at that time.


Jean-Luc Pepin: We could drop it at that. I had heard that particular point being made, but having been rudely misquoted this afternoon I would not like to do it to anyone.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The Chair would like to know which hon. member wishes to participate in the debate at this time.


Jean-Luc Pepin: We will forget that point and take it up some other day.


Max Saltsman: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, and to clarify my position in this debate, as a result of my intervention as an interpreter I wonder if you would apprise me of my position. Should I continue the remarks I have commenced as part of my intervention in this debate, or can I have the floor following the minister's intervention?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: The hon. member has a few minutes left and may use all of them, but once he sits down he automatically loses his right to participate in the debate.


Max Saltsman: Mr. Speaker, my colleague from Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) by placing this amendment before us has made an excellent suggestion. I know that the minister followed my colleague's remarks with a great deal of interest and could see the wisdom in them. I was hoping that when the minister had the floor he would endorse those remarks and indicate his acceptance of the motion, but on listening to his parliamentary secretary I lost hope that this course of action would be adopted.
Through this amendment we are really asking the government to learn something from experience. There has been a great deal of experience with similar kinds of programs and it has shown that eventually the dissemination of information assists the government in reaching a proper conclusion and serves as a policy guide. On the other hand we have had programs that have been disastrous simply because of secrecy attempted on the part of

the government. As a result, it took us years to learn that we were wasting time, energy and money when we should have been moving in more worthwhile directions.
The minister does not need any further reminder of this than the latest report of the Economic Council which discussed the manpower policies of the government. It points out that through lack of statistical and other information, even to this date, after spending close to $2 billion, we do not know whether the program has been as effective as we originally hoped it would be. Surely that should be a lesson to this minister. I would also like to direct the minister's attention to our experience with the regional development program. The government started off with the same kind of nebulous approach to regional development, with criteria which did not hang together, and said, "We will change the criteria as we go along."
All we ask is that the minister give us some indication from month to month of which industries are getting the money. We do not believe this will be a danger to the competitiveness and confidentiality of the industries involved. The government's arguments in this respect are complete nonsense. Why should we have to wait for a whole year to find out whether the legislation is a disaster or not?
I listened to the speech of the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert). As you know, Mr. Speaker, I was very much in agreement with him on a previous amendment. There is one notable trait which that hon. member has: he is consistent. For as long as I have had the pleasure of listening to him both in the House and in committee, he has always opposed any attempt at disclosure. He opposed it on the Bank Act when we were drafting amendments to the Corporations Act and during discussion of consumers' programs. He always asks, "What do we need information for? Who is the information for?" I hesitate to say that the hon. member for Edmonton West has been proven wrong in his contention that the competitive position of industry will be hurt by disclosure. He does not object to having information placed before this House and, Mr. Speaker, when information comes before this House it is immediately available to the public. There is no evidence to show that in those areas where we have pushed for more disclosure of information, such disclosure has hurt anyone. But if anyone has been hurt as a result of the disclosure it is because he deserved to be hurt, because he was hiding something that should not have been hidden.
If the minister adopts this amendment it will go a long way to improving a bill that does not have very much to commend itself. In fact, the incorporation of this amendment might prove to the best thing in the whole of the bill. What makes the adoption of the amendment more important is the minister's statement that this action is really a permanent feature of government, that it is not a six months' deal or something like that. All the indication are that Bill C-262, when enacted, will be around for a long time.
At the moment the intention is to use this legislation to counteract some of the effects of the American 10 per cent surtax. But the implication is clear that it will be an on-going instrument of government. We are talking about legislation that calls for an initial expenditure of $80 million but which may end up with an expenditure involving
September 27, 1971

billions of dollars. Parliament and the country have a right to know how the money is being spent, rather than waiting for a year to hear the minister say, "We goofed it all up again, fellows." We can save the country a lot of money if we have access to the necessary information.
Another argument in favour of disclosure of information is that there is a great tendency to mistakes-and I say this as my leader would say it, with the greatest of kindness, thinking only of the minister and the difficulties he faces in his portfolio. Through not being compelled to keep this House informed of the actions of his department, even this energetic minister or some of those around him might turn slothful. We could save him a great deal of trouble by catching the mistakes, rather than perpetuate them until the end of the year when the whole package comes in and the evidence and the costs are before us in that particular form. The experience we have had is that disclosure has been all to the good and that everyone has benefited by having information available to him. This is a long-range program which makes disclosure even more important. Also, disclosure is one of the best methods of ensuring that government departments operate with whatever competence is available to them.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Pepin) wishes to speak.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Just a few words, Mr. Speaker. There are two points, really, in the amendment-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Maclnnis).


Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order, though it is one which I do not wish to press home except to remind the minister where he has gone wrong. I would call your attention to the fact that the minister has already participated in this debate. The Chair did not recognize the minister, but the fact remains that he made his remarks and then surrendered the floor to the member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent), thereby confirming the fact that he had already participated in the debate. I do not wish to press the point home, but it shows that the minister has gone wrong in more ways than one.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. Does the minister have something to say on the point of order?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Yes, Mr. Speaker. I should like to ask members if I can get unanimous consent to take part in this debate for the second time.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: This might be the best way to clarify the point. It was the impression of the Chair that the minister rose and asked a long question. However, the hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond (Mr. Maclnnis) has a point and I think it could be solved at this time by allowing the minister, if the House agrees, to speak a second time with unanimous consent.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
Employment Support Bill


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Would the House agree to allow the minister to speak a second time?


Some hon. Members:: Yes.


John Edward Broadbent: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I will give my consent only on the grounds that, unlike his parliamentary secretary, the minister will deal directly with the amendment.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: The Chair is not in a
position to allow hon. members to put conditions upon their consent. The hon. member either gives consent or does not, and if he does not the minister will not speak. The Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, again I shall have to be on Caesar's side and not on Caesar's wife's side. I do so because I know how unhappy my hon. friend from Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) would be on the government side, and that is a fate of which I should like to deprive him for a long time to come.
The hon. member raises two aspects of clause 21 in his amendment. One deals mainly with the fact that the clause as it appears in the bill does not anticipate that there will be a report on what size grant has been given to each company. I think that is the main point that he makes. The second point that he makes deals with the fact that reporting will not take place more often than once a year.
On the first point I must grant that the information relative to the amount of assistance granted to a firm for a plant and the level of employment and production of a plant is not going to be provided. Rightly or wrongly, this is considered confidential information. I say rightly or wrongly-and of course one could argue, but this is the practice in Canada. We have a number of other bills in my department which are applied in the same way, such as bills providing for research and development support. In this case companies make the point that if their opposition knew how much they were going to spend on research and development, and if they knew the area of research and development in which the money was to be used, they might be damaged in the competitive process.


John Edward Broadbent: On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: The hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) on a question of privilege.


John Edward Broadbent: I would not want to suggest that the minister deliberately distorted my argument, but I took great care to point out to him that research and development information, for example, was one thing that was not being required. I listed many other things that should be required that might threaten the competitive position of a firm in order to point out that what I was asking for did not-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please.


Jean-Luc Pepin: This afternoon, when looking at the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) asking for a

Employment Support Bill
special provision to be made in this particular legislation, I gathered from the smile on his face that this was intended to be one of many to come. I do not blame anybody for doing that because this is the usual progressive way of getting one's own thinking implemented in bills. I suspect-and if I am wrong I shall apologize on my knees- that my hon. friend from Oshawa-Whitby will be coming back later to suggest, and he would make a good case for it, that similar information should be given on grants for research and development also. Be that as it may, we have an unfortunate situation where the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby takes the position that everything should be put in the report.


John Edward Broadbent: No.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Oh, nearly everything-whatever it is he mentioned in his amendment, should be put in the report. Then the hon. member for Edmonton West says that nothing should be said-so in my usual liberal way I am compromising. Compromise is the bread and butter of politics and I have done that for a number of years now, in the sense that the information on assistance provided to particular companies is not made public under my other Industry, Trade and Commerce programs. This has generally not caused much hardship. I suggest to hon. members that in some cases I have been able to provide such information on specific requests. Of course, I have to seek permission from the company involved to release the information and have to make some assessment in respect of whether it will cause them embarrassment. I undertake to do this under the employment support program now being discussed.
I have asked on a number of occasions if it would be an embarrassment to a company if it is known that the Canadian government has provided it with subsidies of a certain amount. Some companies have said no, possibly a bit reluctantly, and I have given the information to the House. I have gone halfway trying to accommodate the very well known curiosity of my hon. friend from Oshawa-Whitby among others. In this case I have said in committee, and I repeat it now, that I would be giving information regarding levels of employment by sectors; I would take sectors and supply information on how much employment has been maintained in a sector. This is a practice which Statistics Canada follows. When it is possible to identify a particular company, they give what I referred to as sector information. So much for what is going to be in the report.
I share the argument that reporting once a year, especially in view of the temporary nature of this bill, might not be enough. If my hon. friend or anybody in the House wants to introduce an amendment to clause 21 to the effect that reporting should be on a quarterly basis, I would be delighted to accept that.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Is the House ready for the question?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, could I move such an amendment myself, or is it against the rules?


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: The minister knows that according to the rules, notice must be given. The

September 27, 1971
Chair cannot allow an amendment at this point, because there has not been notice. Of course, it could be done by unanimous consent.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, Standing Order 75(8) reads:
When the Order of the Day for the consideration of a report stage is called, any amendment of which notice has been given in accordance with section (5) of this order shall be open to debate and amendment.
We had a case of this a few days ago. I submit that if any member who has not already taken part in the debate wishes to move an amendment to the motion before this House, that would be in order. It could be moved without notice although Your Honour would have to decide whether or not it was relevant.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. Speaking on the point of order raised by the hon. member, the Chair was of the impression that the minister was speaking of a new amendment to replace the one in front of us. The hon. member seems to be raising the point that the amendment in front of the House at this time could be amended. Nevertheless, it is the responsibility of the hon. member to bring in a subamendment and it would be the responsibility of the Chair afterward to decide whether the purport of the subamendment was relevant to the amendment.


Mr. John M. Reid (Kenora-Rainy River):: Mr. Speaker, with leave I should like to move an amendment, seconded by the hon. member for Okanagan Boundary (Mr. Howard), that clause 21 of this bill be amended so that it would read as follows:
The minister shall as soon as possible after the end of each calendar quarter prepare a report on the administration of this act during each calendar quarter and shall cause such report to be laid before Parliament forthwith upon the completion thereof or, if Parliament is not then sitting, on any of the first fifteen days next thereafter that Parliament is sitting.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, I submit that the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) is now moving the kind of amendment to the bill itself which Your Honour would say can only be done by notice. If the point is reached where I can get the floor to test what the minister has said, I would be happy to move an amendment to the motion now before us. Oh, I shall not be able to do it because I seconded the main motion. My leader has offered to do what I have now asked him to do.


Gerald William Baldwin: He is taking a chance.


David Lewis: I know what it is.


Stanley Howard Knowles: He is prepared to go along with me.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) has the floor. He sought to move an amendment which has not yet reached the Chair and it is difficult for the Chair to make a decision on it. When I see the amendment, I can rule on it. After that I shall recognize another hon. member who perhaps could move another amendment.
September 27, 1971


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, may I suggest that you were right in the first place. We should have followed your lead. What has been suggested by the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) constitutes a new amendment and not an amendment to the amendment presented by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent). Consequently, I ought not to have made the suggestion that I made.


Gerald William Baldwin: Perhaps we could adjourn for ten minutes so that the government can make up its mind.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Does the Chair understand that the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River has changed his mind and does not wish the Chair to put the amendment?


John Mercer Reid: It appears to me that the amendment, Mr. Speaker, is technically out of order, and I would withdraw it on those grounds.
Motion (Mr. Reid) withdrawn.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I do not want to make a speech. I seem to have misunderstood the minister. Perhaps it was my fault. I understood that the minister was prepared to go along with the amendment which required disclosure to be made public once a quarter, rather than once a month. If that is what he meant, that is fine by me. He did not move any amendment. If he meant that he will be prepared to make public disclosure once every three months instead of once every month, we would be prepared to accommodate him. I see he is shaking his head. In short, he does not agree to any disclosure by the companies to which he is going to make these grants. That being so, there is no sense in moving any amendment. We will just let the amendment of the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) stand.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, in my desire to be helpful may I suggest that if the government wants to take 15 minutes to decide what it wants to do and how to do it, I am sure the House would give them the time.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The point raised by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) might constitute a good suggestion for the government but it cannot influence the Chair. The Chair must abide by the rules of the House, and the House has before it a motion moved by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent). Any amendment moved must be related to the motion before the House. Although it is not the responsibility of the Chair to make suggestions, I do not think the House should bring forward a new question relating to any other kind of report.


David Orlikow: Mr. Speaker, I was intrigued by the comments of the minister in rejecting the proposed amendment which suggested, essentially, that since the government of Canada will pay out substantial amounts of money-in the neighbourhood of $80 million-the government shall be required to make available information once a month as to how the money has been spent, the amount of each grant and the levels of employment and production in companies to which money has been given.
Employment Support Bill
Although the minister said he did not agree with the position taken by the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert) who, as he suggested, opposed any disclosure, after the minister had finished speaking he really accepted the position of the hon. member for Edmonton West, namely, that we should not make available to the public information as to how public money is to be spent.
The federal government and various provincial governments have had sad experiences in recent years with the expenditure of large amounts of money given in grants and loans at subsidized interest rates to private companies in order to provide for economic growth and employment, particularly in the have-not provinces. In light of the very large losses which have occurred to the public I would think that even the present government and the minister would have learned from experience that the best way to protect the public interest would be to provide as much information as possible as quickly as possible. I will give a couple of illustrations from past experience.
I am not now talking about the assistance which was given in the building of Canadian Pacific Railway; I am talking about the experience of the last five, six or ten years. Hundreds of millions of dollars have virtually gone down the drain because governments, federal, provincial and municipal thought they knew best. They made special deals with promoters, some of them with past experience and some without experience in industries which turned out to be of very little value. Let me mention a few illustrations to show that this has occurred in a number of provinces under different governments of different political stripes, yet all of them were marked by terrible disasters.
Let me begin with the province of Nova Scotia under a Conservative government. There is the heavy water plant in Cape Breton. I come from a have-not province so I know something about what it means when an area has large-scale unemployment and I can sympathize with any government, regardless of its political stripe, wanting to provide more employment in an area which suffers heavy unemployment. But here we are in the year 1971. The provincial government in Nova Scotia and the federal government in Ottawa have paid out in the neighbourhood of $200 million-I am speaking from memory, but I do not think I am far wrong; it was certainly substantially more than $100 million. We still do not know whether we shall have a plant which will ever produce any heavy water, and we certainly do not know whether it will produce heavy water at an economic price.
When that plant was proposed they were talking in terms of a plant costing $10 million or $15 million. I suggest to the minister that if we had had in that kind of plant the kind of disclosure we call for in this amendment, we would never have had an expense of between $100 million and $200 million because governments and the public would have demanded an accounting, an examination of the situation. An informed public would not have permitted that kind of expenditure on what may well be one of the most expensive failures this country has ever seen.
Similarly, in Nova Scotia we had the fiasco of Clairtone. The government of Nova Scotia in its desire to promote

September 27, 1971
8212____________________________________
Employment Support Bill
employment and industry in the province was persuaded and encouraged to bring into the Halifax area a company which was producing television receivers. That company has lost probably $10 million or more and it looks as though it will never be in a competitive position. Again, I suggest, not that they should not have gone ahead but that had the government of Nova Scotia and had the federal government been required to give the kind of public accounting in detail and frequency which is suggested in this amendment with reference to this special legislation you would not have had the losses which have taken place.
In my own province we have a fiasco which has been criticized, not just by people in my party, not just by socialists but by as respectable a business publication as the Financial Post. We have Churchill Forest Industries. That has now cost the people of Manitoba and the people of Canada $100 million, and the promoters probably made several tens of millions of dollars simply because there was no requirement on the part of the government of Manitoba and no requirement on the part of the federal government that sensible, honest and open accounting practices be followed.
In the province of Saskatchewan the former Liberal government was promoting a pulp and paper mill at Meadow Lake. It may be the minister will say the federal government is not responsible for the promotion of industries in a single province, that that is done by the provincial government. The fact is that had that plant gone ahead, the federal government would have invested by way of outright grants somewhere in the neighbourhood of $15 million or $20 million because that plant would have been in a depressed area.
Aside from the fact that our experience of government involvement with pulp and paper plant has been bad, as I have already demonstrated in the Churchill Forest example, here is an industry which is now plagued with overcapacity to produce. Here is an industry where workers in long-established plants in Ontario and Quebec are being laid off. Yet the federal government was willing to make grants to a new plant which would probably have taken away sales from existing plants and led to further unemployment in existing plants. And that plant probably was not viable in the first place. If we had the kind of legislation which required regular complete disclosure of financial details from companies which are given grants or loans from governments, the kind of thing I have talked about would not have taken place.
Let me for a few minutes talk about the situation in Newfoundland. Here you have two very energetic and very smart promoters operating. You have the Doyle interests and the Sheehan interests. You have proposals for the building of an oil port at Come-By-Chance which would cost tens of millions of dollars-money which would come almost entirely from federal or provincial government sources, which means money which would be paid out by the people of Canada through the federal government and by the people of Newfoundland through the provincial government. The profits of those operations would go entirely to the promoters, who would put no money in at all. This oil complex, if it comes to pass, will be in competition with existing oil facilities which have been built up by companies which have paid the

existing corporate taxes, albeit they have received generous tax concessions and write-offs.
It seems to me this is another illustration of the necessity for the kind of disclosure we call for in this amendment. It seems to me that what is involved here should not divide us on principle. I do not see that it should be rejected simply because it is a proposal made by a member of a party that has some reservations about the way the so-called free enterprise system works.
Let me say this to the minister in closing: Surely the few examples that I have given, examples that could be doubled and quadrupled if one were to take the time to document all of the enterprises in which federal and provincial governments have become involved, enterprises which have to a large extent been a failure except to the promoters, enterprises which to a large extent have been of little value to the public, should lead the minister to welcome this amendment rather than to oppose it.


Mr. John L. Skoberg (Moose Jaw):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to say a few words in support of the amendment put before the House by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent). One of the points the minister made a while ago is a clear indication of the thinking of members on the other side of the House. He said that he would be prepared to go halfway on some of the measures contained in the hon. member's amendment. However, we know that halfway is not good enough in cases where public disclosure is needed, as it is here. It is like talking about being half-pregnant when you talk of disclosing halfway a matter which, to say the least, should be public property.
This motion makes reference to preparing a report on the levels of employment and production at the beginning and end of the assistance period. I suggest that those who are displaced from employment by the surtax imposition of the United States would like to know just where their tax dollars are going. It just is not good enough for members opposite to say that public disclosure might harm competition. We must remember that people walking the streets are being given no job opportunity even though they have put their money into the treasury through income tax deductions.
We in this party have said many times that public disclosure is the best thing that can happen in a democratic society. This evening we have heard members on the other side of the House, and the hon. member for Edmonton West (Mr. Lambert), suggesting that public disclosure is not in the interest of the public, that it is the concern of the treasuries of the various companies given assistance under this bill.
If the security of the nation is at stake we do not hesitate to prohibit public disclosure of certain matters. In this case it happens to be taxpayers' dollars that are going to companies in need of assistance, and this is why everyone in Canada should be entitled to know whether it is in the best interest of Canadians, particularly those affected directly by the surtax, to give this money to these companies.
I cannot understand the argument of the minister and his parliamentary secretary that public disclosure would
September 27, 1971

harm the competitive spirit of these companies. I am sure that all Canadians are concerned to see whether or not the money given to Canadian plants once this bill is passed is being invested in the best interests of Canadians. To talk of disclosure of this information doing harm to the competitive position of these companies is just not good enough.
The amendment that my colleague has moved clearly spells out those areas in which there should be public disclosure. In our opinion it is not good enough to tell the unemployed that their money is being spent for the benefit of a company in some other country. Neither is it good enough to state that the branch plant economy that we have is entitled to receive assistance when not one job opportunity will be created.
Surely the minister could find his way clear to accepting this amendment. It is not so far-reaching as to harm the position of companies in the event of public disclosure. My colleague has made it clear that he is not going to ask for the world; all he wants is public disclosure of employment levels at the beginning and end of the assistance period. Level of employment is something that we in this House should be concerned about. Clearly, the United States is hell bent on a program of keeping everything within their own boundary. Our obligation is to protect employment in Canada and investments made by taxpayers in various corporations.


Mr. Mark Rose (Fraser Valley West):: Mr. Speaker, I did not intend to speak on this amendment this evening.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Gerald William Baldwin: We will let you know whether you should have spoken later.


Mark Willson Rose: Earlier in the evening I was invited by the ranks of the government backbenches to review a scholarly publication known as "Fuddle-duddle", and while over there perusing this magazine, which I think is volume 1, No. 2-


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: Is No. 2 out now?


Mark Willson Rose: It is out now-I noticed some consternation among the ranks of government members who were calling for the House leader, the fire department and every other facility that might assist them, since they seemed to feel at that time that the extent of this debate on the amendment before the House was more than they had anticipated.


Gerald William Baldwin: They should know better by now.


Mark Willson Rose: I am afraid I did not hear what the hon. member said.


Gerald William Baldwin: I said, they should know better by now.


Mark Willson Rose: Let me say to the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) who said, "They should know better by now", in case the Hansard reporter did not write it down, that they have a learning block. Unfortunately, under the kind of system that we have, which is the adversary system that we have inherited from our progenitors, the British, only the government have men of enlightenment. I see the Gallic minister of Industry, Trade
Employment Support Bill
and Commerce (Mr. Pepin) looking at me at the mention of the British.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Do I have a choice?


Mark Willson Rose: Although I did not hear what he said either, the smiling minister has a favourite phrase which is, "It takes two to tangle". I would invite him to tangle now. If he would like me to repeat what I said earlier, I will be pleased to oblige and then he could repeat what he said.


Jean-Luc Pepin: That would be a pleasure. The hon. member said I was looking at him, to which I said that I did not have a choice because he had the floor.


Mark Willson Rose: The minister says he has no choice but to look at me. But when my deskmate, my old buddy from Moose Jaw (Mr. Skoberg), was speaking a minute ago, the minister did have a choice. However, in complete defiance of the policies of his colleague the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Munro), I saw the minister out in the hallway having a cigarette. He was not looking at anybody but the hon. member for New Westminster (Mr. Hogarth).


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please.


Mark Willson Rose: In spite of the fact that the hon. member for New Westminster-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The Chair hesitates to allow the hon. member to pursue his remarks, but it is very difficult to relate the last few sentences to the motion now before the House. The hon. member should try to get back to the motion before the House, which is to amend clause 21 of the bill.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mark Willson Rose: I sympathize with Your Honour in trying to thread your way through the excursions and intricacies of this debate. I had a similar problem a little earlier and was deflected somewhat by the question of the minister. It would seem to me the minister should try to "home in" on the real essence-the nub, if you like-of the argument, instead of being distracted and diverted by every kind of irrelevancy and frivolity. In any event, I will do my best to get back to the point.
My colleague, the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent), who is looking very unhappy at the moment, put forward a sincere amendment. His amendment called upon the government, which is spending public funds, hopefully in the interests of the Canadian worker, to disclose the recipients of these funds on a monthly basis. It is very important that any recipient of public funds, whether they be corporations, municipalities or unions, should disclose the source of these public funds and show what has been done with them. They should be willing and eager to do so. This is only sensible, and I have no objection to the suggestion. We must decide whether we are living and operating in a closed or an open society. Hopefully, in an open society all things are placed on the table and nothing is too private to be revealed to a public which is charged with paying the shot for all of us.


Max Saltsman: Keep the state out of the bedroom.
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September 27, 1971
Employment Support Bill


Mark Willson Rose: The hon. member for Waterloo (Mr. Saltsman) made a suggestion, frivolous I am sure, about keeping the state out of the bedroom. I agree with him, but I do not think it is germane to the point I was making.
The hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River (Mr. Reid) proposed an amendment. I do not know whether he was in contact with the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce, but apparently he was not. He suggested, as sort of a halfway measure, that rather than supporting an amendment calling for a disclosure every month it should be quarterly. That might have some merit. But when I was on the other side of the House the minister shook his head, indicating this suggestion was not acceptable. An hon. member of his own caucus proposed the amendment, and I am distressed by its reception because there is one thing I can say for the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River- he may be a Liberal but he is also Labour. If you look him up in the "Parliamentary Guide," that publication frivolously termed "the stud book" in parliamentary language, you will find he is known as the Liberal-Labour member. I think he has the best interests of labour at heart. Of course, his party tends to be historical, and often hysterical, but that member represents a constituency that has returned to this House since 1926 Members of Parliament who are not only Liberal but also Labour. His amendment was rejected and held in complete contempt by that smiling minister. He smiles even when he is unhappy, and I am sure he is unhappy about the length of the debate tonight.
I think the hon. member's best intentions were put forward in the form of this amendment, but he was repudiated by the government. In any event, the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce seems to be willing to bulldoze this bill through no matter whether the taxpayer's money is protected.


Mr. Lessard (LaSalle):: Oh, no.


Mark Willson Rose: I hear the chairman of the transport committee, that hon. member from Montreal. He is one of my-


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: -''dear friends."


Mark Willson Rose: Yes, "dear friends."


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: And highly respectable.


Mark Willson Rose: I am very fond of that particular chairman.


Lincoln MacCauley Alexander: But!
Mr Rose: That hon. member and I have an association in common. Once upon a time I played trumpet in a night club. I was very surprised to learn that once upon a time that hon. member owned a night club. So we really do have something in common. Regardless of his interjection, the public has the right to know where its money is going.
The hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) made four essential points. He asked for a declaration of the name of the recipient of each grant. What is wrong with that? I do not see why it is not important for the public to know who receives these grants. The hon. member wants to know whether there is a preponderance of U.S.-owned firms involved. To the average guy working at GM in Oshawa, or at RCA or GE in Montreal, who is

about to lose his job because of the recent imposition of the U.S. surcharge, I do not think this matters a bit. It may make a big difference to the long-term benefit of Canadian society and our economy, but in terms of these grants I do not think it is too important who owns the firm. The point is that we should know who gets the money, and I think that is fair enough. I think the amount of each grant should be clearly identified.
As the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orlikow) suggested, we have already witnessed what can only be regarded as a frivolous waste of money by the Department of Regional Economic Expansion. People and firms which really do not need the money, receive it. Companies with all kinds of finances were lured into particular areas and given government largesse they really did not need. The government of Canada, as the donor of the grants, did not have any share in these firms in proportion to the grants given. In my opinion this is wrong. If a private firm received a grant, at least the people should obtain a kind of equity share for the amount given.
My colleague also asked for an indication of the production level at the beginning of the grant period and at the end of the crisis peak. He also asked for a statistical indication of the employment level at the beginning of the grant period as well as at the end. There would then be some indication of whether the $80 million to be given to industry had an effect, or whether it was frivolously wasted in propping up some industries that were not going to amount to a great deal in terms of continuing employment.
In conclusion-this is usually where the applause comes-my colleague said there was a good reason for being rather careful about the disclosure if it should involve the security of the state. He agreed that in certain instances there was a need to be very circumspect about the disclosure if the security of the country was threatened. There is no security of the state, in the sense we usually think of it, involved in this amendment. The wellbeing of the state in the interests of all is thoroughly documented in Charles Wright's recent book "The Greening of America". We can excuse all kinds of inadequacies and injustices on the basis of the best interests of all, but there should be other safeguards.
In closing this part of the debate-at least I assume I am-I suggest to the minister, through you, Mr. Speaker, that we in this party are not calling upon him to be responsible for everything in terms of where these grants go. I do not mean the minister personally but, rather, the government. But I think nothing could be lost and a great deal of confidence could be gained on the part of the general public if the minister were prepared to accept the amendment proposed by the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River, because I believe there is enough evidence to suggest from past practices of the government that government funds are not always used to the best advantage. Every Canadian, rich, poor or impoverished would have no real chance of benefiting from these grants although they contribute equally if not in terms of the amount paid, certainly in respect of the proportion of their income.
So there is really nothing wrong with this amendment and I appeal to the minister's smiling and Liberal conscience to stand up before us and say this is not a bad idea. If he cannot accept the amendment of my hon.
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Division
friend from Oshawa-Whitby, at least he could accept something along the lines suggested by the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River.
I do not know whether the minister was pointing with his thumb to the hon. member for Kenora-Rainy River, whether he was hitch-hiking to Banff or whether he wanted to go the men's restroom; but whatever it is, I wish he would stand up and tell us that something along the line we have suggested has penetrated to him and that he really is in sympathy with us.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Is the House ready for the question?


Some hon. Members:: Question.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: The question is on amendment No. 4 in the name of the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent). All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.


Some hon. Members:: Yea.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: All those opposed will please say nay.


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: In my opinion the nays have it.
And more than five members having risen:


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Call in the members.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I declare the amendment lost.


Jean-Luc Pepin: that Bill C-262, to support employment in Canada by mitigating the disruptive effect on Canadian industry of the imposition of foreign import surtaxes or other actions of a like effect, as reported (with amendments) from the Standing Committee on Finance, Trade and Economic Affairs, be concurred in.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:: When shall the said bill be read the third time? By leave, now?


Some hon. Members:: Next sitting.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: At the next sitting of this House.
8216

September 27, 1971
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the acting House leader what designs he has on the time of the House for tomorrow.


James Alexander Jerome: Mr. Speaker, I do not presume to be the acting House leader, but I can speak on his behalf and say that we propose to commence tomorrow with third reading of this measure.


Gerald William Baldwin: If that is finished, what will follow?


James Alexander Jerome: We will go to the tax bill, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. It being two minutes before ten o'clock would it be the wish of hon. members that we call it ten o'clock?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
A motion to adjourn the House under Standing Order 40 deemed to have been moved.

Joseph Adrien Henri Lambert: Mr. Speaker, the Canada Student Loans Act was given effect on July 26, 1964 and designed to provide eligible students with financial assistance to enable them to pursue postsecondary studies on a full-time basis.
Under this plan, the Canadian government guarantees grants made to students by designated banks and caisses populaires.
The Canada Student Loans Act calls for the payment of a compensation to any province which administers its own student loans plan.
Since education falls within provincial jurisdiction and that in many cases Quebec is a province unlike others, it did not participate in the federal student loans plan. On the other hand, Quebec contributes to the federal treasury, as do all the other provinces. It is therefore asbolute-ly normal that it should benefit from compensation that is proportionate to its needs and population. I should like to know whether consultations have been held between federal civil servants and their Quebec counterparts with a view to setting up compensation that is as fair as possible, and to developing administrative criteria to favour the students of Quebec as much as those of other provinces.
Many students in Quebec have financial difficulties trying to complete their studies, and it seems some of them have a hard time getting loans under the act. Is that why Quebec ranks fourth among the provinces that avail themselves of the Canada Student Loans Act while it ranks second by population?
So as to invite this government to correct this situation, may I suggest that a review of the entitlement criteria be made in order that Quebec gets its rightful share of these

loans. So, the question that I had put to this House, on June 2, 1971, referred to this matter. I would ask the Minister of Finance (Mr. Benson) to give an answer as clear as possible on this point, so that we may be well informed and that we can, if required, give the required information to those who claim that Quebec is often the victim of injustices in this field.


Mr. P. M. Mahoney (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member seems to be almost completely misinformed about the situation prevailing with regard to the Canada Student Loans plan and its application in the province of Quebec. The Canada Student Loans plan provides for government-guaranteed loans to students who require assistance in their postsecondary education. The program has been in effect since 1964, during which time 656,535 loans aggregating $398.6 million have been approved in the nine provinces and two territories of Canada that participate.
In addition to guaranteeing the loans, the federal government pays the interest charges while the borrower is engaged in full time studies and for six months thereafter. The borrower then assumes repayment of principal and interest over a period of up to 91 years. The interest rate is established by a formula agreed between the federal government and the banks which provides for a maximum rate of 1 per cent over the current average yield of government of Canada securities maturing in five to ten years. The cost of the program in the nine participating provinces and territories is, firstly, the interest in course and for six months therafter and, secondly, claims paid in respect of defaults pursuant to the guarantees.
Quebec does not participate in the plan but it does operate its own program and receives from the federal government a share of the cost of interest payments and loss claims. The formula is established by section 12 of the Canada Student Loans Act and is based on the relationship that the population in Quebec between 18 and 25 bears to the same age group in other provinces. In the loan period of July 1, 1970, to June 30, 1971, Quebec was paid $9,106,197 under this arrangement. This amount is not to be compared with the amount of loans guaranteed in other provinces but, rather, with the interest and default costs borne by the federal government in respect of those loans.



POLLUTION-THREAT FROM SUNKEN IRVING WHALE AND IRVING LAKE-REQUEST FOR PROGRESS REPORT ON REMOVAL

David Samuel Horne MacDonald: Mr, Speaker, in rising to speak during the adjournment debate this evening I want to say I am disappointed and alarmed because of the lack of interest the government has shown regarding the serious threat posed by the Irving Whale which is still rusting on the bottom off the north coast of Prince Edward Island. I am becoming increasingly disturbed because not more than seven or eight minutes ago the Minister of Transport (Mr. Jamieson) was in the House; he was here for the vote which was called just before ten o'clock and he has now left the chamber and I assume
September 27, 1971
COMMONS DEBATES______________________________
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
that he has left the task of responding to my question to his parliamentary secretary.


An hon. Member:: That is right.


David Samuel Horne MacDonald: In no way do I want to cast aspersions on the parliamentary secretary, yet it is well known that it is the minister who speaks for the department and who, hopefully, knows what is going on with respect to this serious problem. Our inability over the last few months to obtain satisfactory answers as to what action the government will take with respect to the Irving Whale has disturbed extremely not only members of this House but the people of Prince Edward Island and of nearby areas who are still threatened by the persistent danger posed by the Irving Whale. I hope the parliamentary secretary, who is here to answer this evening, will be more informative than he was a week ago during the "late show" when he answered a similar question asked by my colleague the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie).
Hon. members will recall that back, I think it was, on the first day of this part of the session, when Parliament reconvened on September 7, I asked the Minister of Transport whether in view of the policy announcement by the government they were going to raise the Irving Whale and remove the pollution danger of the oil that was on board. I asked him also what progress report he could make with respect to the raising of the Irving Lake, which I understand has been a threat to the coast of New Brunswick for some eight years.
In answering me, the minister said there had been a meeting held five days earlier, in Montreal, on September 2, of potential tenderers for the job of either lifting the vessel or removing the oil from it. He said there had been an on-site inspection arranged for all tenderers so that they would be able to see all the circumstances at firsthand. After that was done, he said, the department would get their proposals but no decision would be made either to remove the Whale or to take the oil from it until it was absolutely certain that the maximum amount of protection was provided.
That answer leads to only one conclusion, namely, that the government seemed suddenly to become aware in the latter weeks of the summer that there was a problem. I am wondering what they have been doing and thinking. I know what they have been saying, but I wonder what they have been thinking and doing over the last 12 months. The Whale did not sink in June, July or August of this year, it sank more than a year ago, last September.
I wrote a letter during the summer, on July 30, to the minister. In response I received a letter which came after the answer in the House, on September 8 or 9,1 believe, in which the minister confirmed pretty much the information that was provided by way of answering the question, telling me that preliminary conversations had been held, that there was no firm indication of the problems which might exist with respect to raising the barge, that there was to be an on-site inspection either directly there or through the use of cameras, and then they would be able to draw up sufficient tender forms so that prospective contractors might submit bids.
It is high time the government gave a clear answer to the people of Prince Edward Island and adjacent areas as to what they have been doing for the past 12 months-not only that, but to begin to give some clear answers as to what steps they intend to take to clear up this serious pollution threat.
I have asked repeatedly since receiving this communication from the minister what the department has been up to during the past 12 months. Is it that they have suffered some form of amnesia and forgotten the problem has existed, in the hope it will go away? Is it that they really do not care, that while they can make speeches which give the impression that they are increasingly concerned about pollution, when they have direct responsibility, as in this case, they really do not want to take decisive action? Or are there areas in this department which really are not competent to deal with the problem? Surely, at least they were reminded by local officials in the province. At least we were given assurances from time to time by provincial ministers that the problem would be dealt with at an early date this spring.
I am wondering on what basis these ministers spoke. On what ground did they continue to feel the federal minister and officials would take decisive action while the weather and climatic conditions were suitable? This evening we need some firm answers and, hopefully, the parliamentary secretary will be able to provide them. I repeat, I am disappointed that the minister has not seen fit to be present to answer the question I have raised tonight and I hope by not being here he is not conveying by his absence a lack of interest, a lack of concern, a lack of willingness to tackle this important problem.


Mr. Gerard Duquet (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, it is a fact that the minister was here a while ago and is out of the House now. But that is not because he does not know what is going on in connection with the Irving Whale. The minister knows perfectly well what is the situation concerning the Irving Whale, and the only answer I can give the hon. member is in conformity with the facts.
In so far as the portion of the question dealing with the Irving Whale is concerned, this matter was dealt with by myself last Monday night at this hour in responding to the hon. member's colleague, the hon. member for Hillsborough (Mr. Macquarrie).
Briefly, in the limited time which is available, the situation on the Irving Whale is as follows. Over the past months every effort has been made by the Department of Transport to gather all useful information about the vessel, its structure, its position on the ocean bottom, temperature factors and data about her which will be imperative in preparation for a successful salvage operation. Pre-tender meetings are now over and an on site inspection has been completed. Tenders are presently being sought from the salvage companies and a final decision to begin the salvage operation will be made only after every consideration is given to the safety factor as well as the timing factor in view of the very uncertain weather conditions on the east coast at this time of year.

September 27, 1971
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
The Whale or her cargo will be removed as soon as the circumstances permit.
The hon. member also referred to the Irving Lake-a vessel lodged on the shore line off northern New Brunswick. This wreck had some oil remaining in her tanks. A work crew has been on the scene over the past few weeks and the oil is being removed by burning it. Much of the work is now finished. The remaining tanks will be burned out in the next few days when there are prevailing offshore winds and when there is absolute assurance that no damage to anything else can result.



TAXATION-ESTATE AND GIFT TAX PROPOSALS- RESPONSE TO PROVINCIAL REQUESTS FOR DELAY

Mr. Doug Rowland (Selkirk):: Mr. Speaker, on September 15, as reported at page 7835 of Hansard, I asked the following question of the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and received the following answers. I asked the Prime Minister:
Has he yet replied to the letter which he received from the first ministers of the provinces in which they asked for a deferral of one year on the estate and gift tax proposals now before the House? If he has replied, what is the nature of the reply?
The Prime Minister replied:
Mr. Speaker, no substantial reply was sent as far as I know.
I then asked:
Does the government intend to send a substantial reply to the first ministers?
The Prime Minister's answer was:
Mr. Speaker, the best reply would be the position the government takes in the House when the bill is passed. We cannot reply to the hypothetical situation as to what will happen if the bill is delayed past January 1, the date that the premiers mentioned in their letter to me.
The answer which the Prime Minister gave me is misleading in the extreme since the text of the letter from the Premiers read, in part, as follows. They requested that-
-the present system of estate and gift taxation be continued for at least a year from January 1, 1972 to give the provinces concerned time to assess with the federal government the implications involved in the federal proposal.
The statement refers to the proposal now before the House in Bill C-259 for the federal government to quit the estate and gift tax field and to leave it entirely open to the provinces. In referring, as the Prime Minister did, to "a hypothetical situation as to what will happen if the bill is delayed past January 1," the Prime Minister either completely misunderstood or was completely misrepresenting the contents of the letter. The request which I have read is most precise. The letter from the provincial Premiers was drafted at, and mailed from, their conference in Victoria on August 6. Eight Premiers signed the letter. The Premier of Alberta did not because he had to leave early in order to deal with an election, and the Premier of Newfoundland did not sign because he never attends the conferences.
Eight provincial Premiers have made this request. I see none of the confusion that the Minister of Finance (Mr. Benson) pretended to see when he answered questions on September 8. Moreover, it is beyond belief to me that

neither the Prime Minister nor the Minister of Finance has had the courtesy to reply to the letter.
I would be the last to say that the federal government should automatically agree to everything suggested by the provinces, but surely when the Premiers of eight provinces, representing every political stripe in this country, make a united appeal for a certain course of action on the part of the federal government, the request is worthy of reply. It is worthy of reply if only because the event is virtually without precedent. That statement leaves aside the merit of the provincial Premiers' case.
I would argue that the abandonment of estate and gift taxes by the federal government represents an abandonment of considerations of equity in the tax structure, and I believe I would be right in so doing. However, the provinces have not gone nearly that far. They have simply asked for the delay of one year in implementing that part of the act for some entirely practical and unassailable reasons.
Firstly, the provinces argue that federal abandonment of estate and gift taxes should be delayed for a year because they need time to meet and determine a common policy on the question. If they do not have the opportunity to do so, a tax jungle will be created in the field of estate and gift taxes to the disadvantage of the whole nation. Secondly, the provinces moved to make the request because under the current timetable they would not have time to draft legislation and to assemble their legislatures to deal with legislation concerning estate and gift taxes.
These arguments simply cannot be refuted; their logic is irrefutable. In failing to accede to the provinces' request, the federal government is being irresponsible to the extreme. Not that I am startled by the fact the federal government has acted irresponsibly, but its decision to abandon estate taxes was in itself more irresponsible than its decision not to reply to the provincial Premiers.
If I had time I would read in defence of that statement the arguments for federal presence in estate and gift taxes put forward by this government at pages 32 to 36 of its publication "The Taxing Powers and the Constitution of Canada". In that publication this government under the same Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) placed before the provinces and the people of Canada six strong arguments for federal estate and gift taxes and concluded with this sentence:
For these several reasons the government of Canada does not think it would be in the interest of either Canada or of the provinces for Parliament to forgo its power to impose estate taxes.
I wish, Mr. Speaker, that time permitted me to deal with the substantial arguments against federal government abandonment of estate and gift taxes and with the government's specious argument that the capital gains tax is a substitute. Time, however, does not permit this. Thus, I would in conclusion, express the hope that the federal government will see fit to grant the Premiers' request to delay the implementation of the proposals affecting estate and gift taxes contained in Bill C-259.


Mr. Barnett J. Danson (Parliamentary Secretary to Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to inform the hon. member that the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) responded this weekend by Telex to Premier Bennett. Premier Bennett contacted the Prime Minister about this question on
September 27, 1971

behalf of the other Premiers. A copy of this communication has been forwarded to every Premier but it is not known at this time whether they have all been received, nor has there been an opportunity for response. It would
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
be inappropriate for me at this time to indicate the contents of that letter, but a response has been sent not only to Premier Bennett but to the other Premiers on whose behalf he wrote.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.20 p.m.

Tuesday. September 28, 1971