1973-05-25

ROUTINE PROCEEDINGS


Mr. Paul Yewchuk (Athabasca):: Mr. Speaker, I rise under the provisions of Standing Order 43 on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity, namely, the decision by the Canadian Radio-Television Commission to approve the sale of radio station CKSB, Winnipeg, to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Because this decision has created hardship for many ethnic groups and because of CBC broadcasting policy, I would move, seconded by the hon. member for Provencher (Mr. Epp):
That the matter be referred to the Standing Committee on Broadcasting, Films and Assistance to the Arts for study and report to the House.


Mr. Speaker:: The motion proposed by the hon. member requires the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: There is not unanimity and the hon. member's motion cannot be put at this time.


INCOME TAX
Mr. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa-Whitby):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to move a motion under Standing Order 43 on a matter of urgent and pressing necessity arising from public concern about the amount of taxes paid by the Chrysler Corporation in recent years and from the Auditor General's recommendation for more stringent control to prevent corporate manipulations designed to avoid the payment of income tax. I would move, seconded by the hon. member for Assiniboia (Mr. Knight):
That this House do recommend an amendment to Section 247 (2) of the Income Tax Act which would remove the discretionary power of the minister where two or more corporations are separated solely for the purpose of saving taxes and not for operational efficiency, and make it mandatory that such separation be not permitted for tax purposes.


Mr. Speaker:: This motion, also proposed under the terms of Standing Order 43, requires unanimous consent. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


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


ARCTIC WATERS POLLUTION PREVENTION ACT
Mr. Frank Howard (Skeena) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-186, to amend the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act.


Some hon. Members:: Explain.


Frank Howard: Mr. Speaker, it seems apparent that the United States government is going to move its Prudhoe Bay oil across Alaska and down the west coast by tanker while this government sits idly by and wants to see it happen. The purpose of this bill is to extend what the government has described as the finest piece of pollution control legislation in the world, the Arctic Waters Pollution Prevention Act, to the Atlantic and Pacific coasts in order to protect our land from potential injury by what can only be described as an inconsiderate and irresponsible course of action by both the American and Canadian governments.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair will take exception with the terms of the explanation given by the hon. member. It is not an explanation but a speech in support of the motion proposed by the hon. member and that is not in order.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.
[Stage Direction]
May 25, 1973
Oral Questions


Hon. Robert L. Stanfield (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Labour I wish to direct a question to the Acting Prime Minister with regard to the differences existing between Air Canada and the International Association of Machinists. In view of the fact the commissioner appointed by the government has been unable to recommend solutions for the four critical issues relating to matters other than money, what initiatives is the government taking toward the settlement of the dispute and the avoidance of a tie-up of Air Canada?


Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Acting Prime Minister):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to have an opportunity to discuss this dispute with the Minister of Labour before giving an answer.


RAILWAY AND GRAIN HANDLERS DISPUTES- GOVERNMENT INITIATIVES TO SETTLE
Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question on a related matter. Does the Acting Prime Minister have any information about the railway and grainhandlers disputes and can he indicate to the House what initiatives, if any, the government is taking with regard to the settlement of these disputes?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I would give the same answer as I gave in the other case.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: May I express the hope to the Acting Prime Minister that the government will really consider these disputes as serious matters and seriously involve itself in methods of-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.


CONSIDERATION OF ESTABLISHMENT OF INDUSTRIAL DISPUTES COMMISSION
Mr. James A. McGrath (St. John's East):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Acting Prime Minister. Is the government giving consideration to setting up an industrial disputes commission, as recommended by the Woods task force report of 1968 and by this party, in order to define areas in the public interest and to provide a mechanism whereby industrial disputes that threaten to tie up the national economy can be averted?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, that general subject is very much before the government. It is one of the reasons the Woods commission was appointed. However, the government has not found it easy to deal with this question in a satisfactory

manner. In response to the Leader of the Opposition, may I add that the government is taking these disputes very seriously indeed. The Minister of Labour reports to the cabinet from time to time on his progress. To date, I think he has a fair measure of success in these matters.


James Aloysius McGrath: Mr. Speaker, I can appreciate the Acting Prime Minister assuring the House that the Minister of Labour reports to the cabinet from time to time. However, as these three disputes threaten to tie up the economy of this nation at a very critical time, can the Acting Prime Minister assure the House that the Minister of Labour will give the same kind of information to the House he has given to the cabinet?


Mitchell William Sharp: That is a matter of judgment. I would think the main purpose of all these negotiations is to achieve a satisfactory settlement and if the Minister of Labour finds it necessary to maintain the confidence of the various parties from time to time I would support his judgment.


STRIKE BY AIRLINE EMPLOYEES ASSOCIATION MEMBERS AGAINST AIR CANADA AT WINNIPEG-GOVERNMENT ACTION
Mr. David Orlikow (Winnipeg North):: Would the Acting Prime Minister discuss with the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Transport the strike by members of the Canadian Airline Employees Association against Air Canada which began this week in Winnipeg, a strike brought about by the refusal of Air Canada to accept the unanimous report of the conciliation board? That strike will have an effect in the very near future on the whole operation of Air Canada.


Mitchell William Sharp: My
answer to the first part of the question is, yes, Mr. Speaker, and I thank the hon. member for his contribution.


Mr. Lincoln M. Alexander (Hamilton West):: In view of the serious nature of the impending strike, would the Acting Prime Minister involve himself with the Minister of Labour in order to ascertain whether he should intervene directly in order to arrive at a peaceful settlement?


Mitchell William Sharp: I think this question illustrates the confidence of members of the opposition in the effective work being done by the Minister of Labour, and I am sure he will intervene if he thinks it will be useful to do so.


GASOLINE-POSSIBILITY OF SHORTAGE-REQUEST FOR CONTROL OF EXPORTS
Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. On May 17, in answer to a question of mine regarding the danger of a possible gasoline shortage in Canada, the minister said that the National Energy Board was following the export of refined products very closely. Has the Energy Board drawn to his attention the fact that exports of gasoline for the months

of January and February combined amounted to only 11,500 gallons and that in March exports had climbed to 5,332,000 gallons compared with 72,000 for the same month in 1972? In view of the fact that gasoline is being drained out of this country to meet the shortage in the United States, is the minister now prepared to extend the export controls which he imposed last February to cover gasoline and other refined products?


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: It seems to me the critical question is whether there is short supply in Canada. My information from the board is that at the moment there is not, although these contracts which are made from day to day obviously have to be watched very closely. I can assure the hon. gentleman that if there is any evidence of short supply export control will be extended, but at the moment my advice from the board is that there is not.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: I am not sure from where the minister is getting his information. Is he aware of the fact that some of the independent dealers have already closed their doors and that others have been informed they cannot be guaranteed supplies of gasoline beyond the end of this month? In view of these facts I ask the minister whether, over the weekend, he will get in touch with the National Energy Board and then make a statement to the House on Monday as to what he proposes to do to meet this very serious situation as it affects not only the independent dealers but also the customers who deal with them?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I shall be glad to check and determine whether the hon. gentleman's assertions are facts.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: May I ask the minister, if he is going to make a statement on Monday, whether he will secure from the National Energy Board the figure for exports of gasoline in April and an estimate of what they will be for May? All the information available seems to indicate that the astounding increase for the month of March has been escalated even further during the months of April and May.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I shall be glad to see what the facts are.


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Mr. Gerard Laprise (Abitibi):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the hon. Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development.
There have been reports in Abitibi of closing down the Indian School at Saint-Marc. Can the minister tell us whether the Indian band councils served by that school were consulted before this decision was taken or whether they will be consulted if no final decision has as yet been taken as to the closing of the institution?
Oral Questions


Hon. Jean Chretien (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of the facts in this case but I shall make inquiries. However, I can assure the hon. member that before closing down that school or of any institution coming under the jurisdiction of my department, sometimes motivated by lack of pupils, we invariably inform the communities involved, and this will be done in the present case.


Gérard Laprise: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary.
Can the minister tell us whether he has received briefs or other communications calling for continuing the institution?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I shall inquire and report to the hon. member.


FINANCE
Mr. James Gillies (Don Valley):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister in the absence of the Minister of Finance. Given the fact that American banks have announced another increase in their prime interest rate, and given the fact that the explanation for the rise in interest rates in Canada has been the differential between the rates of the two countries, is it reasonable to expect that the prime bank rate in Canada will be raised again in the near future?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, it is contrary to my custom to engage in speculation of this kind.


James McPhail Gillies: Is the government giving any thought to an alternative way of dealing with this problem rather than constantly raising domestic interest rates in a period when there is some question whether this is an effective way to handle the domestic economy?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman is asking me to engage in a debate on the relation between interest rates in Canada and the United States, and I really do not intend to do so.


James McPhail Gillies: May I ask very specifically whether the government is giving any thought whatever to introducing a domestic interest equalization tax so we can slow down the outflow of funds from Canada because of the differential in interest rates on the short end of the market without following a policy that is causing all Canadians to pay more for mortgages, consumer credit and things of that sort?


Mitchell William Sharp: The answer is no, Mr. Speaker. An interest equalization tax was once imposed by the United States. My recollection is that it did not prove to be'very effective and eventually came under very strong attack.
4094

May 25, 1973
Oral Questions PENITENTIARIES


DECISION ON NEW TRIAL FOR YVES GEOFFROY- REASONS FOR TEMPORARY RELEASE
Right Hon. J. G. Diefenbaker (Prince Albert):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Solicitor General. Has any decision been made by the government with respect to the new trial asked for by Mr. Yves Geoffroy?


Hon. Warren Allmand (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, that is a question for the Minister of Justice who is absent today, but to my knowledge no decision has been made.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I would ask the minister, who is in charge of penitentiaries, how it is that a photograph of this vile murderer, Yves Geoffroy, who killed his wife and whose appeals have been denied right to the Supreme Court of Canada, appears in an article in the Montreal Star, along with the woman for whom he committed the murder, sartorially perfect with hair cut and mustache trimmed in a manner that would do honour to anyone in that profession? How does this man happen to be out of prison? When prisoners are taken from penitentiaries, are they allowed to dress themselves up in perfect civilian attire? Why was the preliminary hearing not held in the prison in so far as the evidence was concerned, having regard to the fact that this man disappeared for three months at the time he was given freedom to get married?


William Warren Allmand: Mr. Speaker, I will look into that. I do not know whether that picture is one that was taken when he was out recently, but I will be pleased to look into the matter and report to the House.


An hon. Member:: He had that picture taken in Spain.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, was the minister not asked to give permission for this man to get out to go to Joliette along with this woman to whom he is now married? With murderers disappearing from penitentiaries today, surely this pampered pet should not be placed in the favoured position in which he is.


ACTION TO PREVENT USE OF CHEMICAL FENITROTHON FOR SPRAYING
Mr. Bill Clarke (Vancouver Quadra):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Minister of National Health and Welfare. In view of the near disaster at Port Alice, British Columbia, this week, which was only prevented by the action of a local doctor who advised that the chemical fenitrothon, which was to be sprayed on trees in the area, contained enough nerve gas to kill 200,000 people, will the minister assure the House that he will review the regulations and legislation which allowed this situation to occur in order that recurrences will be prevented?


Hon. Marc Lalonde (Minister of National Health and Welfare):: Mr. Speaker, I will be pleased to investigate the incident mentioned by the hon. member and ask my officials to make a report on the present situation. I can assure the hon. member that if supplementary action is needed, we will not hesitate to take it.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond.


Mr. Donald Maclnnis (Cape Breton-East Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources who was here in the House but has now departed. Perhaps I should wait until later in the question period to see if he returns. If he does not I will put the question to the Acting Prime Minister.


NATIONAL REVENUE
Mr. Bill Knight (Assiniboia):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Revenue. In view of the fact that the Auditor General's report points out that the government has written off $6 million in taxes owed by a large United States automobile company and at the same time is trying to collect $228,000 in overpayments under the Lift program, which were mainly the result of government mistakes, can the minister indicate whether the government is giving consideration to forgiving these overpayments to farmers?


Hon. Robert Stanbury (Minister of National Revenue):: Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member's facts are a little twisted.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


John George Diefenbaker: Your answer certainly is.


Robert Douglas George Stanbury: Mr. Speaker, I will study the implications of the hon. member's question and try to give him an answer, but he is certainly not interpreting the Auditor General's report as I read it.


Mr. Fairweather:: You are twisting it.


William George Knight: Mr. Speaker, in view of the indication in two reports of the Auditor General that the government has in fact spent a considerable amount of money attempting to collect overpayment under Lift, while at the same time we see no evidence in the reports of any attempt to collect the $6 million owed by a large U.S. automobile company, will the minister give serious consideration to writing off the $228,000, which I suggest would be cheaper than trying to collect it?


Robert Douglas George Stanbury: Mr. Speaker, in respect of the question of recovering overpayments under Lift, I do not think this would be a matter for the Department of National Reve-
May 25, 1973

nue. In so far as the $6 million is concerned to which the hon. member has made reference, there is no suggestion in the Auditor General's report that this is money owing to the government.


BROADCASTING
Paul Yewchuk: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Secretary of State. Is he aware of a petition to the Governor in Council, which has been presented to the government, asking that approval by the Canadian Radio-Television Commission of the CBC takeover of radio station CKSB, Winnipeg, be set aside and that the matter be referred back to the commission for a rehearing to be held in Winnipeg where all interested groups could be heard? If so, what decision has been made on this matter?


Hon. James Hugh Faulkner (Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of such a petition but I will check with my office. It may be that the petition has been sent to the Minister of Communications.


Paul Yewchuk: Would the minister give the House his assurance at this time that section 38 of the Official Languages Act will be enforced in respect of this takeover and that the established and customary rights of ethnic groups will not be violated, not only during the next 12 months but thereafter?


James Hugh Faulkner: Mr. Speaker, I do not think I can comment on that question at this time. I am prepared to discuss it with the hon. member. I do want to tell him that I have now received the petition. Several copies have just been placed on my desk.


COMMUNICATIONS
Mr. Roch La Salle (Joliette):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Communications.
In view of the serious difficulties between the Quebec and the federal governments with regard to telecommunications, and as the federal minister stated that he is quite willing to let the dispute go before the courts for a settlement if need be, can he tell us whether, in the interest of both parties, he will try to meet again his opposite number for Quebec before the matter has to be solved before the courts?


Hon. Gerard Pelletier (Minister of Communications):: Yes, Mr. Speaker. My statement on motions last week did contain an indication to that effect.
Oral Questions


Roch La Salle: Mr. Speaker, a supplementary.
The Quebec premier having spent the last two or three days in Ottawa, did the minister take advantage of the situation to discuss this matter with him?


Gérard Pelletier: No, Mr. Speaker. The Quebec-premier, like all other provincial premiers who were here, looked very busy. Anyway, I had learned that the Quebec Minister of Communications was abroad when I made my statement. He will be returning to Canada very soon.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Jim Balfour (Regina East):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs my question is for the Acting Prime Minister. In light of the position of the three prairie ministers that recent price increases on farm machinery are not justified, does the government intend to instruct the Food Prices Review Board to investigate farm input costs and, as a high priority, present farm machinery prices?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, it is my understanding that the terms of reference of the proposed board do not encompass that question. If it were to be extended in that direction it would, of course, lose its character which is to deal with the food prices.


James Balfour: Would the minister tell the House whether the government is prepared to establish price guidelines for farm machinery and is it prepared to act with the provinces to control farm machinery prices if necessary?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, we will take that suggestion under consideration.


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Mr. F. Oberle (Prince George-Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. In view of the fact the government of British Columbia has by order in council and against vigourous protests by the people involved moved to incorporate part of the Indian reservation in Kamloops within the city limits of Kamloops, has the minister consulted with the Minister of Justice concerning the legality of such a move?
4096

May 25, 1973
Oral Questions


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I sent a telegram to the government of British Columbia indicating that I did not agree with that decision. However, the province of British Columbia can pass any legislation it wants, but I can assure the hon. member that, as far as I am concerned, the status of Indian reservations will not be changed for all that, and I do not believe that the move initiated by the province of British Columbia is appropriate at this stage because there has been no previous consultation whatsoever with the Indians. I have already discussed the general problem of the relations between the government of British Columbia and the Indians of that province with the Attorney General, and I wrote to him, but, to this day, we have not been able to solve all the difficulties.


KAMLOOPS RESERVE-NULLIFYING OF ELECTION OF CHIEF-REQUEST FOR TABLING OF TRANSCRIPT OF HEARINGS
Frank Oberle: Mr. Speaker, my supplementary is also related to the question of the Indians at Kamloops. Having regard to the fact that the department found it necessary to nullify the election of the chief there, is the minister prepared to table in the House the transcript of the hearings which were held in connection with that dilemma?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I wonder whether the rules allow me to do so, but I will inquire and if we can get consent of the persons concerned, I will gladly table it.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Mrs. Grace Maclnnis (Vancouver-Kingsway):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Acting Prime Minister in his capacity as Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of the fact the United Nations has designated 1974 as world population year, with a big conference scheduled similar to the Stockholm conference on pollution, will the minister be making a statement as to Canada's preparations for input into that conference and, if so, when may we expect a statement?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, in view of the widespread interest in this question I would respond to the hon. lady that we would want to give great support and if it would be useful for me to make a statement on our participation I would do so. I cannot say at the present time when would be the most suitable time. I would think it would be closer to 1974.


Winona Grace MacInnis: The reason I raise the matter now is that I believe it is of the highest importance that the minister should be thinking of plans to involve the Canadian people in seminars and discussions ahead of time. Otherwise the whole thing will just die-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. That, of course, is a representation, and the member will have to assume that the minister has heard and noted it.


NATIONAL DEFENCE
Hon. George Hees (Prince Edward-Hastings):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. Some time ago I drew the minister's attention to the fact that the foreign service allowances being paid members of the armed forces serving on the International Commission of Control and Supervision in Viet Nam were considerably less than those paid personnel from the Department of External Affairs. I asked him to see what could be done to correct this anomaly. Can he report to the House on the success or otherwise he has had in this regard?


Hon. James Richardson (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, hon. members will recall from earlier statements that in addition to regular pay and allowances we pay a foreign service allowance of $150 for a single person and $180 a month for married men. As this allowance was some $70 below the allowance paid to Canadian civilian personnel serving on the International Control Commission I have recommended, and the Treasury Board has now approved, a new special foreign service allowance of $70 a month for all personnel in our armed forces serving on the International Control Commission. I might add that this special allowance will be tax free and will be retroactive to January 29 for those personnel who left Canada on that date and to later dates for personnel who left later. I am certain the House will agree that this additional foreign service allowance is deserved by our personnel serving in Viet Nam.


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, I congratulate the minister on his constructive action and wish to say that if other departments would come through with such action this government would not be in the spot it is in today.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Cape Breton-East Richmond.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, the information for this question has come to

me on very short notice, but the matter is urgent and very real in its aspects. I have spoken to two ministers about it. I should like to ask the Acting Prime Minister to take steps to eliminate Gerald Blackmore from a mining delegation about to visit Poland.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, this is the first time I have heard the gentleman's name, but I will take that representation into account.


Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, I cannot understand why the minister has not heard the name because I have been kicking it around in the House for six years. I would ask the Acting Prime Minister whether he is aware that Gerald Blackmore was, in Tom Kent's words, recently separated-that is the sophisticated way of saying he was fired-from a position with the Cape Breton Development Corporation, a Crown company?
Oral Questions


SUGGESTED PROCLAMATION OF NON-SMOKING DAY
Mr. Barry Mather (Surrey-White Rock):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question I should like to direct to the attention of the Minister of National Health and Welfare, but first I should like to say that I am glad to see him safely back in the House today. In view of the continued heavy incidence of death and disease associated with such diseases as lung cancer, emphysema and thrombosis, associated with cigarette consumption, will the minister give favourable consideration to the proclamation issued by the government of British Columbia setting aside May 31 as non-smoking day in that province?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Parry Sound-Muskoka.


Donald MacInnis: Mr. Speaker, I must insist on this because this is very urgent. I think the least the Acting Prime Minister can do is take notice of these questions and the importance of not having this man, who has been the architect of ruin in Cape Breton, on an international delegation. The minister from Cape Breton is well aware of this and will substantiate the statement that this man was dismissed from a Crown corporation.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member has made his representation.


Donald MacInnis: Give him a one-way ticket.


THE CANADIAN ECONOMY
Mr. Stan Darling (Parry Sound-Muskoka):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Finance I direct this question to his parliamentary secretary. Does the government intend to make a statement on the economy, particularly on inflation, and as well does the government intend to present a proposal to the provincial premiers on the subject of inflation involving a co-operative attack on this problem?


Mr. J.-Roland Comtois (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Finance):: Mr. Speaker, I am taking note of the question and I am sure that when the Minister of Finance returns from the conference, he will be able to give the answer to the hon. member.


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, first of all I wish to thank the hon. member for having given me notice of this question a few days ago. I will certainly give consideration to his suggestion. I would like to have some assurance, however, that smokers will not take double rations on June 1.


AGRICULTURE
Mr. Gordon Towers (Red Deer):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce. In view of the fact that fertilizer ordered last February by farmers in central Alberta is not available now, and in view of the assurance of the Minister of Agriculture to the House that there would be an adequate supply, would the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce state now what action the government plans to take to meet this national emergency?


Hon. Alastair Gillespie (Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, without accepting the premise that it is a national emergency, I will be pleased to look into the matter and report back.


Thomas Gordon Towers: If the minister finds this statement to be correct, which I am sure he will if he checks with central Alberta, will he be prepared to stop immediately all export of fertilizer until domestic requirements are supplied?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. In spite of the hon. member's assurance, which the Chair does not doubt, I will have to rule that the question is hypothetical. The hon. member has made a representation and he has to assume that the minister has noted it.

May 25, 1973
Oral Questions BROADCASTING


SALE OF RADIO STATION, CKSB, WINNIPEG, TO CBC-CBC POLICY ON MULTICULTURAL PROGRAMS
Mr. Jake Epp (Provencher):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Secretary of State regarding the sale of radio station CKSB. In view of the petition that has been received by the minister and his cabinet colleagues with regard to the sale of CKSB, and in view of the recent multiculturalism program outlined by the minister in charge of that department in Edmonton recently, could the minister indicate to the House what changes the CBC is considering in its policy regarding the use of CBC facilities relative to multicultural broadcasting?


James Hugh Faulkner: Mr. Speaker, as I have suggested before on this matter if members of the House, particularly members of the Broadcasting Committee, want to pursue this matter with the CBC they should do so while the estimates of the corporation are before the committee. It seems to me that this is the most intelligent way to get at the problem in depth.


SALE OF RADIO STATION CKSB, WINNIPEG, TO CBC- ACTION TO SET ASIDE CANADIAN RADIO-TELEVISION COMMISSION DECISION
Paul Yewchuk: Mr. Speaker, now that the minister has had a chance to review the petition and because there is a good deal of urgency in setting aside the CRTC decision, the deadline being Monday next, can the minister indicate whether he plans to take any action prior to the expiry of the period during which he can launch an objection to the decision?


James Hugh Faulkner: have not taken a speed reading course and I have not finished reading the petition yet. I will reserve judgment until I have, but I doubt very much that any action will be taken between now and Monday.


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Mr. S. J. Korchinski (Mackenzie):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Health and Welfare. I should like to ask him whether a directive has been issued by his department indicating that the department will no longer assume responsibility for the cost of drugs taken by treaty Indians after June 1 other than by those who are resident on reserves or indigents? Why was this change in policy necessary, and what provisions have been made to identify those Indians who qualify so as to avoid any hardships?


Marc Lalonde: Mr. Speaker, I believe the hon. member is referring to a situation in Saskatchewan. I heard about this situation only yesterday afternoon and I have asked for a

full report. I will be glad to inform the hon. member later, some time next week.


SUGGESTED TRANSFER OF MEDICAL SERVICES FROM HEALTH AND WELFARE TO INDIAN AFFAIRS DEPARTMENT
Stanley James Korchinski: I have a supplementary question for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. Has he received any representations to have the medical services section transferred back to the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development so that he can assume the responsibility for health services as provided for Indians under existing treaties?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I am aware of this problem, but with regard to the hon. member's suggestion, I believe that the area of the Indians' health is very well administered by my colleague, the Minister of National Health and Welfare.


Stanley James Korchinski: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. How can the minister make that statement when the minister is abdicating his responsibility?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Meadow Lake.


Mr. Elias Nesdoly (Meadow Lake):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question to the question asked by the hon. member for Mackenzie. Is the Minister of National Health and Welfare aware of the medicine chest clause in treaty No. 6 and the several court rulings in this regard?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I doubt that a question asked in those terms is in order. The hon. member might like to rephrase the question.


INCOME TAX
Mr. Bill Jarvis (Perth-Wilmot):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Finance may I direct my question to the Minister of National Revenue. Will the livestock inventory provisions in the last budget be made retroactive to January 1, 1972 and, if not, what steps will the minister or the cabinet take to cure the one-year tax hiatus between the termination of the basic herd provisions in 1971 and the commencement of the inventory provisions in the recent budget?


Robert Douglas George Stanbury: Mr. Speaker, I will be glad to consult the Minister of Finance on that and advise the hon. member.


BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE
Mr. Ron Atkey (St. Paul's):: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs I wish to put my question to the government House leader. Can he tell the House whether the government plans before the summer recess to introduce the reworked version of the competition bill to which the Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs has referred on several occasions in the House?


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (President of the Privy Council):: Mr. Speaker, that is a rather distant ideal at the moment.


INDIAN AFFAIRS
John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question to the one asked by the hon. member for Mackenzie. I wish to ask the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development whether he was consulted in connection with this matter before the Department of National Health and Welfare took action which is in direct contradiction and contravention of the treaty rights of these Indians?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I must say that I have not been informed of it, but I had the opportunity to discuss this problem this week with the Indian Association of Saskatchewan. I already made representations to the Minister of National Health and Welfare on this matter and he assured me that he was considering the problem and that he would be in a position to report to both the House and myself early next week.


John George Diefenbaker: As the minister is the custodian of the rights of the Indians under the treaties, did he point out that what was done was in direct violation of the rights of the Indians and that it should be immediately set aside and countermanded, and if he did have a chat with the Minister of National Health and Welfare as he has just stated, when was it that he gave his views?
[ Translation]


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I was informed of this problem long before the right hon. member raised the question in this House and as soon as I had a chance to do so, I met with the Minister of National Health and Welfare. Yesterday I discussed the matter with him and he is now considering the issue. I think that everything to be done will be done in due course.


John George Diefenbaker: Mr. Speaker, the minister cannot brush aside the rights of the Indians in that cavalier manner.
Oral Questions


Some hon. Members:: Question!


John George Diefenbaker: I ask the minister: did he protest against the wrong that is being done to these Indians by this bureaucratic order that is totally unjust?
[ Translation]


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, unlike the right hon. member, I examine all the facts before protesting and as soon as the Saskatchewan Indians asked to meet with me, I was pleased to receive them. I made representations to the Minister of National Health and Welfare before the right hon. member himself became aware of the situation.


Mr. A. P. Gleave (Saskatoon-Biggar):: Mr. Speaker, in view of the fact that a short time ago in the House the Minister of National Health and Welfare presented a program of increased family allowances and social services to the people of Canada, may I ask if this new ruling in respect of the native people of Saskatchewan indicates a reversal of that policy on the part of the government?
[ Translation]


Marc Lalonde: No, Mr. Speaker.


PROPOSED JAMES BAY HYDROELECTRIC PROJECT-CABINET COMMITTEE ASSESSMENT OF ANALYSIS-COMMUNICATION OF POSITION TO QUEBEC
Miss Flora MacDonald (Kingston and the Islands):: Mr. Speaker, I wished to direct my question to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources in his capacity as chairman of the cabinet committee co-ordinating federal activities relating to the James Bay project but in his absence I would direct it to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development who I presume is still a member of that committee. Can the minister tell the House whether the committee has examined the recently presented analysis which shows, first, an over-exaggeration by the James Bay Corporation of Quebec's power needs and, second, the advantages of nuclear rather than hydraulic power, and has the federal committee's assessment been conveyed to the province of Quebec?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, this question of resource development in the James Bay area is still under consideration by the government; all the elements of the case are being continuously considered. This is one of the elements of the case now under consideration and consultations take place quite regularly with the Quebec government. As regards the number of kilowatts and the cost, etc., this comes under the jurisdiction of my colleague, the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, and I shall bring to his attention the question asked by the hon. member.

May 25, 1973
Oral Questions


OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOUTH PROGRAM-CRITERIA FOR POSSIBLE ADDITIONAL PROJECTS
Mr. Mark Rose (Fraser Valley West):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct my question to the Secretary of State. Since the minister has now advised Members of Parliament that there is going to be an increase in the number of opportunities for youth projects funded this year, may I ask whether a different set of criteria has been used in the selection of the additional projects compared with the first batch?


James Hugh Faulkner: Mr. Speaker, I am not quite sure that I understand the hon. member's question. No additional funds have been provided for the program. What might take place is that, with the extension of certain LIP projects, projects that we might have been involved in through the opportunities for youth program will be funded that way. If this happens, then these additional funds will be applied to projects that were turned down but against the same criteria that applied to the first batch. There will be no change in the criteria.


Mark Willson Rose: Mr. Speaker, a letter from the minister's office advised my office that there were four additional projects to be funded in my riding. I do not know what has happened in other ridings, but 50 per cent of those additional projects funded are not from the rated list at all. I asked the question to find out whether new projects have been selected on a different set of criteria from the former ones?


James Hugh Faulkner: No, Mr. Speaker, but I should like to look into that particular case because that is not my understanding.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair will recognize the hon. member for Yukon on a supplementary, then the hon. member for Grey-Simcoe, and then call orders of the day.


OPPORTUNITIES FOR YOUTH PROGRAM-ALLEGED NOTIFICATIONS THAT PROJECTS REJECTED AS A RESULT OF CONSULTATION WITH MEMBER FOR AREA
Mr. Erik Nielsen (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the same minister. Is it the practice in his department when notifying applicants whose applications for OFY projects have been rejected to state that the rejection has been arrived at as a result of consultation with the Member of Parliament of the area? If so, will the minister cease and desist from the continuation of this rather reprehensible practice unless it is in fact the case?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


James Hugh Faulkner: Mr. Speaker, I have had some strong representations on the phrasing of the letter of rejection, particularly from my colleagues on this side. In my judgment, and I know this view is not shared by many of my colleagues, if one views

the letter objectively and dispassionately the opportunity for consultation was open to Members of Parliament. Where the confusion seems to arise is on what consultation means.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


James Hugh Faulkner: If I may continue, Mr. Speaker, I think I have made it abundantly clear to hon. members and to the public that consultation does not mean that the member of parliament has the final say. It simply means that, as an individual who in my judgment knows his constituency well, he should be approached for advice on projects, but the final decision-I repeat this for the fourth or fifth time-lies with me. Responsibility for rejection does not lie with Members of Parliament; it lies clearly with me and I am prepared to take that responsibility.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, I rise now because this matter affects the privileges of all members of the House. There are some members who have chosen not to reply to the letters that have been sent by the minister and have not offered any advice to the minister one way or another. It is an offensive practice and contrary to the privileges of members for the minister to leave any inference, directly or indirectly or in any manner, that such grants have been rejected after consultation with the Member of Parliament. The question of privilege centers upon the abuse of ministerial prerogatives to that extent. The minister is not entitled to do it and it is an offensive practice.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Fraser Valley West and also the Leader of the Opposition are seeking the floor. In view of the fact that we have reached the end of the question period I suggest we should try to get on. I was hoping to recognize the hon. member for Grey-Simcoe, but the hon. member for Fraser Valley West rises on a question of privilege after which I will recognize the Leader of the Opposition and then, hopefully, the hon. member of Grey-Simcoe.


Mark Willson Rose: On the same question of privilege, Mr. Speaker, that was raised by the hon. member for Yukon, I would ask the Secretary of State whether he is aware that a prominent former member of the government, former employee of the government and former member for Bur-naby-Seymour has been quoted in print as implying that Members of Parliament in their constituencies have the power to approve or veto any project.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. That is a question. Again, in the hope that we can make some progress the Chair will recognize the minister for the purpose of replying and then recognize the Leader of the Opposition.


James Hugh Faulkner: No, Mr. Speaker, I am not aware of that statement, but I will certainly make it clear to my colleagues, if there is a continuation of OFY in the future, that there is no support for consultation among members of this House. It seems to me that is a regrettable retreat.


Erik Nielsen: It is not.


James Hugh Faulkner: Of course it is.
May 25, 1973


Erik Nielsen: It is not.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We are obviously getting into debate. The hon. Leader of the Opposition.


George Harris Hees: Consultation consists of you saying no; that is what it is.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Would the minister not agree, as the fair-minded man I always thought he was-


George Harris Hees: Until now.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: -that a letter going out over his signature indicating that a grant had been rejected after consultation with the Member of Parliament indicates to the recipient that the Member of Parliament has objected to the grant?


George Harris Hees: That is straight dishonesty.


James Hugh Faulkner: Mr. Speaker, in fairness I think the hon. Leader of the Opposition should note that the letter of acceptance contains exactly the same words.


George Harris Hees: There are a lot more rejections.


James Hugh Faulkner: All we attempted to do through that rather longer letter-


George Harris Hees: -is pass the buck!


James Hugh Faulkner: Just relax, George-was to explain to those whose projects were refused, as well as to those that were accepted, the process. It is perfectly true-the hon. member for Yukon makes this point and it is a valid point which I will probably have to consider-that those members who systematically stayed out of any consultations and did not want to see the list of projects are left in an ambiguous position. I think probably we should try to clear that, but the fact remains that all Members of Parliament had the opportunity to look at the complete list of projects and the preferred list-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Perhaps there will be an opportunity to look into the matter a little more deeply later, but for the moment we have to make some headway. I am still hoping to recognize the hon. member for Grey-Simcoe.


NATIONAL DEFENCE
Mr. Gus Mitges (Grey-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of National Defence. In view of the fact that Camp Meaford, better known as the Meaford tank range, has to some extent again been reactivated as an armoured training area for the army, can the minister inform us whether this is a temporary measure or one of a more permanent nature because of the concern of the
Control of Public Funds
people in the area whose basic desire is to use this range as a national park some time in the foreseeable future?


James Armstrong Richardson: Mr. Speaker, we have advised those concerned that the Meaford range will be required for training purposes long into the future. It is not a short-term program.


Mr. Speaker:: Orders of the day.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River) moved:: That this House, protesting the Government's continuing takeover of Parliamentary control of public money and the Government's mismanagement in spending escalating public revenues, warns that immediate and decisive action must be taken to restore control of public funds to Parliament.
He said: Mr. Speaker, on a point of order, before I begin my comments may I say that there has been general understanding that after the first four speakers have taken the time allotted to them under the pertinent rule, all other speakers shall speak for 15 minutes. There has been great interest in this subject and that time limitation will give more members an opportunity to make comments and intervene in the debate.


William George Knight: Mr. Speaker, I heard the hon. member suggest that after the first round of speakers have completed their remarks, each speaker is to be limited to 15 minutes. We are in agreement with that.
[ Transla tion]


Mr. Speaker:: Is the House in agreement?


Gérard Laprise: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, one wonders why this subject is being brought before the House again today. This is the fourth time in three years that Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition has considered it essential to bring this matter to the attention of the House, of the government and of the country. A good many other subjects could provide a topic for discussion today. Nevertheless, we take such a serious view of the situation regarding government expenditures that we feel, as the government has done nothing at all as a consequence of the three debates held in the last three years since 1970, that it is our duty as well as prerogative to make sure that the facts are ventilated so that, hopefully, at some time in the future this government will be aware of its delinquency in the area of government spending.
The government has a duty to perform in three areas, as has parliament. First, we must enact legislation; second,

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
challenge and scrutinize the accounts of the government generally, on a day-to-day basis; and, finally, deal with government expenditures and approve government expenditures when they are brought forward in the proper form. In my opinion, the last of these areas is the most important for us to consider.
I said that there were lots of other topics which we might have discussed today. I do not know how much attention will be paid to the present debate. I know there are stirrings across the border in Washington, in connection with certain events going on there. In the United Kingdom, the senior chamber of the United Kingdom parliament apparently is showing more activity in certain respects than is our senior chamber and is securing a great deal of attention from the press. A conference is going on in Ottawa, about which I will say something later. All the same, I suggest that we can spend our time in no better way than in discussing, for the balance of this morning and this afternoon, the tremendously important question suggested by the motion.
The other day I was at the National Arts Centre. Anyone who has been there lately will have seen the reconstructed skeleton of the dinosaur. It certainly reminded me of this government. When it was alive it must have been heavy, covered with scales, and fierce looking. It had a big mouth. It was carniverous and had a great appetite. If we had seen it in action, no doubt we should have found it adept at concealment and deception.


An hon. Member:: Like the President of the Treasury Board.


Erik Nielsen: And it probably changed colour when the occasion was right.


Gerald William Baldwin: Despite the other attractions I have mentioned it is evident, from my reading of news stories and editorials printed in various newspapers across this land, that the statements made in the last report of the Auditor General have revived the interest of the people, particularly of the poor, harassed taxpayer of this country, in what this government is doing. This fact has reinforced our determination to continue to bring this matter to the attention of the government so that, at least when this government has gone and we have replaced it, we shall have our own words to contend with and there will be a new deal for the taxpayers of Canada.


Mr. Nowlan:: For the forgotten majority.


Gerald William Baldwin: My colleagues will be dealing with particular items of waste, extravagance, stupidity and misspending. I am particularly anxious to direct the attention of the House to what I believe to be one of the most serious issues we must face, namely, the loss or weakening of parliamentary control over government spending.
I asked the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Sharp) about this yesterday, and in his reply he brushed the suggestion off, saying, "Why, parliament has even more control over spending than it had before." That, I say, is nonsense.


Erik Nielsen: Sheer rubbish.


Gerald William Baldwin: The President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) who has replied on behalf of the government in a number of similar debates no doubt will be trotting out the 1973 version of the rather juvenile and attenuated remarks which he has brought forward in debates of this kind. In addition, he will probably say, "You have more powers than you ever had; you have more weapons at your disposal and more means of dealing with estimates." That, I say, is wrong. I know it is wrong; my colleagues know it is wrong; parliament knows that is wrong and it is not in accordance with the facts. Something will have to be done about it.
I suggest that the minister and the Secretary of State for External Affairs are entitled to the degree, "master of obfuscation". When I thought of that word I looked it up in the dictionary and saw I was right in using it. Obfuscation means to darken, to obscure, to confuse and to stupefy. That is what the minister and his colleagues are doing with respect to this particular issue.
There are two aspects of the issues at which we should look, namely, what I call the aspects of pre-spending and of post-spending. Let us look at the issue of pre-spending and what we can do about it. The minister may say, "You may use the committees to examine estimates". The President of the Treasury Board knows as well as every member of this House that all the members of my party and, I believe, all my friends to my left have participated in parliamentary committee proceedings have done so diligently and earnestly, but in spite of this many here will agree with me when I say that, so far as being a vehicle for a reasonable examination of estimates of departments and Crown corporations before the money is spent, those proceedings are an absolute flop. They have failed.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: True, they have provided opportunity for the cross-examination of witnesses and the basis on which facts can be gleaned. Those facts can be used at a later date, possibly in debates in this House. However, as a method of conducting a rational and sensible examination of estimates before the money is spent, those proceedings are not satisfactory. One of the things my electors in Peace River said when they sent me here was, "Go down there and do something about the government's extravagance in spending." Hon. members opposite look honest to me. They try to be honest. Sometimes they do not completely succeed, that is in a parliamentary sense. They will agree that if they talk to their constituents, they will be told to do something about this government's escalation of expenditures. This government is poised like a space satellite; all system set to go right up to the stratosphere.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: A better method must be adopted. If time permits, in spite of the discussions on the other side, I intend to do just that.
This debate is not just for the purpose of criticizing, but, in a spirit of friendly co-operation, to try to show the government what can be done. This is the last opportunity
May 25, 1973

for the government to do these things. If they do not, we will be doing them before too long.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: I hope my friends to my left will join with us in our attempt to achieve our objection through this debate. Both the New Democratic Party and the Credi-tistes have supported us in other motions we have presented. I hope they will continue to do so. That is the reason we did not put this motion in the form of a confidence motion, as we might have. At this stage, this situation is too serious and we want their support. I know the NDP have been having a few problems recently. They have been so busy concealing their doctrines with one hand and covering their dogma with the other that they stand almost indecently exposed.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: But, I hope they will join with us in meeting one of the most serious situations in this country. When the estimates are included in an appropriation bill on the final opposition day, it will be our intention to challenge and vote on certain items. I hope the government will make public its position before that item. Will it regard the loss of an important supplementary item such as Information Canada as a question of confidence? What will be the position of the government on this? What will be the position of my friends to the left? We intend to treat our responsibility seriously in this matter and make a valiant, reasonable and diligent effort to bring this monster of government under some kind of control.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: The former Auditor General has had a lot to say in his report. We must bear in mind that the Auditor General's report is prepared by more than one man. The Auditor General holds that office together with members of his staff. They are competent, diligent, hardworking, independent people who do a very tough job under circumstances which have not been made easy by the efforts of this government. The Auditor General's report has stated that expenditures are now $20 billion. By the time we take into account certain loans, advances and future payments which will be presented in the form of supplementary estimates before we finish with this fiscal year, the figure will be well over $20 billion. The Auditor General has made reference to this fact and has pointed out the dangers.
I suggest that hon. members read carefully the Auditor General's report. I hope they do. It should be done in the proper way. It is like drinking brandy. You put it in a snifter, sniff it quite often and drink it drop by drop. Only in this way can you get the full flavour of the report. It cannot be done hastily. It must be done with competence, diligence and patience. You have to be a good reader to understand what it is all about. If hon. members opposite do that, they may have a completely different approach to this particular issue.
What is to be seen behind the dry language of the accountant and the lawyer is the unfolding of the details of a fiscal assault of massive proportions against the tax-
Control of Public Funds
payer, with completely inadequate weapons given to those representing the people to repel the assault or even to uncover the details. The federal government first woos the voters with deceptive and seductive calls for the implementation of great new social and welfare proposals, always concealing the true escalation of costs. Then, there is established a huge bureaucratic machine with a new minister or ministers and their accompanying menageries, and ultimately parallel provincial counterparts.
The inevitable result is a spending program of enormous stupidity and duplication, waste and extravagance. The unfortunate taxpayer is then sternly told he will have to pay for the great benefits which a kindly and benevolent government has conferred upon him. When the Auditor General, in pursuance of his duties, attempts to ferret out and detail what these expenditures are, the government says that he is snooping and is going beyond his authority. Their subtle, and sometimes not so subtle, methods delay and impede any attempt to examine the control of expenditures in the detail required.
To add insult to injury, the federal government, having fixed a habit on the people like drugs for an addict, calmly suggest that they should pull out and leave the resulting mess as well as the massive costs to be dealt with by the provinces. This is what this meeting in Ottawa today is all about. I have some views, as do others, on what is going on in this city today. These eleven people, the sultans, caliphs, emperors and the Caesar from Ottawa are like eleven doctors conducting a premature postmortem and autopsy on a still breathing and struggling taxpayer. This is what it amounts to. Some day I would like to see a federal-provincial conference with one item on the agenda, finding ways and means to reduce the huge duplication of administrative expenditures. I may not live to see the day unless in the near future this Conservative party forms the government.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: I suggest to the hon. member for Bruce (Mr. Whicher), who is now making more noise than usual, and sometimes it is a good noise, that he will support what I have to say today. I know this is how he feels. I want him and some of his colleagues to say they feel this way. Let them be honourable members, speak up and say they agree with me. I know that is the way many of them feel. All they need is a little courage to stand up and say so.
My time is limited. I want to refer briefly to some of the comments contained in the Auditor General's report. Although I should like to deal with all of them, time will not permit. I am referring, Mr. Speaker, to the report of the Auditor General for the fiscal year ending March 31,
1972.
It is one of the fundamental principles of our constitutional heritage that the House of Commons control the finances of the country.
Who disagrees with that assertion? Yet it is not the case today. How many hon. members can stand up and honestly say that this situation exists in parliament, in this House of Commons, today?


An hon. Member:: No one.

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds


Gerald William Baldwin: And on page 10 we read:
Expenditures of public moneys at the level of $20 million a year are today over three times larger than they were a decade ago. The number of employees on the federal payroll, which in 1961-62 was 330,000, reached 405,000 in 1971-72. This figure could well reach 450,000 in 1973-74 on the basis of the recently tabled estimates for that year.
And this does not take into account all the contractual arrangements which are made, by means of which people can be brought in without being shown on the payroll.
The changes which have taken place over this period, and the nature and diversity of public spending, including its presentation to parliament, continue to add vast new dimensions to the problem-In my 1968 report to the House I suggested it would be of material assistance were parliament to consider commissioning a management study of government organization at least once every decade.
I support that. My colleagues support that proposal. I asked a question of the President of Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) yesterday. I think he tried to skip over it. I hope I am wrong. I hope that before this debate is over he will stand up and say he accepts that proposition. And, finally, on the same page:
It is the right, privilege and duty of the House of Commons to control the finances of the country.
Mr. Speaker, this is simply not being done today. Look at some of the ways in which the government evades its responsibilities. Reference to committees I have shown to be useless as far as real control is concerned. Then, there is the method of using dollar items in the estimates. It is quite improper but it is used frequently in spite of admonitions from this House and from the Auditor General.
Take statutory fixed payments. The House passed the relevant bill, of course it did. Hon. members were deceived at the time as to what the ultimate cost would be. Yes, they were deceived. The President of Treasury Board gives me a pained look. If he goes back to those debates and reads what was said, as I did-and I have the relevant copies of Hansard here, but I do not have the time to go through them-he will find I am right. The Liberal government from 1963 to 1973 engaged in actual deception through deliberate miscalculation of what the cost of some of these programs would be, and today we are faced, as taxpayers as well as in our capacity as members of the house, with a fait accompli.
Take subsidies. Millions of dollars are being disbursed by way of subsidies under programs such as LIP and OFY. We do not have time to debate the issues involved here, but the government knows, and we know, that expenditures of this nature are undertaken, programs are entered into, and only ex post facto do we in this House have an opportunity to deal with those expenditures. Hundreds of millions of dollars are committed and all we can do is approve those expenditures, the money having already been spent. That is a fact of life. That is one of the ways in which the government evades its responsibilities.
Then, there is the device of omnibus legislation. I could refer to items in the report-paragraphs 52 to 63. Failure to file annual returns. I could go on. There are 15 or 16 methods itemized by which the government succeeds in evading its responsibilities, preventing the House from carrying out its duties to the taxpayers.

Mr. Speaker, my time has almost expired. I said I would make some suggestions. I shall not simply end my comments on a critical note. I believe it is part of our duty to be critical when we see wrongdoing and my hon. friends and I will exercise our rights without fear or favour. But I believe we should also make some suggestions and I have a few suggestions I should like to put before the House. First, there must be a new Auditor General's Act. The minister says: Wait and see what the new Auditor General has to say about it. That is reasonable. But I submit that the Public Accounts Committee has a responsibility to undertake immediately a study of new legislation and to complete that study before this House adjourns. If not, what will happen is this: the new Auditor General will not take over until July 1. The act will not be studied by the committee until well into the fall of this year. It will not come before this chamber until, probably, the early part of 1974 and there will not be a new act until at least a year has gone by. That is too long to wait, and I, for one, do not intend to see such a length of time elapse if I can prevent it.
The form of the estimates has to be changed. I see the President of the Treasury Board writing busily at this time. He and I know that the estimates conceal rather than reveal, like some of the dresses which were worn a few years ago. I believe the form of the estimates must be studied in committee so as to produce a simplified form which reveals, rather than conceals, information.
Then, as I have said over and over again, there must be brought into the House, into a revived Committee of Supply, at least four or five departments every parliament so that we may have an opportunity in this House to subject to full scrutiny at least one of the important departments once each Parliament. The choice should be that of the opposition. The proceedings in that Committee of Supply should be televised. They should be open to live radio and television. The issue is too important to be concealed from the people of this country, and I suggest this is one debate which should be televised.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Gerald William Baldwin: My colleagues may agree with me or not, but I think this is important.
A vote should be taken at the end of every opposition day. It is a travesty of parliamentary procedure to conduct debates of this kind in the absence of a division. I recognize that not every vote need be in the nature of a confidence motion, but it is imperative that every opposition motion on an opposition day should be decided by a vote.
Yesterday or the day before I was obliged to drag out of the government, using Standing Order 43, agreement to refer to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts the reports of the Auditor General going back to March 31,
1971.	Such a reference should be automatic. What happened was a shocking example of dereliction of duty on the part of the government. There should, therefore, be a change in Standing Orders to provide that automatically at the beginning of each session the Public Accounts for the preceding year and the report of the Auditor General should go to the committee, which would be in business at once. There should be a mandatory date by which the committee should report back. The committee should be
May 25, 1973

armed with sufficient professional staff and facilities to make it possible to report to the House by a date which would allow time for a mandatory debate. There should also be in the standing orders a provision that the chairman of the committee bring before the House the report of the committee for its consideration; the opposition would then have the right to move an amendment or call attention to any shortcomings which in its opinion showed that the government was failing to carry out its duties properly, or failing to pay attention to the recommendations of the Auditor General and the Public Accounts Committee. This should be mandatory, and these proceedings should be carried out in the full glare of publicity, attended by live television and radio. I might add that the government should have the right to table its response in advance so that we might engage in a debate with the issues clearly defined.
I suggest, finally, that an attempt should be made by the government to eliminate some of the practices to which I referred earlier in my remarks. There is no reason these things should be so esoteric. Consider the extent to which the people of this country are involved in the escalating cost of living. It has been said by the Economic Council of Canada and by a great many others that as far as domestic issues are concerned, the increasing cost of government constitutes the largest element in the present inflationary process. I think this statement is accepted in all circles. It is essential that this House show the people of Canada a determination to grasp this nettle and deal with it. No better way can be found to do that than by this government indicating to this House and the country its recognition of the problems, its defects of the past, and its preparedness to accept some of the proposals I am sure will emanate from this side of the House before the debate is concluded.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Hon. C. M. Drury (President of the Treasury Board):: Mr. Speaker, this is not the first occasion, as the mover of the motion has recalled to us, on which the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) has moved a motion along the lines of the one we are now debating. Almost exactly a year ago he expressed similar concern in almost the same terms, lacking some of the suggestions he included in today's remarks.
I should like to be able to think that the hon. member is showing only a general, highminded and meritorious concern for the principles upon which our parliamentary system is founded, a concern which I am sure is shared by all members. I should like to believe so, but I cannot leave it at that when I study his motion which presents a charge so much at variance with the facts. I could try to excuse him on the grounds that he has not had an opportunity to be informed, but last year and on other occasions it has been my lot to reply to motions on this subject that he or his colleagues have placed before this House.


Gerald William Baldwin: I am still uninformed.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I have, in the clearest and simplest terms, attempted to allay any real concern he may have felt. Had I not done so, and had no member of this government
Control of Public Funds
spoken about the matter, the evidence of what this government had done should have been enough to show him that he was the victim of unfounded fears.


An hon. Member:: Let's have a look at the evidence.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: In the face of this evidence and in spite of what he has been told, he continues on the same theme. I can only conclude that he has some deep-seated paranoia, however vague his apprehension of the cause of it, and the best that can be done is to try again to set him at ease by again reciting the facts. I must reach this charitable conclusion about his inability to see and grasp reality to avoid the contrary conclusion that he is being irresponsible and partisan.
Let me again go through the record as I have on previous occasions. When the present government assumed office in 1968, it had as one of its priorities the up-dating of a financial apparatus very much unsuited to the needs of a contemporary government and a contemporary parliament. We had a system that had originated, in many respects, in times when governments had a very narrow role to play in a society of a much less complex sort. It was a system that had hardly been altered in a fundamental way for more than three decades.
In particular, parliament was annually being presented with the government's expenditure proposals in a style reminiscent of these earlier simpler times. This style of presentation heaped detail upon detail with little apparent structure. Parliament, as is evidenced by the debates of those days, turned away from the actual and factual consideration of the estimates. It used the days on which estimates were scheduled for study much as this day is being used, in treating topics in a very general way.
I want to ask hon. members to recall that period of last January in which we reverted in a substantial measure, because of unusual circumstances, to the procedures of earlier days as we dealt with the first supplementary estimates for 1972-73. There were relatively few items in those estimates.


Gerald William Baldwin: But oh, what estimates!


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: All of them were concerned with matters of urgency and, I believe it fair to say, all were quite straightforward.


An hon. Member:: Oh, come on.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: If hon. members were to examine the debate over the many days that this House was occupied with those estimates they would find that the House dealt with the matter and substance of the items in the estimates hardly at all. Instead, hon. members engaged in general discussion of general topics, proving again that the floor of the House of Commons is not a practicable forum for the detailed examination of expenditures.
To revert to the situation as it was assessed in 1968, the government undertook to pursue vigorously the investigations that had been going on under the previous Liberal administration into modern developments in government budgeting systems. Steps were taken to bring these investigations to a head; to effect radical changes and to put into effect new forms of documentation and new proce-

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
dures designed to give parliament a better opportunity to scrutinize expenditures. The hon. member for Peace River has chosen to present a picture of a government that seeks to slight and ignore parliament in the matter of expenditures. I shall be able to offer sufficient evidence to refute, if not to ridicule this charge.
I should like now to refer to the many profitable discussions which were held with the Public Accounts Committee of this House in 1968 and 1969 about the new form of estimates then under development. I spoke to the committee in November of 1968 at some length about our general thinking in this matter. In particular I said:
The blue book of estimates constitutes the framework for parliamentary control and the examination of departmental expenditure plans. The primary objective of the proposals that I have presented to you is designed to facilitate your task in carrying out your responsibilities as Members of Parliament.
I spoke about a new system of expenditure coding to replace the existing one that had become outmoded, a new system that permitted the classification and cross classification of expenditures in many different ways. I said that the new form would include much more information about Crown corporations than had been included in the past.


Erik Nielsen: What a laugh that is.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I showed how we proposed to make a clear distinction between grants and contributions; an important distinction obscured by changing circumstances. There were many changes proposed, but most fundamental of all was the proposed system of classifying the expenditures of each department and agency onto one or more programs, each with its own appropriate vote structure. In each program, statements of objectives would be made in the estimates, supported by descriptions of activities to be carried on in pursuit of these objectives as well as by much detail about the manpower to be used, the nature of the expenditures to be undertaken, the related major capital projects and other matters.
This open end frank presentation of our plans to the designated representative of this House in matters relating to financial procedures was followed by several meetings at which the committee questioned officials of the Treasury Board. Of significance is the fact that these meetings resulted in changes in the proposals of the government in response to the suggestions of the members of the committee; changes made because the government recognized the importance of a clear presentation of ample information about expenditures to parliament to facilitate the work of parliament with regard to expenditures.
I may say, and recall to the hon. gentleman, that this committee charged with the responsibility of improving this presentation gave unanimous approval to the new form.


Erik Nielsen: It was not unanimous, and that fact has been raised as a question of privilege before.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: The research work undertaken to prepare the remarks, from which the hon. gentleman has read, represented another means of improving the efficacy of the tools available to Members of Parliament. I will not dwell on that, but his remarks rather indicate that the new

form of estimates was some form of concoction by the government designed to mislead the House.


Gerald William Baldwin: Right.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: This new form of the estimates, I repeat to the hon. member, represents the unanimous approval of the conclusions of the committee of which a member from his party was chairman and of which, on an off-and-on basis, he himself has been a member. I can only wish that in formulating his criticisms of the present form of the estimates-the present form of the presentation-he had taken a little more time when this matter was under discussion to improve them in the manner he is now suggesting.


Gerald William Baldwin: There are three official languages, French, English and bureaucratese.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I would interject that there is another official language the hon. gentleman uses which falls under none of those headings. He is, perhaps in his own terms, obfuscatory. The new form was put into effect first with the main estimates for the year 1970-71 and the form of the supplementary estimates was altered subsequently. Since that time, the government has gone on to make changes this year to further improve the quality and increase the quantity of information in the blue book and its supplements.
If any member of the House has further suggestions for improvement other than general ones I-and I can speak on behalf of the government-would be glad to have these and to take them into consideration. To refer again to the situation in 1968, pre-1968 experience indicated that the House had ceased to deal with the estimates in an effective way. There was clearly a crying need for some changes in procedures that would give hon. members a chance to discharge their responsibilities in this regard. With the concurrence of the House, amendments were made to the standing orders calling for early reference of various sections of the main estimates to the Standing Committees according to the subject matter in which each committee specializes. For the last few years, the estimates have then had a much more searching review in these committees than it had been possible to give them in the House for many years. This has been the case, I may say, despite the seeming inability or unwillingness of some members of the official opposition to use the opportunities for inquiry given them.


Erik Nielsen: What tripe!


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: The mover of the motion said that the work of these committees was "flub". I am not sure what that term means. My dictionary does not contain it. I would suggest that if this is pejorative, then he might examine the performance of some of his henchmen in respect of these committees, if indeed they are not working satisfactorily as a means of making effective inquiries.
In summary of my remarks to this point, let me say that the government has understood, as the hon. member apparently has not, the essentials for parliamentary review and control of expenditures. And having under-

stood them, it has gone on to provide for them. The first essential is information about the proposed expenditures. To this end the government has increased the amount of such information and improved its form of presentation.


Erik Nielsen: Don't read us fairy tales.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, if I could respond to these uniformed interjections, I am suggesting, in respect of the method of presentation of information related to expenditures, that this information is two years late. Perhaps the hon. gentleman would just listen to how parliament does its work or should. The Auditor General's report by definition is an audit of the events which have occurred. The estimates purport to be, and in fact are, a representation of plans for future implementation. At the moment, I am talking not about the audit subsequent to the event, but the presentation of plans for the future.
The second essential, which would also seem to have escaped the hon. member, is ample opportunity to question ministers and their officials, to seek yet further details. This opportunity is abundantly provided through the committee system, now incorporated in the Standing Orders through amendments introduced in the early years of the present Liberal administration.


Gerald William Baldwin: The other day a minister refused to appear when the committee asked that he appear.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: It is to be greatly regretted that some of the hon. members colleagues in opposition have chosen to waste the time of the committees in pointless haggling over procedure rather than address themselves to the country's finances, as he professes they are so anxious to do.
The third essential is the report to parliament of the expenditures after they have taken place. The government has acted in this regard as well in restructuring the form of the public accounts to mirror the new form of the estimates, in adding more information, and in advancing by a number of months the date on which these accounts are tabled.
I am led to speculate about what the hon. member means by the phrase "control of expenditures". He may be caught in the grip of some nostalgic vision of a day that never existed or he may have some dream of himself as a departmental financial officer examining individual transactions. The fact of the matter is that in a real sense, parliament does control expenditures fully and in the only way it ever has. That is, not one dollar is spent that has not been authorized by parliament.


Some hon. Members:: Oh! oh!


Erik Nielsen: A fairy tale.


An hon. Member:: That is not what the Auditor General says.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: This authority may be found in continuing statutes such as the one which calls for the payment of family allowances, or it may be found in the Appropriation Acts through which the estimates are given effect. This is the way it has always been and this government
Control of Public Funds
has worked only to improve the procedures which Parliament follows in giving these expenditure authorities.
Now, let me' spend some minutes on what I suppose might be called the second theme of the hon. member's motion, the so-called "mismanagement in spending escalating revenues". As is so often the case, the meaning of such motions is difficult to grasp from the way they are worded. The hon. member has done little in this case to explain his meaning when he spoke to us today. Nevertheless, I will try to look at the motion and continue to place his concerns in proper perspective.
Perhaps, first, I should say it is good of the hon. member to acknowledge by implication the successful economic policies of this government in reference to increasing revenues.


Gerald William Baldwin: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, that is not so. They are lousy.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order, is the hon. member seriously raising a point of order?


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, the minister put words in my mouth by suggesting I indicated I was satisfied with the economic policies of this government. Mr. Speaker, that would cause me to lose my social standing throughout the country if people thought I had said that.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, I can well understand the hon. member's worry about his social standing. It is sufficiently frail that he should be preoccupied.
In relation to increasing revenues, these are revenues to a government that has cut taxes a number of times. This I would suggest provides convincing evidence of economic policies favourable to economic growth. Where have these increasing revenues gone? The publication "How Your Tax Dollar is Spent", issued in each succeeding year, and in particular the one for the current year 1973-74-which, by the way, is another attempt by the government to inform not only members but the public-shows a growth from expenditures for 1968-69 to the estimates figure for 1973-74 of about 70 per cent. The publication breaks down the expenditures into their functional components to show where the new revenues have gone This breakdown shows that the emphasis is being placed by the government on areas where it is difficult to believe that even this opposition would not agree it should be placed.
Expenditures on health and welfare have gone up by over 200 per cent, as have those on educational transfers to the provinces and on general government services. Expenditures have also risen more than the average for culture and recreation, and for foreign affairs as a result of aid to developing countries. The smallest relative growth has been shown in internal overhead expenditures and defence expenditures. This is management of increasing revenues in the broadest sense, and the record shows a government with a sense of priorities appropriate to the national situation and the world situation.
Possibly the hon. member is unaware of what the government has done in improving management in the more usual sense. First, let me tell him that the government of

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
Canada has been among the leaders in the almost worldwide movement to rationalize the procedures by which governments arrive at expenditure decisions. It has adopted the basic principles of planning, programming and budgeting, adapting them in a unique way to Canadian institutions and constraints. As part of this new system it requires each spring long-term, detailed forecast from each department and agency as to the requirements of the existing programs and their proposed new programs. It assesses all these potential demands in terms of available resources and then provides guidance to ministers and their officials as to an optimum allocation of available resources. This guidance is then given effect in detail by the treasury board in its review of departmental expenditure plans and by the departments and agencies as they prepare their estimates.
At a still more direct level of management, the government has in every way advocated and supported the introduction and advancement of modern techniques and methods of management. Through the treasury board it is causing departments to undertake in an organized way studies of the effectiveness of their programs, and these have led to modifications that have enhanced effectiveness.
The board secretariat has also worked with several departments and is to work with others in the application of efficiency measures to as many of the actual operations of departments as possible. These measures will give the government an indication of comparative efficiency as between operations of a like nature in different departments and a means to raise productivity to higher levels for the same or a lesser expenditure of resources.
In addition to the measures that have been taken and are being taken and to which I have referred, the hon. gentleman suggested a new approach to the work of the public accounts committee. The public accounts committee, as I think all hon. members are aware, has addressed itself to a consideration of events that have taken place- an examination of the past rather than the work of examining estimates, which is a look into future plans.
I have suggested that the committee system of detailed review of departmental estimates is a much more effective way than the hitherto employed system of examination of the estimates in the committee of the whole for understanding and learning what the programs are all about and how they can be improved. May I repeat that the experience that we gained, even this year in the current session, from reverting to an examination of estimates of departments in committee of the whole has shown that this method is not productive, is not useful and is not an informative experience.
I think I would have the same kind of reaction to the suggestion made by the hon. member that the rules be changed to provide for time in the House to discuss departmental estimates. I suspect that he intends, though he did not say so in his proposal, that this be in addition to the number of supply or opposition days now provided in the rules. He suggests that we revert to what, in my view, is a non-productive exercise for the committee of the whole, and at this juncture I would find it rather difficult to go along with that suggestion.

The hon. member has also suggested that we might bring in a new Auditor General act. I recall to him that an earlier attempt to formulate an act proposed by the public accounts committee and to introduce it into the house was rejected by the hon. member and his party, without even making any suggestion as to what changes would be useful or examining the document itself.


Gerald William Baldwin: Nonsense.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: I hope that the approach of the hon. gentleman and his party to the new act which is being prepared under the auspices of the same body, the public accounts committee, will receive a rather more reasonable or rational reception when it is proposed to the House than his party accorded the last one.


Gerald William Baldwin: It is being prepared by a committee outside of the public accounts.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: That interjection, Mr. Speaker, was "It is being prepared". I suggest that the bill is being prepared by, and will be the product of, the public accounts committee and cannot be described as the product of some body outside of the public accounts committee.


Gerald William Baldwin: Oh, come on!


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: The hon. gentleman cannot have it both ways. If his scriptwriter talks about overburgeoning bureaucracy, he cannot now try and throw back on to this bureaucracy any claims regarding what he says it should be doing.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I did not suggest anything of the kind in my interjection. I simply said that there is a committee established by the public accounts committee which is engaged in preparing the bill and will bring it to the public accounts committee. I know as well as the minister knows that that is right, so why doesn't he say so?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, we have had some remarks about use of time in standing committees being non-productive and perhaps we are having some examples of the non-productive use of time at this moment.


Gerald William Baldwin: We have for the last 25 minutes.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: The hon. gentleman suggested that the form of the estimates must be changed and he said that his new government would do this. I said earlier, and I repeat, that we would welcome any suggestions for improvement in the form of presentation of the estimates; and if, to use his words, they are now designed to conceal rather than reveal-


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: -they are, in effect, the product of the committee of which his party is chairman.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order. It being one o'clock the House will now adjourn until two p.m.
At one o'clock the House took recess.
May 25, 1973



COMMONS DEBATES AFTER RECESS

[Stage Direction]
The House resumed at 2 p.m.
Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, I had limited time left and very few remarks left to make, but I would like to close by saying, in respect of items mentioned by the mover of the motion and threatened for further advancement by members of his party, that I expect that supporters of the government on this side of the House will respond in detail to these allegations.
However, I should like to say a word in respect of the suggestion made by the Auditor General for a periodic management review of the government service every ten years or so, and also advocated by the mover of the motion. As I indicated in my remarks, since 1968 there have been substantial changes both in the management structure and in management responsibilities within the public service. We have been endeavouring, and indeed are still in the process, of reforming the old and introducing new management techniques designed to make the various operations of the government both more efficient and more effective.
This, in terms of a very large organization, being relatively new, I think that perhaps the time is a little premature to call in a large formal organization to review what is only the beginning of a reformed process. Perhaps at some later date when we have had more experience with these new measures such a review could be undertaken. I have said that before reaching a final conclusion on this I would like to secure the advice of the new Auditor General when he formally assumes his duties and has a chance to look at the government apparatus. He has had considerable experience in his professional career with both the management operations and with making observations and recommendations on them. I would regard his unofficial advice as being of considerable value before reaching a final conclusion.
In summary, Mr. Speaker, I would say that the mover of the motion has failed utterly to demonstrate either his understanding of the way control of expenditures is achieved or, if not a lack of understanding, then perhaps a wilful blindness to the facts of the situation. As a consequence, I do not think that we, on this side of the House at any rate, can either in spirit or in fact support the motion.
In respect of his other suggestion, a reform of the practices of the House to provide a different framework within which the public accounts can be examined, I am not at all convinced by his notion of a television spectacular in the House as being an effective way of learning what is going on.
He has suggested that every opposition motion should be the subject of a vote but when given this option, as he was today, he declined for what I suppose to be partisan or other reasons. I find that rather convincing; while he does not want to see it happen, he is nevertheless inclined to force on everybody else the necessity of voting on every motion. When given the chance to put into operation this useful device of his choice, he chooses not to do so.
Control of Public Funds


Gerald William Baldwin: We will remind you of that at the time you bring up one and are defeated on it.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: As for the suggestion with regard to the Public Accounts Committee itself, I do not think it would be appropriate for me to comment on this. We have a Standing Committee charged with the responsibility for organizing the procedures of the House, and perhaps he should make his suggestion to that committee rather than me with respect to how the Public Accounts Committee might be improved.
I would repeat, Sir, not only to the mover of the motion but to all members of his party that if they have ideas on how the form of presentation of the estimates could be improved to make them more effective and useful, I personally would welcome them and would give them-it would be cynical to say the consideration which they deserve but I would go further than that and say every consideration.


Erik Nielsen: In due course.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Barry Mather: Mr. Speaker, I am sure that the official opposition's motion which is before us today protesting the government's takeover of parliament's control over the spending of public money and which criticizes their mismanagement is very closely related to, and perhaps has its reason for existence in, the report of the Auditor General recently tabled in this House.
If that is so, I would think that a great deal of what either the government or the opposition contends about this motion would have to do with the credibility of the Auditor General. I do not think there is any doubt, Mr. Speaker, that auditors general everywhere are more likely to be popular with the opposition than with the administration. The nature of their work is to find the waste of public moneys by the government and its agencies and to try to correct that. This is a very useful and helpful function. I mention this at the start because much of what I have to say will also be related to the report of the Auditor General.
As a member of the Public Accounts Committee of the House, and thus with knowledge of his work, I have found him to be a conscientious public servant.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Barry Mather: His work and proposals have saved a good deal of the taxpayers' money or put it to better use. In his report the Auditor General leaves no doubt that there have been, on the one hand, deterioration of parliamentary control over the use of public funds and, on the other, an immense increase in the level of the amounts of funds so expended. He states that in the last ten years the federal spending of public money has tripled. We are now in the spending area of $20 billion every 12 months and he says:
. .. it is the right, privilege and duty of the House of Commons to control the finances of the country. It is the responsibility of the government to assist the House by submitting the proposed spending to the members in as simple and straightforward a manner as it can devise.

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
He says that, while he believes the Treasury Board seeks to discharge its responsibility conscientiously, he thinks, and I quote:
I question and deem it my duty to draw to the attention of the House increasing tendencies displayed by the Treasury Board and its staff to devote their energies and resources toward circumventing parliamentary control rather than toward improving the efficiency of departments and agency regulations and remedying situations which for years have demanded attention.
Those are pretty tough words from a man in an extremely responsible position, Mr. Speaker. The Auditor General goes on to point out that his annual report over the years, and also many recommendations of the Public Accounts Committee based upon his findings of waste in government, could have achieved a more efficient use of men and money and have guided departments to avoid the continued repetition of mistakes.
In his current report, which we received just the other day, there are 130 cases that need to be dealt with. In many instances-the Auditor General estimates 65 per cent-these cases could be disposed of by the Treasury Board. Yet he says that never has a President of the Treasury Board responded to the criticism of such mistakes by replying and detailing steps which should be taken or have been taken to assist the departments and agencies in improving their financial performances.
He calls for the issue of treasury minutes-that is minutes from the Treasury Board-in response to and in respect of each of the Auditor General's detailed comments on public spending in the various departments and agencies. He says, and I agree as I think others on our committee would, Mr. Speaker, that these would be helpful to all concerned-the department, the Public Accounts Committee, the House of Commons and the taxpayers of the country. He laments, as well he may, the lack of such constructive action by the Treasury Board.
On page 12 of his report he gives details of the accounts he has been unable to certify involving large sums of money. He mentions some cases where the agencies or the departments criticized in his report or in the report of the Public Accounts Committee, have taken the advice themselves and have benefitted the public thereby, but he says he has never understood why the Treasury Board would not participate in promoting efficiency in cases as serious as those he has listed.
Mr. Speaker, this is one area where there is a growing lack of parliamentary control over public money; another is the use by the government of non-lapsing balances of votes available for spending in subsequent years. There is a government contingency program with reserves of money, millions of dollars, the need for which the Auditor General states the Treasury Board has been unable to demonstrate. There is a supplementing of parliamentary appropriations and there are loans and advances representing grants. Mr. Speaker, time does not permit the cataloguing of all the Auditor General's complaints as to the handling of government funds. There is in his report-


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, a point of order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The hon. President of the Treasury Board on a point of order.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, I do not think the hon. gentleman would like to mislead anyone. I am sure of that. Unfortunately, in quoting from what the Auditor General has said he has been using the present tense. At that point the Auditor General was talking about a period prior to one year ago and was not talking about the way things are, even though the present tense is used. He was talking about the way things were. The hon. gentleman is, I know aware that these non-lapsing accounts to which moneys have been granted have ceased. Not only are funds not being granted to these no longer existing accounts, but authorization for granting has also ceased.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. Although the minister may be allowed to raise a point of order if he wants to clarify something, I do not think he should be allowed to go as far as he has gone. Other hon. members on his side of the House who take part in the debate may make the argument he seeks to make at this time.


Gerald William Baldwin: The minister knows that the situation is much worse now than it was then.


Barry Mather: Mr. Speaker, I am indebted to the minister for his interjection; it means that some reform has been made in recent times. It is a step forward. Nevertheless, I am going by what is contained in the Auditor General's report. I think it is substantially on the mark.
As I said, a book has been published containing many paragraphs outlining in a detailed way what the Auditor General of Canada considers as improper, wasteful or non-productive expenditures on the part of the government and government departments. Many of these items have been reported in the newspapers recently and no doubt many more will appear in the days ahead. There is no point in taking up the time of hon. members by going over these items in detail. I commend the Auditor General's report to hon. members. It ought to be one of the best sellers in this country today. Canadians in recent days have been reading about the Watergate affair in Washington. We also read that another kind of human interest story is unfolding before the House of Lords in London. In this parliament we have not been able to arouse much interest in that kind of thing since that affair which some of my friends on my right were interested in about eight or nine years ago. I think the Auditor General's report contains certain items which would be interesting to all Canadian readers, especially if they are interested in retaining Canadian content in our publications.
As a member of the Public Accounts Committee, and as one who believes in public enterprise as well as private enterprise, I support the Auditor General's report and join him and the official opposition in the concern over the lessening of parliamentary control in the expenditure of public funds. This concern is all the more valid at the very time when those expenditures are escalating. I think they have tripled in the last decade.
It is no friendship to the cause of public enterprise to close our eyes to mismanagement or to poor and wasteful management of the public business. The reverse is true,
May 25, 1973

and I speak as a social democrat. We live in a society in which the public sector is necessarily becoming more and more important. It behooves us to make public enterprise, as represented by the departments and agencies of government, work in a businesslike manner.
While we, on the Public Accounts Committee, examine the Auditor General's report, interview representatives of departments he criticizes, and do our best to rectify or at least recommend reforms to reduce non-productive expenditures, we are but dealing with the tip of the iceberg. That iceberg at the federal level has now reached proportions of almost $20 billion in spending per year. It is one thing to demand, as does the motion of the official opposition, action to restore control of public funds to Parliament. We support that, Mr. Speaker, but, even with improved accounting by Treasury Board to parliament and even with an improved system of examination of estimates, there is more to it than that. We need to deal with the continuing cause and not just with the annual result of waste in public spending.
The Auditor General in his report points out that it is more than ten years since there was a management study of government organization, its administration, and methods and procedures by a qualified team, for the benefit of parliament and taxpayers. He specifically asked the House to consider this. In the House yesterday, on behalf of the New Democratic Party I sought to move the following motion:
That this House urges the government to take immediate steps to supply the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament with expanded resources, including research, legal and other staff necessary to conduct a thoroughgoing, in-depth and in-breadth examination of our immense and complex expenditures to enable the most effective and economical use of such outlays in the public interest.
That motion was not accepted yesterday. I commend the proposition which it contains to the attention of the government and to all other hon. members. If we are to get proper parliamentary control over government spending and not merely over the examination of accounts, essential as that is, we need to know the roots of waste as well as the branches.


Gerald William Baldwin: A new government would help.


Barry Mather: Provincial governments as well as the federal government, for the most part, are spending more and more. They are responsible for more and are taking over more and more from the private sector. To my mind, this is inevitable and good. We are passing from a once essential but now outmoded social order. Science has pushed us on to deal collectively, through government, with common problems.
As I deplore the waste of private enterprise, as evidenced by the 230 different labels or companies producing and duplicating, at consumer cost, essentially the same products, by the blocks of duplicating supermarkets and by the expensive advertising of these things, I deplore all the kinds of waste that have developed, including the waste in public enterprise. We, of the New Democratic Party, consider the motion before us today as an important and timely one. We seek reforms in this important area. We are glad to see that the Auditor General referred favourably to draft legislation involving a new auditor
Con trol of Public Funds
general's act. He recommends it. The objectives of the Public Accounts Committee, in so far as it was involved in producing this new draft legislation, was to combine to the fullest degree possible independence for the Auditor General in his war on waste, and security for the members of his staff. We hope that a new auditor general's act will provide for both these essential points.
As I have already noted, Mr. Speaker, we are calling for an expanded and greatly strengthened public accounts committee. If we are to do our jobs properly as members of that committee and save the public's time, our time, and public money, we must have researchers, legal help, permanent secretaries, and so on. In addition, I would urge that the committee be enabled to meet even during recesses, in order to get on with the job of dealing with how the public's money is being spent. To my way of thinking the average Canadian thinks few things are more important than knowing how the money that he or she has contributed through taxes is being spent. Taxpayers want to know if that money is being spent properly. If there is doubt in the public mind as to the efficiency and effectiveness of money spent on public business then, surely, that would undermine public confidence in Parliament. So, from every point of view, financial, social and democratic, I think the Public Accounts Committee, the instrument available to us in Parliament, ought to be strengthened, expanded and given more power. So far as the official opposition motion coincides with the criticisms which we have levelled with the proposals we have put forward, we support it.


Mr.   C.-A. Gauthier@Roberval: Mr. Speaker, the motion presented before the House today challenges the post of the Auditor General of Canada with the powers required for the carrying out of his function of an honest and impartial supervisor of government administration.
Indeed, in December 1972 the same mover appealed to the Auditor General, Mr. Henderson, to proceed to a scrutiny of the Unemployment Insurance Commission's books, and here is what could be read in the Quebec newspaper, he Soleil:
Mr. Baldwin stipulated that a report of Auditor General Maxwell Henderson should be brought forward before Parliament immediately upon resumption of its sittings in January.
"Government comments on the colossal amounts handled by the Unemployment Insurance Commission were not successful in inspiring credibility'', Mr. Baldwin stated in a press release.
"From the start, a mixture of deceit and ignorance was apparent, and the true facts are still unrevealed even today. It is time to call for the intervention of the watch-dog and to be apprised of the results of an autonomous and thorough examination of the books", he added.
The hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) was well aware of the fact that the Auditor General's report would be tabled on March 31, 1973.
After reading the report and noting the most serious discrepancies denounced by Mr. Henderson, we are astounded to see that the Auditor General presents this report each year, without succeeding in changing the administration by one jot.

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And I would even add this: when the Auditor General expressed himself rather severely over the last few years, he was threatened with dismissal because he was too cumbersome for the government.
Surely you have noticed that this year again the size of the report is bigger, that the remarks are ever more numerous and the warnings ever more to the point. But nothing changes except the thickness of the report. Besides, this explains why the Auditor General resigned from his most important position which is, in my opinion, the most important of our administration system. Mr. Henderson is simply fed up of talking to walls. Today, the official opposition is protesting against government actions by introducing a motion worded as follows:
That this House, protesting the Government's continuing takeover of Parliamentary control of public money and the Government's mismanagement in spending escalating public revenues, warns that immediate and decisive action must be taken to restore control of public funds to Parliament.
When you speak about Parliament control of public funds you wonder who surrenders this control to the government. I would immediately reply that it gets this control from the laws themselves. I have always noticed that after passing a law which has been studied for one or two months, you find on the last page a small subsection stating that under any circumstances the minister may act on his own. Therefore let us not wonder why laws are broken. After lengthy discussions a law is passed and, in the end, the minister is the master of the situation.
I could give dozens of examples. Let us take the Regional Development Incentives Act, let us consider the distribution of funds by the Regional Economic Expansion Department; this was again noted during the last election campaign: $500 million were distributed left and right provided it replenished the election coffers and collected voters. Why did the minister do it? Because it was authorized by law.
In my opinion, as as long as the matter is not seriously considered and the legislation is not given sufficient authority, we will continue to hear those criticisms against the government, this one or another. During past years, criticisms were not directed more against this government than the previous one. But I suggest that our legislation has too many loose ends and that we leave too much scope to politicians who use it to play politics.
What about bad administration? Again, the reason why the administration is often deficient is purely political. The aim of the administration is not common good but the next elections. Any project must be electorally profitable. Once again this applies to our successive governments. It is unfortunate, but as long as we are governed by the electoral fund, we will have bad administration.
We have revenues as well as expenditures and we notice on page 23 of the report from the Auditor General the statement of our revenues, and we see that they increase from year to year. In 1970-71 they were $12,803,051,000, and $14,226,558,000 in 1971-72. Compared with those revenues we have expenditures of $13,182,143,000 in 1970-71 and $14,840,865,000 in 1971-72.

I think, Mr. Speaker, that when you look at those figures you come to the conclusion that a serious government should first consider spending according to its revenues. And we see, particularly in recent years, that the increase in expenditures occurred mainly in the field of services, that is to say the public service. The expenditures for the public service nearly doubled in the last two or three years and we are getting fewer services than ever.
I think that those areas should be looked at to see if we could not find a way to reduce expenditures in order to balance the budgets and avoid regular deficits and hiding or transferring funds so the people will not come down on us.
I have here, for example, the figures for the amounts allocated to the commissions which were established. I have always said that often a royal commission was a smoke-screen to hide government scandals or to prevent a problem from being considered. In fact, it is the only raison d'etre of those commissions and $36,738,000 were spent in 1972 in that respect.
I think that when the Auditor General draws the attention of this House on certain things a serious government should at least listen a bit and consider a more concrete reform.
In view of the cautious and up-to-the-point comments of the Auditor General, and there are 178 of them in his last report, it seems to me that if a government is concerned with the well-being of the people, instead of hicking back as it does it should tackle the problem to try and right the monstrosities, if only that.
I wish I had the time to read each one of those remarks, not to convince the minister or present government-it is far too concerned with camouflaging its bad administration-but to inform the people, and tell them where their income tax really goes, and that the government could not care less about their opinion and well-being.
I have already said in this House that if private enterprise were managed the way the government is, it would not last six months. Bad administration poses no problem to the government: all it has to do is increase taxes. The taxpayer will always be the one who pays for administrative blunders. In his report the Auditor General denounces errors, voluntary or otherwise. Here are a few:
Weakening of parliamentary control.
Non-lapsing balances of votes available for spending in subsequent years.
I will skip some and stop at the following:
Faulty computer system planning.
Computer purchased on the instalment plan.
I did ask a question in the House about those computers because I suspected shady maneuvers as there often are with big building contracts. I have always wondered why the government always rents large blocks of offices. They are to be found all over Ottawa and Hull, built by companies that are friends of government and negotiated 20-year leases with the government. These buildings will be paid for in 20 years, and the government will still be paying rent. I wonder if these people have any administrative sense.
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Instead of building office blocks that would belong to the government in 20 years, they prefer paying rent for 150 years. Building themselves would not help out their friends. Indeed, the Auditor General mentions this in his report.
To get back to computers, this is a matter that I studied at the unemployment insurance. I was told that these computers were second hand, that they were rented to "try them out", and that the government was paying an exorbitant rent for the use of them. The replies I got from the department were quite true: these second hand computers had been rented, but the government was paying for repairs as well as rent. The owner might at least have undertaken to keep the machines in working order! The government pays exorbitant rent instead of simply buying new computers. But that would not have benefited the in-group. There are a number of such cases involving computers, and I can even quote names. The rented computers did not work properly, and caused a multitude of problems when it came to paying out unemployment insurance allowances. And yet the machines are still being rented.
In another department, computers were bought on the instalment plan. To quote again from the Auditor General's report:
81. Computer purchased on the instalment plan.
Instead of paying for the computer in full, they paid $190,000 in interest on one computer alone. I believe that the government pays this amount of interest now because the large companies are very generous at election time, you have to admit.
To continue my quotation:
Escalation of costs relative to developing and implementing a computer-based management information system.
Grant paid without parliamentary approval
Grants paid without approval remind me of the grants awarded in election campaigns, grants which were distributed to everyone. I repeat:
-without parliamentary approval
Then, there is question of a payment of interest to the Army Benevolent Fund. I quote:
Interest on the public debt improperly charged to departmental programs.
Reimbursement to Bank of Canada for bonds improperly redeemed.
Inadequate accounting for appropriation and Indian band funds.
And there is ever so much. Then comes this one:
Local Initiatives Program
What does the Auditor General say about the Local Initiatives Program? The following:
115. Local Initiatives Program. Manpower and Immigration Vote 10 provided $125 million for payments to municipal and other public bodies and community organizations and private groups with respect to projects undertaken by them for the purposes of providing employment to unemployed workers and contributing to the betterment of the community. This Program, known as the Local Initiatives Program, was announced in the House of Commons on October 27, 1971.
At March 31, 1972, 5,672 projects had been approved, on which $83,716,000 was disbursed during the year.
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The principal objective of the Program was the creation of additional jobs between November 1971 and May 1972-persons hired by project sponsors were to be drawn first from the unemployed .. .
Notice these words:
. . . drawn first from the unemployed through Canada Manpower Centres. The objective was to be achieved through innovative and imaginative projects to provide new facilities and services for the benefit of the community as a whole. Participation of municipalities, community groups and unemployed individuals in the development and management of the projects was invited.
Guidelines for the Program included the following:
-projects were to be capable of being put into effect quickly so that the main employment impact occurred within six months after November 1, 1971;
The amount of financial support was related directly to labour and other costs of the project. For labour the contribution was based on the level of prevailing wages and the skills required in each project but was not to exceed an average of $100 per man-week.
And what happened? Fifty per cent of those who worked on these projects were not unemployed. They were all friends of the party, but not unemployed, and that is what the Auditor General denounces in his report.
I see that my time has expired, Mr. Speaker.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, the motion that we are discussing is one that is aimed at the insidious, rather lustful and deliberate attempt by the government, the executive, to increase its powers of control. This motion is based also on the Auditor General's report, and the rapidly accelerating encroachments that are being made by the present government to weaken parliamentary control over the expenditure of national revenue. From listening to the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) this morning, it was very apparent to me that a little time in opposition would do him a good deal of good. As a matter of fact, it does all governments a good deal of good to come over to this side of the House from time to time and experience the feelings and frustrations of the members of the opposition.
I want to discuss this question today in the short time available to me from three points of view. The first has to do with the depths to which the institution of parliament itself has fallen as a result of the policies that have been followed by the government; second, I want to discuss the motion as it relates to the committee system; and lastly, if I still have time, I want to deal selectively with one or two specific examples. I maintain that not only since 1968 but from 1963, when the government changed, a deliberate course has been followed to weaken the institution of parliament. What we have now is not the ultimate result of that kind of undesirable policy but certainly very close to the ultimate result.
I maintain that this place has become a very flabby and ineffective debating forum. All we have to do is to look around at the benches of the House this Friday afternoon to determine the degree of interest in this debate. We were confronted with changes in the rules under the guise of parliamentary reform, under the guise of making more opportunities available to Members of Parliament to perform their functions more effectively, under the guise, as

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the minister who spoke just before lunch would have us believe, of providing members of the opposition with more opportunities to get information. The minister who uttered those words knows full well that they are not true. Why is there no interest in debate? I can recall when debates of this nature would have almost filled the benches in this chamber. Why is it that there is this lack of interest now? The reason is that there is no effective debating forum here any longer because of the absolute control that the executive, the government, has garnered unto itself.
From 1963 onwards the government has adopted policies which in turn were embraced by the new head of the government in 1968. These policies have gradually weakened and watered down the effectiveness of the opposition, thus resulting in this rather regrettable lack of interest in this chamber. We are no longer effective in this House. The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) is aware of the lack of interest and he knows he can implement further encroachments upon, and erosions of, the authority of parliament itself and he is doing exactly that. He and his colleagues in government are guilty of further abuses of the parliamentary process which in the end can only make this institution a rubber stamp for the executive authority.
With regard to the committee system, yesterday the Secretary of State for External Affairs (Mr. Sharp) tried to pass off the committee system and what he called the "reforms" which were implemented in 1968 in the regime of the present Prime Minister as something which have resulted in committees being able to perform their function with a great deal more efficiency than in the past. This, Mr. Speaker, is simply not the truth. I was here before 1963 when estimates were brought into the House and discussed in committee of the whole. I have been here since that time and I have found, even in the minority situation we have this session, that the committee system has been an absolutely useless procedure.
We are told by the President of the Treasury Board that we have more opportunities for access to information. I think he should speak to some of his backbenchers, such as the hon. member for Ottawa Centre (Mr. Poulin) who is one of the central leaders in a constant effort to stonewall members of the opposition and keep them from getting information. These members are constantly throwing up barriers of points of order and points of procedure in order to prevent this kind of information from coming out. I see the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Cafik) in his seat and he is one of the biggest offenders.
The committee system is set up to provide the opposition with an opportunity to examine government spending estimates when the estimates are referred to committee. But do we get the information that we want? No, Mr. Speaker, we do not, because hon. members like the hon. member for Ottawa Centre, the hon. member for Ontario, the hon. member for York North (Mr. Danson), the hon. member for Gatineau (Mr. Clermont) and the hon. member for Laprairie (Mr. Watson) are constantly throwing up a barrier by raising spurious points of order and points of privilege in order to-


Mr. Cafik:: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order. The hon. member is rising on a point of order.


Norman Augustine Cafik: I certainly am, Mr. Speaker. The hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) happened to refer to me and said the hon. member for Ontario was constantly raising points of order in committee. I should like to suggest that the hon. member does not sit on any committees on which I normally sit and that he certainly cannot make that kind of unfounded allegation, which is totally untrue.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, what the hon. member who has just risen on a point of order has said simply bears out what I have been saying. He has raised a spurious point of order.


Norman Augustine Cafik: A further point of order, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: I am sure hon. members know they must not engage in debate between themselves. I will hear the point of order.


Norman Augustine Cafik: Mr. Speaker, I quite legitimately feel aggrieved by this unfounded allegation and I certainly have the right, as does any other member of this chamber, to defend myself and my reputation and I intend to do so. I think it is unworthy of the hon. member to make a statement that he knows is unfounded.


Mr. Paproski:: Why don't you come in tomorrow? We will give you the whole afternoon.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order, please. Although it is a very serious point of debate I would remind the hon. member that he will probably be the next speaker and can make the point during his speech.


Erik Nielsen: For the second time the hon. member interrupts on a spurious point of order.


Some hon. Members:: Shame!


Erik Nielsen: I am not going to suggest that the hon. member has no reputation to defend, because obviously he believes he does and I accept his word; but I would have expected him, not only now but during previous debates in this House when similar conduct has occurred, to have shown a little humility, learned from the fact that only four votes separated him from his opponent in the last election. Obviously, he has not learned that humility.
This is the kind of tactic used not only here but in the committee by hon. members on the other side to provide their ministers with the vehicle with which to give members of committees just enough information and no more. They seem to delight in getting away with telling members as little as possible. The President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) speaks about providing Members of Parliament with information. He appeared with his officials before the miscellaneous estimates committee where one after the other delighted in circumventing and circumambulating questions, simply to give us as little information as possible. I have spoken about the President of the Treasury Board, but I speak also about the Minister of

Supply and Services (Mr. Goyer) and the Minister of Justice (Mr. Lang), who are pastmasters in the art of circumambulating. They take about ten times the length of time required to ask a question to answer it, and at the end of that time they have said nothing. The Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources (Mr. Macdonald) rises day after day, week after week and month after month and speaks in great circles, never ending, saying nothing.
The Minister of Consumer and Corporate Affairs (Mr. Gray) considers the ultimate in the discharge of the responsibilities of his portfolio to be a visit to Rochdale College where he puts his feet on the table, watches television for an hour or two and returns here in an effort to answer questions, but says nothing. The Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (Mr. Chretien) is a pastmaster of the technique of evading answers to questions in this House. He not only circumvents every question but in his answers he gets in a little political jab.
Hon. members on the other side and those to my left say, "Let us make this Parliament work. Let us make this House work. Let us not go to the people for an election right away." I suggest they do not want to do that. How do they make this Parliament work? They talk about information, but in answers they provide us with just as little information as possible.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Erik Nielsen: If the hon. member wants to interject, I should like to hear him rather than have him try to smuggle his interjection on to the record of Hansard without my being able to hear it.


Barry Mather: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. The hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) is, in my opinion, one of the most valuable members of the committees and the House. We are now discussing an important motion brought forward by a member of his party. I should think that, with his ability and the time at his disposal, he would provide more facts in support of the motion than he has provided so far. I think he could employ his time to better purpose.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order, please. With regard to the hon. member's point of order, the Chair was about to rise and make a suggestion to the hon. member who has the floor. My English is not 100 per cent perfect, but I can follow speeches quite well. Having reread the motion I had intended to mention to the hon. member that his remarks were slightly off base, as we say in common language.


An hon. Member:: Off the rails.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: The hon. member is a respected speaker in the House and I am sure he will try to make his remarks a little more relevant to the motion before us.


Erik Nielsen: Mr. Speaker, I have always had great admiration for your ability to follow debates, and great respect for your rulings. However, in this instance perhaps it is the difficulty Your Honour has in following the refinements and sophistications of my argument that prevents your concluding that I am exactly on point in dis-
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cussing the subject matter of this motion. What we are speaking about is the weakening of the authority of Parliament over government expenditure. I am advancing several convincing arguments as to why this erosion is occurring. I know that hon. members opposite will suggest they are unconvincing, just as sure as those on this side will feel they are convincing.
I am not going to take issue with the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock (Mr. Mather), a riding in the beautiful province of British Columbia, but I listened very carefully to him and feel he made an extremely useful and meaningful contribution to this debate. I was, however, somewhat taken aback when he said he deplored the duplication or multiplication of products by private enterprise which find their way into the market. I have always wondered whether, should this policy be implemented, I would object to everyone in the country brushing his teeth with Crest, or everyone buying McGavin bread or what-have-you, in order to avoid this kind of duplication. I cannot understand this kind of philosophy.
The President of the Treasury Board has said new procedures were introduced to offer more opportunity to Members of Parliament to scrutinize the estimates. That, Sir, is rubbish, and the minister knows it is rubbish. It has been called by several other names in this House, and if I wanted to be more explicit I could refer to it in worse terms. The minister also said that not one dollar is spent that is not authorized by Parliament. That borders on gross deceit. Of course, he is right in one sense; certainly no money is spent on government programs unless it is authorized by Parliament. What the minister does not say when uttering those half-truths is that he and the government have developed the practice of spending the money first and then coming to Parliament for authorization, perhaps as long as a year after it has been spent.
No better example of this can be cited than the government's conduct since dissolution of the previous Parliament. During the interval between dissolution and the commencement of this Parliament multi-millions of dollars were spent in respect of unemployment insurance claims. Governor General's warrants were obtained by this government to implement plans which had not even been exposed to Parliament but which the executive decided should be implemented. The government spends money today and then comes to Parliament after the event and says, "This is what has been done. This is the money that has been spent, and now it requires approval." What sort of parliamentary approval is that? The minister knows this is the course being followed.
The Auditor General referred in his report to unexpended portions of authorized expenditures. These were moneys left over from departmental programs passed in a previous Parliament. Because of a change in procedures, about which the minister speaks, this is available to the government without parliamentary authority in respect of future programs. Again, after the event the government comes to Parliament and asks for approval. The moneys have been spent: we can criticize, but that is all. The whole purpose of this institution is to have the government bring in its programs, tell us about them, tell us how much money they cost and then ask us to approve, (a) the program and (b) the sums to be expended. That is the

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manner in which this institution should operate, but everything is "bassackwards" with this same old bunch over there.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order. I should like to remind the hon. member that his time expired three minutes ago. I exercised some generosity in order to give him an extra few minutes because of the points of order which had been raised. The hon. member has already been given an extra three minutes; therefore I regret to inform him that his time has expired.


Erik Nielsen: You have been most generous, Mr. Speaker.


Norman Augustine Cafik: Mr. Speaker, I do not wish to spend too much of my time dealing with the comments of the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen). It is a long time since the hon. member attacked me for something he knew nothing about. The last occasion was before I was elected a Member of Parliament. While I was a candidate he made some rather erroneous charges.
However, I should like to point out in all fairness and honesty that to my knowledge I have never sat on a committee of this House of Commons of which he has been a member. So I find it difficult to understand how he can be so authoritarian about anything that happened in a committee on which I sat but he did not. His contention is that hon. members on this side are really trying to frustrate the operation of committees for members on the other side. I should like to use a specific example which can be well substantiated by the records of the House. If one looks at the record of the 3.30 p.m., Thursday meeting of the Standing Committee on Health, Welfare and Social Affairs, he will find that the estimates of the Department of National Health and Welfare were before the committee and that the members of the committee decided they would like the committee to vote on the estimates. One member of the Conservative party did not want to vote. I agreed that we should not vote because he wished to deal with the matter later.


Some hon. Members:: Order.


Norman Augustine Cafik: That certainly is an indication that the charge made is unfounded.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I hesitate to interrupt the hon. member, but he is a very experienced member and knows he cannot discuss committee evidence in the House when that committee has not filed its report. I think he would do us a great favour by dealing with the subject matter of the motion.


Norman Augustine Cafik: Although I have mentioned the committee, I am merely responding to the allegations which have been made. To get down to the motion itself, it is really twofold. First, there is the allegation that the government is continuing to take over parliamentary control of public moneys.
I should like to speak about that for a moment because I think it is a serious matter. In my view, Parliament is supreme and any government which would try to spend money without the approval of Parliament certainly

would not be doing the right thing either by the letter or by the spirit of the law.
Let us look at what really has happened. First of all, the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) mentioned the form of the estimates. I have no objection to that, but I would remind him and other hon. members that within the last five years the form of the estimates has been studied by the public accounts committee. The committee spent many months trying to make recommendations so that the facts in relation to the estimates would be more clear to Members of Parliament. If there is something still wrong in the form of the estimates and they are confusing to hon. members, then by all means let these members come forward with suggestions to clarify them and to make them more understandable. A great deal has already been done to this end by the parliamentary committee. Recommendations were proposed to and passed by the committee, and adopted by this government.
The second thing I should like to point out is that the time spent on the consideration of estimates seems to be a problem. Members now feel, since we have moved from the procedure of considering estimates in committee of the whole House to one where the matter is largely in the hands of the standing committees, that they are robbed of time to deal with the estimates. First of all, let us deal with the study of the estimates in committee. In my five years' experience as a Member of Parliament, when estimates are before a committee it is very seldom that a member really talks about the estimates which are before the committee. The questions range from policy matters to God knows what else. They do not really zero in on the amount of money allotted for a specific purpose and whether or not the expenditure is justified. Members on the other side who are concerned about this question ought to use their time more wisely and deal with the estimates which are before the committee rather than complaining now that they do not have adequate time to study them.
The last point concerns the House itself when dealing with the estimates. I understand that when the rules of this House were changed to bring about three periods a year with 25 opposition days, six of which could be used for votes, this was done in lieu of not having committee of the whole. Why do not members opposite use that time to zero in on and talk about the estimates of the government? Why do they not exercise their responsibility as Members of Parliament to scrutinize the estimates then, rather than try to make political points? They should fulfill their responsibility in that regard.
We might look at the estimates themselves to determine whether in fact they are worded and prepared in such a way that Parliament's will is frustrated. In my experience as a member of the committee on public accounts, the Auditor General on numerous occasions has brought to the attention of the committee that the will of Parliament has been frustrated. What he considered to be frustration of the will of Parliament was the actual determination of Parliament itself. For instance, I remember a couple of years ago that this allegation was made in respect of Vote L-55 concerning the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, where $25 million was voted by Parliament for the current year and subsequent years. Parliament passed that vote. I
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presume Members of Parliament read what they are passing. The Auditor General, however, said that it should not apply to subsequent years. But Parliament said it was to be for subsequent years.
If there is any erosion of power, it is certainly not the erosion of the power of Parliament. It may be a change in direction, but it is something that was done with the approval of Parliament. If Parliament does not want to exercise its responsibility by authorizing expenditures which would occur in subsequent years, then it should not do so. But members should not come back and cry "wolf", saying they as parliamentarians made a mistake and therefore the government is at fault. We cannot expect the government to run a training program for Members of Parliament so they will know what they are doing before they do it. That is their responsibility and I would hope they would exercise it.


An hon. Member:: That is arrogance.


Norman Augustine Cafik: I do not see anything arrogant about expecting Members of Parliament to do their homework before they exercise their responsibility. I recall a time in the public accounts committee when members were surprised when they found they had passed a particular vote. I do not think that is something about which a Member of Parliament should be proud.
The last point I want to make concerns the whole question of the mismanagement of public funds. I have been a member of the public accounts committee since 1968. I think all Members of Parliament will agree that the public accounts committee ably carries out its role in trying to make sure there is no waste of public funds. The Bonaven-ture is a good case in point. I personally spent over a year working on a one-man committee to try to expose the problems involved, so I do not need to produce my credentials in that regard.
I think one thing we must understand is that the report of the Auditor General is a report to Parliament through the committee of public accounts. It is not a report that we can prejudge at this moment. For that reason I am not bringing forward statements made in the most recent report because it is a matter for the committee to deliberate upon, decide whether the report is right or wrong and what kind of action should be taken. To prejudge that report is to prejudge Parliament itself. The whole, basic argument is that we want to uphold this institution of Parliament. Surely we can all agree that the report should be dealt with by Parliament in the way in which Parliament decides to deal with it, rather than all of us shooting from the hip and trying to make political mileage out of a subject that has not been adequately discussed.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Norman Augustine Cafik: In summary, I conclude by saying, first, if there is not enough scrutiny of public expenditure, it is because the opposition has not used dilingently enough the time that has been given for that very important and essential job. I leave it to the voters to deal with them accordingly. Second, if there is waste of government expenditures, then I for one-and I am sure all members
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of the House-would want to see it stopped. But let us ascertain the facts before we make judgments. Third, let us look at last year's report of the Auditor General, which we have not yet done, before we start making judgments on this year's report; and let us allow parliament to study it in the institution we set up to do that, namely, the public accounts committee.


Mr. Robert C. Coates (Cumberland-Colchester North):: Mr. Speaker, I listened to the hon. member's interjections while the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) was speaking, and I listened to his speech. I must say that his concluding remarks are an example of the reason this motion was moved by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin). Also, it is the reason the Auditor General indicated in his final report to the House of Commons and to the country just why he is so concerned about Parliament and the fact that this government has done everything in its power to prevent the country from knowing the facts regarding the operation of the business of this country. I believe that is why the hon. member for Peace River has spoken so often about the operations of the government, the secrecy of the government and its divisive means of hiding the facts from the public almost continuously since 1968.
I think the hon. member for Peace River is justified in taking the kind of action he has taken over and over again because the people of this country said on October 30, 1972, that this government does not deserve a majority of seats in the House of Commons. Indeed, the people of Canada came very close to saying that it does not deserve to be the government of this country because of the ways and means it has devised to try to hide its actions from the public.
We, as the opposition, were certainly justified by the vote on October 30 in taking the type of action we took prior to that date, and the type of action we have taken since then to try to make Parliament the institution it once was, and no longer is because of the devious methods used by the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) and the government as a whole to try to hide from the public the facts about the government's wastefulness in spending the taxpayers' money. What this government has been doing is nothing short of a national scandal. They sit like a bunch of satraps, spending the taxpayers' money as if they could not care less. I think one has to conclude that they could not care less about how they spend the taxpayers' money.
They wrap around themselves, apparently to try to keep away the criticism that has been mounting in the nation regarding the way they operate the country, a clique that has become almost alarming, of executive assistants of various sizes, shapes and forms to tell them what they want to hear and not to let the country tell them what the public thinks. We discovered in the last general election campaign that the people of this country were trying to get the message across to the government that they did not like the way they were running this country and they would have little or no opportunity to run the country any longer, especially after the next general election.
I believe one of the things that must be done quickly to eliminate the bureaucratic morass that has been developed by this government is to solve the problem of the tremen-
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dous increase in the cost of operating the public service of Canada and the amount of money that has been spent by this government to pay for professional and consultative services since it took office. Everywhere you look today there are people working for cabinet ministers, with friends working for that cabinet minister's department in some way or other. Everybody who is a Grit in Canada is looked after by this government. Never in the history of Canada from 1867 has there been a government that has indulged in patronage to the degree that this government has done and continues to do. The way they throw the taxpayers' money around is nothing short of shocking.


An hon. Member:: It is criminal.


Robert Carman Coates: It is worse than criminal, because what it is doing more than anything else is producing the inflation that we face in this nation. There may be unemployment in Canada, but there is very little of it among the Grits- and are they ever generous! For instance, in my province of Nova Scotia we discovered that one of Pearson's pets, Tom Kent, who was at first a special adviser to Mr. Pearson and then became a deputy minister in the public service of Canada, moved from deputy minister of the Department of Regional Economic Expansion to president of a Crown corporation. You can look at that as a promotion, I suppose; you can look at it in many ways. But it seems to me that Ottawa in one way or another was not happy with what Mr. Kent was doing in the Department of Regional Economic Expansion, so they sent him to Cape Breton Island to try to solve their problems there.


Erik Nielsen: Aren't you lucky?


Robert Carman Coates: I do not know whether we are lucky or not. What really upsets me is that a man goes from the position of deputy minister of one of the biggest departments of government, to a Crown corporation in Cape Breton Island with an increase of something like $15,000 in salary just to make the trip. I would have gone for $15,000 more a year; I think anybody would.
What concerns me, Mr. Speaker, is that if you are a Grit and you are in need, then the payday is big if they decide to look after you. The only Liberal I know who has not been looked after by this government is Jim Tucker of Newfoundland. Poor old Jim really feels left out. This practice has been going on steadily since 1968, but it accelerated after October 30, 1972. That is when the people of Canada opened a whole new area in which the government could indulge in patronage. The way they have been looking after their friends is nothing short of a national scandal.
When I came to this House, Mr. Speaker, a minister had to sit over there, with his deputy minister and assistant deputy minister beside him, and he had to tell members of this House everything they wanted to know about the operation of his department. It was not just one or two ministers; it was every minister. Ministers had to appear before this House and before committees to answer questions posed by members about the operations of their departments.

For the President of the Treasury Board to stand up with his bare face hanging out, suggesting to us that there is public scrutiny of the estimates today compared with then, is nothing short of ridiculous. He knows it and we know it. Some sense must be put back into the way the government is spending the taxpayers' money and the opportunity that parliamentarians have to scrutinize government spending. If we went back to the old way, Mr. Speaker, there would be much less patronage that the taxpayers of this country would have to pay for in order to look after defeated Grits, or Grits who cannot secure employment any other way. It must have been a happy day for them when the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) said he was going to hang on, even by the skin of his teeth.


Erik Nielsen: The Minister of Supply and Services (Mr. Goyer) is the greatest grab-bag of the bunch-contracts, without tenders, all over the place!


Robert Carman Coates: The minister has at his disposal a great many opportunities to make available to friends of Liberals all across the country whatever he feels they should have. He could be the dispenser of the biggest legacy of patronage any government has ever had.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to go back to the point I was making about how damaging this government's policies have been with regard to inflation. 1 should like to quote from an article written by Lubor J. Zink in the Toronto Sun on May 4, 1973. He was talking about the buying power of our dollar, which has dropped since 1961 to 62.3 cents. He wrote:
Since that framework is shaped primarily by our governments, blaming labour and business for inflation misses the ultimate source of the malaise.
For a comprehensive picture one has to look at government spending. Coming as it does from taxpayers' pockets, it has direct bearing on cost-price levels, for every increase in taxes finds reflection in higher production costs and consumer prices.
In 1952 federal government expenditure on goods and services amounted to $3,620 million. Canada's population at that time was slightly over 14 million and gross national expenditure almost doubled (to $6,608 million) while population increased by 28 per cent and GNP by 74 per cent. By 1972 government expenditure zoomed up over $20.5 billion-more than three times the 1962 figure. Population during the last ten years grew only by 17 per cent (to 21.8 million) and the GNP, while topping $100 billion at market prices increased only by 65 per cent in constant (1961) dollars.
In other words, government expenditure grew much faster, particularly since 1968, than population and the aggregate wealth the country generates. The root of the cost-price inflation that has by now cut the buying power of the 1961 dollar to 62.3 cents can thus be traced to runaway government spending that provided the impetus and "justification" for wage demands far in excess of what economic growth and productivity gains can sustain without currency debasement.
Mr. Speaker, that is what has been happening-and it has been happening because this government does not take seriously the operation of the country and the con- . cern that should be shown for the taxpayers' dollars that are being pulled out of our pockets at a degree unprecedented in Canada's history. To support my contention about the type of pay increases that have been made available to public servants in this country, especially friends of the Trudeau government, I would like to quote from an article by Douglas Fisher which appeared in the Toronto Sun on May 14 this year. It reads:
May 25, 1973

Opposition MPs are sniffing at one of Ottawa's startling stories. This is the literally "fantastic" increase in recent years in the numbers of government personnel drawing what may be called "executive salaries" and, even more startling, the wonderful generosity in the salary increases themselves. The public tends to bitch about MPs "voting increases for themselves." The mandarins make the MPs seem pikers, without the need for any formal vote.
Only the outline of the story can be given here, and that in rather jerky fashion. Perhaps the best way is to personalize it a bit through one man, the Hon. Charles (Bud) Drury, President of the Treasury Board, the watchdog of the federal purse.
Mr. Fisher outlines Mr. Drury's history in this way:
Mr. Drury, of course, is a "silver spoon" type and a former federal deputy minister. His daddy controlled the big Montreal-based manufacturing complex of Canadian Car and Foundry. Private schools; McGill; post-graduate study abroad; a war-time brigadier; a post-war mandarin; then the co-opting in the days of the chief into the Liberal Party; a cabinet minister for ten years; and first minister of the already defunct ministry of industry.
Mr. Drury is cool toward-indeed I think he dislikes-trade unions.
I do not think there is much doubt about that. Mr. Fisher continues:
My conversations with him (usually abrasive) suggest he considers unions, at best, a necessary evil.


Erik Nielsen: He doesn't like the public service now.


Robert Carman Coates: He doesn't like anybody except himself and the Grits.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Boulanger):: Order, please. I regret to interrupt the hon. member, but his time has expired.


Mr. Maurice Dupras (Labelle):: Mr. Speaker, while listening to the recitation of the motion tabled by the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) today I could not help wondering if it was not an updated version of the motion he tabled on May 26, 1972.


Erik Nielsen: It has got worse since then.


Maurice Dupras: In that debate most hon. members proved how futile and what a waste of time the motion was. Nevertheless, one must realize the great improvement they have made in this motion. Consider the subject of their motion of March 6, 1973. After two months of sitting, the only thing they could find wrong was the wording of the 1973 income tax forms which were to be used in respect of 1972 incomes.


Erik Nielsen: It is still not legal.


Maurice Dupras: I was somewhat surprised when the mover of the motion began his remarks by saying something like this, "One wonders why this subject is brought up again today." That ought to have been our line, but not his.


An hon. Member:: Where is he?


Maurice Dupras: I think he has left the House. Up to now I think the most convincing argument put forward by any opposition member was that of the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock (Mr. Mather). His remarks were well documented. Having sat on the public accounts committee with him for over two years, I know his dedication to that
Control of Public Funds
committee. In my judgment, his intervention was the best coming from the opposition side. I say that because the mover of the motion is not an authority on this subject, having sat on the committee only once in the last two years, namely, on March 14, 1972.


Erik Nielsen: He used to be the chairman.


Maurice Dupras: He is not familiar with everything that goes on in the committee. I do not think he is an authority.


Erik Nielsen: He used to be the chairman of that committee.


Maurice Dupras: And, Mr. Speaker, the mover of the motion went on to say how he deplored the Canadians' apparent lack of interest in the Auditor General's report. It appears that Canadians are being distracted by what is happening to our unfortunate neighbours, the Watergate affair, and also by what is happening in the British cabinet and House of Commons. I believe that the mover of the motion deplores in his remarks that there is not the slightest scandal to exploit here in Canada. For my part, I do not mind in the least if we dig up an old scandal. We could perhaps find one without going back too far; maybe we could find some juicy topics in the last 10 years, and then we too could exploit our little scandal, and make the headlines more easily than the Auditor General's report.
There is perhaps another reason why Canadians are not as interested in the Auditor General's report as the opposition and the Progressive Conservatives would like them to be. And I wonder whether he is not the one responsible for this lack of interest when one considers what he did last September and October, particularly out west in Calgary, if my memory serves me right, when he would have liked to help his friends on the other side by highlighting the shortcomings of the government. He failed, in fact, to convince Canadians that he had a good argument and could really help his friends. And I even wonder whether, in some circles, he has not been prejudicial to his friends of the other side of this House rather than being helpful to them.
At any rate, we have read comments and editorials on the behaviour of the Auditor General who was criticized at that time by serious writers throughout the country who questioned his credibility and popularity.
As we know, he gave again in his last report-which we received only last Wednesday when we should have had it on January 16-the same reasons for this delay in presenting his report. Therefore, if I may, since the mover of the motion has quoted some extracts from the report, I would like also to quote a passage of this report. On page 4, section 8, we can read and I quote:
8. In my Report last year I referred to the downgrading of the 28 senior positions of my Office,.. .
Well, when the committee considered this statement in 1972, it was found that among the 28 persons to whom he referred in his statement, only one had a grade 4 or 5 position which would, in a way, rank high within the organization of his office.
I go on quoting:
. . . I have stated before and do so again that this action by the
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Control of Public Funds
Treasury Board Secretariat was unfair and discriminated against the Auditor General.
Once more, those are arguments which have been negated on several occasions, I believe, for five or six years. This is an excuse, I suggest, to hide his lack of ability and perspicacity to recruit his staff and I think that one of the qualities of a good administrator is to be able to recruit personnel, train them and keep them. And if he had to grieve over the fact that a good number of his employees did not stay in the service, I believe he has nobody else to blame but himself.
Let us look at the statistics he is using in his report to tell us and I quote:
The staff situation has not improved materially during the year.
It is wrong to resort to such excuses, especially if we recall that he has sole responsibility for obtaining funds. Each of the seven or eight last years, whenever he presented his estimates for the coming financial year, he always got every dollar he asked for.
And the year 1971-72 was no exception as during that year, the Auditor General wanted an amount of $3,739,000 to pay the salaries of his employees and provide for the recruiting and training of his staff.
Since he mentioned his staff, I will say that within nine months, namely from March 31, 1972 to December 31, 1972, no fewer than 34 persons were hired, which represents a 12 per cent increase, while the strength of the whole public service increased by only 20 per cent in ten years, from
300,000	in 1961-62 to 405,000 in 1971-72.
There we have irrefutable evidence of the totally unfounded allegations of the Auditor General's when he speaks of the ability of the government or of the Treasury Board to provide him with the required staff so that the report, which should be out 15 days after the opening of a session, be produced on time.
.
The failure and the incompetence of the opposition are evident. The present shortcomings and disputes result from the Progressive Conservative party's dependency on the opinions and the assistance of the Auditor General. They have relied so heavily upon his assistance and cooperation to embarrass the government that they have been weakened. Everyone could see that the mover, the hon. member for Peace River, was making every effort to woo the representatives of the New Democratic Party.
As I mentioned earlier, the best contribution so far by a member of the opposition was made by the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock (Mr. Mather) who has shown much more authority on the subject than the mover.
In his comments, while dealing with the Auditor General's report, the mover recommended not to read it in one sitting. I agree with him on this point because the more one progresses, the more one realizes how this report, full of venom, has gone "sour" on the government. Everything went to achieve its aim which is evidently to embarrass the government. It recalls some measures previously recommended to the government which were taken.
Mr. Speaker, I should like to correct the number of recommendations with which the government did not
| Mr. Dupras.]
comply; they are very specific recommendations made to various departments. There were 15 recommendations which were followed on. Eight of them suggesting the appearance of a minister before the Public Accounts Committee were acted on. I could go on to the recommendation urging the government to introduce a new bill on the Auditor General, a measure which was accepted immediately by the committee. A sub-committee was set up to examine and prepare a bill to amend the terms of reference of the Auditor General.
When listening to the speech of my hon. friend from Peace River, Mr. Speaker, we could say that his epistolary style is much the same as we find in the Auditor General's report and I wonder if it is not the same writer. We are often accused to have people drafting our speeches and after listening to that speech, I wonder if it was not the same person who wrote it. A wisecracking member went as far as suggesting that maybe it was Bill Davis who has written the speech.
In concluding, Mr. Speaker, I would like to remind hon. members of what is going on in the various committees and my hon. friend for Ontario (Mr. Cafik) referred to that fact when he said that no fewer than 124 committee meetings took place during the 4th session of the 28th Parliament in order to examine the estimates. And quite often, if we follow carefully what takes place in those committees, we must deplore the total lack of interest of opposition members with regard to specific items involving rather important amounts.
And, as the hon. member for Ontario suggested, we are more interested in making statements like those made Tuesday by the hon. member for Prince Edward-Hastings (Mr. Hees) in the Committee of External Affairs and National Defence, when he deplored and condemned the participation of our country in NATO. He said that, since 1968, we had reduced the Canadian representation in NATO, and how we were judged severely by our NATO partners in Europe. Perhaps it would have been better for him to use this valuable committee time to inquire about specific points that might have interested him and should be of concern to us.
And as I said a while ago, some often complain about the lack of opportunity to study the estimates; yet, the committees held no less than 124 sittings during the fourth session of the 28th parliament. There is no doubt, then, that opposition members who are really interested in looking into the estimates of all departments, have ample opportunity to do so, and they have never been denied that right, I am sure.


Alfred Pullen Gleave: Mr. Speaker, this motion could read that this House protests the government's continuing takeover of parliamentary control in the spending of public money and that we must take action to restore this power and control to the House. I wish to cite one or two examples. The hon. member who just resumed his seat said that someone on this side of the House deplored the fact that there was not a scandal at this time. There is a scandal at this time, Mr. Speaker. Today, the Minister of National Health and Welfare (Mr. Lalonde) was asked why payments for drug care for the native people of Canada, including those in my province,
May 25, 1973

were being cut off. The government is supposed to be the protector of the people, yet the minister, without introducing any legislation, has decided to deprive one of the weakest and most defenceless groups in this country of benefits which they have had until this time. As far as I am concerned, that is a scandal.
I wish to make one or two comments with regard to agriculture. The feed grain issue is one of the most important. It affects the welfare of the grain producers in western Canada and the farmers in eastern Canada who purchase this grain. On May 16 the hon. member for Richmond (Mr. Beaudoin) asked the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) whether he proposed making changes in the pricing of feed grain. The minister answered yes. The minister said, as recorded at page 3836 of Hansard for May 16:
Mr. Speaker, we are preparing a program for a feed grain policy for Canada. I am not prepared to say at this time whether it has to be introduced in the form of a bill. It is my own personal opinion that this can be done without the introduction of a bill in the House. I am sure it will be such a fair policy that it will be accepted no matter whether it is introduced by a bill or otherwise.
The minister stated in this House that he intends to bring in a policy with regard to the sale and movement of feed grain across Canada. He stated that he hopes he does not have to bring before Parliament in the form of a bill the measures which he proposes. The committee discussed the feed grain issue the other day. If my memory is correct, between $20 million and $25 million a year is being spent on this program. I apologize to the House if my figures are not precise, but the amount is not the important factor. The important factor is that a minister of the Crown has decided not to give Parliament an opportunity to debate measures and proposals he intends to introduce. Many people in western Canada are fed up with this cavalier attitude adopted by the Minister of Agriculture.
It was practised in the previous Parliament by the minister in charge of the Wheat Board. In order to get the minister to carry out an act of this Parliament, four farmers in Saskatchewan had to threaten to haul the government into court. Not until the deadline had almost expired did the government decide to conform with the provisions of the Temporary Wheat Reserves Act and pay the money it was required to pay under the terms of that act, money which it had been withholding for almost two years. I am citing a case which has actually occurred. Then there is the course which the minister has told us he proposes to follow in connection with feed grains.
The Prairie Farm Assistance Act is still on the statute books. The minister announced on May 15 that payments would continue in areas where crop insurance is not available this year. For the information of hon. members, the act is supposed to operate except in circumstances in which a farmer himself takes out crop insurance. The minister went on to say the department was in the process of phasing out the provisions and requirement of the act; they would be introducing legislation this year to end PFAA in 1974.
Mr. Speaker, this act continues in effect until such time as another bill is passed either to amend it or to replace it. The money which is supposed to be collected under PFAA
Control of Public Funds
is not being collected. Nor do we know whether payment will be made in the coming year to farmers in areas where crop failures may occur. The minister said in his statement that farmers in the Peace River area will be paid. He stated that only in Alberta are there areas without crop insurance where PFAA payments will be available in 1973. Farmers who are not sure whether they will be covered are told to write in only to find out whether they are eligible.
Mr. Speaker, if an act is in force it should be applied. The statement declares that approximately $10 million will be left in the prairie farm emergency fund at the end of July, and that whatever money is left after payments are completed for the 1973 year will be used for the benefit of prairie farmers. In what manner is this $10 million to be distributed? By what right? Under whose warrant? Apparently, just such as is the whim of those who set themselves up as the arbiters of power. It almost takes one back to the famous statement about "nobodies" who are elected to this House.
An hon. member across the way said there was a complete lack of interest shown in committees by opposition members. There is not a total lack of interest in committees but there is darned near a total lack of information. Try to get it. A committee has been considering trends in food prices. With this in mind, I decided in the agricultural committee to try to find out a few of the things which were happening. The Kraft corporation for example, controls around 66 per cent of the total market in Canada, so I started asking the Canadian Dairy Commission some questions in an attempt to find out what was really going on under the present structure. Anybody knows what is happening in the Belleville market in Ontario. It is an auction market and everyone knows the prices that are being paid. However, I asked the Dairy Commission to tell us the prices in the Montreal market.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I am sorry to interrupt the hon. member, but the time allotted to him has expired. It could be extended by unanimous consent.


An hon. Member:: Carry on.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Alfred Pullen Gleave: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I shall not take very long. As I was saying, I asked the Canadian Dairy Commission, which is spending aroung $122 million of the money of the people of Canada-in any case, that was the figure last year-to support the price of raw milk, and so on; and we are certainly in favour of that. I asked them to tell us the prices on the Montreal market. You see, I began to wonder how the consumer was faring.
Kraft corporation handles about $80 million out of total sales amounting to $190 million in Canada. There is a very large co-operative in Quebec which sells its total production to Kraft, and I asked the Canadian Dairy Commission for what price they sold it. The commission said it did not know. I quoted figures to show that consumers in Montreal were paying anywhere from six cents to 15 cents a pound more for cheese over a 16-month period, at the wholesale level, than was being paid in Belleville. I asked

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
the Dairy Commission at what prices this cheese changed hands on the wholesale level in Quebec. The commission said they did not even know whether they had a legal right to find out. I suggest that a corporation which is spending so much public money should make it their business to know whether or not the consuming public is getting a fair shake.
I thank the House for its indulgence. I shall conclude very shortly. I find the only opportunity I have to ask these questions and get answers in the interest of my constituents and of the Canadian public is in committee; but, to use an old phrase, getting information out of some of the witnesses who appear before our committees is like pulling hens' teeth-there just aren't any. If the people on the government side expect us on the opposition side to take committees seriously, they had better instruct their public officials and the heads of various commissions such as the Farm Credit Corporation, the Dairy Commission and the grains commission to give the information that is required. They may then find they will receive co-operation, and hold the interest of opposition members.


Mr. Sinclair Stevens (York-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, in dealing with the matter before the House I feel it is particularly important that we bear in mind the wording of the motion. I call the attention of hon. members to the fact that we are dealing with the government's mismanagement in spending escalating public revenues, and we warn that immediate and decisive action must be taken to restore control of public funds to Parliament. As a newcomer to this House, I should say that I have indeed been shocked by the lack of co-operation that the government, its officials and others tend to show when we try to get the facts about what is happening in regard to business transactions of the government.
I should like to touch on certain aspects that have become apparent to me. In view of the fact that the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Gillespie), the Minister of Supply and Services (Mr. Goyer) and the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) are in the House-they are the only three cabinet ministers present-it is perhaps appropriate that I specifically comment on activities that have been taking place within their departments or within Crown corporations for which those ministers are answerable.
Let me first deal with the Department of Supply and Services. This is a department that handles approximately $100 million of contract business letting for the government each and every month. During the last 12 months they have let 11,630 contracts involving over $1 billion. Of that number of contracts, only nine have been publicly let in the sense that the tenders were actually opened in public.
What I find most startling about this kind of activity in the department of the Minister of Supply and Services- who very appropriately is presently talking to the President of the Treasury Board, I hope about secret tendering and when it is going to end-is that the minister has made it clear that he does not believe his department's present practice, to use his own words, is entirely legal. This minister has publicly stated that a process exists which he

believes is not entirely legal, yet he has taken no action to date to put a stop to it.
When this minister is questioned in the House or by the press, he is very quick to say that this is a practice that has been going on for years. In fact, he likes to go back to certain years, such as 1957 or 1960, and say that this has been a long-standing custom. But surely the Minister of Supply and Services does not seriously expect us to accept that. Has he forgotten that his department was formed on April Fool's Day, 1969, and that it has only existed since that date? Yet he tries to put up a bit of a smokescreen by saying that what is going on-that what he admits, to use his own words again, is not an entirely legal practice, has been going on for almost an indefinite period.
I intend to get to the facts concerning this practice of secret tendering on the part of the government. I believe the time has come for an inquiry into the tendering practices of the government, particularly the practices in the Department of Supply and Services. Surely the public has a right to know whether this tendering is being handled in an above-board manner, whether the government is getting the best possible prices, why there should be any suggestion of secrecy, or the why the minister has to say, to use his own words, that he intends to look into the matter to see what are the advantages and disadvantages of this practice. I believe the only way that this House can get the facts is by having an inquiry, and in due course I hope to be able to move a motion asking that the House conduct an immediate inquiry into the tendering practices of the government.
While I am dealing with this department let me touch on another aspect. I refer to how the government seems to have no hesitation in concealing facts. There is a Crown corporation answerable to the Minister of Supply and Services; it is called the Canadian Commercial Corporation. In an auditor's certificate bearing date June 4, 1972, the Auditor General of Canada commented on the fact that he felt certain funds retained by that corporation had been improperly held by the corporation and not returned to the consolidated revenue fund. That comment was made, as I say, by the Auditor General of Canada in regard to a transaction of a Crown corporation. I think it is very interesting to trace what happened here. In regard to this matter I have had on the order paper since February 7, question No. 832 which asks specifically whether the situation has been rectified. I have found that not only has it not been rectified but the matter has been further complicated.
Moving over to the other department, which for some odd reason was also created on April Fool's Day of 1969, namely, the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce, I find that a Crown corporation answerable to that minister, the Export Development Corporation, rushed to the aid of the Canadian Commercial Corporation and extended a $28 million loan, the largest loan it made in that year, to an entity in the Bahamas in order to help finance certain notes that the Canadian Commercial Corporation had taken back regarding the sale of certain aircraft to Venezuela.
When the president of the Export Development Corporation attended before the finance, trade and economic affairs committee I pointed out that the Auditor General
May 25, 1973

had made some comments concerning this transaction. To show the complete contempt that the president of this Crown corporation has for Parliament and for the Auditor General, he had no hesitation in saying, as reported at page 11:18 of the committee report for Friday, April 13 last:
-I objected strongly to the Auditor General qualifying our certificate because I felt that-
At that point I interrupted him and asked:
Is that not his job if he thinks there is a serious enough breach?
Then Mr. Aitken said:
Yes, but I think he is mistaken. I disagree violently with the attitude he took in criticizing us.
Who else is to criticize a Crown corporation which has done something wrong? If the Auditor General is to be chastised or to have his attitude disagreed with violently, I do not know who we in this Parliament can turn to in an attempt to get the facts concerning these irregular transactions. When the president of the Canadian Commercial Corporation appeared before another standing committee I tried to quiz him about his version of what actually transpired, and I specifically asked whether he was prepared for the type of statement the Auditor General would probably make in his forthcoming report. I got nowhere; I received a very evasive answer. I was told that the Department of Justice had supplied a legal opinion, which they had followed, and based on that legal opinion they felt everything was all right.
In his report to the House of Commons for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1972, the Auditor General takes up three or four pages on this subject, pointing out what he calls the improper retention tof public moneys. I suggest that hon. members read those pages which begin at page 53. For example at page 55 the Auditor General said:
Such procedures were clearly devised to circumvent parliamentary control
There the Auditor General was commenting on the intrigue he traced between the activities of the Canadian Commercial Corporation and the Export Development Corporation, and what he believed was quite unlawful. He stated at page 56:
That the law officers of the Crown are of the opinion that the retention from, and investment outside of, the consolidated revenue fund of public money in this way is lawful-
He went on to state:
That is a most serious situation and we recommend to Parliament that it require the law officers of the Crown to draft for Parliament's consideration suitable amendments to the Financial Administration Act that will ensure that the retention of public funds in this way can no longer be considered lawful.
Perhaps in partial answer to the comments of the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Cafik) I should say that this is a good illustration of the frustration we in the opposition meet when trying to get at the facts concerning these devious and irregular activities which have been developed and certainly expanded by the present government. This is why I believe there should be an inquiry into some of these activities, and in particular into the secret tenderer policies of the Department of Supply and Services.
Control of Public Funds
Touching on another matter, I think we should bear in mind that the government, through various devices such as the airport revolving fund, has been able to obtain moneys without parliamentary sanction, to be subsequently used for whatever purpose the minister deems appropriate at the time. I have in mind a matter that is of importance to my area, namely, the new airport in Toronto to be known as Toronto International Airport No. 2, at Pickering.
Here we find that through the device of getting the government committed and then coming to Parliament for funds, we are put in the position of refusing to allow the government to meet that commitment. It is interesting that in this case the hon. member for Ontario was most adamant. He suggested that if we refused the estimate in respect of the proposed airport at Toronto, the people in his area would not have the funds to carry out certain expropriations involving 18,000 acres of land. We are told that if we attempt to block the funds, the commitment cannot be honoured and the people will not have the funds required for the expropriation. I suggest this is a circumvention of the whole process of approving the expenditure of public funds.
This question is particularly important when we consider the magnitude of the project. It was estimated that the land acquisition in the Toronto area would cost approximately $60 million. After the commitment was made and the expropriation finalized, we learned that it was to cost $90 million. This is a commitment in respect of which we had virtually no say. It amounts to the expenditure of about $90 million, for an average of $5,000 per acre. This has been done by the central ministry of transport, and I emphasize "central" because there has been no reference to-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I regret to interrupt the hon. member, but his allotted time has expired. He may continue, however, with the unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: I thank you, Mr. Speaker, and hon. members for allowing me to continue. I would summarize by saying that in my view the central authority, namely, the ministry of transport, is continuing to develop the airport in the Toronto area notwithstanding the fact that the expenditure will eventually amount to at least $500 million and that this is the only authority in North America at the present time proposing such an airport development.
This is in sharp contrast to the situation in the United States, where the federal authorities do not get involved and where the airport activity in the case of the O'Hare airport in Chicago is five times as great as the activity in the Toronto area. The Chicago authorities do not feel they need a new airport facility, whereas the authority in Toronto, where the activity is only one-fifth, is developing an airport which will eventually cost over $500 million. The Toronto airport is rated as number nine in activity on the continent, Montreal rates as number ten, New York as number one, Chicago as number two, and Los Angeles as number three. In spite of the fact that Montreal and

May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
Toronto are rated number nine and number ten, we in Canada will have two of the largest superairports on the continent, thanks to the irresponsible spending of this government. In short, this is ridiculous and irresponsible.


Mr. Gaston Clermont (Gatineau):: Mr. Speaker, before dealing with the motion before us, I should like to take up at least two gratuitous statements made by the hon. member for Yukon (Mr. Nielsen) in this House,
He suggested that the reason for the poor attendance in this House this afternoon for the debate on this motion, might be the new procedure for the study of estimates. I think another excuse will have to be found because we know that sometimes on Friday afternoons few members are present in the House.
Moreover, he claimed that some government members, during the study in committee of bills or estimates, kept raising point of orders so as to prevent opposition members from obtaining information. Among other things he indicated that the hon. member for Gatineau was one of those who abused this procedure, and I will not use the excuse given by my colleague, the hon. member for Ontario (Mr. Cafik) this afternoon, when he said that he did not sit with the member for Yukon, because since January 4, I have attended various committees with the member for Yukon and I have no excuse to offer, either to the members of committees I have attended or to the House, with regard the points of order I have raised on a number of occasions, because if I did, it was to draw the committee chairman's attention to the fact that the member who had the floor was dealing with a question that had not been referred to the committee. I am not blaming the members in question for trying to engage in discussions outside the subject.
I will now make a few remarks on the motion, specifically about the following part:
That this House, protesting the Government's continuing takeover of Parliamentary control of public money-*
When the hon. member for Peace River (Mr. Baldwin) brought in a similar motion on May 26, 1972, I had the opportunity to make some comments and I referred to the new procedure used by this House since 1968 to examine the estimates. I am one of those, Mr. Speaker, who believe that the present procedure is better than the one that existed since Confederation.
And it is since 1968 that at the beginning of February every year, the President of the Treasury Board tables in the House the estimates for the coming year. That is what the President of the Treasury Board (M. Drury) did last February when he tabled the estimates for the fiscal year ending March 31, 1974.
Before 1968, the estimates were examined by a special committee known as the Committee of Supply of the House, where members could only put questions to the minister responsible for the items under study. But the current procedure which consists in referring the estimates to the 16 standing committees of the House, enables the members to put questions not only to the minister responsible but also to the officials.
Mr. Speaker, committees also are empowered, if they deem it necessary, to call other witnesses from the private

sector. We had from 40 to 60 days to study the estimates, or an average of about 200 hours per fiscal year.
Under the new procedure, taking the year 1972 as an example, almost 500 hours were used by the various committees to study the estimates. Again, I insist that the current procedure is much better than the one in effect from Confederation to 1968.
The President of the Treasury Board repeatedly said, and again this afternoon, that the government is always looking for a new procedure to improve on the current one designed to protect public money.


An hon. Member:: Oh! oh! Listen to that!-


Gaston Clermont: The hon. member for Simcoe-North mentioned that the Department of Supplies and Services did not resort to public tendering. He said that the present Minister of Supply and Services (Mr. Goyer) did nothing to change that practice. I must say that I was sitting on the committee on miscellaneous estimates when the hon. member for Simcoe North was asking his questions of the minister.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member intended to refer to me, I am the member for York-Simcoe.


Gaston Clermont: I thank the member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) for calling my attention to the fact that I referred to him by the wrong riding, but I remember quite clearly, Mr. Speaker, when the hon. member put his questions to the Minister of Supply and Services, the latter had answered: "As soon as I became responsible for the Department of Supply and Services and got acquainted with the procedure, I asked my officials to draw up a report, and when I get that report, I will assume my responsibilities."
I felt duty bound, Mr. Speaker, to say how things happened in the Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates.
Mr. Speaker, some have criticized the $1 items, giving the impression that this procedure has only been in effect since 1963 or 1968. I have in hand, Mr. Speaker, photostats of estimates for 1958, 1959, 1961, 1962 and 1963, and if time allowed me, I could quote various $1 items. I remember that the member for Northumberland-Durham (Mr. Lawrence), former minister in the Robarts and Davis governments, said in the Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates that this procedure was commonly used, and when the President of the Treasury Board submitted his main estimates for 1973-74 to the Committee on Miscellaneous Estimates, he undertook to give explanations on every $1 item.
That procedure already existed for a couple of years in the Senate and the President of the Treasury Board undertook in the future to follow the procedure used when he was asked to appear before the Senate committee which has the responsibility to consider those estimates.
May 25, 1973

So criticism is passed on a vote that applies not only to the current year but to subsequent years. It is again a practice which existed for many years.
The report of the Auditor General for 1972 also mentions the fact that the government failed to do anything about the 38 recommendations and comments made by the Public Accounts Committee. When I spoke on the motion on May 26, 1972, I mentioned the action taken by the government concerning those 38 recommendations and comments. I said, and I quote:
A tabulation of these 38 recommendations indicates that the government has indeed responded to them, although not necessarily by acting in the fashion proposed. A substantial number of the issues have been subject to hearings before the Public Accounts Committee. I may say that in most cases these have satisfied the committee, because the subsequent reports of the committee have not raised the issues again.
I now refer to tabulations of issues and action taken. Many of these have been subject to lengthy debate. In this regard the committee has played an effective role and the procedure is not as ineffective as indicated. Mr. Speaker, the following is a summary of action taken on recommendations of the Public Accounts Committee: First, recommendations on which there has been specific comment by the minister involved, 14; second, recommendations on which there has been subsequent specific testimony by departments to the Public Accounts Committee without any new or changed recommendation by the committee, eight; third, recommendations on which departments have not been called upon to testify to the Public Accounts Committee but on which they have taken action which has not received publicity, three; fourth, recommendations which call for continued observation by the Auditor General of departmental practices rather than government action, one; fifth, recommendations subject to action re formulation of separate Auditor General Act, one.
And on the subject of a separate act for the Auditor General the Public Accounts Committee during the fourth session of the 28th Parliament, of which I was a member, called upon a committee of experts to draft a bill to be submitted to the Public Accounts Committee. I am sure that the Public Accounts Committee will take its responsibilities and make recommendations to the Parliament of Canada or the government.
On this committee were, I think, Mr. Ball, assistant deputy minister of the Department of Supply and Services, the parliamentary counsel for the House of Commons, the parliamentary counsel for the Senate and a representative of the Auditor General's office. And I go on with the quotation:
Sixth,
I go back to the recommendations and comments made by the Public Accounts Committee in recent years, and I quote:
Sixth, action could not be determined in time available since tabling of Auditor General's report, four.
Seventh, recommendations made too recently for action to be taken, seven.
So, that is what happened to the 38 recommendations, Mr. Speaker.
In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I want to insist once again that I am one of those who believe that the present procedure is an improvement over the one that existed from 1867 to 1968. Such a procedure enables members of the various parties to put questions either to the minister or to the officials.
Control of Public Funds
I again stress the fact that if a member, under the rules, requires a witness from the private sector for additional information to those given by the minister or an official, he can give notice to the chairman of the committee, and this witness must then appear before the committee.
And I hope, Mr. Speaker, that the House, the Public Accounts Committee as well as other committees will keep on looking for improved procedures so that, as I said earlier, the public moneys will be closely controlled.


Mr. H. W. Danforth (Kent-Essex):: Mr. Speaker, I look forward to speaking today on this subject and backing up my colleague who proposed the motion. I do so because I think we are expressing, through this motion, not only the feeling of the official opposition and of the other opposition parties in this House, but the feeling of uneasiness of the people of Canada when they see what is transpiring in their Parliament.
I listened to the speeches today because I am sincerely interested in this matter. I was very impressed by the speakers on this side who brought forward various points demonstrating their concern over Parliament's control of the expenditure of Canadian taxpayers' money which has reached tremendous levels. We appreciate this fact when we talk of the disbursement of $20 billion. No wonder the Canadian people not only are concerned about, but have a right to know how these moneys are disbursed. Those who are disbursing them should be held responsible for their policies and for the manner in which these moneys are distributed.
I was struck again today-I do not say this unkindly; I say it factually-by the arrogance of the speakers from the government party when they tried to demonstrate once again that Canadians have never had it so good, that they have never had a system that has been working so well. In their speeches they have demonstrated their unveiled contempt for the feelings of the people of this nation. That is the prime reason this government is in political trouble. Everyone makes errors. It is only normal that a group of individuals acting together will make errors; and this government makes errors. That is why we bring this matter to the attention of Parliament today.
It is not good enough for this government to assure Parliament that they are infallible in the way they are conducting the business of our nation, and that the Auditor General should not dare to criticize their expenditures-the man whose responsibility and prime objective is to study those expenditures. They do not think he should dare to question any of their disbursements. This indicates the feeling of the government toward Parliament and the people of Canada.
I was both upset and shocked by the speeches of members of the government side. I refer to one in particular, whom I shall not name, who spent his entire time criticizing the Auditor General, the man who in latter years has done more than any other individual, in the exercise of his duty, to safeguard the expenditures made on behalf of Canadian taxpayers. That was his job, and we must give him credit for trying to do it to the best of his ability. We must not criticize him because he dared to suggest that in
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May 25, 1973
Control of Public Funds
the spending of the Canadian taxpayers' money the government was less than wise.
In the time allotted to me I would like to deal with one other subject. It is the subject of parliamentary control of the expenditures of this nation under the changed parliamentary rules which this government introduced; a change, they said, that was going to make Parliament more efficient and would give us a better opportunity to study in detail the expenditures of the government. There is no doubt in my mind that those who studied this question and proposed the rule changes meant well. In theory it looked as if the system could work, but in practice Members of Parliament soon realized that the parliamentary committee system today is not only useless but is absolutely futile in discharging the responsibility with which it is charged. I should like to give some examples, not in a partisan way but in a practical way, of what is actually going on. The hon. member for Gatineau (Mr. Clermont) spoke about the committee system. He is a member with some experience, having been a chairman. Let me say this, Mr. Speaker, that when 16 standing committees have to sit at the same time as Parliament during a session, it is absolutely impossible for any political party including the government, to man them adequately.


Mr. Bell:: They are sitting this afternoon.


Harold Warren Danforth: We have 16 committees sitting this session, and last session there were 23. With the restricted number of members that we have in the House, it is impossible to man them adequately. The first thing that government members tried to do in bringing in this new committee system was to decrease the number of members necessary for a quorum. This so-called committee system is so bad right now that on a committee with 20 members, members of the government have proposed that we should have votes with only one member of the government sitting on the committee.


James Aloysius McGrath: Shame.


Harold Warren Danforth: This indicates the degree of confidence the government has in its own committee system. They said that it did not work and they were dissatisfied with it. The only people who have proved to be dissatisfied with the government's committee system of examining government estimates in detail are the members sitting on the government benches. To say that we can study estimates in detail is just a sham. Under the old system, as has been illustrated in debate today, the responsible minister sat in this House and answered questions in full. Under the present system they may or may not attend the committee, as they choose-not as the committee chooses. As a rule, however, out of courtesy the minister usually comes in and makes a prepared statement which takes perhaps an hour, and he usually remains in committee for another hour.
We have had instances, though, where a minister would not even come to committee or, having made an initial appearance, has never returned. This system of dealing with estimates, where we are dealing with thousands of millions of dollars and a member may get 10 or 20 minutes

once a week to ask questions in a committee that sits only during two or three months, is ridiculous. It is impossible to deal with more than a fraction of the expenditures of a particular department.
Mr. Speaker, this is the system this government says efficiently deals with the scrutiny of the expenditure of $20 billion of taxpayers' money. If the government sometimes admitted that it made mistakes, it would be a lot more popular with the Canadian people. Why do they not admit this? The Canadian people would accept it, but this Liberal government is not one iota different from the previous Liberal government.


James Aloysius McGrath: The same old bunch.


Harold Warren Danforth: When an ill-founded or irresponsible expenditure of millions of dollars has been made, the government feels that the only course of action is to conceal it, not reveal it. The government states that the information is available to the opposition and to the people of Canada. Mr. Speaker, all the people have to do is read Hansard and they will see for themselves the lack of responsibility demonstrated by ministers when they are asked questions, and how they constantly seek not only to conceal information but demonstrate a derogatory and contemptuous manner when doing it.
This system is not working, Mr. Speaker, and our debate today will have little effect on the thinking of this government, I am afraid. They feel that they are right, regardless of the fact that every opposition party in the House believes the system is not working. Even though the people of Canada are showing a lack of confidence in the system, the government still feels that it has attained perfection. If things continue as they have in the past, the only change the Canadian people can expect in our parliamentary system in the next few months is one carefully designed by the Liberal government to restrict even further the ability of opposition parties to obtain full information on the expenditure of the tax dollar. Mr. Speaker, they show contempt toward the system we have had since confederation.


Mr. Albert Bechard (Bonaventure-Iles de la Madeleine):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the hon. member.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Bonaventure-Iles de la Madeleine has a question to ask.


Albert Béchard: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member complains that the present committee system does not allow opposition members to scrutinize the estimates of every department. Could he explain why during hours and hours of session, members of the opposition did not ask any question on the estimates but only on government policy?


Harold Warren Danforth: Mr. Speaker, the question just demonstrates the arrogance I have been speaking of, because not only do they now want to restrict our questions, but they want to tell us the type of questions we should ask. This is one of the reasons we feel we will not make any progress with the present government.
May 25, 1973

In conclusion, let me say that I think the people of Canada will appreciate and support any parliamentary rule that is designed for the welfare of the people of Canada. All that has been designed in the last few years by this government is a rule to restrict the power of the people to have knowledge of what is going on.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. It being five o'clock, it is my duty to inform the House that pursuant to section
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11 of Standing Order 58, the proceedings on the motion have expired.
This House stands adjourned until Monday at 2 p.m., pursuant to Standing Order 2(3).
At 5 p.m. the House adjourned, without question put, pursuant to Standing Order.
26314-44*

Monday, May 28, 1973