1971-05-13

ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


[Stage Direction]
Seventh report of Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization-Mr. Blair.
[Editor's Note: For text of above report, see today's Votes and Proceedings.]


[Stage Direction]
Hon. J. J. Greene (Minister of Energy, Mines and
Resources): Mr. Speaker, I welcome this opportunity to report briefly to the House on the Canadian government mission to Australia which I headed from April 28 to May 6, 1971. Our purpose was to promote a continuing exchange of information on the development and marketing of natural resources in our respective countries. Our visit was in accordance with the statement made in Australia a year ago by the right hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), with the Australian Prime Minister, establishing an objective of increasing contact by ministers and officials in areas of common interest.
It was generally agreed in talks which we held with federal and state ministers and officials and with persons in the private sector that Canada and Australia faced many similar problems in developing natural resources, in particular matters relating to the foreign investor, further processing of resources, the provision of infrastructure and in obtaining the maximum opportunity in world markets for our commodities.
In a joint statement made in Canberra on April 30, 1971, by myself and the Hon. R. W. Swartz, the Australian Minister of National Development, we outlined the topics and views which arose in our discussions which were conducted in an atmosphere of friendship and frankness. These ranged over the following: Foreign investment policies and the role of the countries' respective banking systems in such policies; an exchange of information on matters concerning minerals and metals in world markets; matters connected with particular mineral commodities which Canada and Australia produce. These included uranium, copper, iron ore, nickel, lead, zinc, sulphur, aluminum and coal; national philosophies and approaches to energy, mining and resource development, mining legislation and relations between
central governments and other administrations and provincial governments in Canada and state governments in Australia.
The minerals industry in Australia has experienced spectacular growth since the end of world war II. Australia will become an even more important mineral exporter in 1971 and years ahead, chiefly because of increased sales of iron ore, coal, bauxite, alumina and nickel.
Australia has uncovered significant and rich deposits of uranium. Canada shares a common interest, particularly in the short term, when the uranium market may be soft, in continuing liaison with Australia on the marketing of uranium.
We were informed that the Commonwealth Government of Australia has now under consideration the decision with respect to its nuclear programs and we put forward the Canadian position with respect to the various modifications of Canada's CANDU reactor which could be made available to meet Australia's needs.
It is in the interest of both our countries to get the optimum price for our raw resources, and to achieve maximum economic processing at home, and thus to leave the maximum amount of the dollars in our respective countries in the form of taxes, profits and in wages from resource development for the growth of our own economies. It was clearly agreed that in working more closely together and having a continuing association we can best assure these objectives.
The talks were the most comprehensive of their kind concerning natural resources ever conducted between the two countries, and mark a new aspect of the role of Canada in the affairs of the Pacific basin, in line with the government white paper on foreign policy.
I can report to the House that we expect to continue these discussions with the Hon. R. W. Swartz, Commonwealth Minister of National Development, here at Ottawa within the next two to three months.
Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I was about to enter a mild complaint about the fact that a copy of the statement we have just heard reached my desk only a few seconds ago, although that may not be the minister's fault, leaving me with insufficient time in which to prepare to comment on it. But having read it and listened to him it is obvious that I had ample time in which to do so. I suggest to the Secretary of State for External Affairs that judging from the language of this communique the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources must be considered a strong candidate for his position.
The statement contains some sensational passages; I shall refer to two of them. The minister said: "We outlined the topics and views which arose in our discus-

May 13, 1971
Australian Natural Resources
sions which were conducted in an atmosphere of friendship and frankness." That is a tremendously important statement. He also said: "It is in the interest of both our countries to get the optimum price for our raw resources." Spectacular, Mr. Speaker!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Gerald William Baldwin: I think what happened was that the minister went to Australia to sell something and he had no more success in doing so than he had in selling himself to the electorate of Lanark and Renfrew.


Mr. David Lewis (York Souih):: Mr. Speaker, I am delighted to begin my remarks by congratulating the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) on both the humour and the relevance of his remarks. I want to say to the minister that he could save the time of hon. members and save himself the trouble if he would refrain from bringing this kind of meaningless nonsense before the House as an alleged report.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Lewis: I suggest to him that if he has nothing to say it is much better not to say it.
The minister tells us that the communique contained topics and views and then he gave us the topics but not the views. I would be interested in knowing what the views were. I would be interested in knowing what the minister told the Australian minister about the Canadian government's policy on foreign ownership. We have been waiting for that for two years and do not have it yet. If the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources was able to tell the Australian minister what the policy is, then he owes an apology to the House for not telling us.


An hon. Member:: Don't get political.


David Lewis: I am trying not to. As for the rest of the statement, it is precisely what the hon. member for Peace River said it was-a lot of words.
I hope the minister had a good time in Australia. I have never visited that country and look forward to doing so. I hope he sold a reactor to the Australians, though he did not say so. I have not known the minister to hide his accomplishments under a bushel; therefore I must conclude that he did not succeed in so doing. I appeal to him not to worry us with this kind of thing unless he does so in comedy.


Mr. Real Caouetie (Temiscamingue):: Mr. Speaker, I thank the minister for sending me a copy of his statement approximately two minutes before I left my office, even though this was the English version.
I do not have the French version; I intend nevertheless to make some comments on his statement in the House. He said, for instance, that his trip to Australia had permitted him to have talks with his counterpart, the
minister of national development, and to state that the two countries-

-faced many similar problems in developing natural resources, in particular matters relating to the foreign investor-

The minister likes to hear himself talk. I agree entirely with the leader of the New Democratic Party (Mr. Lewis) who said that the statement is made up of well constructed sentences, but that it is at best a piece of rhetoric that does not have much meaning. In fact, he said, and I quote:

These ranged over: foreign investment policies and the role of the countries' respective hanking systems in such policies;-

I should have liked the minister to go a little more thoroughly into his views of that important matter, because that is where the problem lies. What is the contribution of foreign investment to the development of our resources?
For many years we have been telling the government and the minister to use new credits issued by the Bank of Canada for the development of our natural resources and the treatment of raw products but the minister pays no heed to our suggestions.
For instance, when we go to the United States for $100 million which are lacking in Canada, that makes an extra $100 million, but the minister does not bring back from the United States a wheelbarrow load of dollars. He returns with figures. What difference would there be between "setting up figures" based on our resources through the Bank of Canada and going to the United States for them? Does a "7" written in Canada not have the same value as a "7" written in the United States? Is a "10" made in the United States different from one made in Canada? This is what the government should pay attention to.
If the minister is prepared, with his Australian counterpart, to discuss-
Foreign investment policies and the role of the countries' respective banking systems in such policies-
-I am anxious to see him come up with some concrete suggestions concerning a Canadian banking system which would allow Canadians to control their own development.



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY


Mr. John Lundrigan (Gander-Twillingale):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to rise on a matter of urgent concern to move a motion under Standing Order 43. My motion relates to the tragic fact, as revealed by labour force statistics

May 13, 1971

released today, that the government's economic plan is causing unemployment to rise continuously in nearly every region of the country when the need for recovery and resurgence has never been greater. The bleak prospects for more than 650,000 Canadians constitute the most urgent and pressing problem which has faced this House and the nation in the last decade. Therefore I move, seconded by the hon. member for Vegreville (Mr. Mazankowski):
That this House demand an immediate reconstruction, review and restatement of employment, taxation, and general economic policies, and that the House categorically rejects the traditional and reactionary economic policies accepted and applied by this government which have caused stagnation, blight, and unprecedented human misery throughout this country.


Mr. Speaker:: Hon. members have heard the motion proposed by the hon. member for Gander-Twillingate. Under the terms of Standing Order 43 this motion requires the unanimous consent of the House. The Chair must inquire whether there is such unanimity.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
Som hon. Members: No.


Mr. Speaker:: There is no unanimity; therefore the motion cannot be put.



SENATE AND HOUSE OF COMMONS ACT


Mr. David Anderson (Esquimalt-Saanich) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-247, to amend the Senate and House of Commons Act (St. Luke 11:46).


Some hon. Members:: Explain.


David Anderson: Mr. Speaker, I must say first that this is not my original suggestion. It came from a former member of the House for Kootenay West, Mr. Bert Her-ridge. The bill in question proposes to remedy the grievance that arises when the public relationship between Member of Parliament and citizen is subverted to the private relationship between lawyer and client to the financial hurt of the citizen, for example, when a citizen asks his member to make inquiries in an immigration matter and is later dismayed to find that he is billed for the service. This bill is designed to overcome this problem.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.

Mr. Speaker:: Before I call on the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings I should bring to the attention of the House that both the hon. member for Prince Edward
The Canadian Economy
Hastings and the hon. member for York South have submitted, by virtue of Standing Order 26, notices to the Chair of their intention to move motions which are substantially the same. Therefore it might perhaps be preferable if both hon. members were allowed to present their motions, after which the Chair could give an opinion on the procedural aspect of the matter.


Hon. George Hees (Prince Edward-Hastings):: Mr. Speaker, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe (Mr. Ricard), the adjournment of the House under Standing Order 26 for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter requiring urgent consideration, namely, the Dominion Bureau of Statistics release showing that unemployment has risen from 6.0 per cent to 6.7 per cent of the work force, seasonally adjusted, during the month of April, despite the assurances by the Prime Minister, the Minister of Finance and other members of the government at the beginning of the year that unemployment would decline steadily as the year progressed.



INCREASES IN UNEMPLOYMENT AND COST OF LIVING

David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave, seconded by the hon. member for Timiskaming (Mr. Peters), to move the adjournment of the House under Standing Order 26 for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter requiring urgent consideration, namely, the fact that the incompetent economic policies of the government have now continued too long as manifested by the combination of a shocking jump in seasonally adjusted unemployment from 6.0 per cent to 6.7 per cent and an increase at the same time in the consumer price index of 1.8 per cent since the beginning of the year.


Mr. Speaker:: As I indicated a moment ago, both the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings and the hon. member for York South have given the Chair notice of these motions. Since then the Chair has spent agonizing moments questioning whether the motions should be put. Hon. members realize that in circumstances such as these it is a very difficult decision to determine whether the provisions of Standing Order 26, from a strictly procedural standpoint, should be interpreted in order to allow the motion to be put and a special debate to take place.
What the Chair must take into account, first, is whether there have been discussions in previous weeks or previous months during the term of the current session on the matter proposed for consideration on an emergency basis. Hon. members know as well as I do that in the course of the current session we have had numerous discussions of the problem of unemployment and on a number of occasions have debated the matter of the economic policies of the government.
As I have said before, I feel there may be an occasion when the statistics brought to the attention of the House might be of such a nature that a motion should be granted in order to move the adjournment for the purpose of discussing the situation revealed by these statistics. At the same time, however, from month to month

May 13, 1971
Unemployment Insurance
we have had to consider those statistics and motions proposed on a regular basis dealing with those reports made by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. The Chair has expressed the thought that because of the recurring nature of the matter and since we were dealing, unfortunately, with a continuing situation it was very difficult from a strictly procedural standpoint, to allow the adjournment of the House for an emergency debate.
The Chair must also take into account the possibility or probability of a debate by other means in the future. I do not think I can honestly overlook the fact that we still have before us and available to all hon. members for the purpose of general debate, particularly on the economic situation, 11 supply days which will be available during the weeks ahead. There is also the fact, as announced by the Minister of Finance, that there will be at least the beginning of a budget debate. I do feel that there will be a reasonable opportunity for debate on this very important and urgent matter within the days ahead.
Because of all these circumstances, and taking into account the precedents and the requirements of Standing Order 26, I do not think that from a procedural standpoint that it is possible for me to agree to an adjournment of the House later today for consideration of the very serious matter referred to by the hon. members for York South and Prince Edward-Hastings.
I might say that there is a third motion which in some ways is related to the two to which I have just alluded. The third motion is proposed by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby, but there are other aspects of this motion which the Chair would like to consider separately. Perhaps the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby might be allowed at this time to make his motion.


An hon. Member:: The budget debate is a month away.



UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE


Mr. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa-Whitby):: Mr. Speaker, I ask leave, seconded by the hon. member for Moose Jaw (Mr. Skoberg), to move the adjournment of the House under Standing Order 26 for the purpose of discussing a specific and important matter requiring urgent consideration, namely, the need to provide emergency aid to the thousands of unemployed Canadians who are no longer able to draw unemployment insurance benefits because high levels of unemployment have continued so long and because the government has announced its intention not to continue seasonal benefits beyond the end of this week.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby
has given notice of this motion. I have again considered the matter very seriously and, as I pointed out a moment ago, there are very special aspects to this motion which
perhaps are not germane to the other two motions to which I have referred, particularly in relation to the government's announced intention not to continue seasonal benefits beyond the end of this week. I have been reflecting on this aspect of the matter.
The Standing Order makes it possible for the Chair to delay decision on such a motion. I should like to have an opportunity later this afternoon to consider certain aspects of the matter, perhaps even in the light of the question period, and later this afternoon indicate to hon. members whether I feel there is such a difference between this motion and the other two that it might be allowed for the purpose of a special debate later today. If hon. members will allow the Chair to do so, as provided by the Standing Order, we will allow this motion to stand and I shall refer to it later in the course of our proceedings this afternoon.



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Robert L. Stanfield (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Finance arising out of the very disturbing figures just issued by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics for the month of April relating to employment, and particularly unemployment. Is the minister now prepared to take the advice that we have been offering him for some months and stimulate the economy through selective tax reductions and other methods? I emphasize this, Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that the seasonally adjusted increase in unemployment between the month of March and April this year is the highest such increase in 20 years.


Hon. E. J. Benson (Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, in preparing the forthcoming budget I shall of course take into consideration all the advice I receive, including advice from the Leader of the Opposition.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: In view of the minister's statement on January 19 that he would be prepared to bet that unemployment on a seasonally adjusted basis would be progressively reduced throughout the year, I should like to ask the minister whether he meant to indicate that he was staking his position on that forecast and, if so, whether he is now prepared to pay off his bet and resign?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Resign!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The Leader of the Opposition is inviting the Minister of Finance-I am not sure what it is he wants him to do, to wager or bet or invest-

May 13, 1971


Some hon. Members:: Resign!


Mr. Speaker:: -but I would think that asked in those terms the question is not in order. Perhaps the Leader of the Opposition might care to rephrase it.


An hon. Member:: Thirty buck Benson.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I agree that the minister does not have to answer the question but I should like to direct a supplementary question to the Prime Minister. In view of the calamitous effect of the policies pursued by this government and by the Minister of Finance, is the Prime Minister prepared to assure Parliament that'he will not permit this Minister of Finance to present another budget to the House?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!
INCREASES IN UNEMPLOYMENT AND COST OF LIVING_______



GOVERNMENT POLICY

David Lewis: I have a supplementary question for the Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker. In view of the fact that we now have a situation of very high unemployment, as has been indicated, and also a rise in the consumer price index for the first four months of the year at an annual rate of around 5 per cent, I should like to ask the Prime Minister whether from now on the government will be fighting unemployment or fighting inflation, since we have both?


Right Hon. P. E. Trudeau (Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, we have always said that we had to beware of these two dangers to our economy and we have fought both.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: We have done it in spite of the advice of opposition parties-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


An hon. Member:: Come off it.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -who all through the inflationary period were suggesting that we spend more.


An hon. Member:: That is a lot of nonsense.


An hon. Member:: Why don't you try kissing it away?


An hon. Member:: Kiss your problems away.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the Prime Minister this simple question to which I think the Canadian people have the right to an answer: Can the government now state to Parliament and the people of Canada that a policy of full employment is its first priority and not its phobic notion of inflation and that it will therefore abandon the gradual policy of hastening economic recovery that it has carried on until now because of its fears and take full measures?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.
Inquiries of the Ministry


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, when the Leader of the New Democratic Party speaks of our fear of inflation I must remind him that in the first full year of this government it was his party and the Conservative party which were blaming the government for not coming to grips with the problem of inflation. Therefore, if there was any phobia it began on that side.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Does the hon. member for Champlain wish to put a supplementary question?


Mr. Matte:: No, Mr. Speaker, tEnglish]


George Harris Hees: I should
like to direct a question to the Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker. In view of the unemployment figures announced today and the fact that the cost of living has gone up during the past three months at an annual rate of 7.2 per cent, showing that the government has obviously lost control of the economy, does the government intend in the near future to announce to Parliament a new approach to these twin problems of inflation and unemployment?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, as the Minister of Finance
just said, if there are any new approaches we will announce them in the budget, but we believe that until then the government must remain free to adopt whatever measures it feels are necessary to combat whichever of these evils is menacing the Canadian economy.


An hon. Member:: Don't you know which one?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: The hon. member knows that in managing the economy you must look at the trends, and by the indicators which the opposition parties are now accepting, the seasonally adjusted figures, which incidentally they were accusing the government of hiding behind a few months ago-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I have heard from the members opposite that it was intellectual dishonesty to use these figures they are now using.


An hon. Member:: You can do better than that.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: But if they are now prepared to accept them I suggest that they look at the trends since last September and they will find that the economy is improving.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, the trend, of course, is established by a series of figures, not just by one taken
May 13, 1971

Inquiries of the Ministry
out of a month, which 17 times out of the past 18 years have increased between March and April.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, on a further supplementary I would just like to say that if that is a win I would hate to see us have a loss. Would the Prime Minister tell the House very simple which the government considers to be the most important problem, unemployment or inflation?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I suppose the most serious problem of the House is the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: But of the two economic problems, Mr. Speaker, obviously full employment is the goal of this government. All through the period when we were fighting inflation we explained to the Canadian people that in order to have a successful and growing economy you had to kill inflation as an evil. Therefore, whether we fight unemployment directly or whether we fight it by curtailing inflation, we are seeking for a prosperous and successful economy.


George Harris Hees: That goes under the heading of
gobbledygook.



UNEMPLOYMENT-INVESTMENT CONTROL TO DIRECT CANADIAN CAPITAL TOWARD JOB-CREATING PROJECTS

Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that in the government's endeavours to come to grips with inflation it produced 659,000 unemployed at the end of April, while inflation is still with us, does the minister intend to take any new initiatives with respect to the government's economic policy and, particularly, does the government intend to exercise any control over investments with a view to directing the available capital in this country toward job-creating projects?


Edgar John Benson: First of all, Mr. Speaker, as I have said previously, the government's economic policy is constantly under review, and it is under particular review at this time in preparation for a budget which I have announced will be forthcoming next month.



UNEMPLOYMENT-ASSISTANCE FOR PERSONS WITHOUT UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE BENEFITS

Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a further question to the right hon. Prime Minister. While we are waiting for the Minister of Finance to make up his mind about what kind of economic policy will deal with this abysmal situation in the country does the government intend to take any steps to provide for the unemployed who will not have unem-

ployment insurance benefits available to them and who, after the fifteenth of this month, will not be entitled to seasonal benefits under the Unemployment Insurance Act?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: I do not
admit the premise of the question. For the past 14 months the government has been indicating that it is turning the economy around, and it began a series of measures-


George Harris Hees: One hundred and eighty degrees around.


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: -and began a series of-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I think this is a very bad example for the children in the gallery.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


George Harris Hees: Go and have a holiday; you need one.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


Mr. Henry Latulippe (Compton):: Mr. Speaker-


Mr. Speaker:: Does the hon. member for Compton wish to put a supplementary question?


Henry P. Latulippe: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member forYork South has a point of order.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. Perhaps other hon. members are wiser in laughing at the remark which the Prime Minister made, but I want to say, Mr. Speaker, as one member of the House, that this unbridled arrogance-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


David Lewis: -in the face-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


David Lewis: This unbridled-


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


David Lewis: -this unbridled-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We are still attempting to hear the point of order. I know that a number of hon. members have supplementary questions. I was trying to ascertain a moment ago whether the hon. member for Compton has a supplementary, and I will call on him in a moment. The hon. member for York South indicated that
May 13, 1971

he has a point of order. Perhaps he might indicate what it is. I had the impression a moment ago that he was making a statement instead of raising a point of order. He might help the Chair by indicating what his point of order is.


David Lewis: If, Mr. Speaker, the hyenas opposite will keep quiet-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: May we have order, please.


David Lewis: I rise, Mr. Speaker, to say that the unbridled arrogance of the Prime Minister-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


David Lewis: -in the face of this discussion of the most serious situation in the country in some time, in attempting to take over your task and tell Members of Parliament what to do and what not to do is unforgiveable.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: On the same point of order, Mr. Speaker,
I have some difficulty in understanding how it can be unbridled arrogance for me to attempt to take over your task and appeal for a bit of order so that I can talk economics, whereas it is not unbridled arrogance for the leader of the New Democratic Party to call the members opposite him hyenas.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I wonder whether we
might not try to return to the questions. I know it is the feeling of all-


Mr. Alexander:: Never mind the red herrings. Let's get back to the action.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. It seems to me it is the feeling of all hon. members on both sides of the House that the matter we are discussing is a very important one. I know hon. members are anxious to ask questions. A moment ago I saw quite a few members seeking to ask supplementaries and I am anxious to give them the opportunity to do so. But if we spend a good part of the question period on points of order and questions of privilege, legitimate or otherwise, there will be very few questions asked.


Mr. Nowlan:: A supplementary-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member has caught the Speaker's eye and his ear. He will be recognized in a moment but I am trying to proceed, as much as possible in the circumstances, in an orderly fashion. I think we had reached the point a few minutes ago when the Chair wanted to ascertain whether the hon. member for Compton had a supplementary question.
Inquiries of the Ministry



INCREASE IN COST OF LIVING-MEASURES TO STABILIZE ECONOMY

Henry P. Latulippe: Mr. Speaker, I want to direct a supplementary question to the right hon. Prime Minister.
As the consumer price index is rising in every sector in a disconcerting manner, would the right hon. Prime Minister tell this House whether the government intends to intervene directly to establish a policy aimed at lowering prices and the cost of living in order to balance the economy and ensure stability to the Canadian currency?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, to answer this question, it would be necessary for me to know more about the means proposed by the hon. member to lower prices. Does he suggest control over prices and salaries through statutory means, and does he think, along with his party, that the federal government has indeed the necessary jurisdiction to do so?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I revealed a moment ago that the hon. member for Annapolis Valley had caught the Speaker's eye, so I shall recognize him now.



BUDGET TAX ADJUSTMENTS RECOMMENDED BY MINISTER OF INDUSTRY, TRADE AND COMMERCE TO OVERCOME PROBLEMS

John Patrick (Pat) Nowlan: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I would not want to accept necessarily the premise of the Prime Minister that he can talk economics if he cannot understand the subject, and so my question is directed to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. In view of the deepening economic problems of the country, and especially how they are affecting our export trade, and in view of the floating dollar which aggravates this problem, can the minister tell us in a general way, without saying what specifics may be involved, if he has made any recommendations at all to the Minister of Finance as to what adjustments, in a tax way, may be in the budget that the Minister of Finance is supposed to deliver some time?


Hon. Jean-Luc Pepin (Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, I have reported to the Minister of Finance that notwithstanding our many difficulties exports were doing rather well.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Jean-Luc Pepin: For the first three months of the year the trade balance was favourable by $682 million.


Mr. McGrath:: And what was unemployment?


Jean-Luc Pepin: -seasonally adjusted, and on a non-seasonal basis, $682 million.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I suspect that the minister has many statistics he would like to impart to the House. I do not think that now is the time. He will have to do

May 13, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry
that by way of a statement on motions. He should reply
to the question as briefly as possible without going into details.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, I just want to give one more figure if I may, because a few months ago the hon. member, Prince George of Hastings, was about to make a-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The minister said he wanted to terminate his reply. It seems to me he was not doing so. He was referring to a previous question. I invite the minister to conclude his reply, if he wants to, as quickly as possible because obviously we will be running short of time.


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, last year there was a decline of manufactured products in our export content of about 3 per cent. It is well remembered that some hon. members tried to make a national crisis of this. I explained fully at that time why we had that decline. I am eager to report to the House that we have reached 40.4 per cent now in the manufactured content of our exports. So there was no crisis then and there is none now. On the contrary.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, if everything is going as well as the minister just indicated with regard to-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Jean-Luc Pepin: I was talking only about exports.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: If everything is going so well with
regard to the manufacture of exports in Canada, how does the minister explain the unseasonal decline in the manufacturing industry in this country between the months of March and April?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, I was talking about exports. The question was about exports and I answered about exports.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Jean-Luc Pepin: If the hon. member has another question to ask, he should ask it. I was answering the question that
was asked.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE


John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker,
my question is for the Minister of Labour. In view of the increased thousands now who are out of work because of the prolonged period of unemployment, which number

will be added to at the end of this week as a result of the
curtailment of seasonal benefits, can the minister inform the House whether special, emergency steps are being taken to provide additional benefits for the thousands affected by the level of unemployment?


Hon. Bryce Mackasey (Minister of Labour):: Mr. Speaker, I said yesterday, to be precise, to an hon. member, "I am sure the hon. member would not want to mislead the House in that regard." He was talking about something else. I also said, "I have no intention at present of extending seasonal benefits beyond May 15." This means that the people on unemployment insurance will be drawing benefits until the end of May. This is the significance of the May 15 date. They will draw benefits for two weeks following May 15. Extending seasonal benefits will do nothing for people presently unemployed and not drawing unemployment insurance as a result of the rather stringent regulations which make it impossible for many people who have been out of work for a long time to draw unemployment insurance. Nevertheless, I am aware of the situation and have asked for a full report from the department. I must bring to the attention of the House that the hon. member's suggestion would require a change in the Unemployment Insurance Act as well as an increase in the rates and would do nothing at all for people presently unemployed and who are not on unemployment insurance benefits, seasonal or otherwise.


John Edward Broadbent: After listening to that rather prolonged answer from the minister may I ask whether he will, after he has looked into the situation, inform the House, say by next Tuesday at the latest, of what he has decided to do?


Bryce Stuart Mackasey: Yes, Mr. Speaker. That decision will be based on the facts, figures and statistics which the department is putting together.

fTranslation]



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY


Mr. Roch La Salle (Jolielie):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to ask the Prime Minister a question.
Referring to a question asked a few weeks ago on the need to call a meeting of representatives of labour unions and the whole economic sector for the purpose of obtaining suggestions to curb unemployment, the Prime Minister answered that he did not deem this necessary at that time. In view of the present unemployment situation, which seems to be out of the government's control, could the Prime Minister tell the House whether the need for such a meeting at all these levels has not become evident today?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member certainly remembers that one reason why we should hesitate before taking such a step is that
May 13, 1971

we tried to do just that last year when, through the Prices and Incomes Commission, we suggested to various sections of the economy that a meeting be called to try and agree to somewhat curtail the inflationary trends. The hon. member win also recall that at that time we were unable to ascertain the co-operation or the attendance of representatives from large sections of the industry and I have no reason to believe, since I already have contacted them, that such a meeting would now be more agreeable to them.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Peace River on a supplementary.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Prime Minister a direct question. In view of the situation releaved, will he replace the government's present economic advisers and scrap their policies which have proved totally inadequate to deal with unemployment and inflation?



INDUSTRY


Mr. Georges Valade (Sainte-Marie):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask a question of the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce who is also the member for Drummond.
I would like to ask the minister who cited figures a few moments ago indicating an increase in exports whether he is aware that footwear imports threaten the very existence of nearly 90 per cent of shoe manufacturers in Quebec, and could he inform the House as to the measures he is considering to rescue this industry from stagnation?
Hon. Jean-Luc Pepin (Minister of Industry, Trade and
Commerce): I am well aware of this situation, Mr. Speaker. If the hon. member would like to suggest with the unanimous consent of his Conservative colleagues that drastic protectionist measures be taken, I would be very happy to consider his suggestion.


Georges-J. Valade: Mr. Speaker, I think that it is a quite urgent question since it deals with an industry of which 90 per cent of its activities are carried on in Quebec.
I am asking the minister a clear and specific question.
Does he intend to take some steps liable to prevent early stagnation in the Quebec footwear industry?


Jean-Luc Pepin: Mr. Speaker, I have often stated in the House that it would be wrong to think that all footwear imports in Canada directly affect the Canadian footwear industry.
Evidently some footwear should not be manufactured in Canada because it would not be profitable to make them. I am thinking, for example, of Japanese sandals.
Inquiries of the Ministry
What we have been trying to do, Mr. Speaker, as I have often mentioned it in this House-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The minister, I understand, wishes to give the hon. member some detailed information. It would perhaps be more simple if the minister would directly communicate the proper information to the hon. member who, I am sure, would be pleased to obtain it.


Georges-J. Valade: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the hon. member for Sainte-Marie rising on a point of order?


Georges-J. Valade: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Sainte-Marie.


Georges-J. Valade: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order so as to report that the footwear industry is now in a deplorable situation and I ask the government to make its position and political objectives known-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Apparently, the minister wanted to go on and the hon. member for Sainte-Marie is rising on a point of order. Because of the very short time available, I will say to the hon. member and to the minister that it is most difficult to allow a minister to give a detailed reply to a question even if it is very important.


Hon. Theogene Ricard (Sainl-Hyacinlhe):: Mr. Speaker, I have a very brief supplementary.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe wishes to ask a supplementary.


J.-H.-Théogène Ricard: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the minister why 35 shoe manufacturers closed their plants?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Again I suggest that such information could be obtained in a general statement by the minister on motions.



THE CANADIAN ECONOMY


Mr. Erik Nielsen (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct a question to the Prime Minister. In view of the crisis proportions of the unemployment problem and the inflation problem, are his plans still remaining the same with respect to his visit to Russia, or is he going to cancel this visit and stay home to deal with these problems?


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: Mr. Speaker, I know that I am planning to leave on Sunday. I do not seriously think that by delaying or postponing the trip I would change the figures in a way in which the government itself could not change them in my absence.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!

May 13, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry


Pierre Elliott Trudeau: However, the hon. member might be interested in knowing that I am going as far as Siberia.


George Harris Hees: The Prime Minister should not just go there; he should stay there.



EFFECTIVENESS OF MANITOBA DEFICIT FINANCING PROGRAM IN DECREASING UNEMPLOYMENT-SUGGESTED CONSULTATION

Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Finance. In view of the fact that, unlike the rest of Canada, the unemployment figures for the province of Manitoba have decreased each month for the past three months because of the aggressive deficit financing program of that province, will the minister consult with his opposite number in Manitoba to find out how they do this and do the same?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member's supplementary is in the form of a suggestion.



INQUIRY OF THE MINISTRY

René Matte: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Prime Minister.
In view of the contradictions which cast doubts on his words, could the Prime Minister once and for all clarify
the situation and tell us whether or not the existence of a parallel government under the leadership of Mr. Claude Ryan has influenced the government in its decision to invoke the War Measures Act last October?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I do not think that question is in order at this stage. The hon. member for Calgary North.


Mr. Woolliams:: My question has already been
answered, Mr. Speaker.



REGIONAL ECONOMIC EXPANSION


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Wish to direct a question to the much neglected Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. Can the minister inform us, and I hope he can, when he is going to give an answer, which I will hope will be favourable, to the demand of the Atlantic Development Council for an appropriate strategy of development for the Atlantic provinces? I ask this question particularly in view of the tragic unemployment figures indicated in the DBS report for the Atlantic provinces, which are substantially higher than when the minister took office.


Hon. Jean Marchand (Minister of Regional Economic Expansion):: Mr. Speaker, of course we are working in close co-operation with the Atlantic provinces. To my mind, the Leader of the Opposition is not or does not want to be aware of the statistics. Since my department's programs have been in effect in the Maritimes the unemployment rate in this region, which used to be double the national average, has been cut by half this year and is still going down. So the unemployment rate has not increased compared with the national average, but it has decreased, Mr. Speaker.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: A supplementary question. Can the minister tell us when he will be able to appoint a chairman of the Cape Breton Development Corporation, or are his policies so ineffective and discouraging that he cannot find anyone to put in that position?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!



ATLANTIC PROVINCES-EFFECTIVENESS OF DEPARTMENTAL POLICIES

James Aloysius McGrath: I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. Notwithstanding the fact that the minister just misrepresented the figures on unemployment in the Atlantic provinces, is he now prepared to admit that his policies cannot work within the present framework of government policies and that unemployment is growing at a rapid rate in the Atlantic region and in the province of Quebec? Is the minister prepared to admit that his program is ineffective within the framework of government policies?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Gander-Twillingate.


James Aloysius McGrath: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. 1 think the minister should be entitled to reply to my question.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I suggest that is a decision which has to be made by the Chair. The Chair is not prepared to allow the minister to reply to a question which in my view is clearly argumentative. The hon. member asked the minister whether he is prepared to admit that his policies are not good policies. That is an argument, not a question which is proper or procedurally correct.


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order-


James Aloysius McGrath: I rise on a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I believe the minister is rising on a question of privilege.
[Mr. Trudeau.)
May 13, 1971


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, I have been accused of distorting the facts and this is a very serious accusation. I would like to know where is the distortion in my statement that the average unemployment rate had decreased in the Atlantic area as compared with that of the whole country. The hon. member accused me of misrepresentation. This is serious and I think he should stop lying to the House.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Again we are dealing with an argument between the hon. member and the minister. The minister gives statistics to the House. The hon. member says the statistics are inexact. The minister claims that they are correct. This kind of matter will never be resolved by a question of privilege or a point of order.


James Aloysius McGrath: I rise on a question of privilege. I said and I maintain that the figures in the Atlantic provinces for the past 10 years show that the minister cannot take any credit for any trend in the Atlantic provinces.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


James Aloysius McGrath: Also, the present figures indicate that unemployment is rising.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


James Aloysius McGrath: The minister should resign.


Mr. Speaker:: Order.


James Aloysius McGrath: The minister should resign.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I realize that the hon. member for Malpeque is anxious to ask a question or a supplementary, whatever the case may be, but I think I should recognize the hon. member for Gander-Twillingate who has been trying to get the floor for a while.



FINANCE


John Howard Lundrigan: Perhaps I can get an intellectually honest answer from the Minister of Finance. In lieu of the budget speech to be made in June, and in view of the present crisis, is the minister prepared to amend the date for his statement to the House and the country and either tomorrow or early next week make a definitive statement on the review, reconstruction and rethinking of the government's economic policies? In view of the fact that the Prime Minister will soon be leaving for Russia and will be out of the country for several weeks, the country is in need of some kind of statement now indicating whether there are any new plans or thoughts on the part of the government that can help Canadians at least to regain confidence in the economy.
Inquiries of the Ministry


An hon. Member:: That is not a question. It is a speech.


Edgar John Benson: At present it is my intention to present a budget some time in the first half of June.


John Howard Lundrigan: I wish to direct a supplementary question to the Prime Minister. In view of the fact the Prime Minister is not prepared to change his plans to travel to the Soviet Union, will he make a statement on motions tomorrow indicating some of the new plans, new economic policies, new employment policies and new taxation thinking on the part of the government to give some rejuvenation to the Canadian people during this period of crisis?


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Regina East.


John Howard Lundrigan: Mr. Speaker, the Prime Minister-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I am not sure whether the hon. member is rising on a point of order or to ask a question. If he intends to suggest that the Prime Minister was about to rise that was not my impression, and I am the one who has to be guided. The hon. member for Regina East.


Mr. Burton:: My supplementary question is for the-


John Howard Lundrigan: A point of order-


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Gander-Twillingate rises on a point of order.


John Howard Lundrigan: Perhaps the Prime Minister did not hear my question.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Regina East.



REGIONAL ECONOMIC EXPANSION


John Stratford Burton: I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. In view of the statement by the Prime Minister in a recent interview suggesting that the concept of full employment involves differing levels of unemployment, such as Ontario 1 per cent and the Atlantic provinces 5 per cent, can the minister indicate if this is the approach being followed by his department in its programs?


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, as has been stated in the House, the objective of the department is to reduce disparities in Canada. Disparity means that a situation is not equal to another when compared with it and the purpose of the department is to reduce the disparity between extremes. We were successful in doing this, as I indicated earlier.

May 13, 1971
Inquiries of the Ministry


John Stratford Burton: Will the minister inform the House when the level of unemployment in the Atlantic provinces was higher than in the month of April, namely 11.6 per cent-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Portage.



INQUIRY OF THE MINISTRY

Mr. Gerald Richard Cobbe (Portage):: My question is for the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce who is responsible for the census. Can the minister inform the House if the number of people leaving the province of Manitoba exceeds the unemployed?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.



REGIONAL ECONOMIC EXPANSION


Hon. J. A. MacLean (Malpeque):: My question is for the
Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. In light of the fact that the number of employed persons in the Atlantic provinces dropped by 3,000 in the month of April and the number of unemployed persons increased by 5,000, indicating that the economy of the Atlantic region is contracting rather than expanding, will the minister assure the House that he will immediately review the policies of his department on an urgent basis so that the name of his department can be justified?


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, for the figures quoted to have any sense, one must absolutely consider how the whole national economy is faring. Obviously, the Atlantic provinces have felt the effects of what has gone on at the national level, but when we speak of regional disparities it is a matter of finding out where the relative situation of the Atlantic provinces has improved or worsened, and I say it has improved.



CAPE BRETON DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION


Mr. Robert Muir (Cape Breion-The Sydneys):: In view of the verification by welfare officials in the city of Sydney and by the executive of the Metropolitan Development Committee for Action in the city of Sydney that unemployment at the present time on Cape Breton Island amounts to 25 per cent-and this has been surveyed-can the minister tell us what steps the Cape Breton Development Corporation is taking or plans to take soon to reduce this unemployment figure?


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, I would have no one think that I am pleased with the rate of unemployment, whether it be 10, 15 or 20 per cent. Obviously, I am not. Every program we have prepared is intended to remedy the present situation in Sydney.


Robert Muir: I don't know whether other members understood it, but to me the translation was absolutely terrible;
I could not figure out what the reply was. In any event, I doubt whether the minister said anything of importance.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member will recognize that there are only a few seconds left before the end of the question period. Perhaps he might ask his supplementary?


Robert Muir: Yes, Mr. Speaker, I shall be pleased to ask the minister a supplementary. Would the minister, on the first occasion he is available outside his owh constituency, go to Sydney and meet with the officials of the Cape Breton Metropolitan Committee for Action as they request, and advise them what is going to be done regarding the mass unemployment and starvation in the Cape Breton area?


Jean Marchand: Mr. Speaker, in reply to the question put a while ago, I would say to the hon. member that to get an intelligent reply he should ask an intelligent question.
In reply to the second part of that question, I am quite willing to meet those people who wish to see me to discuss the serious problems in the Atlantic provinces.


Robert Muir: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, the minister is reflecting on the clergy, on union leaders and on business leaders who are involved in the work of this committee. They think these questions are intelligent. However, if the hon. gentleman wishes to advise these people that they are ignorant, that is his affair.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Orders of the day. I appreciate there are many hon. members who have not had an opportunity to ask their questions. I tried to keep the question period moving as quickly as I could but I was not entirely successful. I apologize to hon. members on that account, but perhaps other questions might be asked tomorrow.


Mr. Nesbiti:: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I was under the impression, though perhaps I was mistaken, that Your Honour had actually recognized me a few minutes ago.


Mr. Speaker:: That is not a very good point of order. I did recognize the hon. member but he was pre-empted when I thought the hon. member for Cape Breton-The
May 13, 1971

Sydneys should be permitted to ask a supplementary. Then there was a point of order raised and we had, by then, gone beyond the time allotted to the question period. I appreciate I have an obligation to the hon. member and I will try to keep it in mind and live up to that obligation tomorrow.


Mr. Saltsman:: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, since you are keeping in mind the position of the hon. member for Oxford, I wonder whether you would also-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I said that I had taken special note of the hon. member for Oxford, but I always have in mind the hon. member for Waterloo.



CONFLICT BETWEEN MEETINGS OF HOUSE AND STANDING COMMITTEE

James Aloysius McGrath: I rise on a point of order, Mr. Speaker. My point of order has to do with the business of the House. Today, while the House is in session, there are, according to Votes and Proceedings, 14 standing committees scheduled to meet. One committee is due to leave today at 4 p.m. on an important mission to Washington.
According to my calculations, these 14 committees have a total membership of 260. In other words, 260 of us are supposed to be meeting in the various standing committees this afternoon. This represents the total membership of the House, bearing in mind that there are five vacancies. In addition, of course, we must take account of the fact that there are 29 members of the cabinet and Your Honour, your two deputies, the Leader of the Opposition and the leaders of the other two political parties who are not normally called upon to attend committees. It is impossible for us to man all the committees this afternoon because, taking into account the factors I have mentioned, we are reduced to a total of 215. Yet 260 of us are supposed to be meeting in 14 committees this afternoon.
I am asking for your guidance, Mr. Speaker, because I am torn between my obligation to the House and my obligation to at least three of the 14 standing committees which are meeting. If I might be permitted to make one more comment before resuming my seat, may I say it seems that the government cannot manage the business of the country and cannot manage the business of this House either.


Mr. Peters:: I wish to support the contention put forward by the hon. member for St. John's East. This afternoon, a number of my hon. friends in this party have been trying to farm out the manning of committees because they are concerned about the subject that the House will be considering in a few minutes time. The difficulty is that if they are replaced they will be replaced by members who have no continuity of attendance at meetings of those particular committees, and committees cannot function satisfactorily in that way.
Meetings of House and Standing Committees Government supporters may be able to man the committees to the extent of providing a quorum, but I do not believe committees can function satisfactorily along those lines. This is a matter which should be taken into consideration.
I have particularly in mind the committee which is discussing the question of unemployment insurance. It is meeting this afternoon, and several of its members wish to participate in the debate in the House. It is obviously not good enough that members in all parties who are interested in the subject should find that the subject to be debated in the House is also before committees in another form. I strongly urge that the House leaders should meet and resolve this matter before the point is reached where members will say: To hell with the committees, we will pay attention to what goes on in the House. If this happens the level of committee work will deteriorate to such an extent that it will not be worth while for members to attend them at all.


Mr. Fortin:: I rise on the same point of order, Mr. Speaker. I should like to support those who spoke before me on this subject.
Today the House is considering government order No. 78 which would establish a special joint committee- another committee on top of all the others we already have-to find out if we should pass permanent legislation on emergency measures.
Mr. Speaker, we see that today's problem is not new. It logically derives from this government's habit of trying to invite out of the House as many members as possible. Thus, as it has been said a moment ago, more than 14 committees will be meeting today so that over 260 members will be out of the chamber during that time. Mr. Speaker, I feel there is abuse there.
Therefore I should like to make a proposal to the government, namely that the subject matter and the number of members making up the committee be referred to the Committee on Procedure and Organization in order to find a much more flexible system that will take into consideration the members' interests, both in committees and in the House, thus enabling every member to do his work properly in both places.


Mr. Speaker:: Is the hon. member for Peace River rising on the same point of order?


Gerald William Baldwin: No, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: Perhaps before I recognize him I should refer to the point of order raised by the hon. member for St. John's East. The submission that he has made is that there is an apparent or obvious conflict between the responsibility of members to the House and to the committees when we have so many committees sitting at the same time as this House is sitting. The point is not new. The hon. member for Timiskaming has made the point and the hon. member for Lotbiniere also reminded us of it.

May 13, 1971
Meetings of House and Standing Committees
Indeed, a few weeks ago, perhaps a month, the hon. member for St. John's East made a formal presentation for consideration by the Chair and I subsequently delivered myself of a three-page opinion saying that, while I recognized the importance of the matter, I was not sure there was anything that the Chair was able to do except perhaps to try to bring together representatives of the different parties. I undertook at that time to take this initiative and I followed up on my promise. There have been subsequent discussions in the Speaker's chambers with representatives of the different parties. I brought to their attention, as earnestly as I could, the point made by the hon. member for St. John's East, which was repeated today, and I gathered the understanding was that there would be a discussion of this matter.
All hon. members will realize that the solution to this very serious problem must lie in a change of the rules. Unfortunately, the Speaker has no power to change the rules. We were told that the Committee on Procedure and Organization would be going on a special mission during the next day or so, I believe, and these very distinguished representatives of the different parties, I suggest, might take this opportunity to review once again the problem that has been raised today.
I realize the difficulty here, which is obvious. When we have, as we have today, seven committees sitting in the afternoon and five in the evening it is very difficult to expect a large number of hon. members to be in attendance in the House to debate a matter as important as the one that will be debated later on. What more I can do than I have done already is difficult for me to conceive, except that the matter having been brought up again I will renew my submissions on behalf of hon. members to the House leaders, the very distinguished representatives of the different parties, in the hope that some agreement can be found to alleviate the difficulty and perhaps solve the problem.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I should like to raise another point of order which I would ask Your Honour to consider at the same time. The government house leader and those responsible are able to get away with the business of scheduling a number of committees to sit while the House is in session because of what I consider to be an illegal practice that has crept into our procedure. I should like Your Honour to take this matter under advisement and rule upon it.
I refer to the committees of this House being allowed to sit and hear witnesses notwithstanding the fact that, according to the rules of the House, they are not allowed to operate without a quorum. That is an illegal practice which allows the government to get away with scheduling 14 committees to meet today while the House is sitting.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: May I make a suggestion, Mr. Speaker?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Before I hear the parliamentary secretary it might be helpful to hear the hon. member for Calgary North.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, may I say I agree with the hon. member for St. John's East. I opposed the rule
changes, and I suggest this problem can only be solved by setting up a legislative committee to take care of legislation. What we are trying to do is to get legislation through all of these committees at once and we just do not have enough manpower to do it. It seems to me that some legislatures do have legislative committees, which are usually large committees that sit much as we sit in committee of the whole House to study bills clause by clause. I throw that suggestion out if we are not going to go back to the former rules, which I think were much superior to the new ones that are not working at all.


Mr. Jerome:: If I may briefly reply, Mr. Speaker, to the point of order that has been raised, may I say at the outset that I understand the concern of the hon. member for St. John's East, and indeed other opposition members who addressed themselves to this point. However, at the conclusion of the question period, which I take it is generally acknowledged to be the time when attendance in the House is at its optimum, only 50 per cent of all opposition parties uniformly across the board were present. So it is no wonder they are concerned about staffing committees.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


James Alexander Jerome: Be that as it may-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I am having some difficulty in hearing the representations being made by the parliamentary secretary. My impression was that after I had heard the submissions made by the hon. member for St. John's East, the hon. member for Timiskaming and the hon. member for Lotbiniere, no member rose to my right. If the hon. member did rise I accept his word for it and apologize for not recognizing him. Fortunately for me, perhaps, a second point of order was raised by the hon. member for St. John's East which might technically give the hon. member the occasion to reply. Perhaps he should try to limit himself to the second point raised by the hon. member for St. John's East.


Mr. Nystrom:: On a question of privilege, Mr. Speaker.


James Alexander Jerome: I do, however, Mr. Speaker, want to hasten to point out that the Votes and Proceedings referred to by the hon. member for St. John's East-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. The hon. member should resume his seat when I call him to order.


Mr. Crouse:: Learn the rules, Jerome.


Mr. Speaker:: When an hon. member rises on a question of privilege, the Chair must recognize him.


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, a few moments ago the hon. member stated that only 50 per cent of the members of the opposition parties were present in the chamber. I might point out that 17 of our 23 members were here. Of the six who were not, two are ill. Therefore the hon. member is not reflecting the truth in making outrageous statements like that.


Mr. Speaker:: This is an indication of the thought that I have always had, namely that not much can be achieved

May 13, 1971

by hon. members pointing to other hon. members and suggesting they are either here or not here, that there is absenteeism when there is not. I believe, generally speaking, there is good reason why members from time to time happen not to be in the House, and that this kind of exchange is not very constructive or productive.


James Alexander Jerome: Mr. Speaker, just to correct the record, if
I may, on a point of privilege, the Votes and Proceedings referred to by the hon. member for St. John's East, in which he suggested it was indicated 14 committees were scheduled to sit this afternoon, in fact reveals that only seven committees were scheduled to meet this afternoon, of which one met this morning. This committee, the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs, had a meeting scheduled for both this morning and this afternoon; and since it completed its work this morning that reduces the number to six. Even at that-


Mr. Speaker:: I would point out that we are debating a point of order and perhaps we should attempt to limit ourselves. We are going backwards instead of frontwards. My impression is that we might try and debate the business of the House this afternoon, though we do not appear to be intent on doing so. Perhaps the parliamentary secretary might be allowed to finish his presentation as quickly as possible and then I shall recognize the hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond.


James Alexander Jerome: I only wanted to say that we have endeavoured through the hon. member for Vancouver Quadra to co-ordinate the efforts of committees. Our most recent efforts were an endeavour to confine committee meetings to four at any one time, except in so far as the scheduling may be interrupted in cases where witnesses have been summoned. We are all anxious to try and co-ordinate this work in order to eliminate the problem, but it does not help to exaggerate the problem out of all proportion by suggesting that 14 committees have in fact been called to meet when in truth only half the number has been scheduled.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member has already spoken to the point of order; I am referring to the hon. member for St. John's East. I wonder whether we should not allow the matter to stand there. It seems to me I have indicated what my thoughts are. Basically and essentially I agree with the hon. member for St. John's East, and I am not in disagreement with the arguments brought forth by the parliamentary secretary. Both sides of the argument have been stated. This is a matter of equal interest to hon. members on both sides of the House. I am sure there are members on the government side who, as members of this committee, are as anxious to have this matter settled as hon. members of other parties. I should hope that those who speak on their behalf in the high councils of Parliament, where representatives of different parties meet, will take into account the desires of the different members who are anxious that a solution to this very serious and pressing problem be found. I really do not see what more can be said at this time, except for the Speaker to reiterate his determination to press ahead with the business of the House.
Bminess of House


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a question of privilege and I do not wish to detract from the point of order I raised, because it is very substantial. It has to do with my rights as a member of this House. My question of privilege arises from the fact that I do not think the parliamentary secretary should be allowed to misrepresent what I said and by so doing misrepresent the facts. What I said was that there were 14 standing committees scheduled to meet today according to Votes and Proceedings. That journal does not show the fact that there is a subcommittee of the Committee on External Affairs also meeting today. Furthermore, Votes and Proceedings does not show that the Standing Committee on Procedure and Organization leaves at four o'clock today on a trip to Washington. If what the hon. parliamentary secretary said represents his only contribution, he should have remained in his seat.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Again I suggest to hon. members that there is little point in proceeding in this direction. We have spent 20 minutes of the time of the House now considering something I do not think relates to the order of business this afternoon or the order of business of the five, six, seven or 15 committees, whatever number there are, and I think we should now proceed at this time with the business of the House.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, could the parliamentary
secretary shed some light on the question of what we will be considering tomorrow and next week in the House?


James Alexander Jerome: Yes, Mr. Speaker. This afternoon we will be proceeding with government order No. 78, a resolution in the name of the President of the Privy Council (Mr. MacEachen), dealing with the establishment of a committee on public order. If that matter is concluded today, and in any event if that matter consumes the full time of today, we will commence with these measures tomorrow in this order: Bill C-244, the Prairie grain stabilization measure; Bill C-238, the Canadian Wheat Board Act amendments; Bill C-246 respecting pilotage, and Bill C-240, the Post Office Act. I think it has been agreed that Tuesday and Friday of next week will be opposition days. If the debate scheduled for today is not concluded, we will return to this matter on Wednesday of next week.


Gerald William Baldwin: For the purposes of clarification, will the parliamentary secretary indicate that if we do not conclude the debate we are to commence in a few minutes we will continue with it tomorrow?


James Alexander Jerome: If we do not conclude the measure we are on today we will move tomorrow to Bill C-244 and the items enumerated.
5778

May 13, 1971
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GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Hon. John N. Turner (for the President of the Privy Council) moved:: That a Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons be appointed to examine, inquire into and report upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with emergencies that may arise from time to time in the future by reason of lawlessness or violence in Canadian society and that endanger the existence of government or the maintenance of the peace and public order;
That twelve members of the House of Commons, to be designated by the House at a later date, be members of the joint committee on the part of this House;
That the committee have power to sit during sittings and adjournments of the House;
That the committee have power to report from time to time, to send for persons, papers and records, and to print such papers and evidence from day to day as may be ordered by the committee;
And that a Message be sent to the Senate to acquaint Their Honours thereof.
He said: This resolution arises out of the tragic events of last October and the experience of the government of the Canadian people with respect to those events. The question which this House is being asked to place before the committee for report is the nature and kind of legislation required to prevent and to deal with emergencies precipitated by resort to lawlessness or violence which can reasonably be anticipated to arise in the future.
In October, 1970 the government of Canada, the government of the province of Quebec and the administration of the city of Montreal were faced with a crisis that culminated in kidnapping and violent death. It is not my intention to review the events of that crisis because I am certain that they have been inscribed indelibly in the minds of all hon. members. Much has been said about them both within this House and outside of it, and it is sufficient for me to recall that the government decided, very reluctantly, to invoke the provisions of the War Measures Act.
I have used the word "reluctantly" deliberately because we recognized last October and still recognize that that act, with its sweeping regulation-making authority, touching upon almost every conceivable aspect of our social structure, conferred more potential power on the executive than was needed to meet an October, 1970 type of crisis. We also recognized that power of this kind should not be given to the executive except under conditions of absolute necessity. It was in recognition of this that, as soon as possible, the government introduced the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act, 1970 which, upon its enactment, restored the War Measures Act to its dormant state.

Even if the October events are now part of history, we must nevertheless consider the present state of our society having regard to the lessons learned from those unfortunate events. We must study our society as it is now, when the impact of such events may increase or escalate because of our important and sophisticated means of communications heretofore unknown, but we must also be prepared to see things as they really are and, unfortunately, we are living at a time of confrontation where too many perhaps have embraced a philosophy which is based on violence and destruction. Their aim is not to ensure reforms or changes through democratic processes, but to destroy the established order and the social structures, in order to replace them with some form of totalitarianism. Such individuals do not hesitate to commit the most serious criminal offences. They have repeatedly done so, by resorting to burglary, bombing, arson, blackmail attempts on governments, kidnapping and even murder.
Hate, destruction and violence have been preached throughout the land and, although there were fewer and much less serious overt acts of disorder and violence outside Quebec than in that province, there is no guarantee, Mr. Speaker, that in future there will be no escalation in this field in other parts of Canada.
On the basis of Canadian history and Canadian experience over the past decade, and the existing social climate, it appears to the government that the events of last October and November cannot be relegated to the status of isolated aberrations unlikely to be repeated. While every responsible person must hope that there will be no repetition, there can be no assurance of this. Indeed, the government believes that some additional legislation is necessary to cope with those problems that may result in the future from disruption, intimidation and violence used as weapons of political action. Such legislation should be designed to permit a graduated response to emergencies that may arise. To the extent possible, response must be in direct proportion to the dimensions of the threat. The adequacy of our laws to meet future emergencies depends not only upon an analysis of those laws as implements of effective crime control but also upon a balanced assessment of whether they reflect the generally accepted and articulated values of our society- one of which is that they must not only facilitate the apprehension and prosecution of the lawbreaker but also that they must protect the innocent from unreasonable interference and harassment. A law that fails to reflect the articulated values of the social order to which it applies is a law that cannot and will not be enforced effectively.
The government is also fully aware that additional legislation in the field of criminal law, whatever form it might take, will not in itself provide definitive solutions to the problems I have been talking about. Indeed, if these problems are to be solved-and if society is to flourish, they must be solved-the primary solutions will be found outside the criminal law. Most of all, the solutions must be found in reforms that eradicate those

May 13, 1971

inequalities in our society from which political fanatics and anarchists draw nourishment for their existence.
However, that there are gaps in the criminal laws of this country that should be filled to facilitate effective law enforcement in times of serious crisis there can be no doubt. But, in eliminating those gaps, we must do everything that can be done to strike the proper balance between those sometimes conflicting and competing social goals of an orderly society on the one hand and of individual liberty on the other.
I wish to emphasize that while the government is of the view that additional legislation is desirable, a final decision has not been taken as to the nature and kind of legislation. The government agrees with those who are of the opinion that every reasonable opportunity should be afforded to those interested persons who may wish to make representations to this Parliament before definitive decisions are taken on the question. We believe the committee will recognize that its examination into these important matters should be thorough, but should proceed with as much dispatch as circumstances permit.
In conclusion, I wish to emphasize that it should be kept in mind, as the Prime Minister has said, that if the government is again confronted with an abnormal and serious crisis that cannot be dealt with within the framework of the existing laws, the fact that the subject matter of permanent legislation is pending before a Parliamentary committee will not prevent the government from immediately introducing additional legislation, if Parliament is sitting, or from summoning Parliament for that purpose if Parliament is adjourned. And finally of course, if circumstances should warrant it, recourse could again be made, as a last resort, to the War Measures Act.
I know that I speak for all members of this House in expressing the hope that none of these steps will be found to be necessary.


Mr. MacDonald (Egmonl):: Mr. Speaker, would the minister permit a question?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I believe the hon. member for Egmont would like to have the floor for the purpose of asking a question of the minister.


Mr. MacDonald (Egmont):: Mr. Speaker, in concluding his remarks the minister talked about an abnormal situation. I think, as a lawyer, the minister would agree that it is very difficult to construct any law without knowing the nature of the problem for which one is trying to construct a law. Since the government is looking for some legal recommendations, would the minister indicate what the abnormal situation is about which he is speaking?


John Napier Turner: Mr. Speaker, I think it will be up to the committee to examine the threats and the responses which may be necessary to meet those threats. That is the purpose of setting up this committee.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Well, Mr. Speaker, I am always happy to see my good friend the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) pilot through this House a motion, resolution or legislation. I notice the Minister of
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Justice was unusually short today. I hope that does not mean he wants to keep the matter which we are about to discuss covered up because I believe it is one of the most challenging things which has been before the House for some time.
In his opening remarks I was happy to hear the minister say that the committee, if it is set up, will wish to come to grips with the crisis-of course we call it the alleged crisis-that took place last fall, and the unfortunate events which surrounded it. I mention that because yesterday I had hoped to be able to cut down my remarks considerably when I asked the President of the Privy Council (Mr. MacEachen), because the motion is in his name, what was meant by the terms and conditions in this resolution. If we look at it very carefully, we will see that there could be some great argument-I say this with the greatest respect-if the committee is set up, and if this matter goes to the committee, concerning just what the terms of reference mean.
I wish to bring these words to Your Honour's attention:
That a Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons be appointed-
By this House.
-to examine, inquire into and report upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with emergencies that may arise from time to time in the future-
I am glad the minister said this committee is to be set up because of what happened during the events of last fall. I believe, to start with, we might ask these questions: Was the War Measures Act necessary? Was there an apprehended insurrection? What was the effect of the implementation so far as the question of civil rights of the individual are concerned? How effective was it? What were the abuses and do we need any legislation beyond what is encompassed in the Criminal Code? Having said that, may I say that any committee looking into this matter must therefore have before it those witnesses who have, or allegedly have, the knowledge, such as the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner), the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion (Mr. Marchand), the Secretary of State (Mr. Pelletier) and indeed the Prime Minister of Quebec.


An hon. Member:: And Mr. Saulnier, too.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Yes, and Mr. Saulnier. If these people appear as witnesses, then we should be able to answer these questions. Having set the tone for my remarks, may I say that we have been asked to consider today the setting up of a joint committee composed of members of the Senate and House of Commons for the purpose, as the Minister of Justice has just said, of inquiring into and reporting upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with a crisis similar to that which is alleged by the Prime Minister and his government to have existed on October 16 in the province of Quebec.
The terms of reference, I say at the outset, of this committee which is to be established would seem to be

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narrow. They certainly appear to be narrow from the answers given by the President of the Privy Council (Mr. MacEachen) yesterday, as recorded at page 5736 of Hansard. The examination of the past is important only to prepare for the future, and when I say to prepare for the future then I ask these questions: Is any permanent legislation necessary at all? If permanent legislation of this nature is necessary, what kind of legislation will it be? An amendment to the Code? A new public order act? A watered down version of the War Measures Act? We can only come to conclusions on that if we are able to find out the facts from those hon. gentlemen who have made contradictory statements from time to time in reference to the apprehended insurrection and the implementation of the War Measures Act and, indeed, the public order bill.
We need a far clearer statement from the Prime Minister or the Minister of Justice and all the other Ministers who gave reasons for the implementation of the War Measures Act than we have to this date. We want to be assured that if the Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice and all those other hon. gentlemen I have mentioned are not compellable witnesses-and there is always some difficulty in getting ministers and the Prime Minister before a committee-at least we should have some statement from some distinguished hon. gentlemen that they will at least appear before the committee and give a clear statement of facts. It should be stated, first, why the War Measures Act was implemented and, second, why the public order bill was approved to replace the War Measures Act, then was allowed to wither and die on the vine without any proper and concrete explanation.
We must have the facts and the evidence to make a decision. This government's desire to hide the true situation will produce a useless committee, forcing members to work but not produce.


Mr. Sharp:: But they will have to think.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: This committee, and I pause here for a moment, is merely set up to sweep under the carpet the facts that have not come forth from the government in reference to what took place. If action was taken merely to inflame public opinion or even help out a weak government some way, we want to know this, because we are dealing with a most important matter. We have a Minister of Justice who likes to ride around in shining armour, as a great reformer. If we need any law at all, this kind of act can only come about if the truth is produced and nothing short of having the Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice give a clearcut statement to the committee on why the cabinet implemented the War Measures Act and proposed the public order bill, will do.
At the beginning we on this side of the House had to accept the words of the distinguished ministers and the prime minister. If you look at the original script when the War Measures Act was implemented you will find they said, "you can take it from us, there is an apprehended insurrection." No shadow boxing is acceptable, otherwise this committee, like many other standing committees of the House of Commons, will be used by the government
to cover up half truths and distortions in an endeavour to justify the implementation of crisis legislation. If this country is to stay together can we, in committee, come up with the kind of legislation that is applicable to one province but really is not going to be used in the other nine? I have always believed that the law should serve every Canadian wherever he walks, runs, thinks or where he sleeps, and it should not depend upon the province in which he resides.
Let us look at the reasons given by the Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice and indeed all the other ministers as well as the premier of Quebec for the implementation of the War Measures Act which set aside the civil rights of the people in this country, in particular in the province of Quebec. Even when the public order bill was before this chamber an amendment to have a board of review was denied. It was denied, Mr. Speaker, and since then we have found out that 497 arrests were made. The responsibility for this situation rests on the shoulders of the Minister of Justice, not the Prime Minister, because he just uses the Minister of Justice at times. Of the 497 arrested, 62 were charged and with one or two exceptions, because you cannot pry the information out of this government even with a crowbar, all were charged with offences contrary to the Criminal Code of Canada rather than under the crisis legislation. One is brought to the conclusion of the Prime Minister, upon reflection after the events are over, when he said, "what are you going to do-we have seditious conspiracy." Mr. Speaker, we had seditious conspiracy in the Code on October 16, 1970 when we implemented the War Measures Act.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: That was a little fresh air, a truth that slipped out.
To digress for a moment, I should like to quote from a statement made by the Prime Minister-as usual outside the House of Commons-at Westminster, British Columbia. This statement was reported in the daily newspapers across the nation when he found out for the first time that we have a monarchy. If one looks at the motion one finds that the committee is supposed to look into the situation and come up with a recommendation as to what kind of legislation we should adopt. I can just see the Prime Minister, as quoted on the front page of the Globe and Mail of May 12 1971, saying:
The federal government will resort again to the War Measures Act if violence like that of the October crisis in Quebec breaks out and parliament gets bogged down in considering special anti-terrorist laws.
Let me pause there for a moment. The Prime Minister knew when he made that statement, as the Minister of Justice knows today, that between the time Canadians went to bed on the night of October 15 and when they woke up on October 16, the rules of the game in society had been changed, yet there had been no action by Parliament. Cabinet met in secret, either that night or the day before, and implemented the War Measures Act. As a result 497 people were arrested and 62 charged,

May 13, 1971

most of them under the Criminal Code. The Globe and Mail article continues:
This was promised recently by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau on two occasions. One, in a letter dated May 7 to Premier Robert Bourassa of Quebec,-
We now have that letter so I shall not refer to it because it has been tabled in this House. The newspaper article goes on:
-and secondly, in a lengthy interview the same day with a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation television crew.
Having said that, let us analyse now what reasons the Minister of Justice gave for the implementation of the War Measures Act and, finally, the public order bill. He is the highest officer in the government, except for the Prime Minister, because it is the Minister of Justice who looks after the administration of justice in Canada. The minister quoted from two letters, one from the premier of Quebec and one from the mayor of Montreal, the texts of which may be found in Commons Debates for October 16, 1970 at page 212. This letter is from the premier of Quebec and reads:
Under the circumstances, on behalf of the government of Quebec, I request that emergency powers be provided as soon as possible so that more effective steps may be taken. I request particularly that such powers encompass the authority to apprehend and keep in custody individuals who, the attorney general of Quebec has valid reasons to believe, are determined to overthrow the government through violence and illegal means. According to the information we have and which is available to you we are facing a concerted effort to intimidate and overthrow the government-
Let me pause there for a moment. The Prime Minister, on the Webster radio show in Vancouver-it is quite a show-said one of the reasons the government brought in the War Measures Act was because there was a suggestion of an alternative government. But he did not explain, if Bourassa was so weak at that time, that the alternative might have been a government set up through a democratic process. Maybe one of the members of his own cabinet said, "This man is too weak." Perhaps one of the members of the opposition could have got a group together in the legislature and formed a new government. Mind you, this suggestion was never explained during the debate. That is why the committee must get the facts. That is why we need the Minister of Justice, and the Prime Minister and his friends before that committee as witnesses, not as expert witnesses but as factual witnesses. Then, we will find out.
I really prefer to accept the words of the Minister of Justice because he went beyond the three reasons given by the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister said, "Look, I have laid everything before Parliament. The Canadian people know the reasons." If you read what the Minister of Justice said about that you will see the contradiction and understand why the committee, if it is to come up with adequate, properly legal legislation, has to get at the bottom of this thing. I continue the quotation:
According to the information we have and which is available to you, we are facing a concerted effort to intimidate and overthrow the government-
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Of course in the light of the unemployment situation today, I would think if anybody in this Chamber could overthrow this government it would be a good thing for the nation.


Mitchell William Sharp: By violence?


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Almost.


Mitchell William Sharp: Do you support violence?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Certainly, I don't support violence.


Mitchell William Sharp: You seem to.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I ask the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Sharp) to read what he and other ministers said. Mr. Speaker, their truth is like a bunch of yo-yos going up and down, changing like the weather changes.


Mitchell William Sharp: You tell us. I am listening but I have heard nothing new.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I am sorry the Secretary of State for External Affairs is so touchy on this subject. But he always gets a little touchy when he is here and the Prime Minister is not, because he dreams of the leadership he once sought. However, he made the great compromise to become minister of external affairs, and handed over his troops.


An hon. Member:: More than you ever had.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: To continue with this quotation:
It is obvious that those participating in this concerted effort completely reject the principle of freedom under the rule of law.
Then, there was the letter from the Mayor of Montreal. I repeat that I am quoting from the speech of the Minister of Justice as recorded in Hansard:
The chief of the Montreal Police has informed us that the means available to him are proving inadequate and that the assistance of higher levels of government has become essential for the protection of society against the seditious plot and the apprehended insurrection in which the recent kidnappings were the first step.
I want to pause there. Under the Criminal Code, kidnapping is an offence, murder is an offence, and suggested conspiracy is an offence. If these people were seditious conspirators plotting kidnappings, plotting murders, blowing up mail boxes, blowing up people,-all of which had been happening,-then all you had to do was get a police force to arrest them under the terms and conditions of the Criminal Code, even in spite of the Minister of Justice's new bail amendment which was more bluff and puff than anything else.
On that day, October 16, as recorded at page 212 of Hansard, the Minister of Justice said:
The government of Canada has to take the final responsibility but when the Government of the Province of Quebec and the mayor of the largest city in this country, on the information available to them and the information available to us through our own law enforcement agencies, are of the opinion that the state has been reached where we ought to, as sound and common sense human beings, anticipate a danger to our society in the form of insurrection and are willing to use that type of

May 13, 1971
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vocabulary to the Prime Minister of Canada, then that is material which we cannot ignore.
I want to recite a list of events that have contributed to the rapid acceleration of this dangerous situation in Quebec. They are the kidnappings, which in themselves if they were isolated would be a purely criminal affair but, within the context of a wider conspiracy and being used for ransom against a legitimately constituted government, are something else. We have the continuous threats to life and property in the communications of the FLQ of a seditious, violent and inflammatory nature. They have been issued and members are aware of them.
Now, I want to pause before I come to that part where the Minister of Justice said-this is something the Prime Minister never said-"There are other facts which I cannot disclose to Parliament." He was saying, in effect, there are other facts that the people don't know which I have within my bosom as a result of my responsibility as Minister of Justice. I cannot tell you now, but when history is written either they will be leaked out, or somebody will tell when all this trouble is passed. The Prime Minister said, "I have laid the facts, the three reasons before the House, and there are no other reasons. Parliament has been told. The people have been told." Therein lies a great contradiction and, as I said earlier, Mr. Speaker, I prefer to take the words of the Minister of Justice because there must have been something more.


An hon. Member:: Someday we will know.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: We will know someday, and I hope it will be in this committee because I want to have not only the privilege but the pleasure of asking questions of these distinguished gentlemen.
Now, I want to refer for a few moments to page 8 of the Report of the Royal Commission on Security, published in June, 1969. I do this because the government left the impression that all this was new, that on the night of October 15 all this came to light. The Minister of Justice must have read this report. The Prime Minister must have read it. What did it say? Mr. Coldwell, a very distinguished Canadian, and two other distinguished Canadians were on this commission. Some people used to refer to Mr. Coldwell as a sort of revolutionary in Saskatchewan. I am glad he created one revolution to get rid of the Gardiner machine.
I quote from paragraphs 21 and 22 of the report:
In addition to the requirement for security procedures imposed by the communist threat, Canada is at present faced with a second and perhaps even more difficult internal security problem arising from the activities of some elements of the Quebec separatist movement. Separatism in Quebec, if it commits no illegalities and appears to seek its end by legal and democratic means, must be regarded as a political movement-
With all of which I would agree, and I think any hon. member would agree.
__to be dealt with in a political rather than a security context.
Then, the Commission says:
However, if there is any evidence of an intention to engage in subversive or seditious activities, or if there is any suggestion of foreign influence-
About which I am going to have something to say in a few moments.
__it seems to us inescapable that the federal government has
a clear duty to take such security measures as are necessary to protect the integrity of the federation.

I might digress. This government won't even protect the constitutional rights of the people.
At the very least it must take adequate steps to inform itself of any such threats, and to collect full information about the intentions and capabilities of individuals or movements whose object is to destroy the federation by subversive or seditious methods.
Before I read paragraph 22, let me summarize what I have just read. There, the Commission warned the government, early in June, 1969, about the events that were taking place. There were bombings. There were murders. There were buildings being blown up. As the Commission said, if it was a separatist movement in a political sense it had to be dealt with in a political way, but if it was a separatist movement to undermine the very foundations of our nation, that was a very different thing.
What the government told us on October 16 was that there was such a movement. But it could have found that out in June, 1969. We were questioning the government, but we never got any answers about the royal commission. Now, let me read paragraph 22:
Although the more moderate elements of the Quebec separatist movement have up till now been conducting a largely political campaign-
That was the way of Levesque, who at one time was a great friend of the minister.
-it appears to us that there is in certain quarters-
And these are the important words
__a tendency to resort to activities that could well be regarded
as seditious.
What did the Minister of Justice, the Prime Minister or any member of the cabinet do about that report? The answer is, nothing. I continue quoting:
What is more, there is no doubt about communist and Trotskyist interest and involvement in the movement.
It is significant that the author speaks of communists and Trotskyists. He was a revolutionary in a parliamentary sense. Actually, I am not quite sure what a Trotskyist is. I have an idea that he will try to undermine you and blow you up. I continue quoting:
Both groups have established 'autonomous' Quebec organizations as somewhat transparent attempts to exploit separatist sentiment.
May I refer to history for a moment? Kerenski was the leader of a democratic revolt, but he was finally overthrown by Lenin and the Bolsheviks. There, evil supplanted good. I continue quoting:
-members of both have achieved positions of influence in at least some of the separatist groups and agencies, helped by the often bitter factionalism within the movement itself.
Was close attention paid to these organizations? Were instructions given at that time with respect to those organizations? The fact that the government implemented the War Measures Act and picked up certain people, some of whom were charged and have been found not guilty, is significant. The facts in those cases in some ways are similar to the facts in the Vallieres case Vol. 9,
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Criminal Reports, 1970, page 24, that I cited to the Court of Appeal. There was an acquittal in that particular case. I point out that 497 were arrested, 62 were charged and some have been released. The police could have picked them up on the night of the sixteenth, or even a few days after. I wish the right hon. member for Prince Albert (Mr. Diefenbaker) were here, because these matters formed the subject of one of his speeches. He has already dealt with the situation of people who were not involved in the organization of separatist groups but who had friends who were involved in those organizations. That subject I do not want to deed with at this time.
Let me say this, however. This government knew of and had been advised of the terrorism and the activities of the FLQ in Quebec since June, 1969. What did the government do about this? Nothing, Mr. Speaker. They knew that there had been bombings; they knew that there had been murders and they knew that there was violence even before the unfortunate events that overtook Mr. Laporte. Questions were asked about these matters in the House of Commons. The government knew that for some time ammunition, guns and dynamite had been stolen not only from the Armed Forces of Canada but from other sources where supplies of this nature were kept available and handy. They knew that communist activists were being trained in Cuba for Canada. We had the report of the Royal Commission on Security and we knew where these people were being trained. Yet the government preferred to ignore the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Security and the general buildup of lawlessness. The Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice said, subsequent to the implementation of the War Measures Act, that the Criminal Code of Canada contained all the necessary law needed to bring these lawbreakers to justice and to conviction. Why was no royal commission set up to examine crime and criminal separatists-I am not referring to political separatists-so that we could get the cards out on the table? We had asked for this for years.
If the objectives of the FLQ were as the government suggested, that organization would have been guilty of seditious conspiracy. I see the minister from Manitoba nodding in agreement with me. I have the best possible witness for that statement.


An hon. Member:: He is a peaceful separatist.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Certainly, the Prime Minister suggested that. What was needed was the tough administration of law, and action; we did not need acquiescence before violence got out of hand, before Mr. Cross was kidnapped and before Mr. Laporte was kidnapped and murdered later. The calling in of members of the armed forces and the militia was not the result of the War Measures Act. That right, as hon. members know, flows from the powers under the Defence Act and regulations thereto, and this step was taken at the time the government implemented the War Measures Act. My friends in Calgary think, as I assume the people in other cities think, that the armed forces were called in because the government threw the lever, so to speak, and implemented the War Measures Act. The Prime Minister made clear what
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happened on the Webster show We are on all fours in that regard.
The Minister of Justice said that the War Measures Act was implemented because the Mayor of Montreal and the Premier of Quebec had asked for it. That this conspiracy existed was well known to members of cabinet. The government's action was linked with the kidnappings and activities of the FLQ, which were described as seditious conspiracy, violent and inflammatory. The Prime Minister said that the Mayor of Montreal and Premier of Quebec asked for this action to be taken and that all the facts relating to the situation were out on the table. They knew the facts. And what did the Minister of Justice say? Sometimes government members are very busy and cannot always compare notes. Truth will slip out. After all, even cabinet ministers are subject to the laws of human behaviour.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Some.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: What did the Minister of Justice say? He said, as reported at page 215 of Hansard:
It is my hope that some day the full details of the intelligence upon which the government acted can be made public, because until that day comes the people of Canada will not he able fully to appraise the course of action which has been taken by the government.
What does the Minister of Justice know that he has not told Parliament? The Prime Minister has said that the government has disclosed everything, yet the Minister of Justice suggested otherwise. Perhaps the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Sharp) who is listening to me can shed some light on this matter. I hope that he takes part in the debate. Why, when the Prime Minister said that the government had disclosed everything, did the Minister of Justice say something else? Just what did the Minister of Justice mean and why was he contradicting the Prime Minister? On this point I prefer to believe the Minister of Justice. He said that the government did hide the facts, that information was withheld and that there was fear on the part of the Quebec government that they might be overthrown or replaced by an alternative government, possibly by democratic means. We do not know the answers.
Let me put these questions. What details of intelligence were withheld by the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister? What secret information did the government have that they failed to disclose to Parliament and the people of Canada and that they ought to have disclosed? How can we enact legislation until we know these facts and until competent witnesses are willing to come forward? Third, what information did the government have that there was in Canada an organization dedicated to the terroristic overthrow of the Quebec government? What are the answers to these questions?
The Minister of Justice said that some day we shall know the facts. Perhaps he will write a book. I can already imagine him in his den-but what will he write? Will he say, "I will tell the Canadian people and the Parliament of Canada that what the Prime Minister said was nonsense." The government has said that it implemented the War Measures Act because it feared an

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apprehended insurrection. In connection with that very serious matter compare the statements of the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister. Answering the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Stanfield) on October 23, 1970, as reported at page 511 of Hansard, the Prime Minister said:
Mr. Speaker, what I said was that the facts that I have recited-
He meant the facts respecting the two letters.
-and which are known to the House were sufficient for us to take the steps we did. I am not saying that beyond that there are not other facts which may or may not be known to the public. It is a matter that will be left to the police, as far as I am concerned. I say that the facts that are known to the House are the facts on which we acted, and it is on that that we stand.
How can we reconcile what those two witnesses, the Minister of Justice and the Prime Minister, have said before this distinguished and illustrious committee. How can their statements stand? One man says that there is nothing more to be known, and the other one has said or suggested that something has been concealed. I will tell you what the government has been doing. It has been sweeping the whole subject under the rug and trying to get out of political danger at the same time. They were sweeping the whole situation under the carpet and trying to keep their political favour at the same time. In answer to a question by the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) on October 26, 1970, the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) said, as recorded at page 547 of Hansard:
First, we had from the authorities of the province of Quebec and of the city of Montreal a clear statement that they apprehended insurrection. Second, there had been the abduction of two very important citizens in the province of Quebec, with an intention to murder them if the government did not give in to ransom. The third fact was circumstantial, if you wish, that approximately two tons of dynamite had been stolen in the province of Quebec this year, as well as a sizeable number of small arms and other ammunition. Also, there was a state of confusion and threats of violence in the province of Quebec. We decided to act on these facts as we interpreted them, and on this the government will stand or fall.
As recorded at page 547 of Hansard, the Prime Minister said the government would stand or fall on those facts. Everything was confined to one package. However, the Minister of Justice said there was something which the people would not be told. Unless that "something" is made known to the committee, we may be wasting our time. What the Prime Minister said must be compared with what was said by the Minister of Justice.
The Minister of Justice, waxing eloquent as usual, said in a confessional way "Some day we will tell the Canadian people the real truth and they will have to judge accordingly, but I will have left this office by this time". No wonder the Minister of Justice wanted to resign at one point. We need the truth now to make decisions for the future.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: How can we move into the future without knowing what kind of a house we are going to build or what kind of a foundation we will have? The Prime Minister denied over and over again, as found
on pages 591 to 654 of Hansard, that the War Measures Act was implemented because there was a suggestion that a group of people were prepared to set up an alternative government to that which existed in Quebec. He has now changed his tune and verse. If you can do that, you are a good musician and politician.
When pressed by the leader of the New Democratic Party, as recorded at page 654 of Hansard, the Prime Minister was asked:
Mr. Speaker, I wish to address this question to the right hon. Prime Minister. I appreciate that the War Measures Act is worded in such a way that the mere declaration by the government that there is an apprehended insurrection makes it so, but I want to ask the Prime Minister whether the information he has given us is all the information on which he acted or did he act on any other information which he has not disclosed to us?
The Prime Minister answered in his usual contemptible way. He said:
Mr. Speaker, I acted on the information that I have been accumulating since I was three years old.
That was the answer of the Prime Minister. Did that mean he knew something about all this? I do not know what it means. Compare the following statements with those of the Prime Minister and the Minister of Justice. The Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Chretien), speaking in the city of Montreal on October 28 last, said, and I quote from page 685 of Hansard:
A lot of information we have on hand comes from informants, some of them highly placed. It would endanger their situation as well.
We have good and sufficient reasons for invoking the War Measures Act. There are other reasons as well, and we will probably never be able to make them public.
The Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development gave a new answer. Unlike the Minister of Justice, he is going to keep his reasons secret. The Prime Minister said that all the information was laid before the House. Is the Prime Minister asking us to believe that his Minister of Justice and Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development have secret information which he does not have? Of course not. What are the reasons? As recorded at page 212 of Hansard, the Minister of Justice said and I quote:
As I said earlier, this has to be a question of judgment based on the information available to members of the cabinet. Needless to say, some of that information, because of the current state of affairs, is not information that necessarily can be made public.
As recorded at page 215, the Minister of Justice said:
It is my hope that some day the full details of the intelligence upon which the government acted can be made public,-
What is this information? We can only get this information by calling witnesses. That is the only way. We want the Prime Minister, the Minister of Justice, the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development, Mr. Saulnier and, above all, we want the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion (Mr. Marchand) because he shed new light on the subject. He said there were
3,000	known FLQ members in Quebec.

May 13, 1971


David Orlikow: And that was a conservative estimate.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Somebody said there were 5,000. If there were 3,000 or 5,000, why were only 497 people arrested and 62 charged? Why were 3,000 persons not charged with seditious conspiracy? The minister did that to create a scare during the municipal elections. That is why he made that statement with grandeur. We want the minister to appear before the committee. If another 2,500 men are trying to overthrow this government by illegal means, the Minister of Justice should be very interested in telling us who they are. He could have had a telephone conversation with the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion. That is the question. That is why this committee is so important.


David Lewis: They even see each other sometimes.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: How can the words of the Minister of Justice be reconciled with the words of the Prime Minister? When the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) directed a question to the Prime Minister, the Prime Minister said, as recorded at page 689 of Hansard:
I am telling the House we did not act on anything else than what is before the House. I am not saying we did not have any other information, but I am saying that if hon. members opposite want to use this information, let them take the credit for it.
I have pointed out the contradictions and distortions on this one matter. I can speak on any matter on which the government is engaged or involved and point out contradictions and distortions. This party is not interested in a committee being set up, without any teeth, to approve what the government has done. If the purpose of the committee is merely to show that the government is right, it should not be set up. This party is not interested in playing games and making political manoeuvres to assist the government in soothing its wounds and, indeed, its conscience. We want a committee that can go into the facts.
This party is not interested in acquiescing to the government in abuses of the law as a result of which people were denied the very limited niceties of their civil rights as understood by our system of jurisprudence or in setting aside the freedoms of the individual guaranteed by the Bill of Rights unless, of course, the evidence before the committee indicates that some limitation must be placed upon the freedom of the individual for the good of society as a whole. We will only have the answer to that question from the Minister of Justice and all the other little ministers who were involved in this drama. Only then can we come to the principle.
This is the reason the Minister of Justice spoke so briefly today. He wanted to be brief. The minister is a tremendous politician. He thought that if his speech were very short, the media would think there was not much involved in this little matter. Well, Mr. Speaker, there is a lot to it. We had another minister like that. The Minister of Justice said that the War Measures Act and the public order bill were produced to lessen the onus of proof on the Crown against the alleged accused. Instead of lessening the onus of proof on the Crown they put the onus of proof on the accused. The Quebec court of
National Security Measures
appeal agreed with me, with other members of this party and members of the New Democratic Party, that clause 8 had a retroactive effect. The Minister of Justice said that he consulted his legal officers. When they speak to the minister, they tell him that is the law. Sometimes the courts do not agree with Ministers of Justice or Attorneys General. I have had that experience.


John Napier Turner: That is not what the Quebec court of appeal said.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Read the case.


John Napier Turner: Read the judgment.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I read the judgment. The courts declared that the legislation was retroactive, although the interpretation by the Minister of Justice in this chamber was the opposite. I can see the great drama playing before my eyes. I can see a committee with Liberal members of Parliament and men from the other place being in the majority, controlling the opinion of the committee and making a majority report, all flavoured as the result of political considerations and associations.
In view of that fact, I wish to move an amendment. Before doing so, I wish to state that I have taken cognizance of the rule. I trust that if Your Honour has any questions as to the legality of this amendment, we will have an opportunity to speak. I would direct Your Honour's attention to Standing Order 47. I have discussed this matter with my hon. friend from Peace River who has a great knowledge of the rules. The Standing Order reads:
A motion to refer a bill, resolution or any question to a committee of the whole or any standing or special committee, shall preclude all amendment of the main question.
The main question here concerns the setting up of a committee. We are not opposing the setting up of a committee. But we do not want it to be a drama coloured by political associations. I have therefore prepared an amendment, in French and English, and perhaps I might read it.


An hon. Member:: In French.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I have been invited to read it in French but we Calgarians have a little difficulty there. The amendment reads as follows:
That the motion be amended by adding at the end of the first paragraph thereof the following:
''and, for better assuring the purposes of such report with respect to emergencies that endanger the existence of government, inquire into and first report upon all the circumstances anticipatory of and giving rise or purported to have given rise to the proclamation of the War Measures Act on October 16, 1970, as well all the circumstances thereafter following and thereto related which may have or presently or in future may endanger the existence of any government, whether federal, provincial or municipal."
If there is any question as to the admissibility of the amendment on procedural grounds, I should like to have the privilege of addressing Your Honour after you have examined it.

May 13, 1971
National Security Measures


Mr. Depuiy Speaker:: The hon. member lor Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) has indicated he would like an opportunity to present arguments directed to the procedural aspects of his amendment should the Chair have any difficulty in deciding whether or not it is procedurally acceptable.
I must say to the hon. member and to other hon. members that I do have such a difficulty, and I would invite the hon. member for Calgary North and other hon. members to assist the Chair. I might say that the kernel of the problem is whether the proposed amendment goes beyond the scope of the motion, in other words, whether it raises what might be called a new and substantive question. If this is the case, then, of course, notice would be required under the Standing Orders. The hon. member asserts that this is merely an elaboration or extension of the main motion, and I think this is the question to which hon. members should direct their thoughts when assisting the Chair. I might say there is already parliamentary jurisprudence on this point to be taken into account. Speakers in former Parliaments and, indeed, in this Parliament, have indicated they would look very closely at an amendment such as this which proposes to amend a motion setting up a standing or special or select committee. Thus, it seems to me, argument should be directed to the Chair bearing in mind the parliamentary jurisprudence I am required to keep in my mind when making a decision.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Thank you very much, Mr. Speaker. I appreciate that, as you have said, there is jurisprudence to the effect that the substance of such a motion as is before us may not be changed. I will read the relevant Standing Order again:
A motion to refer a bill, resolution or any question to a committee ... shall preclude all amendment of the main question.
I invite Your Honour to direct attention to the words "the main question". You were not here when the Minister of Justice began his speech. He said he was dealing with this issue in the light of events which took place last October. As I understand it, the motion asks that a committee be set up of Members of Parliament and members of the Senate to determine whether we need emergency legislation for the future. That is the substance of the motion. A crisis might arise similar to the one encountered last fall. The only crisis we have experienced since confederation in which the War Measures Act has been used in peacetime was the situation we encountered on October 16. In order to determine whether we need new legislation at all, and, if so, what kind of legislation is needed, whether an amendment to the Criminal Code or a new public order measure with more teeth in it than is presently the case, we must have evidence, and the only evidence we find on the tracing board is the evidence of the crisis in October. We agree with the motion entirely.
I think I should wait for a moment, because I wish to argue this case before the Speaker.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order. The Chair is listening to the hon. member.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: The meat of this motion is the proposal to set up a committee to ascertain whether any legislation is necessary to deal with a possible crisis in the future similar to the one encountered last fall. How could such a conclusion be reached in the absence of the proper evidence? My amendment simply enlarges the motion in a declamatory way to improve the procedure when we get to the committee. We want this committee to have the right to call witnesses and to examine the records of that crisis in October, not because we want to examine the crisis itself, but in order to determine whether or not we need a new law.
The Prime Minister says the Criminal Code covers the situation. I believe the committee is entitled to know whether the Code covered the situation on October 19. Is there need for additional legislation? I am anxious to see a committee which will produce the best results. If the Minister of Justice would rise and assure us that the direction contained in his motion covers what is asked for in the amendment, there would be no need for my amendment to go forward. But think of the narrow approach the other minister took toward this issue yesterday. I repeat, this is not an amendment designed to change the motion in substance; it is merely intended to give direction to the committee and help it to function more precisely.


Gerald William Baldwin: I wish to support what my hon. friend from Calgary North has said. In dealing with this question Your Honour must, of course, be guided by precedent and by our Standing Orders, including Standing Order 47, which, as my hon. and learned friend from Calgary North has said, deals with the main question at issue. You must also take into consideration, Mr. Speaker, what was said by the President of the Privy Council in whose name this motion stands. You cannot, as I assume the committee would not-and certainly it is not likely that the co-chairmen of the special committee would-ignore the comments made by the President of the Privy Council who, speaking in response to a question by the hon. member for Calgary North, indicated beyond any doubt that in his view the committee was limited to looking to the future.
How in the name of heaven can a joint committee examine what it proposes to do in the future regarding emergencies of this kind unless it examines the precedents of the past? I do disagree with my hon. friend in one respect. He said that this crisis of October was probably the only crisis we have had for some years. I would add to that the crisis we had in June 1968 when this government was elected.
On this particular issue, surely the committee not only has the right but the duty cast upon it to examine the conditions under which this country, certainly last October and possibly at other times, was precipitated into a crisis by a certain combination of circumstances that might have led to the necessity for imposing some type of emergency measures over and above certain provisions in the Criminal Code. Certainly, the committee as our agent,

May 13, 1971

and to whom we delegate authority, must inquire into this issue. Probably it would also be wise to authorize the committee to look abroad and examine legislation in other jurisdictions to determine what are the criteria that permit other jurisdictions to enact regulations under emergency legislation.
We are faced with the fact that in October the government made a declaration that there was a crisis, an apprehended insurrection, and that therefore they were invoking the War Measures Act. What were the facts that existed then? What did the Prime Minister know? What did the Minister of Justice know? What were they advised? If the committee as our agent is to be inhibited and prevented from examining those facts, then this whole thing is a complete travesty, a farce. The hon. member for Calgary North is not seeking to bring up a matter that is foreign to the main issue; he is seeking clarification. By his amendment he is seeking to have the House declare that this motion means that, in addition to looking ahead, the committee can look back. I suggest that that is the basis of his motion.
The hon. member could just as easily have moved this type of amendment, namely to add the words "that such inquiry shall include the right to examine emergencies which have arisen in the past and the steps taken to deal with them". But rather than move that amendment, which I submit would fall squarely within the ambit of the present motion, he has narrowed it to asking the House to direct the committee to look in particular at the situation that existed in October. Without that direction being given to the committee, I suggest that the committee will be sterile and its deliberations will be futile. The hon. member is not striving to have the committee go off in a new direction; he is keeping it within the direction laid down by the motion, namely to examine, inquire into and report upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with emergencies that may arise from time to time in the future. But the hon. member says that in order that the committee may do that competently it should look at the situation that existed last October.
It may well be that the government intends that to be done; but I have the feeling, one that I think I am entitled to, that this government is not anxious to do that. I have a feeling this government has deliberately couched the motion in terms to inhibit and prevent any kind of examination of the situation or what took place last October. If that is the case, let the government stand up and say so. If it is not the case, with the greatest respect, I suggest that this amendment of the hon. member for Calgary North falls squarely within what is allowed and permissible under our rules.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I rise to support the opinions expressed by the hon. members for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) and Peace River (Mr. Baldwin). May I first do so in very simple language, if I can. As a lawyer I have always believed that unless the application of a rule makes common sense, either the application or the rule is not very sensible.
The problem as you have stated it, Mr. Speaker, is whether or not the amendment is a substantive one
National Security Measures
which would require notice. I ask you first, Mr. Speaker, with great respect, to look at the amendment. I ask you to assume that the motion is not on the order paper, to assume that the hon. member for Calgary North moved nothing else but his amendment. Is it a substantive motion? Does it make sense? Would it make sense if there were no motion on paper and all you had before you was the amendment moved by the hon. member for Calgary North? Would a motion which said that certain things must be done to better assure the purposes of such report with respect to so and so make sense? Would it be a substantive motion?
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, in the first place I would suggest to you as a matter of simple logic that before Your Honour can hold this to be a substantive motion it has to stand on its own feet. It cannot be a substantive motion unless it does. If it cannot stand on its own feet, it is not a substantive motion. Then, it is attached to the motion that is now before the House and amends it.
The second point I wish to make also seems to me to be common sense. What this amendment does-and it clearly sets out its purpose-is to say that this inquiry that is ordered by the motion before the House can be improved if the inquiry extends to certain events that have taken place. That is all the amendment says. It does not interfere with the inquiry. It does not interfere with the purpose of the inquiry. It does not interfere with the substance of the motion which is now before the House. It interferes with nothing that is basic and central to the motion before Your Honour. It is purely a procedural motion and in no way substantive. It merely says that, in addition to looking at the kind of legislation that we need to deal with emergencies in the future, the committee should be empowered to look at events in the past that will guide the committee in arriving at proper legislation to deal with emergencies in the future. That is all the amendment means and it is clearly procedural. Clearly, it is not an amendment that interferes at all with the substance of the motion. I respectfully submit that I cannot see any way-perhaps Your Honour will teach me later on-in which Your Honour can hold this to be a substantive motion.
May I make a third point? The rules of any society, of any organization, are to serve a constructive purpose. The rules are there in order to prevent the society or organization from failing to deal with matters before it in a proper and constructive way and to arrive at a conclusion.


Gerald William Baldwin: To be construed liberally.


David Lewis: And they are always to be construed liberally. If this amendment is not allowed, since I assume that the chairmen of the committee and the majority on the committee will be government members from this House and the Senate-and I shall have something to say about this when I speak to the main motion-if they say that no witnesses can be called in regard to anything that has happened in the past, never mind October 1970 but that the committee cannot discuss what happened at the Riel rebellion, or what happened in Regina during the unemployed marches of the 1930's, or the situation surround-

May 13, 1971
National Security Measures
ing the Winnipeg strike in 1919, or what happened at Kent State University in the U.S., or anything that happened in the past to guide the committee in arriving at the kind of legislation that may be necessary, then the committee will not be able to do its work. That committee's work will be destroyed before it starts and you will have a Donnybrook at every single committee meeting. The members who want to know the circumstances under which legislation such as suggested in the motion is relevant and should be on the statute books will be illiterate if they do not insist in looking at past events in this country and in other countries in the world.
Let me point out two things the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) said this afternoon. He said the motion derived from the events of last fall. If it derived from the events of last fall, then obviously the events of last fall are relevant to a consideration of the motion.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: They are indispensable.


David Lewis: They are indispensable, as the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands (Mr. Douglas) suggests. The Minister of Justice said more than that. He tried to place the motion of the President of the Privy Council (Mr. MacEachen) in an historic and philosophic context. I am not quoting him, but the essence of what he said is that we live in an era of violence and confrontation where people are ready to use violence to upset public order. If that is so, and the minister is right, how in heaven's name is the committee to be able to find out what that era really consists of, or is it merely to accept the minister's word?
The minister is not one of the members of the government who acts in this House with any arrogance. He will not expect the members of the committee to say, "John Turner said that we live in an era of violence, therefore that is so". He will expect the members of the committee to want to find out what he is talking about and what constitutes this era of violence. I say that because he related the motion to the events of last fall and because of the historic and philosophic context in which he wants to put this debate. Somewhere in the logic and common sense of this motion we are required to put this authority in the hands of the committee, otherwise the committee cannot do its work intelligently.
For the reasons I have stated, without repeating them, I plead with you to permit this amendment. I believe it is in order because it does not interfere with the substance of the motion, it does not limit that substance or extend it, and it does not touch upon it at all. It merely adds an area in an effort to assist the committee to arrive at the substance of the motion. Surely, that is logical and in order.


Mr. Gilbert Rondeau (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, after hearing the mover of the amendment and the N.D.P. leader (Mr. Lewis), I do not intend to speak long.
First, we feel that the main motion is ridiculous and should not have been introduced by the government, since it shows a lack of responsibility. If the government plans to appoint a committee to discuss emergency measures or the opportunity of studying legislation to be passed, we consider the motion ridiculous.
I simply intended to say a few words on the main motion. This motion is evidence of the government's intention not to assume its responsibilities. It had the opportunity to do so at a given time but it failed to do so when the time came.
It seems to me that the amendment introduced by the hon. member if it were adopted would in these circumstances hinder our progress for if we have to investigate the whole of Canada's history, not just last October's events but all the revolutions or pseudo-revolutions which may have occurred in Canada, we shall never see the end of it. If we are to investigate past administrations, there are two parties here in this House that will be the first to object.
If the committee is going to investigate Canada's past in order to better orient its future with regard to emergency measures, it might sit for a rather long period before it arrives at practical conclusions. The committee then will merely fizzle out.
However, since we consider that the committees of the House are of vital importance and that this motion should never have been introduced in the House by the government, we stand firm against it as well as against the amendment. Besides, we will each in our own time have a chance to state our point of view.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I see that the clock is approaching the witching hour of five. In order that the Chair might have the opportunity to consider the careful arguments which have been made, and in view of the fact that one or two other members, including the hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald)-the Minister of Justice must be anxious to put his position regarding this amendment on record-want to speak, we might slightly invade the private members' hour so that all arguments can be put. The Chair would then have an opportunity between now and eight o'clock to consider these arguments. I therefore urge that the House consent to hearing all the arguments on the point of order at this time and then, if necessary, have a decision rendered when the House resumes at eight.


Mr. Depuiy Speaker:: Hon. members have heard the suggestion of the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin). Is it agreed we continue beyond five o'clock to hear the procedural arguments?


James Alexander Jerome: Mr. Speaker, if the opposition House leader is speaking about one short procedural argument there is no problem. If there is a series of arguments to be made, there is a private member's bill which might be proceeded with, unless the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orlikow) is prepared to waive the usual procedure.

May 13, 1971________ COMMONS DEBATES____________ 5789


James Aloysius McGrath: What is the motion?


James Alexander Jerome: The motion for the production of papers.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair must determine whether there is unanimous consent in respect of the suggestion made by the hon. member for Peace River. If there is no consent the Chair will notice the clock.


David Orlikow: On that point, Mr. Speaker, in view of the importance of the debate taking place, I have no objection to having my motion set over for another week.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Apparently there is not unanimous consent.


David Lewis: Let us take another ten minutes.


Mr. Boulanger:: How do we know how long it will take?


James Alexander Jerome: If only one speech is involved we are prepared to accept the suggestion in order to get it on the record. That being the case we are satisfied.


David Lewis: Perhaps the hon. member for Peace River would agree to a time limit.


Gerald William Baldwin: Yes.


David Lewis: Perhaps we could take just another 15 minutes, and then go on to private members' hour whether or not the argument is completed.


James Alexander Jerome: An extension of 15 minutes would be satisfactory.


Prosper Boulanger: I do not want to disagree with the parliamentary secretary, but I think five minutes should be sufficient. If we do not limit it, then under the rules we cannot stop anyone from getting up and speaking. I think five minutes should be the limit, if we extend the time at all.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: It appears to the Chair that there is no consent.


James Alexander Jerome: Perhaps a compromise on a ten-minute
extension.


Prosper Boulanger: All right, ten minutes.
OOp.m.)



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION


Mr. Deputy 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 Calgary North (Mr. W oolliams)-Air	Transport-Hij acking-Parliamentary
ratification of Hague Convention-Amendments to Crimi-
Unemployment Insurance
nal Code; the hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Stewart)-National Parks-Riding Mountain-Closure of church camps.


Mr. Speaker:: Order. Before we proceed to private member's business perhaps I might be given an opportunity to refer to the motion proposed by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) this afternoon. I indicated to him that I would take the matter under advisement, and I said to him and to the House that I would be guided to some extent at least by what might transpire during the proceedings in the afternoon. I am not sure whether or not that was a very good guide by which to reach any decision, but I suggest to hon. members the Chair has been helped in this decision in this regard. The hon. member's motion was different from the two which had been proposed by the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings (Mr. Hees) and by the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) in that it referred specifically to a certain aspect of the unemployment situation, seasonal benefits.
Actually, it is a two-headed motion, part of which deals with the unemployment situation in general. I believe in respect of this aspect of the motion what I said in making a ruling after hearing the hon. member for York South and the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings would apply. I wondered whether a good case might be made for an emergency debate on the other aspect of this motion under Standing Order 26. I have come to the conclusion that perhaps the circumstances might be somewhat different in view of the developments later in the afternoon during the question period, namely, that in answer to two or three questions asked by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby the minister indicated that he would look into the situation and make the statement on Tuesday. I assume this would be a statement on motions. It was also announced that there would be two supply days next week, on Tuesday and Friday. When we look at the opportunity for debate, I would think it would be very difficult for the Chair to suggest that there would not be an opportunity for the consideration or debate of such an important matter as the one raised by the hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby, and indeed the matter raised by the other two hon. members.
In the circumstances, I think it might be wise to allow the matter to stand in so far as Standing Order 26 is concerned and to make a ruling that the motion cannot be put at this time.
It being five o'clock, the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's Order Paper, namely private bills, notices of motions (Papers) and public bills.

May 13, 1971
Increase in Publications Postage Rates



PRIVATE BILLS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from Thursday, April 29, consideration of the motion of Mr. Harries that Bill S-12, respecting Central-Del Rio Oils Limited, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications.
Mr. Speaker:: Is it the pleasure of the House to adopt the said motion?


An hon. Member:: On division.
Motion agreed, bill read the second time, and referred to the Standing Committee on Transport and Communications.


Mr. Speaker:: I understand that the last item under private bills is a bill standing in the name of the hon. member for Notre-Dame-de-Grace, Bill S-19, respecting the Royal Victoria Hospital. I gather there are procedural difficulties in relation to the petition. In any event, it has been suggested that the bill might be allowed to stand for the moment. Is this agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.



PRIVATE MEMBERS' MOTIONS FOR PAPERS


David Orlikow: That an Order of the House do issue for a copy of all letters received by the Postmaster General from churches, professional organizations, trade unions, co-operatives, credit unions and private organizations, indicating that as a result of the increase in postal rates they intend to discontinue or curtail their publications.
He said: Mr. Speaker, shortly after the 1968 election the then Postmaster General, the present hon. member for Duvernay (Mr. Kierans), came to the conclusion, and obviously persuaded his Cabinet colleagues, that the postal service of this country should be put on a paying basis and that postal delivery should not be subsidized or at least not subsidized as much as previously. Therefore, there were very sharp increases in the cost of mail deliveries. There were increases in the cost of first class letters, in the cost of second class mail and a very sharp increase, running anywhere from 100 per cent to 1,000 per cent, in respect of the rates charged on publications issued by various organizations.
The organizations affected covered a wide range. There were trade unions, co-operatives, credit unions and educational and scientific organizations which issue publications of great importance to their members and to the general public in the sense that they disseminate as
widely as possible the most important basic scientific information in their fields. The increases implemented by the Postmaster General, and by the government, in a desire to wipe out the deficit created by the delivery of various types of mail has had a very adverse affect on a large number of organizations and their publications. I maintain that without newspapers, magazines, weeklies, monthlies and scientific and educational journals, one cannot really expect a country, certainly not a country as diverse and large in area as Canada, to survive as a country. This country is under permanent assault. I do not say this in a critical manner but as a statement of fact.
The survival of this country, as a country, is under permanent assault by the United States of America, not because they deliberately want to harm this country or wipe it out but simply because the richest country in the world lies next to Canada and has a population ten times as large. There is a tremendous flow of printed material from that country to this, as there is a tremendous flow of material from radio and television. Canadian publications of all types are finding it increasingly difficult to survive.
When I set this motion down I was not concerned about commercial publications or profit making publications like Chatelaine, Macleans, Saturday Night and a host of others; I was concerned about publications issued by organizations almost exclusively for their own members. Sometimes these publications are necessary for the survival of the organizations, but a large number of them have gone under.
I should like to point out to the minister in charge of the Post Office that the newspaper issued by the Confederation of National Trade Unions, probably the best of its type in Canada, ceased publication almost immediately after postal rates were increased by the former postmaster general. Other publications too numerous to list here have ceased; many which were weekly switched to monthly or quarterly publications and those which were monthly decided to publish quarterly or twice a year. I could give endless examples, because they are all in my file, of postage increases ranging from 100 per cent to 1,000 per cent which made it impossible for organizations to continue publication.
The former postmaster general had an easy and stock answer to the complaints made by hundreds of these organizations. He said that they should not expect the taxpayers of Canada to subsidize them and that it should not be difficult for them to increase their dues structure to cover payment for the publication. I say to the minister in charge of the Post Office that if he does not know what happened to the publication of the CNTU he should inquire from his colleague the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion (Mr. Marchand) who was president for some years. I am sure the minister will substantiate my statement that this vital and aggressive organization decided that it should not raise its membership dues so the only alternative, because of the increased postal rates, was to discontinue publication.

May 13, 1971

I say to the minister in charge of the Post Office, who comes from a working class family and has some knowledge of what a trade union means to the ordinary worker, that the decision to suspend the publication of the CNTU could only weaken the lines of communication between the elected officials of that organization and its
200,000	to 250,000 members. The difficulties faced by the CNTU in settling strikes may in some degree have been aggravated by its inability to communicate with the membership. Almost every day we have an illustration of these difficulties. We see the former employees of Lapalme, who were members of the CNTU, demonstrating on Parliament Hill. I shall not go into the rights or wrongs of that strike, but I shall simply say that 1 believe that kind of thing was helped by the effect on the CNTU publication of the decision of the government to increase the postal rates.
I have made a very reasonable request, Mr. Speaker. I have simply asked the minister and the government to table the letters and telegrams received from organizations of the types I have listed, informing the minister that as a result of the increase in the cost of mailing they would have to give serious consideration to suspension or curtailment of publication. Surely, this is not an unreasonable request to make from a government led by a Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) who speaks so frequently and eloquently of participatory democracy. Participatory democracy must mean more than the Prime Minister or his ministers lecturing the people of Canada. Surely, it means that the people of Canada have the right to express their views and to feel that those views are known and shared by others. I can see no reason, Mr. Speaker, why the former minister or the present minister should object to my motion which would require the government to table letters about this matter which were received by the minister from organizations of the type I have listed.


Hon. Jean-Pierre Cote (Minister without Portfolio):: Mr. Speaker, the motion introduced by the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orlikow) reads:
That an order of the House do issue for a copy of all letters received by the Postmaster General from churches, professional organizations, trade unions, co-operatives, credit unions and private organizations, indicating that as a result of the increase in postal rates they intend to discontinue or curtail their publications.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North introduced an identical motion, No. 85, on March 4, 1969, during the first session of the twenty eighth parliament. When the motion was called in the House on March 26, 1969, the following reply was given:
This notice of motion asks for a copy of all letters received by the Postmaster General-
I need not repeat the exact wording of the motion. X continue reading the reply:
If this motion were adopted it would be necessary to make a review of hundreds of files because letters were not segregated on the basis of whether or not they suggested an increase in postal rates would result in either the discontinuance or curtailment of the publication. Such a review would be costly. In
Increase in Publications Postage Rates
view of this fact, perhaps the hon. gentleman would be willing to withdraw his motion.
The hon. member for Winnipeg North refused to withdraw the motion and it was transferred for debate according to Standing Order 48(1). The matter was never debated, and therefore with the end of the first session it was dropped.
In the second session, the hon. member for Winnipeg North introduced a similar motion and the following answer was given when that motion was called on December 10, 1969:
The motion is not acceptable as the information requested would necessitate a review of over 5,000 files. It is estimated that several hundred man hours would be expended in drawing flies and searching for desired correspondence without taking into consideration time expended in copying such correspondence. The expense of such a project is not considered warranted.
Again, the hon. member for Winnipeg North did not wish to withdraw the motion, and again it was transferred for debate. It was never debated, and therefore with the end of the second session it was dropped.
The hon. member came back with this motion on November 4, 1970, on which occasion I replied in the House as follows:
I think this is the third time this motion has been presented and the reply to it will be the same as on the last occasion, namely, that the motion is not acceptable as the information requested would necessitate a review of over 5,000 files. It is estimated that several hundred man hours would be expended in drawing files and searching for the desired correspondence without taking into consideration the time expended in copying such correspondence.
The hon. member again refused to drop the motion, which was transferred for debate, and now we are debating it. Basically the situation has not changed. It would be very costly to produce the required papers. The time involved is estimated as 544 man hours, more than a quarter of a man year, at an estimated cost of $2,025. In addition to the answers previously given, Mr. Speaker, we have great reservations about how meaningful the results would be to the hon. member if we spent the time and money to locate the requested information.
I would like to inform the House on how this question of the birth and death of publications was dealt with in a couple of studies. The first is the Royal Commission on Publications which reported in 1961, and I quote:
Births and deaths of magazines are a general indication of the profit-or lack of it-in the magazine-publishing field.
The Mass Media Report, or Davey Report of 1970 reads:
It has been suggested that a number of publications in Canada expired because of the postal increases. Although this may be true, it is just as likely that this incremental cost was simply the straw that broke the camel's back; they might have died in any case for any number of marketing or product reasons.
Now, I wish to give a few figures that will show the number of new publications that were registered as second class mail, and those that ceased to be published from 1967 to January, 1971, according to our own records. However, we have no record of association papers which may have ceased publication after April 1, 1969. Since that date these publications have not had to

May 13, 1971
Increase in Publications Postage Rates register as second class mail, because they do not have any special rate.
Before the rate adjustments in 1967-68 we had no record of the total number of publications that were authorized, but the total number of publications that ceased publication was 358. In 1968-69, still before the rate adjustment, the total number of new publications authorized was 614, and the total number of periodicals that ceased publication was 287.
After the rate adjustments, in 1969-70 the total number of new publications authorized was 92, and the total number of periodicals that ceased publication was 41. From 1970 through to January, 1971, the total number of new publications authorized was 128, and the total number of periodicals that ceased publication was 91. Judging from these figures we can reasonably say that it would be totally unfair to conclude, every time a paper ceases publication, that this must be attributed mainly to the April, 1969, adjustments in second class mail rates.
We also made some inquiries of our own and talked to publishers to discover their attitude. As a result, we can report that there was no conclusive evidence that the recent rate increase caused the death of many publications. The principal response appears to have been a reduction in the frequency of issue, and the end of a widespread distribution of complementary copies. For these reasons we do not feel that an estimated cost of $2,000 to produce the information requested is justifiable. Moreover, the results would not be conclusive.
There is no way to find out if these publications really ceased to be published other than to make further research. Even then, we would have to study their financial statements to see if the postal increase was the real reason for their death.

I merely want to say that even if we do all this searching through our files to locate letters informing us that if we increase postal rates or move periodicals from second to third class some of them will discontinue publication, we have no way of establishing whether those periodicals have really disappeared or whether they are still being published. That would require investigation carried out outside the department since the periodicals no longer have to be registered, as they are no longer second-class material.
Therefore, whether the investigations are carried out or not I do not think hon. members would gain anything thereby and I can hardly request incurring expenses of $2,000 in order perhaps to find letters stating that if we increased postal rates some periodicals would cease to exist, when it is not known whether they have or have not discontinued publication.
We sympathize with the hon. member for Winnipeg North. The discontinuation of certain publications which, in most cases, provide a service to a certain category of Canadians, is unfortunate and we don't like to see them disappear. But between this and saying that they have disappeared only because of an increase in rates, there is a wide margin.

I must suggest that whenever there is an increase in postal rates, whether for first, second or third class mail, there are always people who are affected by such a measure. Indeed some people will pay more if we want to get more revenues. If there is an increase in rates for first class mail, it will be said that certain agencies which provide essential services to citizens will suffer from it, because these organizations will make the average citizen bear the burden of this new expenditure, thus adding to his cost of living.
If we increase second class rates, some will say that it is detrimental to publications. If we increase third class rates, some will say that it is detrimental to some other publications. Some suggest that we should increase third class rates because this class includes a great deal of unsollicited mail. But at the same time, third class mail also includes publications and Christmas cards.
For instance, this afternoon I received a delegation requesting that third class rates not be increased, on the grounds that its organization would be enormously affected by such an increase. So would also be such organizations as the War Amputees Association, groups who sell Easter or Christmas seals and who are concerned with the health of many citizens.
Of course, each time there is an increase in postal rates, some people are affected. But the fact remains that a department such as the Post Office cannot afford to accumulate deficits of hundreds of millions of dollars a year. If we tolerated this situation, many people would say that we are really subsidizing the big customers of the Post Office who are often the companies and that instead of making users pay, we are collecting more taxes.
Whatever our course of action, we will always be criticized but we must act. If we do not do so and if we let yearly deficits of more than $140 million accumulate, we will obviously have to find the money somewhere and it is the taxpayer who will bear the brunt of it one way or another.
During this fiscal year, we must try to be as fair as possible. I think that today's motion might have been of some avail before the 1969 increase. Had all these letters been available, it might have been possible to have a better discussion about the problem when the increase was enacted in 1969. The motion might have been more useful at that time, but as it is before this House for the third time I think that it is useless and it would certainly not serve anybody's interest if we were going to spend unnecessarily $2,000 or so.


Mr. Maurice Foster (Algoma):: Mr. Speaker, the motion before the House this afternoon in the name of the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orlikow) calls on the House to issue a copy of all letters received by the Postmaster General from churches, professional organizations, trade unions, co-operatives, credit unions and private organizations, indicating that as a result of the increase in postal rates they intend to discontinue or curtail their publications.
May 13, 1971

I was interested to learn from the Postmaster General (Mr. Cote) that this subject has been raised three times. I am somewhat surprised at this. I am sure that when the original debate on this subject took place in the House most hon. members were bombarded by communications from all these organizations about the possible effects of the new legislation. I would be surprised if any such organization or non-profit group which found it was being forced out of business had not communicated with the Postmaster General or another cabinet minister and sent a copy of that correspondence to certain Members of Parliament. I am sure that such organizations would send copies of their correspondence to the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles) who occupies a strategic position which in matters of this kind enables him to put embarrassing questions to the government during the question period.
I believe the Postmaster General has fully explained the reason why these documents were not revealed to the hon. member. Principally, it is a question of cost and common sense. Surely all hon. members of the House have received a list of the names of most of the organizations which were severely affected by that legislation. This matter boils down to a question of cost. The minister indicated that it would be necessary to search 5,000 files, which would take about 540 hours and cost over $2,000. Surely this is reason enough for not producing the documents.


Prosper Boulanger: Mr. Speaker, having listened very carefully to the hon. minister and heard the motion of the hon. member for Winnipeg North (Mr. Orlikow), we are now sufficiently informed about the question and we might proceeed to the vote.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: Is the House ready for the question? All those in favour of the motion will please say yea.


Some hon. Members:: Yea.


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


Some hon. Members:: Nay.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: In my opinion the nays have it.


David Orlikow: On division, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: I declare the motion negatived.
Motion negatived.


An hon. Member:: Six o'clock.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: Do hon. members agree to call it six o'clock?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Richard):: In view of the very light attendance in the House, and because I have not
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had much time to prepare a few remarks, I shall not abuse my powers of poetic licence at this time.
At 5.40 p.m. the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Turner, Ottawa-Carleton (for the President of the Privy Council):
That a Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons be appointed to examine, inquire into and report upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with emergencies that may arise from time to time in the future by reason of lawlessness or violence in Canadian society and that endanger the existence of government or the maintenance of the peace and public order;
That twelve members of the House of Commons, to be designated by the House at a later date, be members of the joint committee on the part of this House;
That the committee have power to sit during sittings and adjournments of the House;
That the committee have power to report from time to time, to send for persons, papers and records, and to print such papers and evidence from day to day as may be ordered by the committee;
And that a message be sent to the Senate to acquaint Their Honours thereof.
Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I rise to make a few comments with regard to the acceptance of the amendment moved by the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams). I would willingly give up the opportunity to speak at this time if the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) would give a binding agreement to this House that the concerns expressed in the amendment will be covered. We could save a great deal of time if the Minister of Justice would give that assurance. Without that assurance it would be more appropriate to discuss the legitimacy of the motion rather than the legitimacy of the amendment.
I understand that it is one of the unwritten parliamentary rules that we do not engage in hypothetical discussion in this House or in committee, yet in the motion before us we have such a hypothetical situation. The main question that should have been considered prior to debating the acceptance of this amendment is whether the motion is in order.
We are being asked to consider emergencies which might arise from time to time in the future, but the motion does not suggest the form these emergencies

May 13, 1971
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might take except for a reference to lawlessness and violence in society which might endanger the existence of government. What government? Federal government? Provincial Government? Municipal government? And what jurisdiction does this Parliament exercise over governments other than ours, except in certain circumstances-for example, those reflected in the Criminal Code? It seems to me one of the reasons my hon. friend put forward his amendment was to give the motion the substance which is necessary if the committee is not to find itself up on cloud nine.
I think the amendment amounts to a very appropriate extension of the motion. I find it almost impossible to conveive that this House would instruct a committee to talk about something which might happen in the future without defining the time or the situation in specific terms. After all, there is no limit on the future; the future has a quality of infinity about it. Unless the motion is amended in some way so as to define more specifically the task of the committee, it will become engaged in an unrealistic and hypothetical discussion. As it is, the terms of reference are so vague that any report the committee might make based on those terms would be totally unsatisfactory.
If the amendment is found unacceptable, I submit that some other form of motion will have to be introduced in order that the committee may be given concrete terms of reference, in the absence of which the motion before us and the discussion arising from it are indeed a sham.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: When the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) proposed his amendment this afternoon the Chair sought the assistance of hon. members on the procedural aspects of the question. I wish to thank those who assisted the Chair in that respect.
As I indicated in my opening remarks, this is essentially a question of whether the amendment introduces a new or substantive matter or whether it is an extension, an amplification of the motion which now stands before the House for debate. I also pointed out that the Chair has to take into account parliamentary jurisprudence covering this situation, and that unless an amendment is framed in such a way as to make clear that it does not introduce a new or substantive matter it is difficult for the Chair to accept it.
Before making my ruling I would refer to a citation in Beauchesne's, an authority which all hon. members will recognize and which must be taken into account by the Chair. It is citation 291, which reads as follows: When the House is considering a motion of which notice has been given for the appointment of a select committee a member cannot move to amendment that the committee be given wider powers than those which are set out in the notice.
The question for the Chair to consider is whether the amendment proposes to give wider powers to the committee, whether in fact a new and substantive question is raised or whether it is an extension or amplification of the motion before the House for consideration. If it is a substantive motion, then of course notice would be required and it would not be acceptable from a procedural standpoint.
The hon. member for Calgary North, the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) and the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) have argued very forcefully that the amendment does not put forward a substantive matter; that it is merely an extension or an amplification of the motion. This is the question the Chair must decide.
It might be helpful if I were to read the motion which is now before the House. I shall read only that part which is pertinent to our consideration at this time:
That a Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons be appointed to examine, inquire into and report upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with emergencies that may arise from time to time in the future by reason of lawlessness or violence in Canadian society and that endanger the existence of government or the maintenance of the peace and public order-
In amendment thereto, the hon. member for Calgary North proposed the following:
That the motion be amended by adding at the end of the first paragraph thereof the following:
"and, for better assuring the purposes of such report with respect to emergencies that endanger the existence of government, inquire into and first report upon all the circumstances anticipatory of and giving rise or purported to have given rise to the proclamation of the War Measures Act on October 16, 1970, as well as all the circumstances thereafter following and thereto related which may have or presently or in future may endanger the existence of any government, whether federal, provincial or municipal."
In his submission, the hon. member for Calgary North argued with respect to Standing Order 47-and the Chair is prepared, on consideration, to accept the argument- that this Standing Order is in itself not an impediment to any decision the Chair may take as to the acceptability of the amendment. I did mention in my preliminary remarks that the parliamentary jurisprudence based essentially on the citation I have quoted is definitive in the matter: if the amendment introduces a substantive or new matter, it cannot be accepted.
I wish to refer to a ruling made by Mr. Speaker Michener, quoting a previous ruling by Mr. Speaker Macdonald, as follows:
I could give the hon. member many more citations and rulings by Speakers. There is one by Mr. Speaker Macdonald which appears in Journals for April 4, 1951, at page 243. He ruled "An amendment cannot be moved giving the committee wider powers than those which were set out in the Notice of Motion. Then, there is another ruling of Mr. Speaker Macdonald's on November 2, 1951, as contained in the Journals at page 67. He said, and I quote: "I might say at this time that if the minister himself proposed an amendment which would widen the terms of the resolution I could not allow it to stand unless with the unanimous consent of the House."
The Chair would have some difficulty if the argument were put-and it has not been so presented-that the motion could be considered in an abstract manner. It would seem to me that the motion now before the House is one which must be considered in relation to events of the past.
The hon. member for York South put forward a very forceful argument. He referred to events in Canadian history. I think he referred to the Riel rebellion, and the Winnipeg strike of 1919 in the context of the events

May 13, 1971

referred to in the amendment moved by the hon. member for Calgary North.
The Chair has the responsibility of deciding whether the amendment now before me for a ruling on its procedural acceptability is one of substance or is an extension or a direction within the confines of, or is relevant to, the motion to appoint a committee. In my opinion, the amendment of the hon. member for Calgary North is in fact an extension or amplification of the main motion. It seems to the Chair that the committee could not be asked to consider the main motion in an abstract form without reference to events in Canadian history, whether it be the events described in the amendment of the hon. member for Calgary North or events such as those referred to by the hon. member for York South.
Having come to the decision that it is in fact not a substantive motion but a motion that extends or amplifies the main motion, I am of the opinion that it is procedurally correct and I am prepared to put the motion. The hon. member for Calgary North, seconded by the hon. member for Lambton-Kent (Mr. McCutcheon) moves:
That the motion be amended by adding at the end of the first paragraph thereof the following:
"and, for better assuring the purposes of such report with respect to emergencies that endanger the existence of government, inquire into and first report upon all the circumstances anticipatory of and giving rise or purported to have given rise to the proclamation of the War Measures Act on October 16, 1970, as well all the circumstances thereafter following and thereto related which may have or presently or in future may endanger the existence of any government, whether federal, provincial or municipal."


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I think the ruling you have just given makes an important difference to the motion before the House. If the government party will have the sensitivity to support the amendment so that the committee is given the necessary power to make some kind of intelligent investigation of the reasons that make special legislation necessary, then the committee might have a job to perform that will be meaningful. But I have a strong suspicion that the government will not support the amendment, that the government is not in favour of any investigation of the reasons for invoking the War Measures Act, that the government is not in favour of such investigation because even it now knows that the invocation of the War Measures Act on October 16, 1970, was a shameful overreaction followed by the deliberate creation of hysteria and panic throughout the country.
Because the government now knows that that is the case, it has not the courage to permit a parliamentary committee to call before it witnesses and to inquire into the actual things that happened last fall. I cannot under any circumstances support the motion on the order paper because it is based on the assumption that special legislation to deal with possible future emergencies is necessary. The motion before the House does not say, as it might have, that the matter will go to a committee for decision whether or not special legislation is necessary. It might give the committee an opening to look into that if
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the amendment moved by the hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) is accepted by the House; but as I am certain it will not be accepted by the Liberal majority in the House, what we are left with is an instruction to a committee that starts with the implicit statement that special legislation is necessary and so all the committee has to do is decide what kind of legislation this House should pass.
It is also significant to note that the motion before us does not make the slightest reference to individual liberty and individual rights. The Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) quite properly said that he had to weigh the relationship between national security and public order and individual liberty and individual rights. It is very nice to say that but I submit, Mr. Speaker, that the motion to set up this committee ought to say it. The motion ought to say to the committee: Please inquire into the question whether or not special legislation is necessary, and when and if you consider legislation please keep in the forefront the preservation of human dignity and liberty in Canadian society.
Therefore, I ask myself why the government is making this motion. Why is a government that did not hesitate to bring down the War Measures Act on October 16, 1970, and did not hesitate to bring in the public order act at a later date, now wanting to establish a committee when it has already made up its mind-and the Liberal majority on the committee will be so instructed-that there must be legislation? Why does the government send this matter to a committee? I have a suspicion that the government already has some draft legislation or clauses that will find their way to the committee via a member of the committee, that the government already knows what it wants in the legislation. So why does it not produce a bill?
The minister said this afternoon that he wants the people of Canada who are interested in civil liberty and in this kind of question to appear before the committee. They could appear before a committee that was considering a bill just as readily as they could appear before a committee considering this motion. Why, then, is the government presenting this motion instead of taking the responsibility of and having the courage to present a bill to this House? I have no hesitation in finding an answer.


An hon. Member:: Even you don't believe that.


David Lewis: I do believe it. Knowing the feeling across this country about the way in which Canadians were taken in last fall, the government does not have the courage to present a bill on its own but wants the subterfuge umbrella of a parliamentary committee. In order to make certain that the government gets out of the committee what it wants to get out, it made the committee a joint committee of the Senate and House of Commons.


James Alexander Jerome: Would the hon. member permit a question? Is the hon. member-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The parliamentary secretary may ask a question if the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) is prepared to entertain it.

May 13, 1971
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David Lewis: I do not intend to do so more than once, Mr. Speaker; but since the parliamentary secretary seems unable to sit still I will listen to his question.


James Alexander Jerome: Is the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) saying that he would prefer the government to send a prepared text of a bill to the committee instead of simply giving the committee a resolution? Is that what he is now saying?


David Lewis: I am saying to this House-and the parliamentary secretary is intelligent enough to know what I am saying-that I am opposed to the bill and I am opposed to this motion.


James Alexander Jerome: What bill?


David Lewis: I am opposed to any kind of special legislation; and I am opposed to this motion because it underlines the need for special legislation, something that I do not accept. I am saying that if the government wanted special legislation, it would have been more honest and more helpful if it had produced legislation it wanted directly, instead of taking the subterfuge approach of establishing a committee to do it. It is perfectly obvious to me that this underlines the weakness of the position of the government in stating that special legislation is needed.
The Minister of Justice in his brief remarks today tried to place this whole subject in an historical and theoretical context. He talked in somewhat airy terms about our living in an era of confrontation and violence. There is some violence across the world. My reading of history tells me that there is probably no more today than there has been throughout history. I suggest that in every era there has been a response to injustice which was not always logical, democratic or peaceful. There is nothing new, as so many people suggest, about the modern era and confrontation or violence on the streets.
If the members of the House or the people of Canada are to consider the question of public order in the context of violence, then I suggest two things. I suggest, first, that it is important to try to understand the reasons for that violence. It is important to try to understand what produces the frustration that results in violence. Second, it is important to try to understand whether repressive legislation ever did any good.
Having regard to the first, I suggest that one of the major reasons for the prevalence of violence throughout the western and eastern world today-and I am not talking about wars-is the fundamental disappointment of peoples all over the world at the way in which our democratic process functions; the deep disappointment which people all over the world have felt since the end of the Second World War because the hopes for which Hitler and Mussolini were defeated have not been fulfilled. I refer to the hope of the young in particular that the end of World War II would mean more stable, lasting and untroubled peace.
On almost every continent in the world there is war or the threat of war, and over the entire world hangs the threat of nuclear destruction. I suggest the reason for this violence across the world, particularly in democracies, is that when the Second World War ended there were peoples around the globe, particularly the young, who hoped that the end of that war would also end poverty in the world, degradation, racism and discrimination. The opposite is the case. Young people all over the western world see continuing degradation, poverty, racism and discrimination. They see that the democratic process functions with shamefully disappointing slowness.
That is why you have violence and the threat of violence. The reason is that we have young people in Canada who finish school and are thrown out into the world where they cannot get jobs. Across this country we have university graduates, most of whom cannot find jobs. This is the kind of world our capitalistic, democratic system is producing. This is the kind of world in which violence grows.
I say now what I said on October 16, that this government is merely showing another aspect of its reactionary attitude toward society. It does this by dealing with possible future outbreaks through another piece of repressive legislation which will destroy civil liberties in Canada. It cannot succeed in this way. Whether it is in Quebec or anywhere else, as long as you have the amount of unemployment we have in Canada today, as long as you have a program of regional expansion that is not making the slightest dent on regional inequalities in this country-in spite of what the minister said this afternoon-as long as you continue to have one-quarter of the people in Canada living at or below the level of poverty, and as long as you have young people frustrated about their future you lay the seeds of violence; and no repressive legislation will end that situation or even cure it in the slightest.
If the minister is going to place this question in an historic and philosophic framework, he is talking shallow words, unless he places it in a framework such as I have suggested, I am sure somewhat inadequately. Does repressive legislation accomplish any purpose? I say to the members of this House and the people of Canada, if I may with humility but with emphasis, those of us who expressed our views on October 16 that the invocation of the War Measures Act would simply assist the forces of disunity in this country were, unfortunately, right.
I re-read the speech I made on October 16 and the speech I made on November 5 last, and I am not happy. I am unhappy to find that the words spoken then have proven to be right. Separatism in the province of Quebec has been assisted by the actions of this government. Since the fall I have met literally hundreds of young Quebeckers in various parts of that province, who have pointed to the invocation of the War Measures Act and the injustices that were carried out under it and the new public order act as reason for no longer having any faith in Ottawa, for no longer having any trust in the federal government, and as reason for no longer wanting to be governed in such a way.

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An hon. Member:: That was an excuse.


David Lewis: When the hon. member says, "That was an excuse", I say to him that many of the people who have spoken to me in this way are not separatists but are against separatism, and they are heartbroken about the way in which the province of Quebec suffered as a result of the actions last fall of this government. I suggest that any other repressive legislation put on the books to replace the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act, even when not used, will merely be an encouragement to the forces of disunity in the province of Quebec and in the whole of Canada.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: And a disservice.


David Lewis: And a disservice to our people. What has happened since the fall? The hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) spoke fully and eloquently on this subject. Permit me to spend a few minutes on it. We had a tremendous threat of apprehended insurrection, as far as the government was concerned. I will come back to that in a moment. We had all the powers under the War Measures Act and we had all the powers under the public order act. The total number arrested was about 500. The total released was about 440. About 60 people were charged, and most of the charges were laid under the Criminal Code.
Where was this tremendous threat of insurrection? Where are the 1,000 to 3,000 members of the FLQ the Minister of Regional Economic Expansion (Mr. Marc-hand) so shamelessly spoke of on the radio in Vancouver? Where are these people who have infiltrated every aspect and form of Canadian life, as the same minister shamelessly suggested in this House? We let loose the RCMP, the provincial police, the municipal police and we had thousands of soldiers on the job. What did they do? They caught about 490 people, 440 of whom were completely innocent.
What kind of apprehended insurrection was that? What kind of dishonesty was this government guilty of in making the people of Canada believe there was an apprehended insurrection in the province of Quebec? Then we were told there were weapons all over the place, that there was dynamite all over the place and that there were machine-guns. Then there was all this power of search. The police searched everybody they felt like searching, as dossier Z presented to a recent meeting of journalists showed. What did they find? They found, if I remember correctly-I can be corrected if I am wrong- some 30 weapons including a couple of hunting knives, a rusty rifle and a few hundred sticks of dynamite.
Either the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and the members of the government were telling falsehoods, or the entire police force, including the defence forces, were totally and absolutely incompetent. 1 prefer to believe the first is probably the truth. I do not believe that the RCMP, the Quebec police, the municipal police and the armed forces are totally incompetent. I do believe, however, that the government acted in panic for a reason I
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shall mention in a moment, and that they built a scenario to justify their action which could not be defended by truth and fact.
That is what happened last fall. Why did they act last fall? I shall repeat what I said at the time. These statements are not based on fiction or on a scenario; they are based on legitimate, valid and logical conclusions from things said inside and outside this House. What was said to justify the statement that there was an apprehended insurrection? It was said that there were 1,000 or 3,000 members of the FLQ. Obviously that was an exaggeration beyond compare. It was said there were tons-these are not the words actually used-of arms all over the place. Obviously there were not. That was an exaggeration beyond compare. It was said there was dynamite lying around everywhere, to blow up everybody. That was obviously an exaggeration. We were told, as the Minister of Justice then put it, that there was erosion of will in Quebec. The Prime Minister said there was confusion in the province of Quebec. The Minister of Regional Economic Expansion said that FRAP was a dangerous organization.
Mr. Sianfieldr There must have been an apprehended insurrection of the government.


David Lewis: These are the things we were told. Then
the government got a real bonanza. It learned of a conversation in the offices of Claude Ryan of Le Devoir. It learned that a few editors and other people had been sitting in a room discussing in a theoretical way the possibility that Bourassa's government was weakening and what would happen if it should fall. That immediately gave the government an opportunity to spread another rumour in innuendo in order to support their unsupportable purpose. Two ministers-I said this in the House last fall-two at least among the people directly concerned, told me about the spreading of the rumours, one at a cocktail party and one somewhere else, to the effect that there was an attempt in Montreal to provide an alternative government.
The Prime Minister acted with a kind of cunning for which I admire him more and more, although I admire him less and less for what he is doing to this country. With a kind of cunning, he never denied the rumour. He knew it was not fact, he knew what had happened; but he never denied it. On the contrary, as recently as the other day when he was interviewed for "Weekend"-the interview, I understand, is to appear this coming Sunday-he repeated the innuendo. In answer to a question on this subject he replied that there were people in Montreal seeking to establish an alternative government.
The number of times the Prime Minister when attending universities in Canada, England or elsewhere, when sitting around chatting with students, talked about this, and the number of times the Minister of Justice at a university in Canada, or at Oxford, talked about this when discussing the state of the country and what would happen if the government fell and what the alternative government should be, was legion. They probably are still doing it. This goes on all the time.

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The Prime Minister and the members of the cabinet knew perfectly well it was a wrong rumour, but they never stopped it. The Prime Minister repeated it the other day and ministers of his cabinet helped spread the rumour. Why did they do that? I say now, as I said last fall, that they did it deliberately. They knew that if the people of Canada read some headlines suggesting that a group of men in Montreal were discussing an alternative government, they would naturally come to the conclusion that it was a group of members of the FLQ plotting to overthrow the government of Quebec.
It has been this kind of dishonest, misleading social context for which this government was responsible last fall, and now it comes to this Parliament and says that in its opinion there should be special legislation and asks that a committee of the House tell it what kind of legislation there should be. The members of the government know what they want, and they will get it before the committee in some under the table way. Their members in some way will tell the committee what they want in the law. But they want the people to believe that it is not the government's idea but the idea of a parliamentary committee. So far as I am concerned and so far as the members of my party are concerned, inside this House and outside this House, we will not be a party to this kind of dishonest misrepresentation of an important situation.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Lewis: If anyone wants further proof that what was done last fall was shameful, I suggest he read the book by the Secretary of State (Mr. Pelletier). I read it some weeks ago before I could obtain a copy of my own; I borrowed a copy from a member of the press gallery. What does that book add up to? The Secretary of State will have an opportunity to disagree with me if he wishes to do so. I read the book carefully from cover to cover. It adds up to this; that there was never a threat of a popular insurrection. What the Secretary of State meant by using the word "popular" instead of merely "insurrection" I do not know, but it is this kind of semantics which confuses the situation a little. He states clearly that there was no danger of a popular insurrection. That is what he said, I believe word for word, or at least that is the effect of it.
Then he goes on to pile up the escalation of the FLQ activities over seven years and the dangers thereof. The dangers are those of marches on the streets of Montreal which might have resulted in riots. That is all there is in that book. That is all there is as an explanation of the invocation of the War Measures Act. All that is fact, instead of fiction, in that book is that there was a danger of marches, particularly by students and other young people, on the streets of Montreal which might have ended up in violence and riots. That was reason enough, Mr. Speaker, to invoke the War Measures Act; that was reason enough to take away personal liberties from people or to incarcerate 440 Canadians, innocent people, for days on end!
Some of these people lost their jobs as a result and many of them are still suffering from the ignominy of having been in jail and of being associated with violence and the FLQ, by reason of the fact that they were in jail. I say that this could not have justified anything and that the only thing which made this government do what it did last fall was the obvious danger that the Liberal government of Quebec was not keeping together.


An hon. Member:: Nonsense.


David Lewis: The obvious danger for the Bourassa government was in being divided within itself on the question of negotiating with the kidnappers or not negotiating with the kidnappers. The War Measures Act was invoked for no other purpose but the ignoble one of saving a Liberal provincial government from going to the dogs. That was the erosion of will about which the Minister of Justice talked. That was the confusion about which the Prime Minister talked, for there was no other in the province of Quebec at that time.
As a result of that, as I have said, some 440 innocent people suffered great injustice and there was a worsening of the situation with regard to the fragile unity of our country.


An hon. Member:: The Prime Minister would call you a bleeding heart.


David Lewis: The Prime Minister might call me a bleeding heart, but I have not hesitated to tell the Prime Minister what I think of him, so we are even-Steven.
Mr. Speaker, I should like now to spend a moment dealing with some misunderstandings which have also been spread among the people of Canada. If you put a thing in a certain way, then the facts disappear and something that is not fact becomes fact in the public mind. The art of communicating carefully wrapped nonfacts so that they look like facts is an art in which this government, and particularly its leader, are expert. Every time the Prime Minister speaks about what happened last fall, he says something to the effect that there were two kidnappings and there was one murder, so obviously they were right in invoking the War Measures Act. He never tells his audience that the unfortunate, the brutal, the unforgivable murder of Mr. Laporte came after the invocation of the War Measures Act and not before.


An hon. Member:: That is right.


David Lewis: He never tells his audience that the War Measures Act was invoked at 4 a.m. on Friday, October 16, and that Mr. Laporte was not murdered until some time on Saturday, October 17, 1970. I say, Mr. Speaker, that it is more logical to see a causal connection between the invocation of the War Measures Act and the murder

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of Mr. Laporte than it is to put to the people of Canada what happened in October last in such a way as to make them think that the War Measures Act was invoked as a result of the murder, when the murder occurred perhaps as a result of the invocation of the War Measures Act and certainly after that took place.
There is another way in which the Canadian people have deliberately been made to see something that is not a fact, as a fact. The Prime Minister did it again in the interview to which I have referred when he said, "We needed the War Measures Act; we needed the soldiers and all the police in order to meet the threat in Quebec". Never is the audience told what is the fact, namely, that you do not need the War Measures Act to get the armed forces to assist the civil authority.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Lewis: Never is the audience told the truth, namely, that the armed forces were sent into Montreal on the Wednesday and Thursday of that week before the War Measures Act was invoked.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


David Lewis: Never are the people of Canada told that. Never are the people of Canada told by this government that there is in the National Defence Act a provision which makes it obligatory on the Minister of National Defence or on the officers concerned to give assistance to a civil authority if the attorney general of a province demands it.
All the things I have referred to this evening, Mr. Speaker, have been carefully woven together into a piece of fiction in order to defend what was done last fall. I am delighted to see, as I was certain would happen, that in the course of the last few months the people of Canada saw that it was a piece of fiction, that they had been taken in. The Gallup poll which gave this government 59 per cent last fall has now dipped to 42 per cent. I am not referring to the additional numbers that the Conservatives have or the additional percentages that my party has gained. What is of immense significance to this Parliament and to Canada is that the people of Canada are seeing through this government, and that this government is now at one of the lowest levels of popularity in its history.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I hope they do not only see through it; I hope the government is through.


David Lewis: Mr. Speaker, I think my time is about up, but I say to the Minister of Justice and to the government that they will have to prove to this Parliament and the people of Canada that special legislation is necessary before anyone in Parliament who has any concern at all for human dignity will vote for this motion or for any legislation that may follow. In my view, the Criminal Code has ample provisions to deal with the situation. When the Minister of Justice said this afternoon-if I am wrong, he will correct me-"the Criminal Code is not sufficient because it is concerned with apprehending the criminal", I say to him that he knows better than that.
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John Napier Turner: That is not what I said.


David Lewis: If it is not, then I am glad. I say to the minister that the Criminal Code does not merely provide for the apprehension of a criminal; it provides for preventive action to avoid crime just as readily and importantly. The Minister of Justice nods his head.


John Napier Turner: Certainly.


David Lewis: Fine. In the Criminal Code we have a widely-worded provision about seditious conspiracy- "sedition is," "libel is," and all the rest of it. We have all the Criminal Code provisions about conspiracy and provisions about unlawful assembly and riot which would have been more than ample to deal with the street riots which the Secretary of State feared in his book. You do not need any special law to deal with that.
There is in the Criminal Code provision for the prohibition of offensive weapons, and the Code provides for search without warrant for offensive weapons anywhere except in a private home.
There is provision in the Criminal Code that gives the Governor in Council authority to define what an offensive weapon is, so that the cabinet can define anything that it believes to be an offensive weapon as such. Not only are there all these, but there are provisions in the Criminal Code that give to police and peace officers the right to arrest without warrant if they have reasonable grounds to believe that a crime is about to be committed. The Code also gives them the right to enter a house without a search warrant if they have reasonable grounds to believe there is someone in the house who may have committed a crime, is about to commit a crime, or if there are people on the premises whom they may have reasonable grounds to believe are conspiring to commit a crime. There are all these provisions in the Criminal Code to prevent the commission of a crime as well as the apprehension of the criminal.
The Minister of Justice discovered the Criminal Code for the first time the other day when he said that when the public order act dies, membership in the FLQ will still be a crime because they are guilty of criminal conspiracy. I interjected then, and I repeat what I said on October 16 or November 5, I forget which, when I was booed by members of the Liberal party. I said then that as far as I was concerned, in view of the stated objectives of the FLQ, stated in every piece of paper that they have distributed since 1963-the stated objective of using violence, the stated admission of having used bombs, having stolen, having robbed, having derailed trains, and so on-anyone who is a member of the FLQ is a member of a criminal conspiracy under the ordinary Criminal Code and you do not have to make the FLQ illegal by special law.
I believe that the Criminal Code is adequate. In my respectful submission, this Parliament ought not to take a single, solitary step, even the smallest step, in the direction of curtailing civil rights and liberties. The history of

May 13, 1971
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humanity is full of statements by reactionaries and dictators all over the world that the reason they were introducing repressive legislation or repressive action was to preserve or restore order. Hitler said it, Stalin said it, Mussolini said it, Peron said it, Salazar said it.
No member of this government is in that kind of company; I am not suggesting that. But I am saying that the words of the Minister of Justice, who undoubtedly is as concerned about liberty-or at least will claim he
is__as the rest of us, sound exactly the same as the words
of those people. No repression of civil liberty has ever been undertaken by any government except on the excuse that it was restoring or preserving the social order, and it does not sound any better in this House of Commons than it sounds in any other Parliament in the world whether democratic or otherwise.
Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I cannot support this motion. There has been no evidence put before Parliament or before the people of Canada that special legislation is in fact necessary. The committee, as the minister wants it, will have no authority to enter into any inquiry about events in the past to show the direction in which we must go. It is a motion based on the panic of last fall and on literal insanity in the spring of 1971.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, the motion under consideration reads as follows:
That a Special Joint Committee of the Senate and House of Commons he appointed to examine, inquire into and report upon the nature and kind of legislation required to deal with emergencies that may arise from time to time in the future by reason of lawlessness or violence in Canadian society and that endanger the existence of government or the maintenance of the peace and public order;
Mr. Speaker, before getting to the core of my topic, I should like to say that we of the Social Credit Party are in favour of civil liberties and respect for the individual and I think that no other speeches are necessary to inform the House of our views on civil liberties.
However, we are also opposed to anarchy, and those who were living in the province of Quebec last fall know better than anyone else what had happened to our civil liberties and what point anarchy had reached. Those who do not live in Quebec may talk through their hat on behalf of civil liberties, but they don't know how close we were to anarchy then.
First of all, we are in favour of antiterrorist, antidisorder and antiriot legislation. We would hope-and this is why we are blaming the government-that the legislation be permanent and national. We voted against the Public Order Act because it affected particularly the province of Quebec. Since we do not like the idea of a special status, we have decided to vote against that measure.
Mr. Speaker, the act, which should be national and permanent, could be implemented in the extraordinary circumstances involved.
I must therefore say that we will not sit either on the committee which the government intends to establish. We will not allow them to laugh at us once more. Last fall, the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) sent a letter to all
party leaders asking them suggestions in order to guide the government as to the policy to follow concerning the war measures, but even before our suggestions reached him the proposed legislation was already printed. People laughed at us on that occasion and we certainly will not allow the government to do so again in a special joint committee.
Later on, the right hon. Prime Minister bragged about having consulted all the parties of the opposition. He did, but the bill was already printed before he examined their views.
If another committee is to be set up in order to make the Canadian people believe that the government, through a committee of the House, has consulted parliament, we will refuse to be part of it. We will let the government assume their responsibilities and introduce a second bill similar to the one they have passed, behind our backs, after having asked for our advice.
Mr. Speaker, even if we have not experienced-contrary to the opinion expressed by the hon. member who preceded me-the October crisis, the federal government should propose legislation that would be applicable not only to one province but to the whole country and that would be permanent.
Mr. Speaker, one does not wait until the city is on fire to think about organizing a fire brigade.
We know, in any event, that confusion is rampant in Canada. I agree with the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) that the economic problem is the fault of governments that are financially paralysed, and this leads to confusion, disorder and anarchy.
The communist conspirary, which is attempting to establish its own system throughout the world with the complicity or through the stupidity of governments, is another cause of this problem. This is yet another threat to public order in Canada. Mr. Speaker, I would like to quote statements by Communist leaders which prove that this threat does actually exist.
This is what Lenin once said, and I quote:
Co-existence with other nations is a must until such time as we become powerful enough to assert ourselves through world revolution ... We are no pacifists. Conflict is inevitable. Major political issues cannot be resolved but by means of violence .. . Co-existence of Communism and democracy side by side in this world is unthinkable. The one or the other is bound to perish.
A little further, Lenin added:
It matters not that three quarters of the world should perish so long as the surviving quarter is Communist.
With an overwhelming majority of forces, a frontal attack may succeed. But with inadequate forces, one may have to resort to roundabout ways, periods of waiting, zigzags, retreats.
Well, Mr. Speaker, we began experiencing such zigzags in the province of Quebec last fall. Lenin also said:
Promises, like pie crusts, are made to be broken.
Mr. Speaker, we did not need Lenin to tell us that. Politicians have been giving ample proof thereof for the past 100 years. And here is what Khrushchev told American diplomats in 1956:
We will bury you.

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pline. On the other hand, the Prime Minister's friends from the time of Cite Libre will be allowed to work undisturbed at the building of the socialist society they dream about and which they are today in a position to achieve and which they are, in fact, achieving very well.
The double game of using right-wing talk and letting revolutionaries take the initiative, is merely to be a man of the right in one's words and a man of the left in one's actions. That is why he must be careful not to reinstate, right now, these emergency measures, in order to better allow anarchists to come to Canada, and particularly to Quebec.
The Prime Minister wants to play for time and, to this end, he is hiding behind the ineffectual and verbose democracy of a committee which he controls.
The death penalty is no more, and the underworld is happy about it. Emergency measures are no more; so, the anarchists are shaking hands and congratulating themselves, shouting: Long live Liberty! They are now free to set up another crisis, undisturbed, and when they are well organized, we will set the police and the Army after them, at the last minute. And there we are! That is it! We asked for revolution? We have got it. We have left them all freedom and latitude to organize; then, we will face them, at the last minute.
The government does not need any task force to tell him what to do: Let it take its responsibilities. It has the required majority: Let it act. Its platform during the last election campaign was based on the principle of a majority government. Well today it has a majority, so let it resort to action! It has the responsibility for governing the country: let it propose a bill to the House after consultation with the opposition parties.
The government was warned by Messrs. Drapeau and Saulnier from Montreal. It sneered at their advice. The appointment of a royal commission to inquire into the activities of the Company of Young Canadians had been requested, but the political game was played and therefore the inquiry requested by the mayor and the chairman of the executive committee of the City of Montreal did not take place. The government did not wish to take the necessary measures to prevent the anarchists from going into action in Quebec and on account of this gross carelessness we had the October crisis. The Prime Minister is not willing to pass permanent legislation in order to keep under control the Canadian anarchists, especially in Quebec. It is rather strange to see who are the accused summoned before the courts and what is the past of some of them. Up to now, those people have endeavoured to destroy our society and, when they are quite organized, they will be successful, because the emergency measures will have been passed too late.
I have here some statements which in my opinion are rather important. There is in Canada a new organization directed by Mr. Jean-Louis Gagnon. The federal government should be more cautious about him that it has been up to now.
The hon. member for Bonaventure (Mr. Bechard) can say that we are witch hunting. He can speak as he pleases; he is free to say what he wants in the House, but

it is unfortunate that he does not speak more often so that we may know his inner thoughts.
The Director of Information Canada stated the following:

"I haven't got a drop of national glory in my veins, but X have a lot of hot red blood that demands vengeance-
"I believe that revolt is the law of the slave, and one must die according to his law-but I do not believe anymore that there are races that are born to reign or to dominate-[DOT]
"Nationalism leads to useless wars; class struggle leads to the liberation of the oppressed ... the class struggle is a liberating factor-"

Mr. Speaker, this letter was written not too long ago. I have another statement which is from a distinguished American criminalist and which reads as follows:

People who won't believe in the conspiracy theory of history are the very ones who make it possible for conspirators to go on making history.

Mr. Speaker, I could quote other statements to show that in Canada, as in other countries, the federal government has a right to be concerned about its own security. It is not when disturbances are at our doors that it is time for the government of a country to get organized. We are here to pass preventive legislation, and it should be passed as soon as possible since after the October events we cannot be so naive as to think that everything is back in order.
If we passed legislation enabling some agencies to inquire into what is happening in our province and elsewhere in Canada, we should have an excellent preventive measure to avoid a recurrence of disturbances similar to those we had in October.
That is why the motion introduced by the government is stupid and absurd. This motion is designed to fool Canadians even more, to get them to swallow that the government is studying the problem and will take some action, while it has all which is necessary to draft a bill and introduce it in the House. Those members who are concerned with national security and individual freedom instead of anarchy could then vote in favour of the bill.
That is why I suggest that this government in delaying the passage of a permanent and national act is failing in its duty. Such a law could be useful. It is essential that this government discharge its responsibilities but obviously it is procrastinating so as to be in a position when the elections come to play politics on the FLQ's back.


Mr. Warren Allmand (Noire-Dame-de-Grace):: Mr. Speaker, as we proceeded through the month of April knowing that the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act was about to expire, I was one of those who felt that we should not continue the public order legislation. I was also one of those who felt that we should consider new legislation to deal with situations such as we had last fall, but that this legislation should be considered by a
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parliamentary committee and by Parliament as a whole in consultation with the people of Canada.
When I heard the hon. member for York South (Mr. Lewis) state this evening that this resolution was a subterfuge and hoax, that the government had a bill under the table and that it would instruct us what to do at the proper time, I was extremely disappointed in him. The hon. member for York South, the new leader of the New Democratic Party, is very quick in this House to accuse others of arrogance. He did that this afternoon with regard to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau).
I do not know whether it should be called arrogance or something else when a member rises in this House and presumes that when another member makes a decision on an important issue it is because he has been instructed by somebody else. He presumes that the members of his party will not be instructed by somebody else, but categorically suggests that the members of this party on an issue that is very important-especially to me because I am from Montreal and represent people in that city- will be instructed by the government as to what to do when a committee studies this issue. I say to the hon. member for York South and other members that I was not instructed what to do on any of the votes last October, and I will not be instructed what to do on this matter.
The type of resolution now before the House is the kind of solution I look to in order to deal with this type of problem. My reason is as follows. Now that the situation in Quebec has become quiet, we can deal with this matter at greater length and without passion. Because this is a question of suspending civil liberties in certain situations it must have a proper consensus rather than being in the form of a bill brought in by a government party or a majority in Parliament. We need the type of legislation to which all parties have contributed, as if they had to deal with the situation which confronted the government last fall.
I visualize the committee hearing from civil liberties groups, bar associations, mayors, police representatives, judges and all who administer the law in order to find out whether the law as it stands is adequate. The committee may find that no changes in the criminal law are necessary. I accept this as a possibility. I do not know. All I know is that last fall we were confronted with a situation in which the ordinary law was not adequate. I shall deal with this aspect later.
I wish to turn now to some of the arguments put forward by those who say we should have continued the public order legislation. I was completely opposed to doing so. I believe the goals we sought to achieve last October through the use of the War Measures Act, and later through the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act, have been achieved. Quiet and peace has been brought to Quebec. There have been no serious incidents in the province since October. The strong and prudent action taken by the government then has served as a deterrent to those who thought they could change the social or political order by violent means. In the circum-
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stances, the government had a duty to encourage a return to normality in Quebec. Had we sought to prolong the public order legislation, our action could have been taken as indicating a lack of confidence in the return of normal times to the province.
The Prime Minister of Quebec recently visited Europe and New York to encourage investment in the province. He has tried to convince potential investors that normal times have returned. We ought to second that type of approach. The best way of doing so was to discontinue the public order legislation after it expired in April.
It is fitting we should reconsider the criminal law to determine whether it is adequate to deal with situations of the type encountered last October. I would be opposed to the government bringing in a bill directly on this subject. When the suspension of civil liberties is in question there ought to be a broad consensus in the country as to the type of legislation which should be permitted- broader than can be shown by a simple majority in Parliament. We should endeavour to stimulate as many people as possible into thinking about this subject and grappling with it.
Of course, the government could have brought a bill forward. There would have been the usual opposition and bickering in Parliament by one side against the other as to its merits. By putting the issue before Parliament in the way now proposed, by inviting witnesses to give evidence before the committee and enabling all parties to deal with the question, we shall be in a better position to assess the situation and determine the type of legislation which may be necessary.
I repeat, under the terms of this motion I consider it a possibility that the committee might find that no changes are necessary. I reject the insinuations contained in the speech of the leader of the New Democratic Party, that we are dealing here with a subterfuge or a ruse and that we have all been instructed on these benches as to what we must do. Such a suggestion almost justifies a question of privilege being raised. However, I shall not pursue the matter.
In my opinion, the major question the committee should deal with is whether the rules with respect to appearance and arraignment within 24 hours of arrest are not lacking in circumstances where it is necessary to arrest a large number of people, where it is necessary to assess evidence and prepare charges against a great many people. In other words, the committee should consider whether in certain circumstances it might not be necessary to allow the Crown a longer period in which to examine evidence and prepare charges.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Will the hon. member permit a question? In the case of Laporte, the persons accused were arrested and charged with offences under the Criminal Code-kidnapping or murder. Would anyone accused of such crimes be released on bail in normal circumstances? Would he not be held in custody to give the Crown precisely the time the hon. member was talking about?


William Warren Allmand: Yes, in cases where those arrested are suspected of murder. But where crimes of violence are
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May 13, 1971
National Securities Measures widespread, situations could arise in which the normal rules with respect to arraignment might have to be modified and the period allowed for preparation of prosecutions extended. One might have to consider whether the law with respect to search and arrest ought to be changed. I make no judgment at this point, however. This is a matter which should be considered by the committee. We should talk to the police forces, the bar associations and everybody concerned-


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Call the Prime Minister.


William Warren Allmand: As for declaring the FLQ illegal, I personally do not see how it can be done effectively. It could be done last fall because there was a group in existence then who called itself the FLQ and had done so for a long period; its members had committed criminal acts, including murder and bombing, and I think it was appropriate under the appropriate regulations to declare it illegal. As I say, I do not see how we can do it when bringing in new legislation but that, too is open to discussion.
The hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) presented an amendment which in my opinion is nothing more than an attempt to use the select committee as a tribunal to judge what Parliament decided last fall.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Nonsense.


William Warren Allmand: It would be a tribunal to judge whether the action taken by the government in introducing the regulations under the War Measures Act and the public order legislation was right or wrong. This is another attempt by the opposition to make political, partisan capital if they can out of a most serious issue. This type of re-examination of what Parliament did last fall is pointless. I suppose one could argue about it for months or years.
There had been an escalating situation. If the government had not taken the measures it did under the War Measures Act and then replaced the act with the public order act, no one can speculate what would have happened. Consequently, we have to look to the future and not to the past. I do not think anything can be gained by using the proposed committee as a tribunal. All it would end up as would be a lot of political partisanship and an attempt to rejudge what has already been done.
In his speech the hon. member for York South spoke as if the situation in Quebec last fall had been caused by the introduction of the War Measures Act.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: He did not say that at all.


William Warren Allmand: Well, he seemed to say that. But many of us in Quebec had the impression that the FLQ had kidnapped two men, that they had threatened the government of Quebec and all Canada by asking for the release of certain prisoners, by demanding $500,000 and other things. We had the impression that these things happened first and that the government, which had been very patient for a long time, was concerned with civil

liberties and with trying to solve the problems under the ordinary provisions of the Criminal Code, acted with great hesitancy when it introduced the regulations made pursuant to the War Measures Act. The government acted after the threat to life and liberty issued by the FLQ.
In his remarks the hon. member for York South continually spoke as if all the problems in Quebec were caused by the government bringing forth the War Measures Act. He said he had spoken to people in Quebec who said that the situation got worse because the government did what it did, and so on. The problems in Quebec were not caused by the government taking measures to protect the population. These problems have been created over a period of seven years by a group called the FLQ, which has attempted to disrupt, and has disrupted, society by many forms of violence.
The hon. member for Egmont (Mr. MacDonald), the hon. member for York South and the hon. member for Calgary North, indeed all members of the Conservative and New Democratic parties, continually ask: Where was the need for bringing forward the laws the government brought forward last fall-as if nothing had happened. I should like to quote an article written by James Stewart of the Montreal Star in which he wrote the following:
Hardly anyone was prepared for the quantum jump in terrorism that electrified Quebec and all Canada in October 1970. Perhaps we should have been prepared. If you write down, one after another, all the deeds and declarations of the Front de Liberation du Quebec over the past seven years, you compile a catalogue of violence that recognizes no conventional limits.
But it would be no more than a catalogue, a selection of halfforgotten products of seven years of blasting, robbing, and raiding by the FLQ in the name of Quebec independence and the global socialist revolution: seven people dead, many injured: a bomb planted, on the average, every ten days.
Imagine, Mr. Speaker, a bomb planted on the average every ten days over a period of seven years! I wonder how long the hon. member of Egmont would have tolerated bombs being planted every ten days by a group that put forward the idea that they were going to change the political system by violence in his province? It seems to me that in that province, the entire population of which is about the same as my constituency, the usual level of violence is a bit of drunkenness on a Saturday night. I wonder how long the hon. member would have tolerated a bombing every ten days over a period of seven years. Would he still have taken the position he has taken in this House today and over the past several months? These were not random bombings. These were bombings with a message. There were bombings with communication. These were bombings by people who said that they were out to change the social and political systems by violence.
Some hon. members have contended that research and investigation have revealed that only a few men were involved, a few guns, a few knives, a few cases of dynamite, and so on. That might be true. But I submit, Mr. Speaker, that you do not need too many men who are seriously committed to violence, who are seriously committed to the type of urban guerrilla warfare that we are seeing now around the world, to upset society com-
May 13, 1971

pletely. As a matter of fact, you can have situations where one man declares he is going to terrorize a society and who does terrorize society. This was done for a while in Boston by the Boston strangler.
When you have threats made by a group and you do not know how large the group is, and the group carries out its threats by bombing, by kidnapping and by murder, then I suggest it is the duty of the state to take measures to protect its citizens. The government of this country did take measures to protect its citizens, and I think that again this government will take measures to protect its citizens.
I find it somewhat strange that today the Conservative Party want to make the committee stand in judgment upon something for which that party voted last fall. They are now asking that the committee that it is proposed should study this matter stand in judgment upon a vote and a decision that they took last fall in voting for the regulations under the War Measures Act and in voting for the Public Order (Temporary Measures) Act. Now they are doing a bit of a flip-flop. I do not know whether they think the political winds have changed, but it is very difficult to understand their approach. It is my impression, with all the good faith in the world, that they are still trying to make politics out of what is a very serious issue, an issue which in my province is one of life and death.
The number of people that can terrorize a society, as I have said, can consist of a very small group. But I think we must realize that in addition to that small group committed to carrying out violence under the name of the FLQ there were also others who had great sympathy for what they were trying to do. Although they were not using guns, dynamite or other types of weapons, they were ready to assist those who were. Right now there are people on trial for doing just that, people who have helped hide those who were being pursued by the police, who built secret compartments in their homes and apartments and who helped find houses for the FLQ.
I would say that there were probably large numbers of people-I do not know how many-ready to support the FLQ if they were able to go further, and who are sympathetic to their cause. That is an unfortunate statement to make, but I think it is true. We have seen in Quebec over the last few years hatred and violence expressed in the city of St. Leonard, where there were very terrible riots. We have seen this violence at the St. Jean Baptist parades in 1968 and in 1969, where people were injured, property was damaged and riots broke out. We have also seen it at the march on McGill by thousands of people where, again, property and life were threatened.


John Edward Broadbent: Will the hon. member permit a question?


William Warren Allmand: Yes.


John Edward Broadbent: If the hon. member knows, will he reflect, in the context of his comments, upon the events that took place last week in Washington when several
National Securities Measures thousand people decided to virtually bring the government of that country to a standstill? That was the openly-declared purpose of the mass demonstration. The United States government did not declare a war measures act, or say that an insurrection was about to take place, although it might well have decided to do so, being faced with the threat of several thousand people who said they were going to bring the government to a standstill. That government used the normal process of law to arrest 7,000 people, keeping them incarcerated for a brief period of time and then releasing them. Would the hon. member, who is defending his government, compare its action with the actions of the government to our south?


William Warren Allmand: Mr. Speaker, I saw a film of what happened in Washington, and the events that took place there seemed to be peaceful. The men and women who went to Washington did not threaten to use violence. They declared in advance that they would not use violence. I think they conducted themselves in a very peaceful way, and I would have supported them. On the other hand, if you consider the St. Leonard demonstration and the riots that followed, the riots that took place during the police strike in Montreal and the riots that took place at other times in that city-


An hon. Member:: All insurrections?


William Warren Allmand: The apprehended insurrection, as I said in my speech on the War Measures Act, constituted threats to carry out violence in order to destroy the constitution of the state-not by the traditional type of revolution with armed revolutionaries in the streets challenging the armed forces but by threatening terrorism, selective assassination, bombings and violence in an attempt to throw society into a state of imbalance in which people could no longer feel free to do the things one can do in a democratic state. Under these circumstances people might cease to stand for public office, cease to speak out as they might like, cease to govern in the province and cease to live in a province in which they were not free to do the things one can do in a democratic society.
You do not need a revolution in order to cause this type of atmosphere. All you have to do is establish a group which publicly declares it is going to assassinate, commit terrorism and bombings. This group in fact has carried out an average of one bombing every ten days over seven years and has caused the death of seven people. We must remember that the group which did this threatened the lives of two important people, one a diplomat and one a cabinet minister. At that time no one knew where the violence would stop. This government took strong action to see that nothing else happened, and I suggest that nothing else did happen because the government took that action.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


William Warren Allmand: As a matter of fact, since last October we have had relative peace in Montreal and Quebec. Because we have had relative peace I was against the prolongation of the public order act. This is why I believe

May 13, 1971
National Security Measures
now is the time we should together attempt to deal with this problem.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


William Warren Allmand: I hope that the statements made by the hon. member tor Calgary North and the leader of the New Democratic Party are not signs that they will not participate in seeking a solution.
Mr. Woolliamsr What do you mean?


William Warren Allmand: I have the impression that the hon. member for Calgary North feels that the committee cannot accomplish anything because everything has been decided in advance. I tell him honestly that is not so. I suppose I could speak in this way for months and for years and never convince the official opposition and the NDP that there was a problem in Quebec. I suppose they might stick to their position forever and a day.


Mr. Bell:: Why did you wait so long?


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Why did you take seven years to do anything?


William Warren Allmand: This is the dilemma the opposition finds itself in. When the government does take action because the state is threatened or the threat becomes accelerated to a very high degree, members of the opposition criticize us. At the same time they ask us why we did not take action sooner. I assume they are asking why we did not take action in the way of introducing special measures as a result of bombings and other things. Do I understand from the position they take that they would have invoked the War Measures Act earlier, or adopted special legislation?


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


William Warren Allmand: It is difficult to understand the position of the opposition. I might be very happy if the hon. member for Calgary North, the hon. member for York South, the hon. member for Egmont and, in fact, all hon. members of the Conservative and New Democratic parties continue to make speeches of this type. I might hope that they will continue to do so until the next election. I might hope that they continue to press the points they are making today. I know they are sincere and will continue to do so.
I would invite the hon. member for Calgary North to an election meeting in my constituency. I hope he would then make the same type of speech he made in the House this afternoon. I am sure we will then find out who in Montreal and Quebec believe him when he tells them we do not need this type of legislation to deal with this sort of situation. We will discover those who believe him when he says there is nothing to be worried about in spite of the fact there were bombings on an average every ten days over a period of seven years, thefts of dynamite and the kidnapping of two men, one of whom was murdered. I might hope he would come and make this kind of speech, and I would hope that other members of the Conservative party would do likewise.
This is a serious issue. Not all of my colleagues are on the same side of the fence. This is a matter in which Parliament and the people of Canada should be involved. I hope there are enough people of good faith in the House who will look at this issue with a view to bringing forward the necessary legislation. After its meetings, the committee may come forth with the suggestion that our laws do not have to be changed. At least then we will have had a full examination and investigation of the problems and we will have had the opportunity of discussing the results of what happened last fall-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please.



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

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

Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, many of us have had a long day today. I posed a question to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) regarding the Hague convention which related to illegal interference with commercial aircraft. As I understand the situation, Canada and other nations signed that convention and agreed that some form of law based on that agreement would be adopted by various nations making it a crime to illegally interfere with the normal operation of aircraft.
I asked the Prime Minister why the government had not asked Parliament to approve the convention agreed to by Canada. This agreement has not been presented to nor approved by Parliament.
From time to time I have asked the Minister of Justice (Mr. Turner) when he intends to bring forward a bill in respect of hijacking. He has said, frankly, that there are legal difficulties. I ask the Minister of Justice, who is in the House, what are those legal difficulties? My information is that the Prime Minister has never forgotten that he was Minister of Justice, and now that he is Prime Minister he has directed the Department of Justice to do nothing at this time. All I want to find out is who is running the Department of Justice, the Prime Minister or the Minister of Justice.
After one hijacking and one attempted hijacking in Canada surely it is time the government had the Hague convention approved by Parliament. Perhaps a bill could be presented along the lines of my private bill. I should like to hear from the Minister of Justice tonight. I should like him to tell us why he has been vacillating so far as this legislation is concerned. Is he once again to be controlled by the Prime Minister so far as the Department of Justice is concerned?

May 13, 1971

Canada is a signatory of that convention, and surely having signed it we should approve it and bring forward a bill to protect not only the pilots and personnel of the commercial airlines of Canada but all the passengers who use those airlines. That is the reason I brought forward this matter in the first place and prepared a bill in respect of hijacking. I drew up that bill along the lines of the terms and conditions contained in the convention.
If the Minister of Justice does not intend to introduce a bill himself, perhaps he would allow my bill to receive second reading and be referred to the committee for study. Then we would be able to come to grips with the problem. I make the prediction that if something is not done now, we may have a situation similar to the one we were discussing this afternoon and this evening. Something will happen in Canada, not only to the personnel of the commercial airlines but to the public using those airlines. Why does Canada not take the lead?


Mr. Albert Bechard (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Justice):: Mr. Speaker, since Canada signed the Hague convention on December 16, 1970, the text of this new instrument as adopted at the Hague conference has been under study by the Department of Justice, the Department of Transport and the Department of External Affairs with a view to ascertaining what steps, including the enactment of domestic legislation, will be required to enable Canadian ratification. Because Canada will be accepting certain international responsibilities with respect to the treatment of aircraft hijackers when we become a party to the convention, it has been necessary to consider a number of legal implications which will affect Canadian criminal law once the convention comes into force for Canada.
The examination of this matter has shown that we would be in a better position to implement the convention if a specific offence of "unlawful seizure of aircraft"-hijacking-were to be created under the Canadian Criminal Code. This offence would conform to the definition set out in article 1 of the treaty as follows:
Any person who on board an aircraft in flight:
a)	unlawfully, by force or threat thereof, or by any other form of intimidation, seizes, or exercises control of, that aircraft, or attempts to perform any such act, or
b)	is an accomplice of a person who performs or attempts to perform any such act, commits an offence (herinafter referred to as "the offence").
One of the most far-reaching provisions of the convention deals with the question of jurisdiction over hijackers. Section 5A of the Criminal Code gives Canada jurisdiction only over alleged offenders or offenders when the offence concerns a Canadian aircraft or a foreign aircraft which subsequently lands in Canada.
Article 4, paragraph 1(c) and article 4, paragraph 2 of the Hague convention require a contracting state to establish jurisdiction when the offence is committed on board leased aircraft and where the alleged offender is present in its territory-at any time-and it does not extradite him pursuant to other provisions of the convention. In order for Canada to undertake this obligation we must amend section 5(a) to extend the jurisdiction of Canadian courts.
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion
The Department of Justice has under preparation, and shortly expects to introduce into Parliament, a number of amendments to the Criminal Code. At that time the amendments relating to the Hague convention will also be dealt with. When the relevant legislation has been passed, the major step which will enable Canadian ratification of the Hague convention will have been taken. Immediately following the enactment of such legislation, it is expected that the Secretary of State for External Affairs-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I regret to interrupt the parliamentary secretary, but his time has expired.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: If other members would consent-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: There is no provision in the rules to extend the time. The hon. member for Marquette (Mr. Stewart).


Albert Béchard: Mr. Speaker, I thought we had ten minutes altogether.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The parliamentary secretary's time has expired. The hon. member for Calgary North (Mr. Woolliams) has been gracious in suggesting that it should be extended, but there is no discretion in the Chair to extend it. The hon. member for Marquette.



NATIONAL, PARKS-RIDING MOUNTAIN-CLOSURE OF CHURCH CAMPS

Mr. Craig Stewart (Marquette):: Mr. Speaker, on May 111 questioned the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Chretien) on the government's decision to force the closure of six church camps in Riding Mountain National Park. I do not understand the government's policy that the leases to these six church camps will not be renewed after 1975. It is as confusing as most of the policies they have established for our national parks, particularly as they affect our parks in western Canada where space is no problem.
The member for Brandon-Souris (Mr. Dinsdale) and myself during the Easter recess met with representatives of the six denominations involved in the operation of these church camps. I can assure the minister that they are not happy with his decision after the time and effort that has been put forth in the last 30 years in developing these camps. In choosing a church camp it is extremely important that a location is chosen for urban children to receive the special gift of the revelations of nature; it is necessary for them to be in an unspoiled, undeveloped, isolated area. The present church campsites in Riding Mountain National Park fill this need.
The government will say that they have offered to relocate the church camps in one large, group camp. In view of the fact that the proposed relocation site offered the six denominations is a former prisoner of war camp, surely the government will alter its decision. By giving these six churches one unacceptable alternative the minister knows that he will force the eviction of these

May 13, 1971
Proceedings on Adjournment Motion church camps from the park. The government will say "Not to worry" because these closures will not take place before 1975, but everybody knows it is impossible to continue operation of the camps under this guillotine.
Surely the government realizes that one of these camps, the Anglican camp, is established as a memorial to those who gave their lives in World War II. Also, I understand that the churches have been advised that they will receive no reimbursement for their present camps and buildings. This is a most dictatorial attitude.
For several years the government has said that public hearings would be held in Manitoba to discuss national parks' policy. When are these hearings to be held? How much longer do the people have to wait? Let the government get the reaction of the people to the closing of these church camps, the proposed closing of the outdoor roller-rink at Clear Lake, the unbelievable increases in commercial assessments at Clear Lake that, through time, will close many businesses, and the many more controversial decisions being made for Riding Mountain National Park. I ask the government not to delay these public hearings any longer, so that the people will know what its intentions are.
The largest area of Riding Mountain National Park is in the federal riding of Marquette. Mr. Speaker, through you I personally invite the minister to be my guest and visit the park. I will show him the church camps he is forcing to close. Let him see first-hand how idiotic are the government's policies as they pertain to this park. A visit like that would give him a better understanding of the situation. I say to the government, allow these church camps to remain in Riding Mountain National Park. They are used and enjoyed by many western Canadians. If you want to establish new policies for national parks, make them effective when new parks are established but leave the present parks alone.
Finally, I would point out that the closing of these camps is another case of one hand not knowing what the other hand is doing so far as the government is concerned. Other departments of government are spending large amounts of money encouraging our youth to travel and see Canada. Youth hostels are being established all over the country. Yet we have the department responsible for our national parks forcing the closure of six church camps which will give our youth guidance and do more good than any government programs to date.


Albert Béchard: Mr. Speaker, six private group camps are
operated by church groups in Riding Mountain National Park. Agreements have been renewed with four of the organizations to continue occupancy of the lands until March 31, 1975, and similar renewals will be granted to the remaining two organizations.
At the present time, a number of organizations operate private group camps in our national parks. These organizations established camps in years when there were comparatively few visitors to our national parks. Due to the substantial increase in park visitation, it is no longer possible for us to accommodate all the demands from new organizations which would like to establish camps within national parks. Also, it has become necessary to plan the long-term recovery of parklands previously reserved for exclusive purposes of various kinds, and to make all facilities within the parks available to the general public with no special privileges and no exclusive use by any group or individual.
We recognize the need for careful testing to establish practical routines, procedures and programs for application in departmentally-controlled group camps. We anticipate, and hope to encourage, the interest of many worthy organizations that will be able to take advantage of public facilities which were previously reserved for exclusive use. The department recognizes a special responsibility on behalf of the young people of Canada. Consequently, we want to be absolutely sure that the resources for this purpose in our parks are adequate, properly administered and will in fact make it possible for many more Canadian youth to enjoy our parks now and in the future.
I would also mention that this summer a former army cadet camp in Riding Mountain National Park will be operated by the national parks service as a group camping facility, available to any organization wishing to take advantage of these resources. This project will be very carefully watched to make sure that this test of the proposed policy is as thorough and as objective as possible. While no assurance can be given that the agreements for the existing camps will be extended beyond 1975, there is no intention on our part to phase-out their operations until we are certain that we have a practical alternative that will serve the purposes we have in mind.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I wish to thank the hon. member for the kind invitation he extended to the minister and I will transmit the invitation to him.
Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.15 p.m.

Friday, May 14, 1971