1973-05-24

[Stage Direction]
Third report of Standing Committee on Transport and Communications-Mr. Horner (Crowfoot).
[Editor's Note: For text of above report, see today's Votes and Proceedings.]

Hon. Mitchell Sharp (Secretary of State for External Affairs):: Mr. Speaker, I have the honour to table the text of correspondence between the Department of External Affairs and Mr. Marc Cayer on the subject of the expenses associated with his return to Canada, as well as the text of a departmental memorandum itemizing these expenses. I have also included an English translation of the letters and a French translation of the memorandum.


VETERANS AFFAIRS
Mr. Jack Marshall (Humber-St. George's- St. Barbe):: Mr. Speaker, I ask for unanimous consent to move a motion under Standing Order 43. The decision by the government to phase out the Veterans Land Act in March, 1974, will deny a majority of 125,000 veterans now qualified and other servicemen who will retire the opportunity to take advantage of the act because of the lack of flexibility in qualifying due to changing conditions. I therefore move, seconded by the hon. member for Hamilton Mountain (Mr. Beattie):
That a joint study be appointed immediately to look into the problem, and that the matter be referred to the Standing Committee on Veterans Affairs.


Mr. Speaker:: Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


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


GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION
Mr. Barry Mather (Surrey-White Rock):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to move a motion under Standing Order 43 on a matter of urgent business arising out of the report of the Auditor General tabled yesterday and having to do with his call for a management study of government organization, administration, methods and procedures involving federal expenditures now exceeding $20 billion per year. I therefore move, seconded by the hon. member for Winnipeg North Centre (Mr. Knowles):
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.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Perhaps the hon. member for Shefford might allow the Chair to make one comment about the proposed motion of the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock. I have serious doubts whether this motion is in order. The hon. member is referring to a report which is before a committee at the present time. I have stated before and I should like to restate now that hon. members should not take it for granted or assume that any motion proposed under Standing Order 43 is in order and that the Speaker is under an obligation to put it to the House to determine whether there is unanimous consent. The motion has to be in order before it can be put. However, I am prepared to give the hon. member the benefit of the doubt and ask whether there is unanimous consent.


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


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

May 24, 1973
Government Administration


FINANCE
Mr. Speaker:: As consent is not unanimous, I regret to advise the hon. member for Richmond that his motion cannot be put to the House.


Mr. Gilbert Rondeau (Shefford):: Mr. Speaker, pursuant to Standing Order 43, I solicit unanimous consent of the House to bring forward a motion related to a matter of specific and urgent necessity.
In view of the fact that federal-provincial conferences almost always end up in a deadlock and bickering over fiscal matters, and in view of the serious danger to the unity of the country such fiscal bickering represents, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Richmond (Mr. Beaudoin):
That this House consider the monetary possibilities proposed by the Social Credit Party of Canada in order to arrive at a solution which would release the federal government from its deadlock and allow provinces to administer according to the spirit of Confederation.


Mr. Speaker:: The House has heard the hon. member's motion. Under Standing Order 43, this motion requires unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Yes.


Some hon. Members:: No.


Mr. Speaker:: It appears that there is unanimity among members of the hon. member for Shefford's party, but no unanimity in the House. The motion therefore cannot be put.


MEASURES TO PERMIT BANK OF CANADA TO GRANT LOANS TO PROVINCES-REQUEST FOR UNANIMOUS CONSENT TO MOVE MOTION
Mr. Leonel Beaudoin (Richmond):: Mr. Speaker, I rise to seek the unanimous consent of the House to move a motion, pursuant to Standing Order 43, to allow the discussion of an extremely important matter, particularly during the current federal-provincial conference of first ministers.
As the provinces have executive powers, under the British North America Act, and the central government has the appropriate financial means to help those provinces fulfil their obligations, I move, seconded by the hon. member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau):
That this House study without delay the means to enable the Bank of Canada to make available to the provinces the financial resources required to meet their constitutional obligations.


Mr. Speaker:: The House has heard the motion of the hon. member. Under Standing Order 43, it requires unanimous consent of the House. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.

[ English]


INDIAN AFFAIRS
Mr. Elias Nesdoly (Meadow Lake):: Mr. Speaker, I rise on a matter of utmost urgency under Standing Order 43 arising from a joint communique by officials of the Department of National Health and Welfare and the Department of Indian Affairs dated April 3, 1973, affecting medical entitlement of treaty Indians and particularly entitlement to prescription drugs. In view of a letter issued on May 8, 1973, to the Saskatchewan Pharmaceutical Association advising them that Indian health services will no longer be responsible for provision of drugs to treaty Indian people falling into certain groupings as of June 1, 1973, and since this appears to be an abrogation of the "Medicine Chest Clause" in Treaty No. 6, I therefore move-	*


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member should not make a speech in support of the motion he is presenting under Standing Order 43. I appreciate he is at the point of proposing the motion. For the advantage of the hon. member for Meadow Lake and other hon. members I point out that the case in support of a motion under Standing Order 43 should not be made but that the motion should be put to the House for the consideration of the Chair under the terms of Standing Order 43.


Elias (Eli) Nesdoly: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Therefore I move, seconded by the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom):
That the question of health and pharmaceutical services to the Indian people be referred immediately for study and report to the Standing Committees on Health and Welfare and Indian Affairs.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member's motion requires unanimous consent. Is there unanimous consent?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


Some hon. Members:: No.


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


HOLIDAYS ACT
Mr. John Reynolds (Burnaby-Richmond-Delta) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-184, to amend the Holidays Act.


Some hon. Members:: Explain.
May 24, 1973


John Douglas Reynolds: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this bill is to make the national holiday celebrated in Canada to commemorate the confederation of Canada as a country a celebration that is more relevant and meaningful to Canadians of all races and nationalities. The bill proposes that the holiday on July 1 be known as Canada Day.


[Stage Direction]
Motion agreed to, bill read the first time and ordered to be printed.
Mr. Speaker:: When shall the said bill be read a second time?


Some hon. Members:: Now.


Mr. Speaker:: The Chair is prepared to put the second reading motion now.


Mr. MacLean:: There is not unanimous consent, Mr. Speaker.


Mr. Speaker:: There is not unanimous consent. At the next sitting of the House.


CANADA ELECTIONS ACT
Mr. Reg Stackhouse (Scarborough East) moved: for leave to introduce Bill C-185, to amend the Canada Elections Act (leave of absence).


Some hon. Members:: Explain.


Reginald Francis Stackhouse: Mr. Speaker, the purpose of this bill is to open membership in parliament to many who cannot seek it now because they would jeopardize their employment if they were candidates. It would give all employees under the jurisdiction of the Canada Labour Code the right to a leave of absence with or without pay during an election campaign in which they are candidates and give them the right to a leave of absence of up to five years without pay if they are elected to serve in this House.


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

Mr. Speaker:: It is my duty to inform the House that an objection signed by the hon. members for Sherbrooke, Gloucester, Madawaska-Victoria, Bonaventure-Iles de la Madeleine, Lapointe, York-Sunbury, Westmorland-Kent, Carleton-Charlotte, Glengarry-Prescott-Russell and Sarnia-Lambton has been filed with me pursuant to section 20 of the Electoral Boundaries Readjustment Act, Chapter E-2, R.S.C., 1970 to the report of the Electoral
Oral Questions
Boundaries Commission for the province of New Brunswick.
[ Transla tion]
If the House is agreeable, I would propose that the text of the objections be printed as an appendix to today's Votes and Proceedings. Does the House agree?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.
[Editor's Note: For text referred to above, see Appendix to today's Votes and Proceedings.]



ORAL QUESTION PERIOD


Hon. Robert L. Stanfield (Leader of the Opposition):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. It relates to a study entitled "Canada's Commercial Policy and Energy" prepared by the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce and alleged to have been sent to the National Energy Board in November, 1971. I assume it was also sent to the minister's department. Were the recommendations in this report approved in principle or simply rejected or ignored? I ask this in light of the finding in the report that Canada's oil and gas were being sold abroad too cheaply and unless the government of Canada took action this would continue and the Canadian economy would be badly damaged.


Hon. Donald S. Macdonald (Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources):: Mr. Speaker, with regard to one of the questions involved, namely, possible negotiation for further access of Canadian petroleum products to the United States, I think it is obvious that the conclusions have now been followed and have been overtaken by events. In fact, there are no negotiations on this question with the United States. Indeed, since I have assumed this portfolio we have taken steps to put an over-all ceiling on our shipments to that country.
With regard to the question of prices, particularly the effect on the Canadian market of the increasing price in the international market, I responded earlier last week to a question along these lines from the hon. member for Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands by pointing out that the question of a two-price system, and trying particularly to insulate the Canadian market against the impact of international prices, has been receiving detailed study. The issues involved in this Star story are much more fully argued out in the energy policy studies we hope to make available to the House in the very near future.

May 24, 1973
Oral Questions


An hon. Member:: You have been saying that for months.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: Granted the minister made some comment about a two-price system in the House last week, can he give any reason why this report dated in November, 1971, has not been acted upon, and why, since this report has been in the hands of the government all this time, he is only now getting around to making some preliminary comments with regard to energy policy? Has the minister any excuse for this?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I would point out to the hon. gentleman, as I did at the beginning of my last response, that it is apparent that the argument in the report has been acted upon, that there has been no initiative taken by the government of Canada to seek increased access to the United States market. I would say now, as I have said many times in public since I have been minister, that as the report indicates we have a distinct advantage here. It is not necessarily in our interests that we should be prepared to make an over-all pact with the United States with regard to energy commodities, and through the actions of the National Energy Board under regulation 11A and in other ways we have been seeking to get improved payments to Canada for our resources. Indeed, the further processing provisions of the mineral policy objectives which I set before the House just a week ago are a further indication of our efforts in this regard.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: With all due respect to the minister, they do not indicate that any action was taken until Alberta moved.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: That is not so.


Robert Lorne Stanfield: I should like to ask the minister whether he is prepared to table promptly in the House this study entitled "Canada's Commercial Policy and Energy" and similar background papers so that we can be fully apprised of the stakes involved in formulating a new policy? Will he do this immediately rather than wait until he is ready to table some papers of his own?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: It seems to me that the energy policy studies are a much fuller treatment of the all the interprovincial, national and international issues involved and that they would provide a far better presentation of these important issues.


Mr. Hees:: So it seems to you.


REQUEST FOR TWO-PRICE SYSTEM FOR OIL AND SUPPLYING OF WESTERN CANADA PRODUCT TO EAST
Mr. T. C. Douglas (Nanaimo-Cowichan-The Islands):: In view of the fact that this report was prepared by the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce 18 months ago recommending a two-price system for oil in Canada, may I ask the minister whether he is prepared now, after a year and a half of study, to announce a two-price system for oil in view of the fact that prices of oil and gasoline in Canada are going up at a totally unjustified rate?


An hon. Member:: Totally justified.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: I would remind the hon. member again that part of the Canadian market, with regard to oil in particular, is dependent on foreign supplies and as the cost of offshore oil goes up so inevitably will prices in Canada. It is because of the complexities of our market, the division between east and west and also the conflicting interests between western Canada and the eastern Canada market that we think there is an important question to be decided not only internally by this government but also by the provincial governments. No, I am not prepared to announce a two-price system today. I believe this is one of the national issues which should be debated fully after the studies have been made available.


Thomas Clement (Tommy) Douglas: If the minister has studied this document entitled "Canada's Commercial Policy and Energy" he will have noticed that the writer says the present oil policy with its Ottawa Valley line is no longer in the public interest. May I ask the minister whether he is prepared to allow western crude oil into the eastern market and fix the price of that oil so that the people of eastern Canada will have western oil that will compete against offshore oil for which they pay a higher price at the present time?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I would remind the hon. gentleman, as he knows, that western Canada oil, even with the increase in the international price, still costs more in the Montreal market than the international product. On this basis, what the hon. gentleman is proposing is an increase in the cost of oil for the Canadian market east of the Ottawa Valley line. This is just one indication of the complexities that may result from a rather simplified approach to this proposal.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Obviously a number of hon. members want to ask supplementaries on this question. The Chair will recognize the hon. member for Temis-camingue and will then return to the hon. members for Trinity, Qu'Appelle-Moose Mountain, Yorkton-Melville and others who appear to want to debate this matter.

[ Transla tion]


THE CANADIAN ECONOMY
Mr. Real Caouette (Temiscamingue):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to put a question to the Prime Minister, but in his absence I shall direct it to the Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Since the free market for gold is increasingly prosperous abroad, did this government conceive any projects aiming at inciting companies to undertake works in eastern Ontario and western Quebec in order to encourage the opening or re-opening of gold mines in these areas?


Mitchell William Sharp: there were a revival of gold mining activity in Canada as a result.


AWARENESS OF MINISTER WHEN HE ASSUMED PORTFOLIO OF REPORT, &quot;CANADA'S COMMERCIAL POLICY AND ENERGY&quot;
Hon. Alvin Hamilton (Qu'Appelle-Moose Mountain):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to return to the question that was directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. What intrigues me about the answer the minister gave is that he prefaced his answer to the Leader of the Opposition by saying, "since I have been minister".


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. May I interrupt the hon. member. The hon. member prefaces his own question by referring to what intrigues him about the minister's response to a previous question. I would hope the hon. member would ask a question rather than refer by way of preface to the statement made earlier this afternoon by the minister. I am making this suggestion in the hope we will be able to proceed a little more quickly.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Mr. Speaker, my question is based on the preamble to my question. When the minister became Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources 14 months ago, did he see this report from the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce that is now reported in the Toronto Star?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, when I became minister I saw a great many documents, but I am certainly familiar with all the arguments that are made in this particular document-


George Harris Hees: Answer the question.


Donald Stovel Macdonald: -which are among some of the central policy issues to be resolved in Canada.


Francis Alvin George Hamilton: Does this evasion on the part of the minister explain why the chairman of the National Energy Board was reluctant to answer questioning in the standing committee in regard to whether he had-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. This kind of questioning, to my way of thinking, is entirely out of order. The hon. member for Trinity on a supplementary.


ALLEGATION THAT INTERNATIONAL COMPANIES HAVE SUPPLIED FOREIGN OIL TO EASTERN CANADA AT ARTIFICIALLY HIGH PRICES TO REDUCE TAXES
Hon. Paul Hellyer (Trinity):: Mr. Speaker, may I direct my supplementary to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources. Has the government investigated the allegation that the big international oil companies have supplied foreign crude to eastern Canada at artificially high transfer prices in order to reduce taxes paid in Canada and to
Oral Questions
move taxable income into tax havens? If so, what are the results of the investigation?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, the National Energy Board has had international prices under close scrutiny. Whether a specific investigation of this kind has been made by the board I am not sure, but I can certainly find out.


Paul Theodore Hellyer: Would the minister find out, and if an investigation has been made would he present to the House the report of the Energy Board?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: Mr. Speaker, I would be glad to consult the board and report my findings to the House.


TAXATION
Mr. Edward Broadbent (Oshawa-Whitby):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Revenue. Following my questioning of the minister on Tuesday in the committee concerning alleged tax evasion by the Chrysler Corporation, and in view of the related criticism by the Auditor General in his report just released, I should like to ask the minister whether he is now prepared to take immediate steps to enforce the Income Tax Act in order to prevent corporate manipulations designed to avoid payment of corporate income taxes. If he does plan to take such action, will he inform the House of what it will consist?


Hon. Robert Stanbury (Minister of National Revenue):: Mr. Speaker, without referring to any particular taxpayer, the kind of action the hon. member recommends is being taken by my department.


REASONS FOR REMISSION OF DUTY AND SALES TAX ON CERTAIN IMPORTED CARS AND PARTS
John Edward Broadbent: Following that very informative answer, Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the minister whether he will inform the House of the reasons that led to the order in council dated February 10, 1972, which enabled a car manufacturer to obtain retroactively duty and sales tax remissions on imported cars and parts in the amount of $6 million as indicated by the Auditor General in his recent report?


Robert Douglas George Stanbury: That was before my time, Mr. Speaker, but I will be glad to find out and advise the hon. member.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!

May 24, 1973
Oral Questions


ALLEGED FAILURE TO REPORT TO HOUSE REMISSIONS OF
John Edward Broadbent: Mr. Speaker, I should like to address my final supplementary question to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce but since he is not here I will put it to his parliamentary secretary. In view of the finding of the Auditor General that remissions of duties on machinery in excess of $1,000 granted to corporations are not being reported to the House of Commons as required by law, and in view of the fact that these remissions for the past year amounted to approximately $78 million, will the minister take steps to ensure that this illegal practice is stopped immediately, and will he further ensure that the names of the corporations and the amounts remitted to them will be reported forthwith to the Public Accounts Committee in conformity with the law?


Mr. Herb Breau (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce):: Mr. Speaker, without necessarily agreeing with the member's statement, I will bring the matter to the minister's attention who, with his usual attention, will look after it.


GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION
Mr. G. W. Baldwin (Peace River):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the President of the Treasury Board. In light of the additional well documented revelations of administrative incompetence and spending misappropriations, is the government now considering the proposal or suggestion of the former Auditor General that the government commission a management study of government organization which would take the form of an audit of all organization and management procedures?


Hon. C. M. Drury (President of the Treasury Board):: Mr. Speaker, I think before reaching a conclusion on this point I would welcome the views of the newly appointed Auditor General.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question for the Acting Prime Minister. I take it that the minister's answer means the government intends to do nothing. Having in mind the repeated warnings about the loss of parliamentary control of current high levels of government spending, will the government in collaboration with the House consider finding ways and means of rectifying this very serious situation and restoring to parliament the right of control over spending that it should have?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I do not accept the proposition, and I am sure my hon. friend would not want to accept the proposition that

parliament does not control the expenditure of public funds.


An hon. Member:: It is true.


Mitchell William Sharp: It obviously does. The committees established for this purpose probably represent the best system that has been in effect during my time in Ottawa. It is certainly an enormous improvement over the situation when estimates of the departments had to be considered in Committee of the Whole. The committee system is an enormous improvement, and I hope the hon. gentleman will learn to use that committee system.


EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Mr. A. D. Hales (Wellington):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. Has he received a public apology from Zambia in connection with the coldblooded murder of two Canadian girls? If such an apology has not been received or if it is not received shortly, does the government intend to reappraise Canada's aid to Zambia?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I should like first of all to associate myself with the hon. gentleman's concern about the way in which this matter has been dealt with by the Zambian authorities. We have received the report of our first secretary who was sent to Rhodesia to investigate the circumstances of this tragedy. We have instructed our High Commissioner in Lusaka once again to contact the Zambian authorities at a very high level and to make clear to them that we are treating this matter very seriously indeed and wish the fullest possible investigation to be continued. We are not satisfied with the public statement that has been made, and we have received no direct communication from the Zambian government.


Alfred Dryden Hales: Mr. Speaker, in view of the conflicting reports that appear to be emanating from that area, will the minister give consideration to referring this very serious matter to the United Nations for a report?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, before taking any further action I would prefer to see what is the result of the representations we are now making to the Zambian government.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair will recognize the hon. member for Surrey-White Rock on a supplementary to the previous question and then the hon. member for Shefford.
May 24, 1973


GOVERNMENT ADMINISTRATION
Barry Mather: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary question in respect of the subject of the Auditor General's report which I should like to direct to the attention of the President of the Treasury Board. Having in mind the many recommendations over the years by the Auditor General and the Public Accounts Committee in respect of economies that might be made in the expenditure of public funds by various departments, I should like to ask whether the minister will, in light of the report of the Auditor General tabled yesterday, give early attention to the implementation of those recommendations?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman is asking that we give early attention to the implementation of recommendations. I might point out that a number of them have in fact been dealt with not only by the committee but by the House, even though they continue to be referred to in the report. I think that probably the most useful approach would be for the Public Accounts Committee to receive a report on the status of each of these so-called recommendations at an early sitting. I would be glad to have that prepared.


Gerald William Baldwin: Some go back to 1963.


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: We have had two major debates on postal rates and you have not said a word.


Gerald William Baldwin: Those horses are dead now.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, I should like to put a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Since the minister has just stated that he has not yet obtained news about the murder of two Canadian women in Rhodesia by Zambian troops and that he has not heard from the government of Zambia, does the Canadian government, through the Department of External Affairs, intend to ask the Rhodesian government for a report giving us its own account of those two murders?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, the hon. gentleman may not have heard the answer I gave to the previous question. I have asked the Zambian authorities to give us a full report. We are not satisfied with the public statement they made and we are pursuing this matter most vigorously.
Oral Questions



NATIONAL HARBOURS BOARD


Mr. Don Mazankowski (Vegreville):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the President of the Treasury Board arising from the report of the Auditor General which points out, among other things, that the accounts of the National Harbours Board were so inadequate as to prevent the Auditor General from expressing an opinion on the validity and accuracy of the 1971 accounts. Will the minister advise the House whether the government is seriously considering the Auditor General's recommendation calling for the appointment of an experienced comptroller with full authority to co-ordinate the administrative and accounting procedures of the National Harbours Board?


Charles Mills (Bud) Drury: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member will realize that the National Harbours Board is a semi-autonomous body which reports to parliament through the Minister of Transport. I would prefer that he would answer as to what action has been taken to restructure and reform both the Dractices and the organization of the National Harbours Board.


Donald Frank Mazankowski: I appreciate the minister's reply but in view of the fact that this appears to be in violation of section 77 of the Financial Administration Act, under which I believe the minister and the Treasury Board have full authority to govern, would the minister not reconsider his position in this matter with a view to recommending to the Minister of Transport that this recommendation be implemented?


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member's supplementary question is in the form of a representation.



AIRPORTS


Mr.   Sean@: Mr. Speaker, in the absence of the Minister of Transport may I direct this question to his parliamentary secretary. In view of the commitment made on behalf of the Minister of Transport by the Minister of Labour, can the parliamentary secretary advise the House as to the date of the meeting in the Hamilton area between the minister and citizens' groups opposed to the expansion of Mount Hope airport and whether these meetings will be open to the news media and the general public?


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for St. Catharines.
Oral Questions EXTERNAL AFFAIRS

May 24, 1973



VIET NAM-INQUIRY AS TO ANNOUNCEMENT CONCERNING CONTINUANCE OF CANADIAN PARTICIPATION IN CONTROL COMMISSION

Mr. Trevor Morgan (St. Catharines):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of the stalemate which is obviously present in the International Commission of Control and Supervision, I wonder when we can expect an announcement or pronouncement concerning the indecision of the government as to what is going to happen in respect of our troops in Viet Nam?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I promised the House that before the end of this month a decision would be made. That is still our intention, and I expect that one day next week I will announce the government's decision.



NATIONAL DEFENCE


George Harris Hees: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of National Defence. Would the minister take the first opportunity on motions to explain to the House why the government recently sold 18 CF-5 aircraft to Venezuela and still has 43 of these aircraft in storage in view of the fact the minister's predecessor, the present Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources, advised the House only a few months ago that these aircraft were completely satisfactory for the needs of our armed forces and necessary for the operation of those forces?


Hon. James Richardson (Minister of National Defence):: Mr. Speaker, this subject has been discussed quite fully in committee and in the House, but if I do consider it will be helpful to make a further statement I will do so.


George Harris Hees: I have attended all the meetings that have been held and it has not been discussed since last fall, as the minister very well knows. Has the minister started departmental inquiries into the reasons the four DDH280 destroyers, which were originally estimated to cost $150 million, have now cost more than double that amount and, in addition, the costs are still increasing and the destroyers are reported to still be in unsatisfactory condition?


James Armstrong Richardson: Mr. Speaker, the DDH destroyer program is within budget. It is within the figure approved by Treasury Board.


George Harris Hees: Would the minister not agree that the cost is more than double the original estimate?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. This is, of course, argument.



TRANSPORT


Mr. Harry Olaussen (Coast Chilcotin):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct this question to the Minister of Transport but since he is not here today perhaps the acting minister or the parliamentary secretary would reply. In view of the fact the federal subsidy to the Singapore registered ship, MV Travetal in the past fiscal year amounted to $368,000, can the minister tell the House if federal government financial assistance to this foreign-registered and foreign-manned vessel will continue as part of the financial assistance by it for the purpose of enabling this ship to carry automobiles between Halifax, Nova Scotia, and St. John's, Newfoundland?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I fail to see the urgency of the question, although I have been wrong when it comes to judging urgency. In asking questions hon. members always suggest that they should be answered the very day they are asked, but it seems to me this question could very well be placed on the order paper or perhaps asked and answered at the time of adjournment. Is the hon. member rising on a point of order?


Harry Magnus Olaussen: Yes. Mr. Speaker, I would like to rephrase the question.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. That is hardly a point of order, but if the hon. member can ask the question in such a way that it will appear to be urgent certainly it will be accepted.


Harry Magnus Olaussen: Mr. Speaker, I should like to direct the question to the Minister of Transport in the hope that I may receive an appropriate answer. In view of the fact that this ship, the MV Travetal of Singapore registry, has been picketed since yesterday, does the minister intend to require the Travetal to assume Canadian registry and employ some of the vast army of Canadian unemployed?


Mr. Speaker:: The rephrased question seems to be a little more urgent. Perhaps the mister might be allowed to reply.


Mr. Joseph-Philippe Guay (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Transport):: Mr. Speaker, I would be pleased to bring the matter to the attention of the minister.



FINANCE


Mr. Eldon M. Woolliams (Calgary North):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Acting Prime Minister whether there has been any agreement with the provinces to get a better and greater share of the revenues in light of the fact that property taxes now in urban centres have made it
May 24, 1973

almost impossible for the average Canadian to meet the instalment payments on his home?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, discussions are now proceeding in another place as to the division of revenues and so far as I know there has not yet been complete agreement.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: I do not know whether or not this is a leak, but in light of the fact that the national press of Canada says there has been a breakdown in the discussions that have taken place on this important subject, would the minister undertake that later when the Prime Minister returns he will make a full statement on this matter which is so important to the provinces and particularly to the urban centres of Canada?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I think I can give an undertaking on behalf of the Prime Minister that first thing he would do after his return would be to give a report on the negotiations now proceeding.



NORTHERN AFFAIRS


Mr. Peter C. Bawden (Calgary South):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. As a result of a court hearing in Yellowknife last week an article appeared in the press which stated that the land freeze prevents transfer of ownership or the granting of any further use of any portion of the 400,000 square miles in dispute and effectively covers the entire Mackenzie River basin. Does this mean that oil exploration activity in the north and normal land transactions between companies must cease until the claim is resolved, or that permits and leases granted to oil companies are in jeopardy?
[ Transla tion]


Hon. Jean Chretien (Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development):: Mr. Speaker, this action lodged before the courts has in no way affected the activities of the people doing oil exploration work in the delta of the Mackenzie and the Arctic islands.
[ English]


Mr. Speaker:: Perhaps the hon. member for Calgary South might be allowed to ask a supplementary, after which I will recognize the hon. member for Y orkton-Melville.


Peter Colwell Bawden: Mr. Speaker, in view of the extreme concern expressed by residents of northern communities, will the minister issue a statement on this subject to reassure them as well as those who are planning substantial Mackenzie River shipments this summer to carry out oil exploration next winter?


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, according to my information the companies are carrying on their development program
Oral Questions
just as they started it. The court ordered a land freeze but did not forbid the Crown to issue permits under normal conditions.



POSSIBILITY OF BRINGING OIL AND GAS INDUSTRIES UNDER PUBLIC OWNERSHIP

Mr. Lome Nystrom (Yorkton-Melville):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Energy, Mines and Resources and is supplementary to questions asked earlier. In view of the recent Gallup poll indicating that the Canadian people now wish energy resources to be under public ownership, can the minister say-


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Some of the reactionaries may not agree, Mr. Speaker, but I would still like to ask this question. In view of the fact the Canadian people now want consideration to this matter, is the minister considering bringing the gas and oil industries that fall within federal jurisdiction under public ownership?


Donald Stovel Macdonald: No, Sir.



UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE


Mr. Rod Blaker (Lachine):: Mr. Speaker, can the Minister of Manpower and Immigration, or his parliamentary secretary, advise on the situation of some 2,000 staff employees of Northern Electric Company who have been suspended without pay by the company and, specifically, will those people qualify under the terms of the Unemployment Insurance Act regulations?


Mr. Mark MacGuigan (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Manpower and Immigration):: Mr. Speaker, although these employees are losing employment because of a labour dispute it would appear that they are not participating and are not directly interested in the dispute. Provided they are not members of the same grade or class of employees, they would be eligible for unemployment insurance benefits. Some 160 claims have already been filed in the Montreal West office.

Oral Questions



CANADIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION

[Stage Direction]
May 24, 1973

Mr. Joe Clark (Rocky Mountain):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Parliamentary Secretary to the Secretary of State. Would he have his minister bring a full report before the House on the events leading to the postponement or withdrawal of the showing on the French language CBC network of the Joyce Richardson film "Chissibi" concerning the native people of the James Bay area, including a full disclosure of any involvement in that withdrawal by the James Bay Development Corporation, Quebec Hydro or the Canadian or Quebec governments?
[ Translation]


Mr. Gilles Marceau (Parliamentary Secretary to Secretary of State):: Mr. Speaker, I am personally interested in these important matters and I shall be pleased to convey my hon. friend's request to the minister who is now attending the first ministers' conference where he will discuss questions falling under his jurisdiction.


Charles Joseph Clark: Would the minister advise whether it is the position of the CBC that this film is sub judice and, if so, whether that has been the consistent advice of lawyers consulted on this question by the CBC and, if not, when will the film be shown?



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs.
Since Canada has stopped sending Canadian arms to Portugal for fear that the Portuguese might use them to repress independence movements in Angola, has the hon. minister also asked Canadian companies such as General Foods Limited, Nestle (Canada) Limited and Standard Brands Limited to stop importing Angolan coffee, since this might encourage and maintain the situation in which Angolans are kept in slavery in forced labour camps-


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I have the impression that this question has already been asked but the hon. minister might perhaps answer it anyway.
[ English]


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. gentleman has any evidence that Canadian arms are being used by the Portuguese in Africa I would be very happy to have it because that would change our attitude toward the provision of arms to Portugal, which we do now as a member of the NATO alliance and purely for the purposes of the alliance.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: I have a supplementary, Mr. Speaker.

As the hon. Secretary of State for External Affairs has just thrown some light on Angola's forced labour policy, which is contrary to United Nations Resolution No. 2918 for which Canada voted in November 1972, does the hon. minister intend to ask these companies to put an end to these imports?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, in supporting the resolution to which the hon. gentleman has referred, Canada specifically reserved its position on the question of economic sanctions against the Portuguese territories. We do not intend to apply sanctions against those territories.



INDIAN AFFAIRS


Miss Flora MacDonald (Kingston and the Islands):: Mr. Speaker, my question is directed to the Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development. In view of the fact that Mr. Justice Malony has said that he wants the testimony at the James Bay injunction hearings completed by the end of May, would the minister give very serious consideration to taking this final opportunity to appear before the hearings to indicate the federal government's constitutional support for the injunction applied for by the native people of the James Bay area?
[ Transla tion]


Joseph Jacques Jean Chrétien: Mr. Speaker, I have stated several times that the Quebec Indians are actively pleading their case; as regards the government's constitutional position, the lawyers for the Indians are quite familiar with the 1912 and 1898 transfer acts and with the Royal Proclamation of 1763, and I am sure that they have brought these to the judge's attention more effectively than I could myself.



FISHERIES


Mr. Thomas M. Bell (Saint John-Lancaster):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Minister of Fisheries. Can he tell the House how he is making out in his efforts to settle finally the claims of fishermen in the Atlantic region arising from the ban on salmon fishing?


Hon. Jack Davis (Minister of the Environment):: Mr. Speaker, the officials have settled all but a dozen of the approximately 1,000 claims for adjustment assistance which we received from the commercial fishermen taking Atlantic salmon. Unfortunately the official who has been carrying out these negotiations has suffered a heart attack. We are completing the remaining dozen negotiations as quickly as we can using other officials.
May 24, 1973



BAN ON WHALING-COMPENSATION TO THOSE AFFECTED-PROGRESS OF NEGOTIATIONS

Mr. Lloyd R. Crouse (South Shore):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to ask a supplementary relating to the benefits paid to fishermen. Would the minister inform the House what progress he is making in negotiations with the fishermen who were operating in the whaling industry at Blandford, Nova Scotia, and were put out of business when he closed down the whaling industry in Atlantic Canada?


John (Jack) Davis: Mr. Speaker, the task force which has been working on this subject has held discussions with the companies and the fishermen affected by the whaling closure. I will shortly be making a recommendation to cabinet as to the nature and extent of the adjustment assistance that we will be paying to the affected parties.



REPRESENTATIONS TO UNITED KINGDOM AND WEST GERMANY ARISING OUT OF COD WAR OFF ICELAND

Mr. John Lundrigan (Gander-Twillingate):: Mr. Speaker, while we are on fisheries may I ask the Secretary of State for External Affairs whether he can respond to the question which was raised on Tuesday and say if Canada, as a member of NATO, has expressed its concern to the United Kingdom and to West Germany in regard to the cod war off Iceland?


Mr. Speaker:: Order. I am not sure that this question is supplementary. The minister will be allowed to reply, but I have the impression that when a question is asked about salmon members think they can also ask about whaling in Labrador, or perch in Cornwall. Again I suggest that this is not entirely a supplementary question, but the minister will be allowed to reply.


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, of course we are concerned about any dispute such as this between two members of the NATO alliance and in that sense we have expressed views. But there have been no direct communications of the kind the hon. gentleman asked me about in his previous question, and I can confirm my answer now.


Mr. Speaker:: The hon. member for Kootenay West.


John Howard Lundrigan: A supplementary-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Perhaps we will return to the hon. member later, but the Chair has been anxious to recognize the hon. member for Kootenay West.



EXTERNAL AFFAIRS


Mr. Randolph Harding (Kootenay West):: Mr. Speaker, I wish to direct a question to the Secretary of State for External Affairs. In view of the proposed nuclear tests by the French government in the South Pacific, has the minister conveyed to the government of France the unani-
Oral Questions
mous opposition of the Canadian House of Commons to these nuclear tests?


Mitchell William Sharp: The answer is yes, Mr. Speaker.


Randolph Harding: Is the government taking further steps to try to stop these tests, and, specifically, has action been taken at the United Nations level, or in support of Australia and New Zealand in their action before the International Court of Justice to try to obtain an interim injunction pending final judgment of the court regarding the tests?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, Australia and New Zealand have taken action before the International Court of Justice on the grounds that these nuclear tests are in an area of special importance to them. That is the basis on which they have taken this action. It is not generally against nuclear tests; it is against tests in their part of the Pacific. Similarly, when we protested very vigorously with respect to the United States nuclear tests in the North Pacific, Australia and New Zealand did not associate themselves with us.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair will recognize the hon. member for Gander-Twillingate who may have a supplementary about another species of fish, after which I will recognize the hon. member for Lisgar.



FISHERIES


John Howard Lundrigan: Mr. Speaker, this is a very important matter to Canada even though it is directly an Icelandic problem. In view of the fact that Iceland depends on its fisheries resources for 84 per cent of its exports, will Canada, through the Department of External Affairs, ask the British government and the West German government to respect the territorial claims of Iceland? Will the government also ask these countries of 50 million and 60 million people to withdraw from the territory of that small country with only 200,000 people and recognize the claim of coastal states for jurisdiction over the continental shelf?


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I understand that this question is sub judice as it has gone before the International Court of Justice. I am quite sure the hon. member would not want me to intervene at such a point.


John Howard Lundrigan: That is a lot of nonsense, absolute nonsense. It is not before The Hague Court. You have not got the courage to stand up-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please.
4054
Oral Questions HOUSE OF COMMONS

May 24, 1973



REQUEST FOR POSTPONEMENT OF DATE FOR COMPLETION OF COMMITTEE CONSIDERATION OF ESTIMATES-GOVERNMENT POSITION

Robert Lorne Stanfield: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the government House leader with respect to the requirement under Standing Order 58(14) that committee reports pertaining to estimates have to be in by the end of this month. In view of the difficulty that members of the committee are having in completing their work, particularly the committee dealing with DREE but also others, the difficulty in part being due to the problems my hon. friend's colleagues have in manning the committees and also the difficulties in getting information, would the minister be prepared to consider any means of postponing this requirement in order to enable committees to complete their work properly?


Hon. Allan J. MacEachen (President of the Privy-Council):: Mr. Speaker, I would be happy to consider any reasonable request but I am certainly not prepared at the moment to say that a change would be made. However, I will consider it.



AGRICULTURE


Mr. Jack Murta (Lisgar):: Mr. Speaker, my question is for the Minister of Agriculture. Since on Tuesday, May 22, British Columbia tried once again to seize a shipment of Manitoba eggs, and in view of the fact that a serious problem is developing in the area of interprovincial trade in Canada, can the minister inform the House what progress has been made primarily under the National Farm Products Marketing Act in solving this?


Hon. E. F. Whelan (Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, I think the dispute is between the British Columbia Egg Marketing Board and the egg broker, for whom I do not have much sympathy nor, I think, does the egg producer and egg consumer have any sympathy for him. He is trying to make a buck. I met with the national egg group this morning and I am sure they will have a proper working body, hopefully by the end of June.


Jack Burnett Murta: Since the National Farm Marketing Council was formed, in part at least, to correct marketing disputes such as we have seen, can the minister inform the House exactly what success, if any, the council has had in solving what could become a very serious problem for interprovincial trade in Canada?


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I doubt whether this question is in order. The hon. member is asking for an interpretation of the legal authority of a government or departmental agency. I think a question in those terms is not in order.



HARBOURS


Mr. J. R. Ellis (Hastings):: Mr. Speaker, I have a supplementary to a previous question with regard to the National Harbours Board. In the absence of the Minister of Transport, I should like to ask the parliamentary secretary if he has had a chance to consult with the minister to see if we can have the study on the future development of the port of Churchill referred to the Transport Committee for action?


Joseph-Phillippe Guay: Yes, Mr. Speaker. In view of the activities of the members of the committee, who are doing an extremely good job, I will be most pleased to request the minister to do just that. I hope it will be the case.



MANPOWER


Mr. Cyril Symes (Sault Ste. Marie):: Mr. Speaker, I have a question for the Minister of Manpower and Immigration, but in his absence I will address it to his parliamentary secretary. I hope I get more than the standard reply that he will take it as notice. In view of the minister's announcement that local initiatives projects in areas where unemployment is above 6.8 per cent will be eligible for extension up to November 30, and in view of the fact that Statistics Canada does not provide unemployment figures on such local areas and that Manpower's calculations of area unemployment have a statistical error rate varying from 15 to 30 per cent, does the minister intend to review this policy so that worth-while LIP projects seeking extension will not be disadvantaged by the lack of accurate figures?


Mark R. MacGuigan: Mr. Speaker, if the hon. member were aware of the fact that the minister last week announced a further extension of LIP projects I do not think this question would arise.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. We are coming to or have reached the end of the question period, but perhaps the Chair might be allowed to recognize one or two members, the hon. member for Yukon, the hon. member for Burna-by-Richmond-Delta and perhaps another member in the back row.

May 24, 1973



PENITENTIARIES


Mr. Erik Nielsen (Yukon):: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the Solicitor General if there is any good reason for suppressing the news of a recent sit-down strike in the British Columbia penitentiary, and can he explain to the House the reasons for that sit-down strike by the inmates?


Hon. Warren Allmand (Solicitor General):: Mr. Speaker, I, personally, have no news of the strike in the B.C. penitentiary and there has been no attempt to suppress any news.



BRITISH COLUMBIA-LENGTH OF SUSPENSION OF THREE GUARDS-STABBING OF PRISONER-REQUEST FOR REPORT

John Douglas Reynolds: Mr. Speaker, my question is supplementary to the one asked by the hon. member for Yukon. Can the minister explain how long the suspension of the three guards in connection with last week's escape will last, and has he any information on the stabbing that took place in the prison which has still not been reported?


William Warren Allmand: Mr. Speaker, I will have to check into the suspension of the three guards. I do not have that information at the moment. I did look into the question of the stabbing. It seems that a protected prisoner was being brought into the penitentiary and on his first day there was stabbed. An investigation took place but they were unable to determine who did the stabbing. I have a longer report and I would be prepared to give it to the hon. member.


Mr. Speaker:: Orders of the day. The hon. member for Gander-Twillingate rises on a question of privilege or a point of order.


John Howard Lundrigan: Mr. Speaker, I think it is a question of privilege. In responding to a question on the cod war today the Secretary of State for External Affairs indicated that he could not reply to the question because it was sub judice. I am not a lawyer but it seems to me that means it is before the courts. First of all, it is my understanding that the issue was before the Hague Court and has now passed through that stage so it is ,no longer before the courts; second, I believe it is not in order for a member of the Privy Council of Canada to take refuge behind something that might be before an international court. I have talked to hon. members who have been here for a number of years about this, and the answer, "sub judice" pertains only to Canada. I suggest that the minister has every right not to answer a question but does not have the right to proclaim the position he has taken today. If he is really going to talk about matters being sub judice he might like to look at No. 34 on the order paper under government business. Perhaps he could take a stand on that one as well when he is explaining his position.


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!
Oral Questions


Mitchell William Sharp: Mr. Speaker, I should like to amend my answer. Perhaps it would meet the hon. member's point of view, to say that I think it would be inappropriate for us to comment on a question that is now before the International Court of Justice. I believe our position in such a dispute should be one of impartiality as between the parties.


Some hon. Members:: Oh, oh!


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


An hon. Member:: What a wriggler!


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. There should not be a debate. The hon. member raises this issue as a question of privilege, but I do not really believe there is a question of privilege. I have said often that many members could rise in the House on suggested or alleged questions of privilege when they are not satisfied with an answer given by a minister. It is well recognized by long practice that this cannot be the subject of a question of privilege. If there is a dispute between the minister and the hon. member in regard to the answer given by the minister, I would respectfully suggest to both that there is no point, either by way of point of order or question of privilege, in pursuing the matter further.


John Howard Lundrigan: On a further point of order, Sir, may I indicate that a precedent is being set in the House today. If the minister, first of all, is permitted to make a claim which is not correct, since the issue is not before the International Court, it having already passed through that particular body, and if he is also permitted to make a claim, and make it stick in the House today, that the government is not obliged to respond to questions that are before international tribunals or courts, we will be setting a precedent and giving the Privy Council further protection which it does not deserve to have. I contend that the minister has every right in the world to say that Canada does not have the gumption to take a stand on the issue, or that he refuses to answer, but he has no right to say what he has said-


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I do not propose to go into the matter further. Any minister can simply say that he refuses to answer a question.


John Howard Lundrigan: I agree with that.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. Hon. members may argue with the minister, but they are not going to argue with me. Orders of the day.



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, I should like to ask the government House leader the usual question as to the business of the House for the rest of this week and for next week.
4056

May 24, 1973
-	Oral Questions


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, today we will continue with the debate on capital punishment. Tomorrow and Monday will be opposition days and on Tuesday, if need be, we will continue also with the capital punishment debate. The other government business that I should like to call after Bill C-2, would be the Judges Act, the National Housing Act amendment, the residential mortgages bill and the languages resolution. It may be that we will want to consider early next week whether we want to deal with the languages resolution on Wednesday. We may begin it on Wednesday or Thursday. If we decide to begin it on Thursday, we will call an opposition day on Wednesday.


Gerald William Baldwin: Mr. Speaker, if I may speak on the issue of opposition days, I wonder if I might be allowed to ask the minister if he would try to restrain the natural and understandable ardour of his colleagues for making long and controversial statements on opposition days. If they need to make them, would they make them on Monday rather than tomorrow.


Mr. Knowles (Winnipeg North Centre):: Mr. Speaker, with respect to the coming business of the House, can the minister indicate whether high priority will be given to the bill to amend the Family Allowances Act and to the measure to provide increases in war disability pensions?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Yes, Mr. Speaker.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Does that affirmative answer mean that we will be dealing with these matters before the end of June?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, I cannot give that assurance until I see what progress is made with other measures that are now before the House. It would be my wish to have those items cleared before the summer adjournment, whenever that takes place.


Mr. Gerard Laprise (Abitibi):: Mr. Speaker, I would like to ask the President of the Privy Council (Mr. MacEachen) what fate he has in mind for the amendment to the Unemployment Insurance Act.


Mr. Speaker:: Order, please. I have some serious doubts and reservations about questions that are being asked as points of order as to what priority the government is giving to a certain piece of legislation or what the government intends to do about one particular bill or the other. It seems to me that these are questions which ought ordinarily to be asked during the question period. I mention this only by way of caution because, certainly, it seems to me hon. members would not want to ask about many proposed bills that are before the House, or about much proposed legislation.
Having said this only by way of caution-

This being said, I certainly have no objection to the minister answering the question of the hon. member for Abitibi.

I will of course recognize the hon. member for Calgary North and the hon. member for Greenwood, who may have similar questions to ask.


Gérard Laprise: Mr. Speaker, this bill was introduced on January 5 last and every day we are in touch with people who are claiming unemployment insurance benefits. This bill contains a number of amendments which would favour unemployment insurance recipients and I feel that we should give consideration to this legislation as quickly as possible.


Eldon Mattison Woolliams: Mr. Speaker, in view of your statement, and as I do not want to break the rules, may I ask the leader of the House one question. When he mentioned the list of legislation that has priority, the Housing Act was omitted. I raise this question merely to ask if he will bring that bill in as a matter of high priority. I should like to know what kind of priority the government attaches to that bill, if I might go that far.


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, I thought I had mentioned the housing legislation. If I did not, I intended to. It will be called very early as part of the government's legislation. For example, if we complete the capital punishment debate today or early on Tuesday, I would certainly call the National Housing Act amendment following the Judges Act, which I expect will require a very short time to complete. If I may reply to the question of the hon. member for Abitibi, it is my intention to call the unemployment insurance debate at the first appropriate opportunity.


George Harris Hees: Some time next fall.


Mr. Brewin:: Mr. Speaker, may I ask the leader of the House whether he is aware that his colleague, the Minister of Manpower and Immigration, pointed out to the committee the very urgent need for dealing with the Immigration Appeal Board legislation. Has that legislation high priority?


Allan Joseph MacEachen: Mr. Speaker, my colleagues are almost as troublesome as hon. members opposite in urging the priority of their legislation. The Minister of Manpower and Immigration is pressing to have his item of legislation dealt with quickly, but there are other items that have to be dealt with first. I have indicated to the House that I want to deal with capital punishment, the languages bill and the corporate tax changes as major items which must be dealt with. The others will be given their place in almost the same rank of priority, and they will be dealt with.


Mr. Alexander:: Mr. Speaker, if I may raise another point of order similar to that raised by the hon. member for Greenwood, is the minister aware that there are something like 16,000 persons waiting to have their appeals heard and that these appeals are being filed monthly in huge numbers? Does he not think, surely, that he ought to reassess his priorities, in order to bring that much needed bill before the House, so that we can expedite this matter?

May 24, 1973


Mr. Speaker:: After these points of order and questions, perhaps we might call orders of the day.



GOVERNMENT ORDERS


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed, from Wednesday, May 23, consideration of the motion of Mr. Allmand that Bill C-2, to amend the Criminal Code, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs.
Mr. Peters:: Let us have the question on the motion.


Mr. Speaker:: I believe the hon. member for Scarborough West (Mr. Harney) had the floor when we adjourned yesterday.


Mr. Harney:: Mr. Speaker, I was just leaving my seat to leave the House.
[ Translation]


David Réal Caouette: Mr. Speaker, the issue currently before this House, namely that of capital punishment, is most sensitive and very controversial throughout Canada.
It is not the first time that the retention or complete abolition of this punishment is discussed. It has been discussed since 1914 and each year since then it has been debated in this House and particularly in 1917, 1948 and 1950.
I have myself received letters from everywhere throughout Canada. Some of them were urging me to vote against capital punishment while most of them asked me to vote for retention.
I would like to express the basis on which we are advocating the re-establishment of capital punishment and summarize the principle of the Thomist philosophy on capital punishment. Generally speaking it is as follows: Anyone must protect his own life and also respect the life of others. It is in that sense that homicide or murder is prohibited by moral law as well as by civil law which should reflect natural law.
It is incumbent upon the civil authorities to protect the individuals through laws and it is their right to adopt and enforce the legislation required by the common good and the protection of the citizens' life and property.
Since civil authorities are responsible for maintaining order in society they are also entitled to inflict punishment and demand reparation from those who break law and order. This is the punishment which come as a complement to law. But can civil authorities go as far as inflicting the death penalty?
This is the question asked by most of those who are advocating total abolition. St. Thomas' thesis is as follows: Political authorities have the right to inflict capital pun-
Capital Punishment
ishment on those who are guilty of homicide. Civil authorities have the right to do everything necessary to serve justice and insure the security of the citizens. Now, capital punishment is required to ensure justice and the security of society; therefore, the civilian authority is entitled to impose this penalty.
The proof of the first part of this thesis is that punitive justice requires that there be equality, if possible, between the crime committed and the sentence for it. Yet, against specific crimes like homicide, murder, there is no retribution other than capital punishment to make the sentence fit the crime.
And let us note, Mr. Speaker, that it is not in a vengeful mood, as some people try to suggest, that I advocate retention of capital punishment. It is not a policy of an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, an arm for an arm, a leg for a leg, but a policy of justice. The would-be murderer knows beforehand the consequences of his act should he commit murder. Then, if he knows he is aware of it and that punishment is nothing more than fair penalty. No sentence other than capital punishment can restore equality between the sentence and the crime. Therefore, in order to serve justice, capital punishment is sometimes necessary.
As to the proof of the second part of this Thomist thesis, it is almost impossible to ensure the safety of citizens against some people's acts without applying the most powerful restriction against these criminals. And the most powerful restriction is capital punishment. Life imprisonment, that some people suggest as a punishment, is not powerful enough to deter potential murderers. Indeed some murderers may escape and not serve their sentence. On the other hand, the frightful crime of taking someone's life is not enough punished, and a deterrent measure like a life sentence is not enough. Capital punishment constitutes a more efficient deterrent. Death represents the deprivation of life, the greatest property, therefore capital punishment must be imposed to those who take this property from others.
It is said that life imprisonment ensures security. To this argument it must be answered that life imprisonment ensures the security to a certain extent, but is it enough and efficient? It may be but not in all cases.
Is the death penalty homicide? Homicide is forbidden by natural law. Now, according to some, the death penalty is homicide. The imposition of capital punishment must therefore be forbidden. So speak those who advocate the death penalty.
A solution must be found to the problem posed by the word "homicide". In fact, natural law does not forbid every kind of homicide. It does not object to the unjust homicide, that is when life is taken unfairly. That capital punishment constitutes unjust homicide must therefore be denied.
Some claim that an innocent man can be inflicted capital punishment and that, then, it is too late to make up for the judicial error. It is true that the death penalty can accidently be applied to the innocent, but the construction of automobiles or aircraft cannot be brought to a stop just because there are accidents. By the same token, because

May 24, 1973
Capital Punishment
judicial errors are made-that is a fact-though seldom, it does not mean that we should depart from the basic principle.
However, to those who uphold the absolute right to life, it must be replied that murderers do not respect that right of others. If that right is absolute, the soldier who kills an enemy would be a criminal. The right to life is not absolute; it can be denied to those who do not respect it. The murderer who takes the life of another cannot claim absolute right to life to escape the death penalty.
Mr. Speaker, many people, in the past, have made representations to the government and I myself-and some of my colleagues as well-have suggested a referendum throughout Canada to ascertain public opinion and in order not to impose in an autocratic or dictatorial manner a measure which the people reject, which the people do not accept.
Let us go back to the years 1960, 1961, 1962, and examine statements made by the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe (Mr. Wagner), for instance, who was then Minister of Justice of Quebec. You could read in the papers: "Fantastic increase in murders in Quebec since 1961, (Mr. Claude Wagner)". And the hon. member for Saint-Hyacinthe invited the public to write the federal government that the death penalty should not be abolished.
Mr. Speaker, those were lawyers.
Another, a former federal Member of Parliament, Mr. Remi Paul, a former Minister of Justice of Quebec, stated: "The death penalty is necessary for the protection of society". Not for purposes of revenge, but for purposes of justice, and in order not to encourage criminals at large, or potential criminals who, because the death penalty has been eliminated, have no respect for the life of others and, when they are caught, feel they must solicit clemency on the basis of their right to live.
Mr. Speaker, hon. members in this House assume quite peculiar positions concerning the death penalty. I actually heard members of this Parliament make a stand against those fighting abortion, openly advocating abortion. I have in mind members of the New Democratic Party, Progressive Conservatives, Liberals who accept abortion as a good thing and say that the solution or decision must rest with the mother or the woman and her doctor.
Mr. Speaker, abortion is a crime amounting to killing a child who never did anybody any harm. Some want to legalize it by way of legislation in this House of Commons and they have had a certain degree of success. However, the criminal, the killer, the thug, the assassin who takes life away after planning his crime, in the name of humanity, in the name of society, in the name of the right to live must be handled gently, spared the rope because he is a human being and we must not exercise vengeance against a human being.
Mr. Speaker, how can those people reconcile their stupid reasoning by saying you can kill a child before he is born but you have no right to kill him if he becomes a criminal later on.
Mr. Speaker, several studies have been made across Canada. I received letters from all parts of this country, as I said earlier, urging me to ask for the restoration of capital punishment. Some of my colleagues also received

similar letters from their electors. I received one in January 1973-so it is not too long ago-from the Sept-Iles Chamber of Commerce, which is not located in my riding. That letter was addressed to the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau), and read as follows:
Find enclosed a sworn compilation indicating the results of an official poll taken by the Sept-Iles Chamber of Commerce last December in the suburb area of the Manicouagan-Duplessis county on the subject of capital punishment.
The results of this poll lead us to think twice about-
I tell you quite honestly that if we conducted the same poll we would get similar results. And now this government wants to impose that legislation on us under the cover of freedom of vote, while saying: Vote with us!
I go on with the quotation:
The results of this poll lead us to think twice about the advisability of your government holding a national referendum to have the population express its opinion on the abolition or retention of capital punishment.
Now, if the referendum said: Yes, abolish capital punishment, then I would vote for that. I am all in favour of an innocent man not being condemned to the gallows, as soon as there is the least doubt concerning the culpability of a murderer, because he must be given the benefit of the doubt. But, when it has been proved that the murder was premeditated, that the criminal cannot possibly be rehabilitated, even if he were to be freed after 20 years, he must pay with his own life for having taken the life of another. And that is why we are in favour of polls being held across the country.
To quote again Mr. Jean L. Mailloux, the director of the Chamber of Commerce:
Many citizens are worried about your government's indecisive position on capital punishment for it is one of the most fundamental questions in a democratic country such as ours. We believe that, before taking a final decision, your government should consult the people of Canada.
Yours faithfully, etc.
And here are the main results of the poll in the Sept-Iles area:
1.	In favour of abolishing the death penalty. Comments: Yes 35; No 210.
2.	In favour of retaining the death penalty as enforced formerly. Comments: Yes 206; No 25.
3.	Do you think that murders have increased in Canada over the last five years? Comments: Yes 220; No 17.
This is corroborated by the former Quebec Minister of Justice, who said in 1967 that murders had increased more than threefold in the province of Quebec alone.
I continue to quote:
4.	Are you in favour of parole . . .
This is something rather different, but 63 were for it and 80 were against.
To continue:
5.	Have you ever been a direct or indirect victim of the activities of a murderer? Comments: Yes 30; No 208.
This means that 208 Canadians have never been bothered by a murderer, but they nevertheless use their intelligence to judge the government's actions in this field.
May 24, 1973

Mr. Speaker, I have here other evidence. I have referred to Sept-lles, but let us now turn to my own constituency, Temiscamingue, where I asked the question: Are you or are you not in favour of the death penalty? That is clear enough. The response was: 390 in favour, 92 against. There you have the opinion of people at the other end of Quebec province. Let us ask questions in other areas, in the English provinces.


Mr.   La Salle@Joliette: Don't forget my constituency.


David Réal Caouette: Which constituency?


Mr.   La Salle@Joliette: Joliette.


David Réal Caouette: It is my friend from the constituency of Joliette, I think.
Mr. Speaker, we see the same everywhere. I have in my hand a letter from a priest in Levis who wrote to ask me to urge the government to re-establish capital punishment, not out of revenge, but for justice's sake.
When we consider what happened in Quebec in 1970 and when we see now the results and the consequences, we cannot but be puzzled. Here are individuals directly involved with the foul murder of a public man. One is released after two years and a half or three years.


An hon. Member:: Just for fun.


David Réal Caouette: Sure, it is just for fun that those three guys hid under a house, in a hole for rats. You will not make me believe that they hid in such a place just for the fun of it. It is because they had done something wrong which compelled them to go into hiding. People keep forgeting that and, in Quebec, they may come up with some legal gimmick which will make us believe that Pierre Laporte is still alive, that he has not been murdered.
Mr. Speaker, when faced with such a parody of justice, I am not the least surprised that Canadians have lost all confidence in the judiciary and the administration.
A few years ago, there was this gangster disguised as Santa Claus, in Ville Laval or Duvernay, I think it was-


An hon. Member:: In Ville Saint-Laurent.


David Réal Caouette: -yes, in Ville Saint-Laurent. He was disguised as Santa Claus as though to distribute gifts to small children at the shopping centre. He was there to take part in a hold-up. Not satisfied with having shot two policemen down, he put five slugs in their heads. I wonder if the killer is still in jail; perhaps he is out on parole; perhaps he is at large. There have been all sorts of escapes. An inmate escaped while supposedly watering the skating rink in Bordeaux, another escaped from Cowansville, another from Saint-Vincent-de-Paul-


An hon. Member:: During a hockey game at the Forum-


David Réal Caouette: -during a hockey game at the Forum, and without a hose either.
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Mr. Speaker, some odious crimes have been committed in the Shawinigan area. Two young girls, 15 or 16 years old, were picked up by two young bums, taken into the woods, raped and killed in cold blood. In the name of humanity, let us save those bums! One of them committed suicide in Saint-Vincent-de-Paul-


Mr.   La Salle@Joliette: He was quicker than the administration!


David Réal Caouette: Yes, quicker, the hon. member for Joliette is right. As another hon. member was saying the other day, it is easier to get out of jail than to get in.
Gangsters and bums are no sooner behind bars than they quickly get bailed out and find themselves free to roam the streets after two hours. That is how society is protected. Let us stop fooling the people. We are not against humanity, but in favour of it. But any man who has, not the courage but the nerve to go and kill his neighbour ought to realize, in the name of the most elementary justice, that he is putting his own life at stake. If he makes an attempt against his neighbour's life, all right; his own will be attacked. That is it. That is justice; not vengeance, but justice. No revenge would be exercised if this man acted like a human being. Why does he not do so? There are homicides, of course, involuntary homicides or manslaughters. But as regards sordid crime, we are for the restoration of capital punishment in order to punish it.
I have here another letter from Chandler. That community is not in my riding, but it is in favour of capital punishment. According to Mr. Armand Langlois, from Chandler in the riding of Gaspe South, we should act as quickly as possible.
Mr. Speaker, we have a lot of evidence. I have here a letter from Malton, Ontario, addressed to the Solicitor General (Mr. Allmand).
It is addressed the Hon. Warren Allmand, Solicitor General for Canada, Ottawa, Ontario and reads, in part:
I urge, therefore, that you consider very carefully before you decide how to deal with this matter in any decisive way.
My hope is you are inclined to listen to those we have in positions of authority, such as the chiefs of police, and the attor-neys-general of the provinces, and guide yourself, according to their ideas.

For the reinstatement of capital punishment, let us again take the evidence of police chiefs at their convention. What did they advocate? The reinstatement of capital punishment because under the present act, if a criminal kills a policeman he should be sentenced to death. This act was never implemented those past five years. Policemen were murdered in cold blood. The murderers were convicted to life imprisonment. Capital punishment was not deemed fit for those people!
Mr. Speaker, while my opinion is that we should protect policemen and their families, I also think that the life of my children, my wife and wives of hon. members is as important as that of a prison guard or a policeman. They are human beings and gangsters do not have more right to

May 24, 1973
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assault a mother than a policeman. Then, capital punishment must be reinstated when there is deliberate, well proven murder. If it is not, let us give the accused the benefit of the doubt, as I said earlier.
I could quote a letter from Sudbury, Ontario. It even has references to articles from the Globe and Mail and to the Bible itself in support of the re-establishment of capital punishment. I have another letter dealing more harshly with our work in the House. It states the following:

It is so simple. Yet our idiot parliamentarians-

That's us!

-are unwilling or totally incapable of following the police chiefs of Canada and their wise advice. The citizens of Canada want restorations of severe penalties if we are to combat

all the ills in our society and those people who are trying- -to undermine our youth with drugs and crime.

Mr. Speaker, I could have brought in a complete file of documents to prove how strongly Canadians favour the re-establishment of capital punishment. I shall now quote a letter from Victoria, British Columbia:

As a citizen of Canada, I am writing in regard to the matter of capital punishment, shortly to come up for review in parliament.
[ Translation]
This is what we are reviewing right now.

I am a believer of the Lord Jesus Christ; we thank God for the favourable government in this country, and pray constantly that those in authority may be helped to do what is right.
I feel strongly that capital punishment should be reinstated fully in Canada-because it is a morally right principle, set up by God and supported in the scriptures, which are the inspired word of God. In Homans chapter 13, it says: "Rulers are not a terror to a good work, but to an evil one ... if thou practisest evil, fear; for it bears not the sword in vain; for it is God's minister, an avenger for wrath to him that does evil". Genesis, chapter 9, verse 6, says: "Whoso sheds Man's blood, by Man shall his blood be shed, for in the image of God, He hath made him".
I trust that you will find these few sentences helpful in arriving at a right judgment as to this important matter.
Yours sincerely
Sam Burrowes
[ Translation]
B-U-R-R-O-W-E-S, from Victoria, B.C.
I have here another letter from Winnipeg, another from Niagara, one from Toronto, asking for the reinstatement of capital punishment.
Mr. Speaker, we have countless examples such as those and I say that if there were a referendum in Canada, 85 or 90 per cent of the electors would say: Reinstate capital punishment but as it was before. I say so to present miscarriages of justice, but capital punishment must be reinstated in order to prevent more and more filthy crimes from being committed in the future.

I gave a while ago examples of a falsified justice, under which the gangster is almost more important than society, and I am always asking myself the following question: Should we pass laws to protect society against gangsters or gangsters against society? That is what we should ask ourselves. If we wish to protect gangsters, let us follow the course we have already taken. But if we wish to protect the life of our children, of our society, of our social classes, of our workers, of our farmers, of our aged people who are being bound hand and foot at every turn in the Montreal-Trois-Rivieres area by scoundrels who steal $200 or $300 from them, we must take the necessary measures. Once gangsters are denounced, they are prosecuted; but we do not have sufficient evidence. Let them commit another crime tomorrow night, as they have thrown off the mask. When they are finally recaptured, we tell them: We let you out on bail! Get back on the street. If you did not get enough last night, try to mug two more persons tonight. Gangsters knock out or kill car or taxi drivers, for instance, to steal $30 or $40 from them. If those people have a heart I really wonder where our supposedly well organized society is leading us. I realize that capital punishment will not eliminate all criminals, and everybody knows it. But if there were at least that sword of Damocles to deter those who could be tempted to commit murder I believe that justice across Canada would be significantly improved.
In any event, the evidence that we receive as well as my attitude and that of my colleagues are not likely to hinder the overall administration of justice in Canada far from it. We want a more reasonable justice, a justice that respects and protects society. I think that the reinstatement of capital punishment would tend to reduce the number of crimes across Canada. I think we have had enough of the abuses observed since the abolition of capital punishment five years ago. It is time to reinstate it, not only to punish or seek revenge against criminals but also for the ultimate purpose of protecting society.


Mr. Paul Yewchuk (Athabasca):: Mr. Speaker, the current debate on capital punishment has been before parliament and the country for several months. From that, it is obvious the issue is not clearcut and that the decision as to whether it should be retained is not an easy one to reach. This bill does not really ask us to make a decision on that point. The bill neither retains capital punishment nor abolishes it, or, conversely, it both retains and abolishes it. It is a bill which negates the arguments in favour of capital punishment as well as those against it, and leaves everyone frustrated with a non-decision. I suppose one might say the situation is rather typical of the present government and its method of carrying out the mandate given by the people of Canada. It is obvious that the present government is not willing to make decisions on important matters such as this, and it is obvious that it is not willing to live up to the responsibility of enforcing the law as it now stands and has stood over the past five years.	,
I have very grave doubts as to whether there is any intention on the part of the government to enforce the law which will follow should this bill pass. Combining the
May 24, 1973

performance in the application of the law dealing with capital punishment as well as in the administration of penitentiaries and rehabilitation programs, one might easily conclude that the trend under the present administration is to accept as normal ever increasing amounts of crime as well as ever increasing numbers of murders.
There have been many speeches made by representatives of the government, including several ministers. I did not hear all of them, but it is my impression that none of them indicated any willingness to live up to the law as it has stood over the past five years in relation to carrying out executions of murderers of police and prison guards, and no minister to my knowledge has indicated there is any willingness to carry out this particular aspect of the law over the period of the next five years should this bill pass.
It strikes me as rather hypocritical that the government is not willing to take a position. If it is the intention of the government to abolish capital punishment, which was the tenor of the speech of the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and the Solicitor General (Mr. Allmand) as well as others, then why not do it? The Solicitor General has indicated that capital punishment for murder of a prison guard or policeman will be retained only as a concession to policemen and prison guards. He might have created the impression in the next breath that they do not intend to carry out that part of this law. This is an example of the lack of courage on the part of the government to carry out its own laws.
If the Solicitor General is truly convinced that capital punishment is not a deterrent, then why leave it in the bill? On the other hand, if he is of the opinion that capital punishment is useful as a deterrent in cases of murder of policemen and prison guards, people who are exposed to unusual amounts of danger, then surely he has to admit it is also a deterrent in cases of murders of any other type of individual.
However, let us take a look at some of the statistics. Prior to the trial period commencing in 1967 an average of 222 persons other than policemen or prison guards were murdered in each of the preceding seven years. That is a period when the death penalty was in effect for all capital murders. For the following four years when the death penalty was abolished for murders of individuals other than policemen and prison guards the average number of murders rose to 376. The figure for 1971 was 422, nearly double the average in the years preceding abolition. It seems to me that no argument is better than the actual figures. These figures indicate to me a very significant increase in the number of murders since abolition occurred. While the abolitionists put forward various arguments that other crimes have also increased, in my view they are irrelevant as far as the present debate is concerned. The fact is that the number of murders has nearly doubled with abolition, and that is a fact we must not forget.
If we look at the comparable figures for the same 11 year period in respect of the murder of policemen and prison guards, for which capital punishment has been retained, we find the increase was from 3.6 murders annually prior to the suspension to 4 per year following the suspension. If we put this into a similar range of figures for comparison
Capital Punishment
purposes, as I have given for other types, it would increase from 360 to 400, a much less significant increase in the murder rate of individuals for whom capital punishment was retained, even though the deterrent effect of this was significiantly diluted by commutation. This comparison has to be looked at as a very significant and major factor in this decision making process.
I previously said this bill does not really do anything for anyone. Those who are abolitionists can vote for the bill because it partially abolishes capital punishment, but they can also vote against it because it partially retains capital punishment. So, the abolitionists can, with a nearly clear conscience, vote either for or against it. Those who are retentionists can also vote for the bill because it retains capital punishment in some cases, and they can also vote against it because it abolishes capital punishment in certain cases. So, those who are retentionists can also vote for or against the bill with a nearly clear conscience.
The whole point is that the government has failed to make a decision or, if it has made a decision, it did not have the courage to put it into the form of legislation. As a matter of fact, the debate on this issue, for the reasons I have just stated, does not call on anyone to indicate whether he is for or against the abolition or retention of capital punishment because no matter where you stand you can vote for or against this particular bill. My firm belief is that the bill does not really change anything. If it passes, we will continue the same manner of law enforcement and the same treatment for convicted murderers because of the right the cabinet has to commute sentences.
Experience since 1962 shows that all convicted murderers have received commutations. From the remarks by the ministers and the Prime Minister, we have no reason to believe the situation in the next five years will be any different. If this bill is defeated, then the pre-1967 law will be in effect and the cabinet will still have the right to commute death sentences. Therefore, if the bill is defeated we have no reason to believe the cabinet will not continue to commute death sentences, just as it has done in the past. When we examine these facts we begin to wonder what the purpose of this bill is, and what the purpose is of putting forward a bill of this nature when the end result in the handling of murderers will be the same. As a matter of fact, it would have been the same had this bill not been before parliament and had this debate not taken place at all. In short, the debate on capital punishment is an exercise in futility because it is very doubtful that there will be any changes as a result of it in the application of the law or indeed in the treatment administered to convicted murderers.
The Association of Police Chiefs refutes the effectiveness of rehabilitation, and we all know that rehabilitation does not always work. We all know also that murderers who are imprisoned for the precribed period of time and then released on parole have, on occasion, murdered again. The main argument against capital punishment which I can accept, and which really makes good sense to me, is the possibility that an innocent person could be executed. That argument in itself is almost enough to convince me that capital punishment should be abolished. But if we look on the other side of the coin, we find that murderers
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who have been imprisoned and released have murdered again, executing an innocent individual without trial, without charge and without judge and jury. While I do not have firm statistics on this, it would appear that the possibility of a murderer murdering again is much higher than the possibility of the Crown hanging an innocent person. So, we must decide where our obligation to society really lies.
I want to point out that I do not feel emotional about this issue. I am looking at it as objectively as I can. While I have dedicated a portion of my life to the saving of people's lives through the work I have done in the past as a physician, the arguments in favour of retention of capital punishment seem to be much stronger than those in favour of abolition of it. I know from information obtained that there are some types of personalities that are not capable of rehabilitation. I know also there is no way to determine whether a murderer will murder again until he actually does it. There has been a significant amount of discussion as to whether criminals should be treated by means of a rehabilitation program only or whether punishment should be part of the treatment as well. I am of the impression that discipline is a good thing and that it can be better achieved through the use of selective punishment. But I agree also with those who say that discipline should not be carried out as a form of revenge, but rather as a rehabilitation measure in itself.
From the statistics I have previously read, I am convinced that capital punishment does have a deterrent effect, in spite of the emotional arguments put forward by the abolitionists. Quotations have been used which suggest that convicted murderers have indicated they did not think of capital punishment at the time they committed murders. There have also been quotations of statements made by individuals who had committed a crime indicating that they would have committed murder had they not been afraid of capital punishment. So, arguments incorporating this approach cancel each other out. I think we must look at this question from the point of view of protection of society, particularly in respect of repetition of murder by the same individual. This of course could be done by a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole, but that so far as I am concerned does not carry the same degreee of deterrent effect.
Finally, Mr. Speaker, we must consider the views of the population of Canada. It has been clearly indicated in many studies and constituency surveys by various members, including myself, that the majority of Canadians are in favour of retention of capital punishment because of its deterrent value. The practice of commutation in respect of all capital punishment sentences in the past few years is of some concern to me because it undermines the authority of the law and of parliament. If parliament passes a law which suggests capital punishment for certain crimes, then the government is obligated to live by this law. The cabinet has not been doing so, creating the impression that the cabinet itself disregards the law as it exists. The average Canadian might well say if the cabinet does not live by the laws it passes, why should I? Therefore, this practice of commutation of the sentence of all murderers is not acceptable. If commutation is the course the government desires to follow, then it should bring in a bill which would abolish capital punishment completely. This would

give members in this House a clear-cut bill on which to express an opinion. Once that is done, the government should be prepared to live with that decision.


Mr.  R. Gordon L. Fairweather@Fundy-Royal: Mr. Speaker, because the whips are not here we can disagree with our colleagues. It is rather interesting for me to follow my hon. friend who, as he mentioned, is a physician. However, the figures he quoted, obviously in an effort to support his case, concerning the repetition of murders by the same murderer conveniently overlook an important point. It is my information that only one such murder has occurred in the last 20 years. I am open to correction on this. The other point on which I must disagree with him is the matter of commutation. Commutation, the royal prerogative of mercy, has not changed. It was not changed by the law of 1967 and it will not be changed by this law. I very much hope the cabinet would continue the practice of commuting sentences. However, I do not see how that aspect of the debate adds very much to the issue.
In any event, I am an abolitionist and have been a convinced one for many years. I think there have been many eloquent speeches in support of this bill, but sadly the discussion is really a continuation of other debates on the subject which have grown in intensity during the past 10 or 15 years. It is a pity-and here is where I indict the government-that the government and parliament seem unable to face the issue squarely and abolish capital punishment once and for all, because this debate will have to be repeated in another five years. I think in a sense we are postponing the inevitable. I believe it is a pity we did not face this issue in 1967. We are faced with it again now, and we will have to face it again in a period of five years.
I wonder whether in all the words which have been spoken-and I certainly include the words I will say-in this and in other debates on the subject, the case for abolition has been put more shortly, more convincingly and with more personal feeling than did Mrs. Pauline Maitland, a brave widow of a brave Toronto policeman brutally murdered in February, 1973 while on duty. This young woman, facing not the strident and blood-curdling outcries of constituents which make many of us cringe, but the terrible tragedy of her husband's death said, "I don't believe in capital punishment. Taking another life would not bring my husband back." I think really that that says it all. I can think of no more poignant statement, and I rather apologize for taking another few minutes, Mr. Speaker, because Pauline Maitland has said all that parliament needs to say on this issue of capital punishment.
I happen to be a convinced abolitionist and will vote for this bill as the second best alternative to outright ending of the death penalty. The death penalty, of all forms of punishments, is the one most rarely carried out. The last hanging in this country took place in 1962, but as members of parliament we do not seem able to take the final legislative step which would end state killing forever.
This is a curious dabate because very few of us will be moved by what others, who are opposed to our views, say on the issue. It is a debate in the sense that people are making their speeches for the record. Some of us, of
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course, will resort to techniques and excuses for delaying a decision which is inevitable.
I have heard of some colleagues who are frantically polling their constituents by means of thousands of questionnaires. Well, here speaks a rather old fashioned parliamentarian. I had understood that my role as a member of parliament, in our system of responsible and representative government, was not to be beholden to opinion polls, in which ofttimes the questions are over simplified. I really wonder if we should take refuge behind somewhat simplistic questionnaires. Rather, should we not tell people where we stand and, if they do not approve, they have many opportunities to tell us that they do not approve. I have taken part in five general elections since 1962. Surely, the people of the constituency I have the privilege of representing have had many opportunities to indicate to me whether they approve or do not approve of my being an abolitionist. I have never hidden it. I have discussed it at election time, but I have not sent out a questionnaire on the subject, and I have no intention of doing so.
I am an abolitionist because I can find no evidence that convinces me that the death penalty is a deterrent. Quite the contrary, I feel that the certain knowledge that nothing lies ahead but the death penalty may well mean that hijackers, or perpetrators of other crimes punishable by death, may take a much more fatalistic and devil-may-care attitude. They have nothing to lose. The death penalty exercises a baneful effect on the administration of justice, arousing mistaken sympathy for the defendant even when guilty. The cabinet surely must understand that statement. Capital punishment cases make bad law. In many jurisdictions increasing difficulty has been found in getting juries to find defendants guilty because of the cruel finality of the punishment involved. Hanging brutalizes us. Hanging is a defeat of society. Hanging substitutes the violence of the state for the violence of a criminal. I assert that there is no proof that the death penalty has special deterrent power against crime, and up to now I have heard no evidence during the speeches of the retentionists which proves otherwise. For the state to take life as an act of retribution demeans the state and makes hangmen of us all.
Throughout my public life I have been trying to find the key to a mystery. I suppose the answer is understood by sociologists. It is this: why should there be such an emotional fervour surrounding debate on this issue? As Dr. Thorsten Selling put it:
Attitudes toward it are rooted deep in the sentiments of people and arouse powerful emotions whenever its justification is questioned. Antagonists bombard each others with "facts" (which are rarely facts at all). Beliefs and opinions are offered, often without substantiation, in support of one or the other viewpoint, and the Holy Writ is liberally quoted by both sides.
I am grateful for the eloquent and timely statement on capital punishment, on the very matter of quoting the Bible to support a point of view, which was given recently by the Conference of Catholic Bishops, who now join many other religious denominations in Canada in their opposition to capital punishment. The Catholic bishops spoke of the scandal that is inherent in utilizing selective parts of scripture in support of a fundamentalist point of view. I think it is a sad commentary that we have to resort
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to these techniques. I happen to believe that one's religion or lack of it is a private matter, and people who parade their piety make me nervous as well as suspicious. Nevertheless, it is comforting to have the major churches in our country speak clearly and without equivocation about this issue.
Some parade what to me-and it is a plural society, we all admit that-are narrow biblical quotations, forgetting or deliberately ignoring what I suggest is an enlarged and uplifting addition to the Bible, namely what we find in the New Testament. Fortunately, we are not engaged in a theological exercise. I certainly would not presume to be an expert in this area. What I can do is to add to the sum of what I think is social policy, to add an opinion, supported eventually I hope by a vote for abolition. I am helped in this by scientific inquiry, but scientific inquiry is not an end in itself. It provides only the data upon which politicians must take decisions.
As a New Brunswicker, the most convincing fact to me is that the State of Maine, which shares a common border with us, abolished capital punishment in the year 1886, almost 90 years ago. Actually, Maine had abolished it before that, and returned capital punishment for about three years until the final abolition took place in 1886. Maine people and New Brunswick people come from the same socio-economic background. Their geography in relation to their respective countries, the United States and Canada, is similar. I have checked the figures, and I am afraid I am repeating myself because I used this in the debate in 1967. However, I was glad to see that the Solicitor General (Mr. Allmand) picked up this example of Maine and New Brunswick.
As I say, I have checked the figures from 1886 to 1971. For those who are made uncomfortable by concepts in world or macro terms, I thought this backyard or microanalysis should prove relevant and helpful. I find that the murder rate in the state of Maine is not revelantly different from the rate in the province of New Brunswick, one with capital punishment and the other where capital punishment has been abolished for 90 years. During the years that capital punishment has been a major and important issue I have had a chance to read statements on this subject, statements which to me go the complete range from the sublime to the shrill. I will not take up the time of the House to list those writers who have impressed me most, although I must say that Albert Camus' "Reflections on the Guillotine" and Arthur Koestler's "Reflections on Hanging" are eloquent books which require no embellishment from me.
A more up-to-date statement, if members are made nervous by books written a few years ago, appeared in The New Republic of February 3, 1973, and a couple of paragraphs are relevant to this debate. The editorial was discussing the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States of last spring that the death penalty as now administered in the United States is unconstitutional. The editorial reads:
The argument for the death penalty-the only civilized argument, since all that's left otherwise is vengeance-is that it may deter. It obviously does not deter numerous crimes, but it may-no one can be sure one way or the other-deter some premeditated crimes, like hijacking, whose commission is contemplated by a sane, cold-blooded, smart, well-informed, calculating person. Ever
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then, the death penalty will deter only if the threat of it is credible, which is to say, if law enforcement and the administration of justice work speedily and effectively. If they do, as they now generally do not, although with respect to hijacking there has been improvement, then penalties other than the capital one will probably deter no less than capital punishment.
The decisive argument, therefore, is the humane argument. Society ought not to kill. There is enough killing, in just wars, in self-defence, to protect the innocent in an emergency, which cannot be helped, and enough killing in error. But society ought not to kill by deliberate choice. It brutalizes us, not to speak of what it does to the agent we employ to do our killing.
Mr. Speaker, I have been indulging in a bit of self-analysis. By this I have hoped to avoid traces of arrogance in my certainty that by voting for abolition I am taking the correct stand. Colleagues whom I respect tell us of the agony of their decision; phrases such as "loneliness" and "soul wrestling" make me wonder if my assurance on this issue and, if I can put it in these terms, my serenity about the stand that I take might have overtones of blindness. Yet, what more can a person do than study the issues, analyse the data, read the evidence, examine the worldwide trend toward ending capital punishment and then reach the decision and vote and "let the devil take the hindmost" as the expression goes. I am aware that man's long struggle toward civilization has had periods of dynamism and periods of stagnation. By passing this bill, the parliament of Canada would add an important forward step in man's eternal search for civility.
May I end as I began, by quoting the poignant words of Pauline Maitland, a policeman's widow: "I don't believe in capital punishment. Taking another life would not bring my husband back." Should not this House of Commons say "amen" to that?


Some hon. Members:: Hear, hear!


Mr. Terry Grier (Toronto-Lakeshore):: Mr. Speaker, as the member for Fundy-Royal (Mr. Fairweather) has noted, there have been many speeches on this subject in recent weeks. I confess that I do not expect to be able to add much if anything new but I do feel, not for the record but in order to try to impress upon all of us my perspective on this issue, that I should like to say a few words.
Perhaps I am in the minority: I, for one, did not come to this debate with any fixed opinion. Not having been a member in the parliament of 1967, I did not have to take a public position on the matter: I suppose, as I look back, I was mildly abolitionist at that time. But as I approached this debate, I really did so with an open mind-that is with as much of an open mind as I could muster, and I have tried to evaluate the expressions of opinion which have been repeatedly made to me by my constituents as well as my colleagues. I am bound to say, however, that without for a moment denigrating the importance of the vote on this bill I feel that capital punishment per se is not the issue of greatest concern to the public at the present time. It has perhaps become a symbol of a wider worry but I do not believe in itself it is the crucial area of concern.
I think there is a wider worry which goes well beyond whether a person should be hanged for committing the crime of murder. It is a worry which is easily recognizable to governments, and I am sure it is recognizable to this government, a worry sometimes expressed in the loose terminology of law and order but a worry which is

focussed on an awareness of what appears to be increasing crimes of violence, a worry about public safety and security. One does not have to be particularly sensitive to appreciate how much less casual air travel is these days than ten years ago; one does not have to be particularly sensitive to appreciate that slowly there appears to be growing in our urban areas problems generically similar to those being experienced in other large cities on this continent. I think that public concern, that wider worry about public safety and security, is a legitimate concern and one to which this parliament must respond.
I shall support this bill because I do not believe the retention or extension or capital punishment is in any sense a response to this wider worry. Although to many, many people it is something of a symbol, to me it is not in any useful way an answer. I suggest that this debate, which may well have gone on long enough, has been useful in that it has enabled parliament to focus on this wider problem of public security, on such matters as the administration of bail, procedures of sentencing, and provisions for parole.
I am not a lawyer and I am not an expert in this area. I, myself, am given to at least some of the same kind of anxieties as I am sure my constituents are, perhaps in my ignorance but none the less I feel these anxieties. I would like to be fully assured, first of all, that this parliament- and I am using the term "parliament" rather than "government", Mr. Speaker, because this is in a sense a nonpartisan vote-is sufficiently sensitive to this wider concern that, having dealt with this bill, it will not simply say "That's that" for five years.
The Solicitor General (Mr. Allmand) and other members of the government including the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) have given assurances that they will be receptive in committee to suggestions for amendments dealing with such matters as parole. The other day the Prime Minister appeared to give the assurance that he was aware of this mounting public concern. I shall support this bill on second reading and hope that those assurances take concrete form in committee stage.
I want to re-emphasize, Mr. Speaker, that I think it would be a very, very serious mistake for parliament to conclude that passage of this bill, satisfies in any meaningful way, the wider worries to which I have alluded. I, therefore, would urge upon government and upon the appropriate authorities, some of whom may in fact be provincial as well as federal, that we not let the matter drop there. The public, in my judgment, has a profound right to express its viewpoint on this wide range of anxieties. It has the right to be heard and the right to influence the course of legislation and other decisions which will follow.
I confess that, on this particular matter, I do not believe this present House of Commons has been a particularly accurate channel for the reflection of that public anxiety. Each one of us will explain his vote according to his own lights. Some members have quoted Edmund Burke, who was by no means a democrat, I might add, in defence of their right to make up their own minds. I am not questioning the right of members of parliament to make up their
May 24, 1973

own minds. I am not altogether sure, however, once we have done so in the fairly certain knowledge that we are not representing the general will of our constituents, that we should necessarily be awarded a bouquet. I think some of us are too anxious to take credit for the fact that, on this issue, we are not being representative. However, whether we are being representative or not, whether or not our votes will sufficiently represent the public anxiety, I do not think the matter should be allowed to be dropped at that point.
I should like to see ordinary members of the public given a much greater opportunity to express themselves in front of some body or group which represents those who will in the end be making decisions on the wider issues of public safety and security. I do not care whether that is a royal commission, a task force or a joint federal-provincial group. When we run into difficulties on matters such as airports, we are quite ready to set up inquiries that go on for one year or two in order to establish that the public shall have every right to express its view. We hear much talk about the value of participatory democracy. Yet on this issue concerning public safety and security, I sense a tendency to reserve the solution of this particular problem for the experts, the parliamentarians, the lawyers and those who have made a study of this matter. Perhaps, unconsciously, we have brought to bear on this subject a somewhat elitist, somewhat narrowly restricted focus.
I should like to see the public given a far greater opportunity to express itself, not through the medium of any member of parliament, but on its own behalf. Let the members of the public have a chance to confront, to ask questions, and to be answered by those who have responsibility for administering and deciding in the whole area of public safety. I think that would be useful in two ways. First, it would give those in positions of responsibility, perhaps, a first hand impression of the nature and intensity of public opinion. At the same time it would provide a channel in the other direction, by which the public itself might become aware to a greater extent than at present of the parameters of this problem. I think we should make a far greater effort than we have made before to invite public participation on a first hand basis in our discussions on the whole question of public safety and security. Let us not leave this matter merely to lawyers and parliamentarians. In considering this problem, let us give as much opportunity for public input as if we were considering an airport or other matter of public policy.
I do not believe that voting one way or the other on this bill is going to do much about the wider worries I have expressed. I believe it is our duty to do something about those wider worries and to seek ways to deal with them. I hope that as this bill proceeds to the committee stage and becomes law, as I hope it will, that this parliament and the government will not let that wider concern drop but will immediately make a visible effort to engage the public in a substantial dialogue or exchange of opinion on this whole subject. If we do not do that then I suggest that five years hence the public's concern over the substantial problems of public security will be even more out of symmetry with the purposes of this bill or its successor than it is at present.
Capital Punishment
I do not think we, as legislators, can permit ourselves the luxury of merely voting on a bill of this kind and saying that the matter is settled, at least for five years. It will not be settled. I think we have a profound responsibility to look beyond the issue of capital punishment, to the larger problem of public security. I trust, Mr. Speaker, that that will be a matter of high priority on the agenda of this parliament and, I would hope, on the agendas of the legislatures of the provinces.


Hon. Marcel Lambert (Edmonton West):: Mr. Speaker, it has become more and more apparent to me during this afternoon's debate that not only the press, television and radio but even members of Parliament are completely mistaken as to the precise meaning of the bill before us.
I have heard some hon. members, and even one of my most highly respected colleagues, arguing for total abolition of capital punishment. That is beside the point, because the 1961 act is in force today. What has in fact happened is that the moratorium expired on December 31 last.
And the government is now returning to the attack and asking us to renew the same five-year moratorium retroactively from January 1. This has nothing at all to do with abolishing capital punishment!
Why therefore do we hear and read in the papers about-

Why are we hearing about a hanging bill, about a retention of capital punishment? What is all this discussion about the abolition of capital punishment? It is totally out of order in this debate. The question before us is, should there be or should there not be an extension of the five-year moratorium, that is, of the law presently embodied in the Criminal Code. There is a redefinition in the law that applied during the moratorium of what is capital murder. In the present bill that same definition is preserved. It is confined to the murder of a policeman on duty, of a peace officer, of a security guard, and of a prison guard on duty, and that is all. There are limitations also in minimum sentences that a convicted murderer must serve. The convicted murderer sentenced to life must serve a minimum of ten years. There are othe restrictions, as well.
What actual difference has the limitation of categories liable to capital punishment made? I say, Mr. Speaker, it has not made one bit of difference because, since 1962, notwithstanding what the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) said the other day, and the proof of the pudding is in the eating, there has been an automatic and consistent use of the royal prerogative, something that should be rare and should be used only in the appropriate cases. However, there has been what I call an abuse of the royal prerogative.
[ Translation]
I wonder, Mr. Speaker, if, in the excitement of the end of 1970 and the beginning of 1971, during the unfortunate crisis in the province of Quebec, the phrase "police or security officer" applied, under the act, to a soldier in a peace-keeping role. If a member of the FLQ, or anyone

May 24, 1973
Capital Punishment
else, had murdered a soldier, from one end of the country to the other there would have been cries of: "To the gallows, post-haste". And the cabinet would have agreed.

Those were cases where the cabinet could have utilized that sense of authority that was assumed by the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and some of his ministers at that time. One remembers their television appearances at the time of the crisis calling for the apprehension and punishment of people committing the dastardly crimes of the day. Is there any difference between those men or any man, woman or child whose life is wrongfully taken as described under the terms of the law as it exists? What is the differentiation between those people and a policeman or prison guard?
Last night over television, a man described capital punishment as murder. How does he describe the killing of the man in Toronto who killed two policemen and was then shot by a third policeman? What about men killed by police when fleeing from the scene of an armed robbery and there is an exchange of gunfire? Is that also legalized murder? I suggest it is sophistry. People are entitled to hold those views, but I disagree with them most violently because capital punishment exacted by the state is for the security of its citizens and is in no way legalized murder.
I insist that the individual citizen has the right to the protection of his life. The state has to assume that. If the state abdicates that right, we will have gun law and an individual will have the right to carry a gun or another weapon to defend his life. That is the alternative. I find it somewhat strange that society is castigated as being a collective murderer for punishing an individual who has wrongfully and maliciously taken the life of an innocent fellow citizen, whether it is a two year old child or an 85 year old woman.
There are great cries about the fact that there is no proof that capital punishment is a deterrent. Has anyone ever canvassed the nation to ask how many men or women did not kill because they were afraid of capital punishment? After all, they did not kill anyone and so how could they be found. It could also be said that 15 years hard labour is no deterrent to armed robbery because there are still many armed robberies. However, how many people have contemplated armed robbery but were not prepared to face the potential penalty? People will not come forward and say, "I was one of those who was deterred by the penalty".
It is an exercise in sophistry to say that capital punishment is no proven deterrent to committing murder. The burden is not on those who say that the law of 1961 is the correct law to prove the value of capital punishment. The legalistic burden is upon those who seek to change the law. No amount of self-righteous wrapping of cloths of so-called intellectual or civilized superiority over a fellow citizen will add one cubit of additional value to their arguments. It has been reported in various newspapers and said in this House that abolitionists are more civilized than others, and that we will progress to a higher civilization by the abolition of capital punishment. That is a sort of self-proclaimed aura of moral superiority which only has validity by reason of the fact that it is being stated.
I find it strange when I read in the press and hear in this House statements, such as the one made this afternoon by

the hon. member for Toronto-Lakeshore (Mr. Grier), that this debate has gone on long enough and parliament should turn to other matters. Those who say that have made up their minds. They have had an opportunity to speak. However, we are not debating a matter of government policy upon which party stands have been taken. Some parties have indicated they have a party stand on this issue. At least one party has done so. The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) indicated the other day that there was to be a free vote. I do not know what has happened to government supporters in the last couple of days, though; they will not be heard through the press, because at the present time there is not one person in the press gallery.


An hon. Member:: Yes, there is.


Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: There is. I beg his
pardon. But the press are not going to interpret what members say to their constituents. Only in one or two newspapers does one see reports of the debate which has been going on here for a number of days. Yet during the election campaign this was a major issue, one which candidates debated at their forums in many parts of the country. In some constituencies this may not have been the case but as far as my constituency is concerned it was an issue which was raised at almost every meeting. I must justify my stand before the electors if this bill is to be subject to a free vote. I cannot simply say I voted with my party, because it is obvious there are many differences of opinion within my own party on this issue, just as, hopefully, there will be within the government party, provided the vote is really a free vote and there is not a "transparent whip". I know that other parties will treat it as a free vote. The hon. member for Joliette (Mr. La Salle) can have both a party vote and an independent vote, but that is all right.
In any case, since the government has announced that there is to be a free vote, there is no urgency attached to the matter. So far in 1973 some eleven people have been charged under the law of 1961, people whose cases have not been disposed of. The procedure for appeals and so forth is open to them, and at the end of the road there is still the royal prerogative. So, no one will wrongly pay the penalty should the decision of the House ultimately be to grant the moratorium. No priority is attached to this legislation, none whatsoever. Yet it has been brought forward, and since this has been done on the basis of a free vote, members must declare themselves. We have to speak while the debate is on.
Members have the right to speak, and I find it particularly offensive to hear journalists and others say the debate has gone on too long. They have had the luxury of making up their minds and they want to turn to something else regardless of the fact that parliament, which is a national forum, continues to discuss the matter. I also find it odd that under the criminal law of Canada, which is in force from Newfoundland to Vancouver, there should be a declaration by an attorney general of one province that he would determine what charges should be laid. Are the people of Saskatchewan, in the matter of the criminal law, to be treated differently from those in any other province?
May 24, 1973

I say this is an abuse of the prerogatives of a provincial attorney general.
I objected to the law being changed in 1967 because it seemed to me at that time that a double-cross had been played on parliament. A year earlier, on a private member's resolution concerning the question of abolition or retention, the House had divided strongly in favour of the retention of capital punishment. Yet less than a year later the government came back with a bill, on which there was no free vote allowed for government members, introducing the present moratorium. Oh, they threw in a sop about prison guards and policemen, a sop which abused every argument used by government speakers in support of abolition, that is, the assertion that it is morally wrong to take the life of a convicted murderer. All of the arguments, esoteric and otherwise, in favour of the abolition of capital punishment were swept aside by the government when it introduced the equivalent of Bill C-2 in 1967.
I find the consequences extremely difficult to explain to any citizen of Canada. A few cases immediately occur to me. What about an old age pensioner who is mortally wounded in an exchange of fire during a robbery at a bank or a credit union? What about a bank employee, male or female, who is killed during a bank robbery? What about the grocer at the little corner store who is attacked by a couple of hoodlums and knifed or bludgeoned to death? What about the case in Toronto the other day when a 75-year-old woman was assaulted by two or three men and kicked repeatedly in the head, over a matter of a few dollars? She was grievously injured. If she dies, is there any reason the treatment of those cowards who attacked her should be any different from the treatment meted out to one who shoots a policeman or kills a prison guard? I just cannot see the reason for any difference. Whose life is the more sacrosanct-that of a peace officer or that of an ordinary citizen?



PROCEEDINGS ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

[Stage Direction]
[ Translation]

The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order. I regret to interrupt the hon. member. Pursuant to Standing Order 40, it is my duty to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Wellington (Mr. Hales)-Canadian Broadcasting Corporation-Recovery of income tax from employees stationed in United States-Refusal by corporation-Position of minister; the hon. member for Yorkton-Melville (Mr. Nystrom)-Agriculture-Farm machinery- Implementation of recommendations of Barber Commission-Action to increase imports; the hon. member for Edmonton-Strathcona (Mr. Roche)-Transport-Alleged deterioration in western Canada railway passenger service-Request for investigation.
Disclosure of Documents
It being five o'clock, the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper, namely public bills, private bills and notices of motions (papers).

Since there are no private members' bills for discussion, the House will proceed to consider notices of motion for the production of papers. I will call upon the hon. member for Bellechasse.


Mr. Reid:: Mr. Speaker, there might be agreement to consider motion No. 87 on the order paper.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Is this agreed?


Some hon. Members:: Agreed.


PRIVATE MEMBERS' MOTIONS FOR PAPERS
Terrence Wyly Grier: That an order of the House do issue for a complete copy (including budgets A, B, X) of the Program Forecast (Program Review) by the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce for the latest year for which parliament approved departmental expenditures.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: The hon. member for Toronto-Lakeshore.
f Translation]


Gilbert F. Rondeau: On a point of order, Mr. Speaker.


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order, please. The hon. member for Shefford (Mr. Rondeau) on a point of order.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, I should like to point out to you that, since we did not have time to consult the hon. member for Bellechasse (Mr. Lambert), who had a motion on the order paper, I should be glad if we might agree to pass on to Notice of Motion No. 87 for the production of papers, with the provision that we will return as soon as possible to Notice of Motion No. 78 in the name of the hon. member for Bellechasse.


John Mercer Reid: Mr. Speaker, there have been consultations in the usual manner as to what motions would be called, and I can assure the hon. member for Shefford that the motion standing in the name of the hon. member for Bellechasse will stand and retain its position.
[ Transla tion]


The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel):: Order. I must point out however to the hon. member that as a result of an

May 24, 1973
Disclosure of Documents
agreement among hon. members, the motion of the hon. member for Bellechasse keeps its rank. I do not believe there is any problem in this regard. In any event, the hon. member being absent from the House, it might perhaps be difficult to proceed with his motion for papers.


Terrence Wyly Grier: Mr. Speaker, this order, along with a number of others of a similar nature, was proposed by me for one very fundamental reason. As a member of parliament it is my responsibility, along with my colleagues, to vote my approval or otherwise of some $18.5 billion worth of expenditures by the federal government on the basis of information that is all too scanty and all too difficult to obtain, and to arrive at a judgment counselled by some educated information as to the nature of government programs and their value.
At the moment members of parliament basically have available to them information contained in the blue book of estimates, which is a veritable sea of figures. Perhaps a member who has been here for a generation or longer may be able to find his way through them, but most of us have not been here for that long. I feel sure that most of us encounter difficulty and frustration in trying to find information on the basis of which we can come to some kind of sensible judgment as to the wisdom of various programs and as to whether or not funds are being spent in the wisest possible way.
It is true that in recent years the presentation of the estimates has been altered somewhat, and there are now contained in that blue book program descriptions and outlines of objectives which, frankly, shed no light on the expenditure programs detailed in its pages, pages that probably were written several years ago and which are hardly changed from year to year. I had occasion yesterday in a committee meeting to be referred to one of these descriptions by the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury), and I think it was evident, as he read it out to me, how useless it would have been in answering the question I had asked; and I suspect that the President of the Treasury Board was himself privately embarrassed. The order of the House for the provision of a complete copy of the Program Forecast of this ministry, and indeed of others for which I have asked, is for the purpose of establishing some logical basis for judging the value of government programs.
Reference is made in the motion to budgets A, B and X. Not all hon. members may be aware of the meaning of these interesting designations. Budget A is the forecast expenditures of the department, taking into account those activities of an on-going nature. That is to say, if one took the activities of the previous year and attached current year costs to them, that would be budget A. Budget B contains an estimate of the costs attached to new programs and activities that the department wishes to undertake. Budget X, which perhaps would be the most revealing of all, indicates those programs which, in the judgment of the department, are of the lowest priority and might well be cut out if it were necessary to provide funds for the items referred to in budget B.
It seems to me a matter of common sense that the kind of information contained in these Program Forecasts be made available to Members of Parliament who, in the end,
[The Acting Speaker (Mr. Laniel)]
must give their approval or otherwise of multibillion dollar federal expenditures. If this information is good enough for the Treasury Board, I suggest it is good enough for parliament. These Program Forecasts are made available in great detail to the Treasury Board and its officials as they attempt to determine the spending priorities of the government for the coming years. Yet they are withheld from Members of Parliament.
Putting the best light upon it, one can only assume that the government feels that if such figures were made available to members of parliament we would abuse them, use them to narrow political advantage, misunderstand them, and that they would be beyond our competence to assess and therefore we had better not have them. Putting it in its worst light, this seems to me to be a deliberate attempt to withhold from parliament, which historically and traditionally is sovereign in the granting of supply, the very evidence upon which some sensible judgment could be made.
In the Program Forecasts that are made available to Treasury Board by each department, every single item of expenditure is defined in detail, justified in detail, described in detail that could turn the forest of figures in the estimates blue book into useful information. This program forecasting approach to budgeting has been established by the Treasury Board for government departments in recent years. Manuals issued by Treasury Board indicate in very specific detail how each department is to go about setting its program forecasts, thus establishing the kind of information that Treasury Board will require in order to make an assessment. It seems to me, as I said earlier, that if that kind of information is needed by Treasury Board to establish government spending priorities, then surely it is needed by, and should be made available to, members of parliament.
There has been criticism over the years of the growing difficulty that this body encounters in trying to get to the bottom of government expenditure programs. For that reason the committee system to deal with estimates has been set up, but to one who, as a new member, has had some brief experience with committee procedures the difficulty is not immeasurably reduced by the opportunity to ask questions for ten or fifteen minutes of a minister who is almost by definition doing his best to provide as little information as he possibly can.
Members of this party during this session have asked that evaluations of the effectiveness and efficiency of certain programs of this ministry of industry, trade and commerce be provided to the House. We were told these evaluations were going on but they have not been made available. On March 14, the President of the Treasury Board indicated in the House that virtually every department of government now has the resources to carry out evaluations of the efficiency of its operations and the cost effectiveness of its programs.
I asked the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Gillespie) whether that statement applied to his department. He said, in part, he was not sure whether he had any budget to enable his department to do evaluations and did not think his estimates provided for that. So,
May 24, 1973

while we are told by the department that evaluations are going on, and by the President of the Treasury Board that within each department there are now resources to carry on evaluations, the minister is not sure whether such evaluations are going on or whether the resources are available to his department. In fact, there is no branch of the ministry of industry, trade and commerce set up for the specific purpose of conducting evaluations.
Such evaluations as may be made are conducted within the branches and divisions which themselves are responsible for administering the programs, and one might be excused for suspecting that such evaluations might not be utterly objective. The absence of that information and the unwillingness of the government to provide us with this kind of evaluation and study, is all the more reason the Program Forecast, including budgets A, B and X, should be made available to members of parliament.
These are not secret documents, but there is a tendency on the part of governments in Canada to regard all pieces of paper written on in the offices of the ministries as confidential or secret whether or not they are worth anything. So, those Program Forecasts are regarded as confidential and withheld from members of parliament. However, it is possible without a great deal of ingenuity to acquire copies of those Program Forecasts, at least for some departments. When one opens them to get some clear description of the programs which are identified in the estimates merely by figures, one appreciates how clearly are set out the objectives and descriptions of these programs. They are readily identified and the changes in government programs are visible. It is easy, as indeed it should be, for members to establish which programs are being adjusted or changed, and thus to ask on behalf of the people of Canada why they are being changed. It is also possible under budget X to identify which projects in the judgment of the departments involved are of least importance and which can most readily be dropped without serious damage to Canada. That kind of information seems to be incredibly important.
Let me refer briefly to such a Program Forecast dealing with one department. The description of a new wing being established to undertake policy planning and research is set out in a way which would permit members of parliament serving on a committee to get straight to the heart of the changes in policy and to ask sensible questions on behalf of the Canadian people instead of milling around day after day with the very limited resources placed at the disposal of parliament by the ministry to get at what in fact is actually going on.
In the ministry of industry, trade and commerce in the last few years the sum of $1.3 billion has been expended on programs for the purpose of aiding Canadian industry to develop Canadian technology and exports. These are laudable objectives, but $1.3 billion is a lot of money. We have only the department's word for it that the money is being effectively and efficiently used. Forgive me, Mr. Speaker, if I regard the department as a prejudiced witness in this case: it has a vested interest in maintaining and augmenting the funds at its disposal. It seems to me quite within the framework of the parliamentary democracy of the 1970's that members of parliament should be provided with the kind of information which can test the compe-
Disclosure of Documents
tence of the department as it asserts that, in fact, its programs are being carried out effectively. That kind of information, I put it to members of the House through you, Mr. Speaker, is to a large extent available in these Program Forecasts.
I may say in passing that the absence of evaluations of programs of the kind I have mentioned, this $1.3 billion alphabet soup program which our party has criticized at some length in recent months, leads me to wonder whether in fact even the Treasury Board is being given any reason for the continuation of these programs. On what basis, I wonder, does the Treasury Board decide to allocate $151 million in this fiscal year for these programs if in fact the evaluations are not being done or not being made available? If they are available to the Treasury Board and to the minister I think they should be available to members of parliament.
We are dealing here with a fundamental principle which has two aspects. One is the sovereign right of parliament to get at the facts of the case before granting supply. The other is the newer idea that government, to the greatest extent possible, must be carried on with a minimum of information being made available to the public. There is a tendency to regard all documentation as privileged or confidential. I think that is a dangerous tendency because, regardless of whether it puts one government at a political disadvantage by providing its opposition with that information, looking at the totality of the government process what happens is that departments grow. We see evidence of tremendous increases in staff at upper levels right now. These departments grow, programs are undertaken and money is being spent at increasing rates each year, yet less and less information is available to those ordinary members of parliament who in the end accept the responsibility for deciding whether the programs make sense. I put it to you that the kind of request we have made makes sense and is in keeping with the concept of modern government, and the role of members of parliament in a modern government. If we are not to give members of parliament that kind of information, we might as well concede that we are being run by a rapidly growing bureaucracy, building upon itself and concealing from those to whom it is responsible all the information it can.
I think that is a regrettable and dangerous tendency, and I would urge this House to order that these documents be made available in order that we may in the future deal more intelligently with the multibillion dollar expenditure programs.


Mr. Jim Fleming (York West):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to speak on the motion presented to this House by the hon. member for Lakeshore (Mr. Grier), I find myself in a very difficult position. I think the principle the hon. member has put forward, the ideal that the public and certainly members of parliament should have access to as much information as possible, surely is supported by members on both sides of this House. However, it is a matter of getting down to the practicality of whether the government can supply all the information to which it has access in making judgment decisions and still be sure that when it makes decisions, subject to opposition reaction and comment, it can act in the best interests of the people of

May 24, 1973
Disclosure of Documents
Canada. Frankly, my reaction is that if any of us sit back and think about it sensibly, we will understand it.
When you talk about the planning, programming and budgeting structures used by Treasury Board you are referring to a concept that was adopted by the government a few years ago to do its very best to bring together the complexities of governing a country such as Canada and indeed to decide on priorities for the use of the limited tax revenues available and giving the political leaders the best advice available from all the various sources of the Public Service. To say now that the government should present, on demand of the members of the House, all such papers and advice surely is to negate the whole system of parliament as we know it. If this suggestion were carried to the extreme, the decision-making would no longer be the responsibility of the political leaders but would fall back one step and would be given to the people who create policies. So, while the principle is good, I think there is great danger in applying it across the board.
In order to promote the effective management of financial resources through improved accounting systems, the government employs a system commonly known as planning, programming and budgeting. The concepts common to all planning-programming-budgeting systems are these, if I may outline them for the House. First, the setting up of specific objectives; second, the systematic analysis to clarify objectives and to assess alternative ways of meeting them; third, the framing of budgetary proposals in terms of programs directed toward the achievement of objectives; next, the projection of the costs of these programs a number of years in the future. In addition, there is the formulation of plans of achievement year by year for each program and, finally, an information system for each program to supply data for the monitoring of achievement of program goals and to supply data for the reassessment of the program objectives and the appropriateness of the program itself.
In other words, there is planning ahead to find priorities and make readjustments as situations change from year to year, and to make sure that there is communication back and forth among all the various departments. So, indeed this planning program and budgeting system is responsive to, and always alert to, changes. The elements of the Canadian government PPB system have been developed in harmony with the aforementioned general concepts and within the context of total resource allocation. By the latter phrase is meant that there is an explicit recognition that the total resources are limited in terms of the individual and collective demands of departments, and that there has to be a setting of priorities by the government itself in light of which departments can plan and budget.
Intensive study is made of feasible alternative ways of attaining defined objectives with a view to determining the approach which is most likely to achieve the greatest benefit for a given cost or, conversely, the approach by which a given objective will be achieved at minimum cost. The government, of course, has a grave responsibility in trying to reach that objective. A number of techniques have been found useful in such studies and the application of these techniques has been found useful in such studies.

The application of these techniques is properly the work of analysts trained in their use. I very much question whether those analysts will confidently go about their duties in this regard if their decisions and recommendations are subject to political question before they can be given to the government which must exercise its responsibility in respect of decision-making.
The adoption of an analytic approach to government decision-making of the kind that underlies planning-programming-budgeting is probably inevitable in a complex society such as we have in Canada today. The minimum needs of shelter, sustenance, internal order and the like having been met, there are innumerable possible ways of improving the quality of life and not all the ways can be pursued at one time because of the limited resources the government has. Choices have to be made as to what should be done, in the full realization that the choosing to do some things means that resources will be unavailable to do other things. The complexity of the considerations having a bearing on these choices invites the application of all that modern techniques of analysis and of gathering and processing information have to offer. Departmental program forecast submissions, which are an integral part of this process, are therefore voluminous documents which would be very costly to reproduce for purposes of tabling. In addition, they sometimes, of necessity, refer explicitly to cabinet decisions. As a matter of policy, documents of this character are not tabled and surely should not be if this is against the public interest.
As I have indicated, program forecasting is an important element in the budgetary system of the government. One of its main purposes is to provide the Treasury Board with information which forms the basis of an optimum allocation of resources among the competing requirements for all programs in the coming fiscal year. This information is also important for improved over-all government planning in subsequent years beyond the coming fiscal year. In addition, the Program Forecast is a useful vehicle for departmental management in focusing attention on the pattern of current and future expenditures, and in decision-making in respect of the priorities which will be attached to the various programs, activities and projects for which the department is responsible.
The activities of the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce, involving as they do industrial development and trade promotion ventures, obviously reflect directly on the plans and initiatives of individual companies and business organizations. In explaining the advantages of the proposals contained in program forecasts to the Treasury Board it is often desirable, indeed necessary, to employ specific examples which expose the interests of those individual companies. For example, most firms regard their research and development work as being highly confidential. They are normally attempting to develop a new or better product before their competitors do so. If it is successful, the firm is likely to have an advantage in both the domestic market and in export markets. This is where Industry, Trade and Commerce steps in.
In some instances the Canadian firm is competing against other domestically-based companies, although in many cases it is competing on an international basis with
May 24, 1973

a wide variety of enterprises in other countries, some with much greater resources at their disposal. Because of the costs of developing new products and the need to protect their interests, most firms will only participate in departmental programs if they have assurance that their affairs will be kept strictly confidential; indeed, there is a confidentiality clause contained in some of the contracts signed between the department and the participating companies.
In respect of dealing with the matter of revealing papers and the adoption of some system for this by the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce, I am pointing out some of the shortcomings. As I tried to make clear in my opening comments, it is the responsibility of the political leaders to exercise their responsibility in making decisions and to answer the hon. member or any other member of this House in respect of matters of policy being presented for action. However, if the documents in respect of the planning were circulated among members before the government exercised its responsibility in dealing with our democratic system this surely would undermine the system itself.
I understand that in committee-and it is on record in recent months-the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Gillespie) has made a very real effort, on several occasions, to bring forward and present every bit of planning and programming material that he felt he could safely make available without jeopardizing long-range planning where there has been a political decision and where private interests, private industry, would not be jeopardized internationally in competing against firms in foreign countries.
Surely, Mr. Speaker, the power to govern must rest with the government. If we come to the point where we roll back the cabinet decision-making process to this House, where this House sits as a cabinet, instead of the government, then it will be a denial of the basis of our democratic system where government must accept responsibility for the decisions it makes.
If we begin to judge before the programs of the civil servants have been brought to a political head and decided upon, then surely we undermine the decisions to be made and we weaken the ability of the opposition to focus its attack on government. If we can talk about or judge, before the fact of a political decision by cabinet, the priorities and directions of a particular program then it may well be that when the cabinet makes its decision it can say, "You cannot blame us entirely; two or three other parties have been involved in this." Moreover, it would place in great jeopardy the morale, and indeed the competence of the civil service if the decisions of civil servants suddenly become the area of criticism rather than the government's choice as to the proper decision being rightfully the area of criticism.
The hon. member for Toronto-Lakeshore (Mr. Grier) said in his concluding comments, as I recall them, that less and less information is available, that more and more there is bureaucracy, and that less and less the members of this House have available to them the information they need to carry on and cope with the kind of modern government that we have in the 1970s. I believe that the opposite
Disclosure of Documents
is true. If I may, Mr. Speaker, I would like to make brief reference to a committee of this House which this morning held an in camera meeting. It was the justice committee. The meeting involved the RCMP and a discussion in great detail of several matters of much public concern. The government felt that the members of the committee had the right to know, without revealing matters of security which might place the public in jeopardy. But, Mr. Speaker, what we are discussing now is a different matter, which might jeopardize long-range planning before political decisions are made on programs drawn up by civil servants.
I end as I began, by saying that I cannot deny the principle of freedom of availability of as much information as possible on government activities and planning. But to intrude on long-range forecasts, bring the civil servants into the forefront and deny political responsibility being placed where it should be, would place our system in great jeopardy.


Mr. H. T. Herbert (Vaudreuil):: Mr. Speaker, it is axiomatic that if next year's resources are to be higher by a certain amount than this year's, expenditures for all purposes taken together can rise by no more than the same amount. It is intuitively obvious that it would be more beneficial for the increase to be distributed unevenly among functions according to the exigencies of the period under review. In other words, expenditures should increase at a faster rate than average for some functional programs, should remain stable in others and should actually be reduced in still others to free funds for higher priority purposes. Consequently, not only should departmental programs be viewed as competing with one another for share of the total resources but each program should be viewed as competing with all other programs belonging to the same or other departments.
A major element of the PPB system, therefore, involves seeking the government's guidance as to priorities to be served in allocating resources. This guidance will be sought in the light of forecasts by the Department of Finance as to the magnitude of the funds likely to be available for the next few years according to specific assumptions as to the rate of growth in the economy, tax rates and the appropriate level of borrowing for budgetary and non-budgetary expenditures, subject of course to any overriding considerations as to the fiscal stance necessary to correct any imbalance in the economy.
The recommendations as to priorities are based on analyses made of information drawn from various sources and, in particular, from departmental program review submissions. It will be obvious that the determination of spending priorities and government policy is closely linked. Consequently, these program forecasts necessarily contain information confidential to government as well as to those private institutions or persons who may be involved in the programs financed by the estimates when these are ultimately presented.
The Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Gillespie) has appeared before a committee of this House on several occasions this month during examination of the department's estimates. He has endeavoured to answer fully the questions of committee members in relation to the department's programs and related spending. I believe

May 24, 1973
Disclosure of Documents
that much of the information which hon. members might expect to find in the program forecast working documents has already been provided, while preserving the confidentiality of those matters not in the public domain. The proceedings of these committee hearings are available to hon. members who may be interested.
I want to speak of the types of control which management has. There are two kinds of control, one output oriented and the other input oriented; that is, one emphasizing steps taken to promote the achievement of chosen objectives of a program, and the other emphasizing expenditure limits that are not to be exceeded, or statutes or regulations that are not to be violated.
One is achievement control and the other is resource control. Resource control as defined here is well known to government managers. Whatever specific form this type of control may take it is required because, (a) the control by parliament over votes and over cash appropriated is paramount in our political system; (b) some initial or primary segmentation of votes by major levels of responsibility or by activity or the like will be made, and some control over the financial and personal resources allotted to these segments will have to be maintained; and (c) where a contract or some other form of covenant is made that requires payment in the future, some record of the commitment is likely to be necessary to avoid overcommitment.
These guidelines which are laid down for management control will obviously only be operative if management realizes that some of its basic considerations are to remain confidential in nature, as in executive consideration in any organization. When this confidentiality no longer exists, then these considerations must be of such a guarded nature as to detract from their value to the persons receiving them. I think that any freer release or any lessening in our controls over the confidentiality of documents is going to detract from the value of the reports that are submitted to our ministers and the heads of departments. For that reason, Mr. Speaker, I must support fully the retention of confidentiality in this type of document, while still believing that through committee discussions all essential information that members must have in order to continue their job as watchdog of the public purse is available in these committee discussions and is freely given.
[DOT] <1740)


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: The hon. member for Gloucester (Mr. Breau).


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, I wish to-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: I mean the hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce.


Herb Breau: Thank you, Mr. Speaker. If I had a preference I would be called the hon. member for Gloucester, because Gloucester, New Brunswick, is a very fine place and I am pleased to be part of it.
In relation to the speech of the hon. member for Toron-to-Lakeshore (Mr. Grier), the most inportant part of it

concerned matters other than the need for disclosure of program forecasts. The hon. member has pursued that point before, but I think he is confusing the need for program forecasts with the need for evaluation and the need for control over government expenditures. I have very great difficulty in relating these to the need for program forecasts.
The hon. member spoke about forecasts and about the need for parliamentary control, but they are not necessary interdependent. It is not necessary, for example, to have a forecast for a party which hopes to be the executive. It is not necessary for opposition parties to have in their hands the results of program forecasting, because really that is what they are, in order for them to make a judgment. I have never asked for, and I do not think I need, copies of their minutes-if they exist, and I do not think they do. I do not need to listen in to caucus meetings of the New Democratic Party to make up my mind on their policies.
I cannot understand why the hon. member for Toronto-Lakeshore would need forecast submissions by various ministers, various departments, that come to Treasury Board and cabinet in order to make up his mind on the value of these programs. Secondly, I do not understand why he should have trouble arriving at a political judgment as to which programs should be voted for. It seems to me it could happen that they would be interdependent, but not necessarily.
On the question of forecasts, I believe the hon. member for York West (Mr. Fleming) and the hon. member for Vaudreuil-Soulanges have explained the point very well. We are in a parliamentary form of government.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The hon. member for Vaudreuil (Mr. Herbert) rises on a point of order.


Harold Thomas Herbert: Mr. Speaker, I hate to interrupt the hon. parliamentary secretary, but it is five years-1968-since the county of Vaudreuil-Soulanges was enlarged to become the county of Vaudreuil.


Herb Breau: I am very happy that the hon. member has brought about a correction, Mr. Speaker. My error was unintentional. We cannot forget the riding of York West because we have had very prominent members from that riding. I was saying that these two members have explained the difficulties the government is faced with in this request.
Program forecasting was initiated out of a planning budget system with which I am sure the hon. member is in agreement. For that system to work, the President of the Treasury Board requires that every department plans its programs and submits them. These are programs of individual departments and individual ministers. In fact, when a minister goes to cabinet or to Treasury Board with a submission, he is committed to that submission and puts his name to it. He says, "I want this program". The Minister of National Health and Welfare for example, is not responsible for the financing of this country; he is not responsible for fiscal policies nor in deciding how much money should be put into the economy. His job is to look after the health and welfare programs of the country and to have with the provincial governments programs which meet that part of federal government responsibilities. Are
May 24, 1973

we in the kind of parliamentary system that does not protect the minister? A minister may come to cabinet and ask for something for his department, but the government may feel that because of other priorities or lack of revenue, or because it is time fiscal policies were geared to putting less into the economy, government spending should be reduced.
I believe our parliamentary system of government could not work if a minister had to make public his submissions to cabinet, and this is what the hon. member is asking for. He is asking for the forecast of a minister, a forecast the minister may have arrived at over three, four or five years before going to cabinet or the Treasury Board and fighting his point. Because there is only a certain amount of money available from taxes and other sources of revenue, and because the Treasury Board, the Minister of Finance and other ministers responsible in this area so recommend, the cabinet may decide on priorities which apply not only to that particular department but to all departments. The hon. member may want a system of government that would make available what he asks for, but I do not know of any system which works that way.
A program forecast is a study by a certain department and a forecast of its expenditures for existing or future programs. It seems to me that is the reason we have a cabinet and the reason our type of parliamentary government has an executive. As the hon. member for York West explained, the executive is responsible for presenting programs to parliament, and if they do not work the executive is also responsible. I do not see how a government could function if this type of motion were accepted and forecasts were tabled in the way the hon. member for Toronto-Lakeshore (Mr. Grier) suggests. The hon. member for York West also explained this point in regard to the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce.
That brings me to the famous evaluation reports. In committee the minister explained that there was no conflict between what the Treasury Board had said in an answer on March 14 and what he had said. The type of evaluation that the President of the Treasury Board (Mr. Drury) was talking about is being made by the department. Like other departments, the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce does not spend money without questioning how it is spent. Every year when the minister goes to Treasury Board with his estimates, he is responsible for them to cabinet, to Treasury Board and ultimately to this House.
Evaluations are being made, but there are different sorts of evaluation. What the members of the New Democratic Party seem to want is independent evaluation. The hon. member for Oshawa-Whitby (Mr. Broadbent) explained that to me in a committee not long ago when he said he would like to see independent evaluations made. Maybe this is possible, but if any evaluation reports are to be made public they will have to be from an independent body. If you ask a government official who is hired under contract or employed by the public service in a government department to make an analysis of a program or to evaluate it, he will probably take a critical stand. Perhaps he will take such a stand because he wants to improve the program. Are we to put that official on the block and say the evaluation report is to be made public? I do not know
Disclosure of Documents
any government which functions that way. I wonder if the NDP governments in the provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and British Columbia do that.


Mr. Stevens:: Let us deal with Ottawa.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, members of the opposition want to deal with Ottawa because they are ashamed of what their provincial supporters do. They suggest that Ottawa should do something else. The fact is that Ottawa has the same problems as any province. I say this to illustrate that it is not possible to do some of the things the notice of motion suggests. It would not be possible to do them if this matter had been raised in the Ontario legislature or any other legislature that operates under our system. I do not know of any parliamentary system in the world in which any member of the executive, while preparing forecasts and submissions for the cabinet, would make them public.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Surely no government is as secretive as the one the hon. member supports.


Herb Breau: I wonder what kind of student of parliamentary affairs the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) has been. That cabinet proceedings are secret is well established; I think this applies to any form of government.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Tell us about this government's tinkering.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member could have made a speech had he wanted to do so. I do not know of any government in Canada that operates that way. I should like hon. members to tell me whether there is any parliamentary government which makes public submissions of ministers to cabinet. That system just could not work. This is also true in business. If the board of directors asks somebody in the company for an analysis or an evaluation, that analysis is not made public. The evaluation is for the board of directors to consider and it is confidential. I do not know how any government could function if such evaluations were made public. They are made for the purposes of the department, to enable it to evaluate programs. I do not see how we could make such evaluation reports public and maintain the type of government that we have in Canada.
The hon. member also spoke about parliamentary controls. I do not think program forecasts or evaluation reports have anything to do with parliamentary control. I admit that the hon. member for Toronto-Lakeshore supports a party that does its homework, as is evident when members of that party come to committee and examine officials and ministers. All opposition parties are not like that. I have seen many instances which illustrate this. Indeed, I remember when the Minister of Industry, Trade and Commerce (Mr. Gillespie) appeared before a committee to present his supplementary estimates and members of the Conservative party were not interested in questioning him on the programs being submitted; they were concerned about procedural questions and making headlines. That is their privilege.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Stick to the facts.

May 24, 1973
Disclosure of Documents


Herb Breau: It is the privilege of members to deal in any way they want to with these matters, but they cannot have it both ways. They cannot say, on the one hand, that the committee system does not provide enough opportunity for scrutiny of government spending and, on the other hand, act as if committees exist only to enable them to make political points. Certainly they can make political arguments; they can try to catch the headlines. That is fine. However, they cannot come here and say that the present system does not provide for parliamentary scrutiny of government spending. I submit that it does.
There are many examples to show that since estimates have been studied in committee, there has been better scrutiny. Some hon. members take time to do their homework before questioning officials. I think that is better for them, better for the minister concerned, better for parliament and better for the public. I do not think it is necessary for members of the opposition to have the forecasts of various department or to have the evaluation reports in front of them to scrutinize government spending.
The previous parliament provided opposition parties with funds for research. Some of them used this money for better scrutiny while others used it for different purposes. That is their business; they can do what they want. But they cannot say this government has not been sensitive to that problem, that it did not want better scrutiny and more intelligent discussion of government spending and legislation.


Mr. Hueglin:: What about the Auditor General's report?


Herb Breau: The hon. member refers to the Auditor General's report. There are Auditor General's reports relating to Conservative governments in Canada, and they are no better than the reports we have seen in recent years.


Joseph Fred Hueglin: Stick to Ottawa.


Herb Breau: It is the job of the Auditor General to be critical, to look for waste and to suggest ways in which accounting procedures can be improved. That is his job. In any big organization, certainly in any government organization, there is room for critical comments by an auditor. If we consider the provinces of New Brunswick and Ontario which have Conservative governments, and examine the reports of their provincial auditors general, we will find that the tone is about the same as that of the report tabled yesterday. In some instances they are worse.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: They could not be worse.


Herb Breau: An hon. member on the other side was scandalized because some tenders were opened in private. Let me tell him that his supporters run provincial governments in this country which do not even call for tenders.


An hon. Member:: Shame.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. I think the debate is getting somewhat off the course on which it is supposed to stay.


Herb Breau: Mr. Speaker, my remarks have to do with parliamentary control. That is what this notice of motion is about. I will stick to the motion.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Question.


Herb Breau: I cannot support the motion, for the reasons I have stated. Like the hon. member for York West and the hon. member for Vaudreuil (Mr. Herbert), I cannot support the motion. You cannot ask a minister to come to cabinet and make a good case for something if he must make public the reasons for his stand. That is what this motion seeks. The hon. member asks for certain forecasts to be made public. Surely that is not acceptable.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Let us take the vote and find out.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. It being six o'clock, the time appointed for the consideration of private members' business has expired and I do now leave the chair. The House will resume at eight o'clock.
At six o'clock the House took recess.


[Stage Direction]
AFTER RECESS

The House resumed at 8 p.m.


[Stage Direction]
The House resumed consideration of the motion of Mr. Allmand that Bill C-2, to amend the Criminal Code, be read the second time and referred to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs.
Marcel Joseph Aimé Lambert: Mr. Speaker, at five o'clock I was indicating to the House that on the basis of my personal persuasions-and they represent the views of the majority of the people I have consulted in the city of Edmonton and the surrounding area-I do not favour the passage of this bill. The people whom I consulted preferred the law of 1961.
The Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) discussed one aspect of this matter the other day on which the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Stanfield) expressed great reserve. That was the question of the royal prerogative. The royal prerogative has been used in countless cases. In fact, it has been used in all cases since the last execution in 1962, sometimes literally one minute before midnight, even after the government had announced it would not interfere with the sentence. I recall in particular a case in Montreal generally known as the Santa Claus murders.
This question of the royal prerogative bothers me. It exists in law. We are not attacking the authority of the constitutional monarch in these matters, but the consideration and advice given to the monarch, or the monarch's representative, which must be followed is that of the treasury benches. Knowing something about the composi-

May 24, 1973

tion and the actions of individuals on the treasury benches, if the Prime Minister or other senior ministers have the personal persuasion that total abolition is right, no cabinet minister is going to make an issue of a matter which, if his views were to prevail, would mean the death of an individual. There are far better grounds for dissent than that.
I do not think there is any member of this House or many people in this country who, as a matter of principle and after consideration, would go to a showdown vote in order to execute a man if there should be a change in the law. One reason for using the royal prerogative is the view of the Prime Minister, whoever he may be at the time, and we have had a succession of abolitionists at all times. I find it uncomfortable that odd kinds of pressure of a political nature can be brought to bear in any case. There is a political aura or atmosphere that applies in the final determination of the exercise of the royal prerogative. This makes me uncomfortable, because whether a man shall die or not usually depends upon the political situation.
Earlier this afternoon I said that I very much doubted that with the cabinet we had in October, November and December of 1970 at the time of the Quebec unrest, when a brave stand was taken by this government in invoking the War Measures Act, anyone involved in a killing during that crisis would have benefited from the royal prerogative. The situation has now changed. There have been appeals, and so on, and we do not know how these cases are going to turn out. I will not comment on them because they are still subject to appeal. However, that is the wrong type of influence that can apply in the exercise of the royal prerogative.
I do not know what the ultimate answer might be. Perhaps we should return to the days when the royal prerogative was used sparingly and in appropriate cases; it then had much greater value. To my mind, the royal prerogative has been abused and as a result it has become somewhat meaningless. One could say it has been used as a device to bring in the abolition of capital punishment by the back door. If there is to be abolition it ought to be as a result of a decision of Parliament.
Let us approach the issue in a straightforward manner. Then, I am sure, if the majority is in favour of abolition everyone will accept the decision. I am not in favour of abolition, but if that is the will of parliament I will certainly accept it as I have accepted other legislation passed by the House over the last 16 years which I have not greeted with much enthusiasm. However, since it was passed by majority decision in a democratic country, one accepts these things and loyally tries to fulfil the law.
I know that many of my hon. friends wish to speak on this subject. I will say, in resume, that I do not believe a case has been made out for an extension of the moratorium. Certainly there is much need for us to spend our time on other and more important business. Again, I do not favour what one might describe as the spurious nod or bow toward abolition which is embodied in the present bill. Either the government should have the courage of its convictions in applying the moral and logical principle of
Capital Punishment
abolition, or it should abandon many of its present arguments. I do not agree with those arguments, but I certainly support the right of others to hold those views-and they hold them strongly. But let us bring them out in clearcut fashion, not in a crablike, sideways fashion. What I did five years ago with regard to the bill then presented, I propose to do with the bill before us now. I do not think it should go any further.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: Mr. Speaker, if I were an abolitionist I could not support the bill before us as it would retain the death penalty for certain crimes. Those who in conscience are against any form of capital punishment should reread the bill before voting on it this coming Tuesday. Indeed, I would urge them to read it and then ask themselves whether in all conscience they, as abolitionists, can support it.
As a retentionist, I cannot support the bill on second reading, which is agreement in principle. In my view the bill is too limited in its definition of murders punishable by death. Should the bill carry, however, I hope to be able to propose certain amendments which, if adopted, would widen the number of cases in which murder would be punishable by the loss of the offender's life. Later I intend to outline in more detail the nature of my suggested amendments in that respect.
First, let me summarize my position on this measure, one which causes a great deal of concern to many people including myself. I am pleased that 89 speakers have already taken part in the debate, including the Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) the Leader of the Opposition (Mr. Stanfield) and the Solicitor General (Mr. Allmand) who is sponsoring the bill. These speeches have given me the opportunity to review the thrust of the arguments put forward by those who support this legislation and those who oppose it.
One might ask whether, as the ninetieth speaker on the subject, there is anything left for me to say. I am sure there is a great deal to be said. The sponsor of this bill, the Solicitor General, and his leader, the Prime Minister, are abolitionists. Their speeches are quite clear on this point. Yet they wish parliament to accept a bill which is retentionist to at least a limited extent. Read the speech of the Prime Minister and then try to justify his support for the bill as an abolitionist.
The fact is this: what is taking place is a sham. Let us judge the government on its record. No one has been executed irf this country since 1962, yet many have been convicted of murder and sentenced to be hanged. All sentences have been commuted by this government or its predecessor. In fact, on one day in 1968, January 4, they commuted 18 death sentences. Is it just coincidence that the amendments to the Criminal Code which provided for the death penalty in circumstances similar to those outlined in the bill now before us came into force on December 29, 1967? This was six days prior to the 18 commutations.
Is it not fair to suggest that those in the government at that time who supported the bill in the House in November and December, 1967, deliberately delayed commuting the sentences so that their action would not influence the passage of that bill through the House? I am suggesting

May 24, 1973
Capital Punishment
that here we find a clear example of the actions of those who formed the government being in sharp contrast with the legislation they recommended that parliament pass in 1967 and which they again recommend in 1973.
Having said this, I believe it is important we review the situation as outlined by the Prime Minister when he spoke in this debate. Early in his address he said:
If Canada is a civilized place, it is that way because of the concern Canadians have for one another.
I hope there is no question in this chamber that Canada is in fact a civilized place. The Prime Minister then touched on another matter. He said he believed we should take our place with other countries in the world, by, in effect, voting for abolition. I think it is wise for this House to remember that there are only nine countries in the world that in fact have abolished capital punishment. Is the Prime Minister suggesting that if we do not become an abolitionist country, somehow or other we are not as civilized as countries that have? The countries which, according to the United Nations, have abolition at the present time are as follows: Austria, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Finland, Iceland, Uruguay and Venezuela. Those are the only member countries of the United Nations that have not retained capital punishment in their judicial systems.
In considering the bill before the House it is wise that we not be caught up in the general impression that somehow we are catching up to the rest of the world which to a great degree is abolitionist, because the fact is that the rest of the world to a great degree is retentionist. If we are to follow the world, then we should be retentionist. On this point I have before me a publication produced by the United Nations, dated February 23, 1972, which is very revealing. This report reads:
Whilst the imposition of the death penalty for reasons of vengeance or revenge finds few if any advocates and the notion of a premeditated judicial killing is generally abhorred, retributive justice and necessity in the public interest are still considerations which hold considerable sway as new forms of terror and violence evolve in society; the tendency to revert to the death penalty as the main deterrent is conspiciously increased.
This, I remind hon. members, is a United Nations' report. It continues:
There are large bodies of people and a wide range of authority who believe capital punishment is necessary either as a deterrent or at least as a matter of basic justice.
For every state member of the United Nations devoted to the abolition of capital punishment in law or fact, there would appear to be three others legally committed to the sanction and use-at least as a very last resort. Moreover, there are examples of some states abolishing the death penalty but then returning to it, either in law or practice, either because they saw no adequate way of dealing with certain offences or because they feel the need for some final and extreme public denouncement of the particular behaviour for which the sentence is awarded.
The publication then goes on to state:
An important consideration in any truly international appraisal is that most published studies have taken their data and orientations from the developed world and largely from the western world. The result has been a rather misleading picture which has frequently given unwarranted universality to values, theories and practices prevalent in the west in academic circles.
I emphasize the words "academic circles".
(Mr. Stevens.]
It has sometimes become unfashionable to support capital punishment. Civilization is tolerance, and severity in punishment is a sign of backwardness and regression and so liberal thinking and the abolition of the death penalty are expected to coincide. Therefore writings available on the death penalty leave the impression that there is a certain inevitability about the movement to more "civilized standards" and fewer executions. A reader could be excused for concluding that throughout the world there is in fact an irresistible and ineluctable trend to abolish capital punishment, or that even where the death penalty is still a last legal resort, the penal codes have fewer offences leading to capital punishment, or methods of execution are becoming more humane, or that the person liable to the extreme penalty will usually have the benefit of the best legal safeguards.
This is the conclusion to the United Nations' report:
In fact, the world picture provides no such assurances. It is extremely doubtful whether there is any uniform progression towards the restriction of the use of the death penalty.
Surely it is important, when we consider the bill before us, to bear in mind that we are the ones who will be out of step with the world if we accept a judicial system that does not include the death penalty among its provisions. On this point it has been suggested by some that we should vote for the bill, allow it to go to committee and there amend it to overcome one of the objections that people sometimes raise, which is that while they feel the death penalty is wrong, there should be a mandatory 25-year sentence of imprisonment or a life sentence.
I believe that a life sentence would impose an impossible burden on prison officers who would look after men who had nothing to lose, in effect. Just think, Mr. Speaker, of the ramifications of the suggestion of a mandatory life sentence. You would be suggesting that men would be confined to prison for life. Should they, either as a result of an escape or even within the prison walls, murder someone, they have nothing to fear. They would not fear any greater judgment. I suggest that those who advocate passage of the bill with a view to its being amended to include a provision relating to a life sentence are being unrealistic in their attitude.
I also believe that it is important that the government and Members of Parliament bear in mind that there is a great danger of the law getting out of line with the moral feelings of the majority of the people in the country. This is a point that I know many like to skip over. In this regard, I found it very odd that in speaking on this subject the Solicitor General used figures in, I felt, an extremely unfair way. Let me quote what he said on January 26, when he referred, at page 689 of Hansard, to what he called a profile of public attitudes in respect of the death penalty. He stated that the profile showed that those in favour of capital punishment in all instances, and those opposed to capital punishment in all instances balanced each other off with 19.1 per cent and 20.9 per cent respectively; and 59 per cent favoured retention of capital punishment in limited cases.
What an interesting twist to put on figures! Any member of this House might have taken the same profile and pointed out, with the same weight, that in fact 79.9 per cent of the people in that profile said they wanted some form of capital punishment. However, the impression left by our Solicitor General was that somehow those for
May 24, 1973

retention offset those who were against, and there was a great middle area in favour of some form of capital punishment in at least a limited number of cases, I feel this is not being frank with the people of Canada.
If the Prime Minister, the Solicitor General and other members of this cabinet are abolitionists in fact, I suggest they should accept the defeat of this bill and introduce an abolitionist bill which they feel is in line, presumably, with their conscience and actions. I think it is unfair to talk abolition yet introduce a bill which appears to be retentionist. This is particularly true in view of the record since 1962, which shows a lack of serious intention to allow the preceding bill to be effective in the sense that there were executions.
In respect of the question of what people want, I think we should take note of the Gallup poll held fairly recently in Canada; that was in February of 1972. It showed that 63 per cent supported the restoration of the death penalty in Canada. This was broken down to indicate that in English-speaking Canada 58 per cent were of that feeling, while in French-speaking Canada 74 per cent were in favour. It is interesting to note that going back to 1968 the figures show that those in favour of retention of the death penalty amounted to only 53 per cent. There is obviously a growing tendency among people in Canada to favour the death penalty.
I suggest the Prime Minister and the Solicitor General, instead of taking an academic approach and catering to those who favour abolition, should trust the people. In many ways, the present government since the election of October 30 has shown mystification as to why it did not receive a bigger mandate. I suggest one reason is that it has forgotten to listen to and trust the people of this country.
Many hon. members have canvassed their constituencies to determine local feelings on the subject of the death penalty. In my riding, of the 5,203 who responded to the questionnaire, 89.4 per cent indicated they wanted the death penalty retained in some cases, while 10.6 per cent were in favour of abolition. This is not unique. The hon. member for Esquimalt-Saanich (Mr. Munro) carried out a similar poll in which it was asked whether the death penalty should be restored to the statute books. He found that 87.2 per cent of the families responding were in favour. The hon. member for Dartmouth-Halifax East (Mr. Forrestall) carried out another survey and found an overwhelming majority in favour of the restoration of capital punishment.
That hon. member's questionnaire asked whether capital punishment should be abolished. Forty-four per cent of those who responded strongly disagreed, 26 per cent indicated some disagreement and only 11 per cent agreed strongly it should be abolished. Surely these statistics mean something, and if we in this House ignore them I feel we are not giving proper representation to the constituents who elected us. Having regard to the world situation, contrary to the impression perhaps left by certain government spokesmen, the fact is that the death penalty is universally favoured throughout the world. This is borne out by the United Nations' report of February, 1973, to which I have referred.
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The Prime Minister did touch on whether capital punishment is in fact a deterrent, although he did so very quickly: he said all of us have the figures, and he is satisfied it is not a deterrent to murder. I hope all members of the House take the opportunity to look at the statistics. I am surprised that the right hon. Prime Minister was able to satisfy himself, after looking at the figures, that capital punishment is not a deterrent. If those statistics prove anything at all, I suggest they prove exactly the reverse.
On page 6 of a Statistics Canada publication entitled "Murder Statistics, 1971" we find listed the number of murders reported to Statistics Canada for each of the years 1954 to 1971. It also gives the rate per 100,000 of population. In 1954 there were 125 murders reported, and in 1962 there were 217 reported. Between those years there was a relatively insignificant increase as far as rate is concerned. In 1954, Statistics Canada shows exactly one per 100,000, and in 1962 there was 1.4. In 1971 there were 425 murders, which was a rate of 2.2 per 100,000. Rather than showing this as an insignificant increase, I think it is fair to point out to the House and to the people of Canada that it is an increase of more than 100 percent. It is an increase from one per 100,000 to 2.2 per 100,000.
Surely the suggestion that if it could be shown that capital punishment is a deterrent, some of those who are not satisfied would be in favour of capital punishment, is not relevant. The point is that statistics only show the number of crimes and the failure of capital punishment as a deterrent. Those statistics can never show how often capital punishment has deterred a potential murderer from committing a crime, or how often it has encouraged one to leave his gun behind. I suggest that is an important point to be borne in mind when considering the bill before us. I suggest that the question of whether capital punishment is or is not a deterrent is secondary to the main question.
Are we in this House prepared to accept that there is no crime, no evil so heinous that capital punishment need not be inflicted upon the person who commits it? To me that is the basic question before us. If you say yes, but only yes, then you are an abolitionist. Surely if you say no, then you are a retentionist and it is only the degree that has to be determined. If we suggest it is possibly not a deterrent to have the death penalty, that is an extremely weak argument because taken to extreme it would mean that we should drop all penalties. Should we drop penalties in respect of all crimes? I think the statistics offered by the academics would also show that in respect of crime generally there has been a substantial increase. If one accepts the argument that has been suggested in this House concerning capital punishment, that capital punishment is not a deterrent to crime, perhaps we should give up on all forms of punishment.
Let me come to a specific matter which I find quite hard to reconcile. In his speech, the Prime Minister began with two premises. The first is his belief that wanton or unnecessary killing is evil. The second is the requirement for self-protection, be it individual or collective in the form of a society. He then stated that it is justifiable for society to use capital punishment as a means of self-

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defence. Is the Prime Minister suggesting it is all right to take another person's life in self-defence, and that somehow it is wrong if a police officer apprehends that person, brings him to justice and he is finally convicted and executed? Is he inviting people literally to take the law into their own hands, or to arm themselves, in the sense that if they are to be attacked they can do no wrong so long as it is simply in self-defence? This philosophy frightens me.
I believe public opinion in this country indicates that the public wishes the retention of capital punishment at least for certain crimes. Canadians do not want to see a sort of self-justice encouraged in the country. I believe it is an integral part of the judicial system that there be a penalty for the most heinous or evil crimes which may be committed. It is very easy for members to sit in this House in their comfortable chairs and speak on this subject in academic terms. However, I can assure members that if they had been at the scene of a crime, as I have, and if they had seen the victim of a murderer lying on the street bleeding to death, and had seen the risks the police officers took in bringing the person who committed the crime to justice, very few of them would stand up in this House and suggest there should be complete abolition as has been suggested here.
To those who have played a part in commuting death sentences, may I say it would be wise for them to read their own publications in which cases are cited number by number indicating actually what has transpired in respect of the crimes in which the death sentence has been commuted. Let me read some of those cases in which the death sentence has been commuted. For example, there is case No. 27, of July 18, 1969. It reads:
The killing took place in St. Boniface, Manitoba, and the victim was a police constable who was responding to a burglar alarm at a local store. When he stepped out of the cruiser car he was shot by one of the hold-up men. Four men were charged with capital murder. Three men were convicted of non-capital murder and sentenced to life imprisonment. The fourth man was convicted of capital murder but his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
Then we have case No. 28, of August 23, 1969, which reads:
This killing took place in the town of Sandwich West, Ontario. The victim, a police constable, Sandwich West police department, was responding to a call concerning domestic complaint. As he approached the residence of the accused, he was shot and killed. There were three shots fired into the victim. Two other Sandwich West police constables who went to assistance were also shot by the accused and wounded. One member lost sight of one eye and the second suffered the loss of a lung. The accused, age 24, was arrested and charged with capital murder. He was found guilty and sentenced to hang. Sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.
I could continue reading the various cases in which commutation has been allowed. I feel it is a very sobering thing for a moment to start thinking about the victims who were involved in the various crimes. Basically, however, I want to put on the record, as I indicated, that I believe there is a place in our criminal process for the death penalty.
I do not believe the government is being fair with the people of Canada. The government has introduced a bill which it thinks perhaps caters to both sides. It looks as if

it is retentionist, yet the government does not seem to have an honest desire to bring in retentionist legislation. To that end I feel this bill, if it should receive second reading-and I sincerely hope it will not-should be amended at the committee stage so that crimes which are punishable by death include others in addition to those suggested in this bill. My hon. friend in the NDP indicated that he thought it should include pickpocketing. I would point out to him that certain communist countries have included that offence under capital punishment as well as various other economic matters.
Let me summarize my proposed amendments. I would point out that in my opinion it is necessary that the law with regard to the death penalty should apply where a person causes the death of a human being while committing or attempting to commit rape. This was included in our law until a few years ago. I believe there should also be provision for the death penalty where a person causes the death of another while committing or attempting to commit an offence under section 24 of the Criminal Code, which is the kidnapping section. I believe it should apply where a person causes the death of a human being while committing or attempting to commit a crime under section 76.1 of the Criminal Code, which is the section on skyjacking.
I also believe it should be applied in respect of any person who counsels, procures or incites another person to commit murder, whether or not the murder itself is punishable by death. I do not propose those amendments, Mr. Speaker, because I understand it is virtually impossible for me to propose them at the present time, but should the bill be passed into committee I hope at that stage to be able to raise them.
In short, as I mentioned at the beginning, I am the ninetieth speaker on this subject. I feel that it is to the credit of my party that I am its forty-third speaker so far. I also wish to point out that speakers from the Social Credit party have been 11 in number, from the NDP 15, and from the government party 21. In short, I believe that this bill should be voted down, be you an abolitionist or a retentionist.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Mr. Speaker, I wonder if the hon. member for York-Simcoe (Mr. Stevens) would mind accepting one question. When he gave a list of countries which he said were all the countries in the world that were abolitionist, how come he missed the United Kingdom?


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: I spoke today to the person who prepared the report for the United Nations in New York. I asked him to give me the up to date list as to which countries they tabulate as being those that did not have capital punishment in their system at the present time. He gave me that list. I specifically asked him about the United Kingdom and he said it still had capital punishment for certain crimes, I believe one of them being treason and other crimes of that nature.


Stanley Howard Knowles: Has the hon. member checked with the authorities in the United King-
May 24, 1973

dom to find out what is the nature of the legislation passed there?


An hon. Member:: You don't believe in the United Nations?


Stanley Howard Knowles: I don't believe in the hon. member's statistics.


Sinclair McKnight Stevens: If our government telephone privileges allowed me to make a long-distance call to London, England, I might well have done that. But I can tell you, Mr. Speaker, that if the hon. member does not believe my statistics, perhaps he believes the statistics of the New York Times in which the report was originally published.
[ Translation]


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, the bill before the House, concerning the abolition of the death penalty, being of the highest importance, reflection and soul-searching should be the keynote of the debate for all of us. All my colleagues who with me will have to reach that important decision, know that it weigh heavy with responsibility. As for me, I do not feel that anyone can avoid his responsibilities by basing himself on a so-called public opinion which has been, and will be, shaped by well orchestrated propaganda bent on exciting the masses, moving them to cheap emotions and sentimentalism.
One thing has always struck me, Mr. Speaker, on hearing speeches on the abolition of capital punishment: individuals are so human, when capital punishment is being discussed, that they want to "humanize" dangerous criminals, rehabilitate them and spare them the death penalty.
On the other hand, it is these same people who cry out loudly for abortion, to kill innocent human beings and satisfy the whims of the weak and the depraved. They want to be humane to criminals who endanger the lives of innocent people, and they think it a crime to bring innocent people into the world. And so to my mind these people bear the sign of the beast in a century in which truth has become falsehood, and falsehood truth.
The Hon. Pierre Laporte was a victim of too much leniency in the enforcement of the death penalty. Not for a moment did his killers fear the death penalty, because it did not exist. Nor did Kennedy's murderer fear the death penalty for an instant, for the same reason. Assassins of all kinds and revolutionaries do not want the death penalty. Nor do anarchists, who advocate and organize violence, want the death penalty. You have to be pretty simple to think that murderers can still be made "humane".
The 24 Nazi war criminals at the Nuremberg trials in October 1946 would also have been glad if the death penalty had not existed to make them pay for their crimes. The death penalty was all right for the nazi murderers, but some think that the death penalty should not exist for murderers who are not nazis. There cannot be a double standard. There must be a death penalty for all murderers, as for the Nazi murderers.

In 1935, just before J. Edgar Hoover said, at the end of three years of repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment, that they were three years of "the most terrible period of
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criminal history in the history of America," Dick Borden wrote:
Death for dealers of death is a policy that works.
At the close of the seventeenth century the English faced a crime wave far worse than ours. A trip from one English city to another, in those days, was a hazardous adventure. Some roads were so unsafe as to be literally impassable. Endless murders and robberies took place on the streets of London.
How did the English end this crime wave?
Not by calling in psychiatrists or theorists of moral uplift.
The English ended their crime wave by calling in Jack Ketch. When a murderer was caught, they turned him over to the hangman. Brutal? Yes-but it worked.
By the end of the century such criminal strains in England were largely stamped out and the country has been notably free from crimes of violence ever since.
Death for dealers of death is a policy that works.
In spite of the repeated statement that hanging is not a deterrent to murder, American gangsters long complained that it was. Nor have statistics belied their complaint-far from it. Life imprisonment is not only more cruel, but is a most unfair and a much greater burden on good citizens. Let us not give up one unpleasant measure only to adopt a more unpleasant and much less successful one.
Melvin Mann in Life Line, Dallas, Texas, reprinted in The Sword of the Lord and reported in Evangelical Baptist of February, 1973, wrote:
Americans for Effective Law Enforcement believes that if the threat of capital punishment were real, rather than imagined, murders would in many cases, in fact, be deterred. Evidence to support this contention was found in the study made in 1970 and 1971 by the Los Angeles police department. This study included the compilation of statements taken from persons who had been arrested for crimes of violence. Those from whom statements were taken either had been unarmed during the committing of their crimes or had not used arms which they carried.
Here are excerpts from the report on that study:
Margaret Elizabeth Daly, of San Pedro, was arrested August 28, 1961, for assaulting Pete Gibbons with a knife. She stated to investigating officers: "Yeh, I cut him and I should have done a better job. I would have killed him but I didn't want to go to the gas chamber."
Orelius Matthew Stewart, an ex-convict with a long felony record, was arrested March 3, 1960, for attempted bank robbery. He was subsequently convicted and sentenced to the state prison. While discussing the matter with his probation officer he stated: "The officer who arrested me was by himself, and if I had wanted, I could have blasted him. I thought about it at the time, but I changed my mind when I thought of the gas chamber."
Salvador A. Estrada, a 19-year old youth with a four-year criminal record, was arrested February 8, 1960, just after he had stolen an automobile from a parking lot by wiring around the ignition switch. As he was being booked at the station, he stated to the arresting officers: "I want to ask you one question. Do you think they will repeal the capital punishment law? If they do, we can kill all you cops and judges without worrying about it."
Ramon Jesse Velarde was arrested September 26, 1960, while attempting to rob a supermarket. At that time, armed with a loaded .38 caliber revolver, he was holding several employees of the supermarket as hostages. He subsequently escaped from jail and was apprehended at the Mexican border. While being returned to Los Angeles for prosecution, he made the following statement to the transporting officers: "I think I might have escaped at the market if I had shot one or more of them. I probably would have done it if it wasn't for the gas chamber. I'll

May 24, 1973
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only do seven or ten years for this. I don't want to die. No
matter what happens, you want to live another day.

I could supply a long list of confessions by criminals with files in various police departments, who have said time and time again that the death penalty was a deterrent against more serious crimes.
And the article ends as follows:

That society which coddles criminals and does not consider the victims of crime needs to rethink its system of justice.
[ Transla tion]
Mr. Speaker, in the Christian Crusade Newsletter of April 1, 1973, one could also read a very interesting article on the deterrent effect of capital punishment on murder. It said:

Most sensible people remain convinced that fear of the penalty of death will deter some people who may be considering committing homicide. Most of us know that the possibility of the death penalty would deter us if we were tempted to such a horrendous act.
The abolition of the death penalty has created an incentive to kill. Consider a criminal engaged in a major crime such as kidnapping or armed robbery. He is anxious to escape capture and punishment. If he is caught and convicted, the penalty is substantially the same whether he has killed or not. His security is enhanced if no witnesses survive who can identify him for the police and give evidence against him in court. The abolition of the death penalty has placed the lives of many innocent people in jeopardy. It illustrates the paradox that characterizes this epoch: intense concern for the rights and well-being of the criminal; little concern for the rights and well-being of the victim.
A shock of horror swept this nation when in Khartoum, the capital city of the Sudan, the Black September group of Palestinian guerrillas cold-bloodedly and brutally murdered the U.S. Ambassador to the Sudan, Cleo A. Noel, Jr., and the Charge d'Affaires, George C. Moore. Those who have succeeded in abolishing the death penalty in the U.S. share some of the responsibility for these deaths.
The guerrillas claim they killed because their demands were rejected. One of these demands was that Sirhan Sirhan, Arab assassin of Senator Kennedy, be freed. This demand was possible because Sirhan Sirhan is alive. After the death of Senator Kennedy, he was arrested, tried, convicted and sentenced to death. This sentence was commuted to life imprisonment when the death penalty was abolished. His presence in prison provided an incentive for the crime.
Most violent criminals have colleagues and friends who are also violent. Doubtless many ruthless men are presently considering their choice of victims to kidnap in order to force the release of some imprisoned murderer. One successful venture would trigger an epidemic.
Many thinking people throughout the world must have been startled when the U.S. Secretary of State, William P. Rogers, urged the Sudanese authorities to execute the murderers of Cleo A. Noel and George C. Moore. They knew that the American authorities could not have executed the assassins if the crime had been committed on American soil. To them this must have seemed imperialist hypocrisy, flavoured with colonialism and racism-one law for the rich, the U.S.A.-another for the poor, the Sudan.
Whatever their motives, those who have succeeded in abolishing the death penalty in this country, have merely substituted the deaths of the innocent for the guilty.
[ Transla tion]
Mr. Speaker, any criminal who intends to commit any criminal act thinks about the consequences he might

suffer. If the law is very liberal, as some people want to keep it in Canada, and his act or acts cannot passibly put him in a serious predicament he will make little of the consequences resulting from the act he intends to commit. In any case, a law that is too liberal, too permissive is the main cause of murder.
Mr. Speaker, it is strange to see how some members like to quote excerpts from statements by individuals who never had anything to do with criminals. For example, most judges in Canada have asked for retention of the death penalty on several occasions; a brief submitted to Parliament in January by the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police included recommendations on capital punishment. I am very surprised to see that up to now this government has disregarded the recommendations made by those with the most experience with criminals, those who have to chase them. Policemen in Canada highly recommend capital punishment for criminals, not only for murderers of policemen but for any individual, any Canadian. They consider that if the law is to protect policemen it should also protect all members of society without any form of discrimination.
On page 15 of the brief submitted to the House of Commons early in January 1973, one could read, and I quote:
The Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police go on record at this time as stating publicly that unless the voice of the people is heard and that the comments made by this association, as a result of practical experience, are seriously considered and acted upon accordingly, society might well tend to take the law into its own hands and create more problems than the abolitionists' suggestions would propose to solve.
It is sad that in this day and age people are starting to think that they will have to take whatever means necessary to defend themselves rather than rely on the law and the courts.
Acceptability of the death penalty is also maintained by the overwhelming majority of judges who surely must be recognized for their sense of justice, impartiality and fair play.

And, on page 3 of that same brief, the Chiefs of Police of Canada had this to say:

Is society justified in taking away a life? This question can be answered by another question, is society justified in making war? There is a fundamental answer which even from the philosophical point of view cannot be refuted and this applies in all cases! Society does have the right to protect itself by whatever means are necessary.
In supporting the retention of the death penalty, the strongest argument probably lies in the fact that the objections submitted by abolitionists are based on argument and debate. On the other hand, the retentionists rely on simple facts... our system of government is based on the will of society. Independently of what the legislators think or feel and independently of what academics may advance, if we accept the principle of democracy we must accept the will of the people. It would appear that the eloquent description of Lincoln of a democratic government referred to in the introduction of this brief has not been given full value of late. We do have a government "for the people" and "of the people" but certainly not "by the people", since their wish, as so openly expressed, for the retention of the death penalty as well as the imposition of that death penalty for which legislation presently exists has constantly been ignored.
May 24, 1973

For example, in support of the police approach to the deterrent value of any punishment, Dr. C. H. S. Jayewardene, professor of criminology at the University of Ottawa states that "if a threat is an empty one that cannot or will not ever be actualized, it will not influence conscious or unconscious deliberations of the individual". It is therefore not a question as to whether society imposes capital punishment or life imprisonment for murder, it is whether those sentences are actually carried out. It is only if the sentences in either cases are actually carried out, will the punishment serve as effective deterrent. As stated in an article of the Ottawa Journal of Saturday, November 11, 1972, it is not the severity of the punishment but the certainty that appears to be related to crime rates. Therefore the certainty of the death penalty for the crime of murder amongst others would certainly qualify as the maximum deterrent.
In the joint committee of the Senate and House of Commons report of June 27, 1956, it is stated in part that "capital punishment is not an effective deterrent; it has no unique deterrent effect which would not be accomplished by imprisonment." We respectfully submit that the so-called life imprisonment of 20 years for the most callous murder simply means that at some time in the seventh year of the sentence, the murderer is eligible for parole.
The Royal Commission on Capital Punishment in its 1949-1953 report, speaking against capital punishment suggests that the death penalty, because so many sentences have been set aside, tends to degrade the administration of justice.

Mr. Speaker, irrespective of the sentences which could be passed by the judges and the convictions which could be executed, it must be recognized that if those sentences are not effectively served and that the state reverses the decisions of judges and jurys-because the cabinet can always reverse legal decisions-the effects of the death penalty under any circumstance will be absolutely destroyed even if stricter legislation is passed.
Mr. Speaker, it is unfortunate to note that the Canadian government has given up its responsibility as far as the protection of the individual is concerned. We all have humanitarian feelings for criminals, but when we discuss the protection of the individual in this House, we would appear to be out of step with what the government would like to see as established policy for the Criminal Code.
Mr. Speaker, we should also consider that a number of homicides could be prevented by having the death penalty in our statutes. It will be said that the number cannot be known. Evidently it cannot be known, there can be no computation of homicides unknown and which have not taken place. However, it is clear that such legislation is like a sword of Damocles held over the heads of would-be criminals, a sword which can fall at any time once justice has rendered its verdict. If the death penalty does not have a dissuasive effect on the murderers of Canada, why would all sentences meted out by all judges of Canada have a dissuasive effect on crime in Canada?
If the death penalty does not prevent a murderer from committing a murder, why would a two- or three-year prison sentence for burglary lessen in criminals the will to repeat such a crime? Such an argument makes one question the rationale of justice in Canada. If the death penalty has no value as a deterrent for criminals, why would the sentences given by all judges have any value in reducing infractions against Canadian laws?
Mr. Speaker, we have made a try since 1967, when the death penalty was abolished. Now, since that time, all sentences were commuted by the cabinet, and that is one
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reason why we realize today that murderers are not afraid of justice, are not afraid of being convicted and are laughing at the judges. Why? Because they know very well that at the right time, the cabinet-and especially the right hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) who declared that as long as he would be Prime Minister there would be no hanging in Canada-will commute the sentence.


Herb Breau: He did not say that.


Gilbert F. Rondeau: Mr. Speaker, as a result of such a policy of liberality in the face of the law, we will unfortunately witness more and more difficult situations where the individual will be less and less protected, because the criminal feels more and more protected by the law.
[ English]


Mr. W. C. Scott (Victoria-Haliburton):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to add my remarks to the debate on Bill C-2 I would like to lend my support to those speakers who have pointed out to this House that we are not debating the issue of capital punishment. We are, in fact, debating the question of whether or not we should put the question in mothballs and debate it again five years from now.
I do not agree with this method of dealing with such a serious matter, Mr. Speaker. When we debated this same bill in the very same manner more than five years ago, it was the understanding of those who took part in that debate that the House would deal with the issue of capital punishment at the end of a five-year trial period. It was very clear to all of us that for five years there would be a ban on capital punishment except for murderers of policemen and prison guards.
The five years are up, Mr. Speaker, and we are saying today the same things that we said back in 1967 about the pros and cons of capital punishment. We do not have any new material and we certainly do not have any new statistics. We do not have any new material to discuss for the simple reason the federal cabinet did not carry out the wishes of parliament. The federal cabinet has commuted every death sentence handed down by the courts since that day in 1967 when parliament decreed that there would be two types of murder, capital and non-capital, and that those persons convicted of capital murder would suffer the death penalty. The guidelines laid down by parliament were clearcut and it is obvious that the federal cabinet has been following a policy of flouting the law and the will of parliament.
Webster's dictionary describes the word "flout" as "to treat with contemptuous disregard." That definition is the best we could find to describe what has happened over the past five years. We in parliament had good reason to think that in those five years we would learn a great deal about the deterrent effect of the new approach that we worked out in 1967. However, as it has turned out we might just as well have said that murderers of policemen and prison guards would be treated no differently than other criminals.
What has happened is that parliament has been ignored and the federal cabinet has placed itself above the will of

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this House. We have been treated with contempt, and now we are being asked to go along with this very same policy for another five years. Mr. Speaker, if the federal government is determined to abolish the death penalty for all crimes, then why should we not debate that issue instead of taking part in what all of us know now to be a sham? We know and the government knows, that we are in effect avoiding the issue of abolition or retention of capital punishment. In a few days we are going to vote on a bill that says one thing and yet we know the government intends to do quite another, if we can go on the government's past performance. I think we can judge the government on its past performance in this area, Mr. Speaker, and I find it very disturbing.
I would have preferred the government to table a bill that sets out what the federal cabinet really wants, instead of asking this House to vote for or against something that does not even apply. If we say again to this government that we want murderers of policemen and prison guards executed upon conviction, can we be sure that our wishes will be carried out? I do not think so, Mr. Speaker. If we say by majority vote that we insist on the death penalty being applied for capital murder, can those who follow careers in our police departments and the penitentiary service be assured that they have our support in carrying out their duties? I do not think so, Mr. Speaker. How can they have any faith in our resolve to exact heavy punishment on capital murderers when the cabinet has allowed so many of them to escape the penalty?
We have a strange situation here, Mr. Speaker. Those who favour abolition of capital punishment will vote for this bill because it is the closest thing to abolition. Yet if they vote for this bill, and if the government discharges its responsibility under the terms of the bill, the abolitionists will be voting for capital punishment. On the other hand, if the federal cabinet follows its practice of commuting all death sentences for capital murder, the retentionists will in effect be voting for abolition. When viewed in that light I think we have the right to ask why the government did not table a bill that draws sharper lines of distinction.
It has been pointed out that in granting stays of execution the cabinet has not distinguished between those convicted of deliberate and brutal crimes and those who really had no intention of committing any crime as serious as murder. We all know that even in crimes of murder a case can sometimes be made for temporary insanity and for other circumstances that might influence juries in the favour of the accused. We also know that the ability of an accused to obtain the services of an experienced and talented criminal lawyer can weigh the scales in his favour.
It would follow that the government's policy of commuting all death sentences has the effect of providing those legal services to convicted murderers of policemen after the fact. The way it is now, a cop killer who is not successful in having his charge reduced to manslaughter would only have to bide his time. He would know that if he received the death penalty, he would in fact get a life sentence. I repeat, Mr. Speaker, this is mockery. If we do not say now that we really want abolition or retention of the death penalty, then we are all party to mockery. I say the government should have tabled a different type of bill

altogether, instead of asking us to debate an issue that has been proved to be neither fish nor fowl.
I do not intend to repeat the passages from the Bible that are used by both the abolitionists and the retentionists in support of their views. It would only indicate that one man's interpretation of the passages would be as good as the next man's. However, I would like to say that it could hardly be considered Christian to put legislation before this parliament that in effect places the life of a murderer on a higher plane than that of his victim.
That is what we are really saying when we vote on a bill that will not have the effect of deterring people from cold-blooded, calculated murder. The victim of a murder is quickly forgotten by the general public, while the murderer gains public attention for months on end while his guilt is decided. If he is found guilty and sentenced to die, he is again made the subject of groups and individuals determined to see that justice is not done. The life of the convicted criminal becomes sacred, Mr. Speaker, while the victim is out of sight and out of mind. It is almost as if he did not even matter. The forgotten victim means a great deal to me, I cannot stand by silently while the natural order of things gets turned upside down by a government that tries to take the easy way out.
There might be some hope of salvaging something from the motion and the debate, Mr. Speaker, after the bill passes second reading and goes to the Standing Committee on Justice and Legal Affairs. Perhaps when we are able to have dialogue, in place of prepared statements, we will be able to put some safeguards into this bill for policemen and prison guards. Perhaps we will be able to put as many safeguards into the bill for the lives of potential victims of the murderers as we have placed in it for the lives of murderers.
The sanctity of human life is certainly a valid and acceptable argument for those who favour abolition of the death penalty, but it should not be used as a crutch by those who are only trying to avoid facing up to an unpleasant problem. I do not want to see it used as an excuse to avoid coming to grips with this serious problem and making a decision as to who we should be protecting.
As I said before, Mr. Speaker, my sympathies are reserved first for the victims of crime. When I have exhausted my sympathy for the innocent victims of brutal, senseless crime, I will direct some to the criminals. However, I cannot accept the position that our responsibility today is to ensure that no person shall suffer the death penalty for deliberate, premeditated murder. My own responsibility is very clear; that is, to erect some sort of safeguards for law-abiding Canadian citizens against violence or loss of their lives and property. That is the issue I want to debate, Mr. Speaker, and I call on the government to table legislation that comes a lot closer to what we really want and what we should be trying to do.


Mr. Jake Epp (Provencher):: Mr. Speaker, as I rise to take part in this debate on Bill C-2, I follow many members of this House who, I am sure, have done a lot of soul-searching and agonizing over their position in their concern to give leadership to the country and to represent
May 24, 1973

adequately not only their own thinking and their own consciences but the thinking of their constituents.
As we look around society today we see members of that society who are reacting to the permissiveness which they find around them. They are reacting to the looseness which they see in our prison system and in its administration. They also look with concern at the increase in the homicide rate in 1972. Since 1968 we have been in a five-year trial period of the ban on capital punishment.
The arguments of those who favour the abolition of capital punishment are well known. They see capital punishment as barbaric, a carryover from the past which is inhumane and has no place in a modern, moral society. It is, they say, an act of revenge and we should concentrate on rehabilitation instead. Possibly as a result of my background I take a different view of capital punishment, for reasons I shall outline. I feel that the abolitionist view has one weakness: there is a disregard of the moral laws upon which our country is established, laws which are part and parcel of the Judaic-Christian philosophy which many of us have inherited.
Man is not in a position, I submit, to establish his own moral code. It is not within his ability to do so. Today we see and hear much about man.'s ability to structure society as he sees fit. The position is taken that he is responsible to no one but himself. I submit this is wrong. I believe punishment and justice are part of our moral standards and that the establishment of these standards is not a human prerogative but a prerogative of the Creator of life. One of the precepts taught by the whole of the scriptures emphasizes the sanctity of life. Life is sacred and we have no right to destroy it. But along with this maxim is clearly set forth the concept of divine justice; the state has the responsibility to maintain security and individual freedom can only be maintained in a state whose leaders take upon themselves the responsibility of maintaining justice for all.
I see an anomaly in our society. Many people today who are abolitionists are also people who are sponsors of liberalized abortion. They feel no concern about the increased number of abortions which approached 40,000 in 1972 in Canada. Yet I submit that this involves the removal of the life of the unborn who has the same right to live as you and me, Mr. Speaker. The sanctity of life is underscored by many writers both in holy scripture and in secular philosophy. The breaking of an immutable law such as "Thou shalt not kill" carries with it a penalty, and the penalty which is exacted by divine justice is that a person who takes the life of another in premeditated fashion must lose his own life. Freedom can only exist in the light of the complete and free functioning of justice.
There are two types of murder, as I see it, as has been stated by many speakers. One is unpremeditated murder. If we check back, we find that even in biblical times, when we hear so much about "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth", there were certain cities designated as cities of refuge to which one who had unfortunately killed his brother could escape and in which he would be considered safe from retribution. The second type of murder is premeditated, or cold-blooded murder as it has been called. Despite the emphasis on rehabilitation, justice demands and exacts the death penalty for murder which has been
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thought-out beforehand, murder which takes away the life and the opportunities of someone else.
A few moments ago I made reference to the maxim "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." I believe this is not vengeful. I suggest that on close examination, Mr. Speaker, you would find that its effect is to deter men from the exaction of a greater penalty than is called for by the crime committed-that retribution should not give way to revenge or to a penalty far exceeding the gravity of the crime in question. The death sentence as a penalty for those who deliberately take away someone else's most prized possession, life itself, is not a matter of revenge but a matter of justice.
It might be argued, Mr. Speaker, that in my own philosophy, in my own thinking there is a conflict on the issue of rehabilitation, and I readily admit this is so. I recognize that rehabilitation, either from a spiritual or secular point of view, should be the goal of all hon. members and should be open to all in our society who are unfortunate. Once a person's life has been removed, rehabilitation is obviously not possible.
There are many instances throughout history where mercy has been shown and where rehabilitation was the overriding consideration. So the prerogative of mercy must remain part and parcel of our judicial system. But the prerogative of mercy cannot be given such emphasis that in cases where immutable moral laws are broken, where the penalty is inescapable, where premeditation is clearly proven, rehabilitation can supersede the supreme penalty which must be accepted for crimes of that type.
Therefore, I favour a set minimum period of incarceration for those convicted of non-capital murder or nonpremeditated murder. Emphasis should be on rehabilitation. Secondly, the reinstatement of the death penalty for those convicted of premeditated homicide must be based, not on revenge or on the adage "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth" that is traditionally referred to, but rather on the basis that only when we exact the supreme penalty from a person who has chosen to take the life of another can we have justice and freedom. Therefore, I cannot vote in favour of Bill C-2 since no attempt has been made to differentiate between these two types of murder, with the sole exception of the murder of police officers and prison guards.
I feel there is another anomaly in this bill in that its originators, by drawing it up in the way they have, seem to indicate that they feel that capital punishment is a deterrent since they retained its imposition for the murder of police officers and prison guards. I believe that if capital punishment for premeditated murder as opposed to non-premeditated murder is extended right across the board, across the wide spectrum that we are looking at in Bill C-2, we can then return to an era in which not only society will be protected but in which our laws will be just and humane. We will also exact from each one of us the penalty appropriate to the various actions we take. I believe if these criteria were extended to those convicted of wilfully taking their brothers' lives, society would be the better for it. This would not be a revengeful act but an

May 24, 1973
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act of justice, based on the supreme laws that exact justice from all. For only by having justice can we have freedom.


Mr. William C. Frank (Middlesex):: Mr. Speaker, I rise as one more member in this House to speak on Bill C-2 relating to capital punishment, a responsibility I feel first of all to my own conscience, and secondly to the views of the majority of the constituents in my riding.
We have all heard many times the comment that we as members should vote as our conscience tells us. This statement comes almost 100 per cent from those who are abolitionists. I feel that in some cases there is an insincerity in this remark-what percentage, we will never know- since these particular abolitionists present this argument to known retentionist members knowing that they have only to change one mind, that of the member.
I am also satisfied that a certain percentage-and here again we will never know how many-are just as insincere in trying to convince the pro-abolitionist member that he should not vote as his conscience dictates but in accordance with the wishes of his constituents, because they well realize that the majority of the people of Canada support the retention of capital punishment. These people know that by trying to convince the pro-abolitionist member to vote as the majority dictated, they would have a better chance of their opinion winning, because it would mean that many thousands of people would have to reverse their decision before they would lose their case. But, Mr. Speaker, this is one problem that I am not faced with; I will be voting as my conscience dictates and as I sincerely feel the majority of my constituents would want me to vote, namely, against a meaningless type of bill for another five years.
We have heard many hon. members quoting statistics, members on both sides of the debate. The abolitionist says that execution is not a deterrent; the retentionist, just as sincerely, quotes figures showing that it is a deterrent. We hear the abolitionist referring to statistics which show that policeman and prison guard murders are no higher in number than they were previously. On the other side, the retentionists contend that murders in 1961 were at the rate of 230 per year, whereas in 1971 they rose to 430, practically double the former rate.
These are all credible arguments in what will probably be considered one of the most emotional and sincere debates that we will witness in this twenty-ninth Parliament. However, as I said before, I do not necessarily feel that statistics prove the point either way. But there is one argument proving that capital punishment is a deterrent- and I challenge any member of this House to contradict me-and that is the pure and simple statement that it deters the one-time murderer from committing a second murder.
I think this is the issue that we are all faced with in this debate. We have conscientiously to ask ourselves which is more important-the ultimate protection of society, or the protection of hardened criminals? As I said before, we have all heard many arguments that capital punishment is no deterrent. If it were, why did not it deter the murders that have been committed in this recent trial period, of policemen and prison guards?

With all due respect to the right hon. Prime Minister (Mr. Trudeau) and his middle-of-the-road approach to this very serious and emotional debate, it is pretty hard to convince Canadians in general that each and every one of the potential subjects for execution in the last several years was worthy of commutation. That, Mr. Speaker, is no meaningful deterrent as far as I am concerned. The so-called trial period that we have had for the past five years, and which this government is asking us to reinstate once again, is nothing short of being a complete farce in view of the way we have seen it administered by this Prime Minister's government and that of his immediate predecessor.
At the very first all-candidate meeting that was held at the beginning of the election I made the public statement that I was in favour of retaining capital punishment, or at least to keep it within the Criminal Code for the protection of our law enforcement officers and prison guards. I felt very strongly about this being at least moral protection for our law enforcement officers. If we could not at least do this to support them, eventually we would see a gradual exodus of our law enforcement officers until all we would have left would be a so-called sadistic, power-hungry, gangster-type individual who would not be afraid to protect our society on the theory that he would shoot first and ask questions later.
I am sure if I wanted to take the time to cite the experience of individual states of our neighbour to the south, and also in one of the larger cities in our own country, I could find policemen in those particular areas who would fit the category of the individual that I have just described. I know Canadians would not want to see this kind of deterioration within the ranks of our law enforcement officers. Canadians can be proud of these members of our society who are dedicated to keeping law and order; and there can be no better example than in the fine young men we see every day around this great institution that we call Parliament Hill.
As I said before, that was my opinion at the beginning of the campaign last September. Having very seriously considered and reconsidered the many aspects revolving around this decision we have to make, I have conscientiously to say that not only do I still have that same opinion but I have had it strengthened to the point that I think capital punishment in some form should be meted out to all criminals who have been found guilty of capital murder.
It has been said many times in the past there is the chance of executing an innocent man. With the opportunities open to our courts today, if there is just the slightest degree of doubt as to a man's guilt, the court can change the charge from capital to non-capital murder. This to my mind takes away any possibility of the execution of an innocent victim. The government still has the sincere and conscientious right to commute that sentence should there be any further doubt.
I cannot help but ask which is the greater crime, the state carrying out an execution of a criminal or the state being directly responsible for the death of numerous citizens, the victims of these committed criminals if and when they should make their escape? Judging from the recent pattern, it is not a case of "if"; it is just a case of when will
May 24, 1973

they be back out, either by impulse or on parole. After all, when you finally analyse the thinking of dangerous criminals in relation to the system of automatic commutation that this government has obviously practised in the last several years, why would they not try to escape? What is the deterrent? What is the penalty when recaptured and returned from whence they escaped? What have they lost?
When I say I favour capital punishment, I do not necessarily mean in the form that has been followed in the past. I am sure a more humane and painless method could be devised to accomplish the same end. On the other hand, some people would then say a criminal would be afforded too easy a way out, and before you know it a whole new debate would be opened up.
In conscientiously trying to assess the feelings of my pro-retentionist constituents on this subject, I felt a great percentage could be persuaded to change their minds from pro-capital punishment to abolition if the record of imprisonment in past years, particularly in the last 12 months, had proven successful. I think our correctional record has been an utter disgrace and has deteriorated to the point where it has become a source of jokes and cartoons. Regardless of who or what is the cause of this deplorable situation, the result of these escapes is certainly not a joking matter, particularly when th public is automatically subjected to further threats to their safety with these criminals at large, perhaps even in their own communities.
"Uncivilized" and "barbaric" are two of the favourite terms used by abolitionists to describe the taking of a life by the state through execution. I wonder how many innocent children and adults in our communities will have to die before Canada's "uncivilized" and "barbaric" parole and bail regulations are revised. As I said before, Mr. Speaker, many of my constituents could rightly accuse the state of allowing their relatives and friends to be murdered, just as surely as if the state had executed them. Since when is it civilized to trade innocent lives for criminal lives for the sake of rehabilitation programs, valid in theory, perhaps, but discredited by the fact that they have been carried to such irresponsible and tragic extremes? Please do not interpret my remarks, Mr. Speaker, as an indication of my being against rehabilitation programs which, if properly administered, are the ultimate approach to penology, but surely the law should attach some value to the lives of murder victims as well as murderers.
In conclusion, I would like to touch on the preconceived opinion of many adults that our young people, particularly at the secondary school level, are basically abolitionists. This is not necessarily so. During the Easter recess I visited the pupils of several of the secondary schools in my riding, and the pupils of others visited me here in Ottawa. During these visits capital punishment was discussed to at least some degree. Our future citizens are also concerned about what has happened to our law enforcement structure, and because of this past and perhaps future concern an average of more than 50 per cent are in favour of capital punishment. Here, again, I expect their opinion could be altered if and when our penal system proves credible.
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I have taken longer than I anticipated in this debate, but I trust that the degree of genuine concern and sincerity that I feel personally and is felt by my constituents has been projected in a way that all members of this House appreciate these feelings. It would benefit all of us as members in this House not to forget that we have an obligation and a privilege to exercise our free vote on this bill in such a way as not to leave anyone with a troubled conscience.


Mr. Ellwood Madill (Peel-Dufferin-Simcoe):: Mr. Speaker, in rising to take part in the debate on Bill C-2 I wish to make some observations about the feelings of my constituents. The constituents of the riding of Peel-Dufferin-Simcoe feel very strongly about the upcoming free vote on capital punishment. The number of letters I have received both for and against retention of the death penalty is indicative of the intense emotional and indeed spiritual conflict which has stirred the people on this issue. The vast majority of correspondents, 95 per cent to be exact, have strongly urged retention of capital punishment for all persons convicted of premeditated murder.
It should be noted that the arguments are not based solely on a desire for revenge. Indeed, most persons are concerned about the ease with which chronic killers are returned to society. In addition, despite certain statistics which imply that the death penalty is not a deterrent, the majority of people are of the opinion that if the laws were enforced this would in fact be a deterrent to some potential killers.
You will note the importance of the phrase "if the laws were enforced". More than 50 per cent of the correspondents in favour of capital punishment strongly urge Members of Parliament to insist that the government carry out our laws to the letter. While there will always be need for a certain amount of leeway, there is little doubt in the minds of many people that there has been too much leeway and clemency; therefore, the government must be prepared to enforce the laws to protect Canadian citizens. Those persons and associations in favour of abolition should not be regarded as bleeding-hearts, because their ultimate goal is the same as that of retentionists, that is, to improve Canadian society. In addition, they have come to this decision after some thought and soul-searching.
One suggestion which appears to be the strongest and the weakest argument for abolition is that a man should not take another man's life in our civilization. The weakness in this statement is that man has not progressed much, if at all, since leaving the Neanderthal age.
We must look far and wide to safeguard humanity. Perhaps a letter I have just received from one of my constituents sums this up. It states that no matter how we may shrink from it, we must have the death penalty to deter cold-blooded, calculating murderers. Such killers are the type who fear for their own skins. The children who may be these killers' victims need our sympathy far more than the homicidal types. The letter I have referred to is from a woman.
The numerous reports and presentations regarding studies on the impact of capital murder on the number of murders leads to one conclusion, that temporary abolition of the death penalty in this and other countries has not led
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to a dramatic increase in the rate of murders. I have a table here I should like-


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. Perhaps it would be convenient for the hon. member to interrupt his speech at this time and present the table to us on Tuesday when the debate is resumed.



PROCEEDING ON ADJOURNMENT MOTION

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

Alfred Dryden Hales: Mr. Speaker, this debate at this time is the result of the failure of the Secretary of State (Mr. Faulkner) to provide satisfactory answers to the questions I asked on January 10 and January 23. Those questions related to the recovery of income tax by the CBC from employees stationed in the United States. Some very basic and fundamental principles are at stake in this issue, and I trust my efforts in this regard will not be considered perfunctory.
This issue arose when the Auditor General reported to Parliament in 1969 that a Crown corporation for which he was the auditor, namely the CBC, failed to remit income tax arid social security to the United States government for 17 of its employees while stationed in the United States. I realize there was a period during which the CBC was not sure whether the employees fell under Canadian income tax laws or United States income tax laws. During the period in which the CBC was trying to settle this dispute it continued to make deductions from its United States-based employees at the same rates as Canadian income tax, and kept this money in trust; then for some reason or other it was later returned in the same year, 1965.
The total amount of income tax owing by these 17 people was $134,573.99. One of the employees in the group had an indebtedness of $15,000, which is included in the figure I have just mentioned. Realizing the complexity and seriousness of this whole problem, the public accounts committee appointed a subcommittee chaired by the very capable and distinguished Liberal member for Ontario (Mr. Cafik). It held six meetings, and the public accounts committee held 15 meetings to discuss this whole matter.
Witnesses from the CBC and from the Department of National Revenue were heard as well as many others, including Mr. J. A. Coates, legal counsel from an outstanding international taxation firm in Toronto, who gave evidence for the guidance of the committee. The committee reported its findings and made a 13-point report to the House. I wish time permitted me to place the whole report
[Mr. Madill.)
on the record. However, I shall mention only two recommendations. First, recommendation No. 7 reads:
That the corporation's action in 1965 was seriously inadequate in terms of taking steps to avoid exposing itself to a corporate liability without having made provision to recover the funds from its employees.
The last, and most important, recommendation made by the committee was that the CBC should immediately take steps to attempt to recover the $134,573.99 from the 17 employees involved. This matter now rests at that point. I should simply like to ask the minister the following questions, and I am sorry he is not here. First, was it not a reasonable assumption for the 17 employees of the CBC to assume that they should pay income tax in one country or the other? No one in their income bracket should be exempt. Second, I should like to ask the minister whether he feels that the hard-earned dollars of John Q. Public should be used to pay the income tax of the employees of the CBC, especially the one who had a tax liability of $15,000.
Further, I should like to ask, on what basis can a Crown corporation to whom parliament grants estimates to the tune of $200 million defy or disregard a recommendation tabled by an all-party committee of this House? Next, I should like to ask why the registered letter of March 29, 1973, was sent by the CBC to the 17 employees when it did not demand payment by the recipients. Finally, I should like to ask the minister this important question: Does he intend to instruct the CBC to collect this income tax, as recommended by an all-party committee of parliament, or does he intend to accept the refusal of the president to collect the income tax? That is the issue. It is a very important issue and one which must be settled.
I cannot understand how the president of the CBC can be taking a stand which defies a recommendation made by an all-party committee of this House. That is the issue. I hope the minister will answer these questions. I am sorry he did not feel that this was an important enough subject for thim to be here tonight to answer these questions.


Gilles Marceau: I will not return the compliment to my hon. friend by telling him that he is not important, even though he is not a parliamentary secretary, because he knows that it has always been a custom for a parliamentary secretary to answer questions and I will try to do my best.
After the discussion which took place during the meeting of the Standing Committee on Broadcasting, Films and Assistance to the Arts, before which CBC appeared on April 5, last, I can only reiterate, in the name of the Secretary of State (M. Faulkner), the statement made by the President of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Mr. Picard.
As the hon. member for Wellington (Mr. Hales), already knows, the attitude of the CBC as regards the recommendations of the Committee on Public Accounts in its report of June 30, 1972 was adopted following the advice from the CBC leagal advisers. The hon. member will also understand that those legal advisers were assigned under a law enacted by Parliament.
May 24, 1973

Therefore I am not expressing an opinion in my name or in the name of the Secretary of State since it is a legal matter. The CBC inquired from its legal advisers what right it had, on the basis of the recommendations by the Public Accounts Committee, to claim this money from its employees, and the legal advice was the following:
If the corporation should lodge such claims against its employees before a Canadian court, it would probably have no chance of succeeding.
As parliamentary secretary to the spokeman for the CBC in this House, I wish to assure the hon. member that the Secretary of State had lengthy discussions about this problem with CBC officials. Following the oral question directed January last by the hon. member to the Secretary of State, the president of the corporation wrote to the hon. member to assure him of his full co-operation towards a solution. The Standing Committee on Broadcasting, Films and Assistance to the Arts, which I personally attended, reviewed the question before approving the corporation's budget. The president of the corporation then answered the recommendations of the Public Accounts Committee, before which he had not appeared since the previous administration. He replied quite clearly, basing himself on documents in support of the legal aspect of his position. I therefore wish to assure the hon. member, and all other hon. members, of the interest taken in this matter by the CBC, the Secretary of State and myself, as a parliamentary secretary.
One thing, however, is certain: the Secretary of State cannot be asked to exceed his jurisdiction, but we will try to take action within our powers, and to find a solution if there is one.


Mr. Deputy Speaker:: Order, please. The Chair recognizes the hon. member for Wellington (Mr. Hales) for the purpose only of providing the date for the speech he made previously.


Alfred Dryden Hales: June 27, 1972, Mr. Speaker.


AGRICULTURE-FARM MACHINERY-IMPLEMENTATION OF RECOMMENDATIONS OF BARBER COMMISSION-ACTION TO INCREASE IMPORTS
Lorne Edmund Nystrom: Mr. Speaker, on February 5 I asked the Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) a question regarding the Barber commission which studied the cost of farm machinery. I asked him what recommendations of that commission he was planning to implement, in view of increasing farm machinery costs. His answer was, "None at the present time." Because of that inadequate answer I want to pursue the question for a few minutes this evening. I also asked about a commitment made by his predecessor regarding imports of farm machinery into Canada. Again his answer was very vague; he said that he had met two ambassadors. As a result, I want to pursue that question also this evening.
The three prairie ministers of agriculture said, after a meeting last week, that one of the issues they are really concerned about is the increase in the cost of farm machinery, farm machinery parts, and repairs. These costs have been going up very rapidly in the past year. As a
Adjournment Debate
matter of fact, when I go around my constituency, as all of us from the rural areas do, one of the biggest complaints I receive is about the rapid increase in the price of farm machinery and of parts and repairs. These prices have been increasing much too rapidly in the last few years and this must stop.
In this House we hear a lot about the problem of increasing food prices. If production costs could be brought down, this would affect the price of food or would at least slow down the increase. If the input of the farmer could be controlled as to price, in the production of a bushel of wheat or a hog or beef it would be reflected at the retail level. The same thing is true, of course, of the input of such things as fertilizers, gas and oil that a farmer uses.
As we all know, the farmer is being squeezed off the land. This is mainly due to the drop in farm income. In my province, between 1968 and 1970 farm income was cut in half, but in the last few years it has gone up. The rural areas are being depopulated and one of the reasons is the increase in production costs to the farmer. The government will have take action in this area very quickly if it is to help the small and marginal farmers in this country.
Sad to say, the government has the solution at its fingertips in the Barber commission report, but that has been put away and is gathering dust. This report should be brought forward and its recommendations put into effect along with the recommendations of the governments of Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta. The report says that farmers are the victims of the farm marchinery companies, that they are paying too much for machinery and repairs. I suggest that the government should act on the recommendations listed in the report.
Apart from implementing this report, the government should establish a prices review board for all products. Then it could investigate the increase in the price of farm machinery and the cost of parts and repairs. If these increases were not justified, the government would have the statutory power to control or roll back prices. I think the government will have to take this step to ensure that the price of farm machinery is maintained at a level which will enable the farmer to survive.
There should also be more standardization of farm machinery parts. Perhaps machinery could be imported from countries such as Roumania at more favourable prices. There should also be more public involvement in public-private enterprise to produce more machinery, and perhaps aid and assistance could be given to the co-operative implements' plants in this country. These are some of the suggestions contained in the Barber commission report or advanced by the provincial governments.
I take this opportunity tonight to urge the government to act on the report as it refers to farm machinery and parts. If world depopulation continues, rural communities will be eroded and before long most of the people will live in a few large metropolitan areas that are unplanned, polluted and depersonalized. The only institution that can prevent this is the federal government. It has the power and the jurisdiction, and it is about time it shifted gears, got into action and implemented some of the recommendations of the Barber commission report.
26314-41)

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Adjournment t Deba te
[ Transla tion]


Mr. Leopold Corriveau (Parliamentary Secretary to Minister of Agriculture):: Mr. Speaker, the hon. member said, and I quote:
. . . the undertaking by the former minister of agriculture that Canada would import more farm machinery from other countries ...
I should like to say at the start, Mr. Speaker, that although I have not been able to find texts in which the former minister gave such an assurance, I know that he tried to limit the prices of farm machinery by encouraging more competition. This was in line with a recommendation by the Barber Commission, which promoted negotiations and discussions aimed at making tractors from unaccustomed sources available to Canadian farmers.
For that purpose he will be meeting with delegations, officials and other representatives from such countries as Czechoslovakia, Rumania and Japan as well as officials from other countries including the USSR.
Since his appointment the present Minister of Agriculture (Mr. Whelan) also had discussions on the subject and undoubtedly there will be other initiatives in that field.
Tractors and other farm machinery from those countries are now available in Canada. I am convinced that all hon. members will agree with me that the government should intervene in purchases of farm machinery for farmers only to reduce import problems to a minimum. I would like to remind hon. members that equipment such as tractors enter Canada duty-free.
As several members know, the building of new lines of farm machinery in a foreign country results in various problems, the main one being undoubtedly the knowledge of our marketing methods to guarantee an adequate supply of machines and spare parts as well as adequate service. Solving those problems required more time than anticipated; however, there is a renewed interest in some countries for exporting farm machinery in Canada and it is hoped that the plans and ambitions of the department will meet some degree of success.


TRANSPORT-ALLEGED DETERIORATION IN WESTERN CANADA RAILWAY PASSENGER SERVICE-REQUEST FOR INVESTIGATION
Mr. Douglas Roche (Edmonton-Strathcona):: Mr. Speaker, on March 8 I asked the Minister of Transport (Mr. Marchand) to find ways to improve rail service between Edmonton and Calgary and I specifically cited instances where passengers had to stand in the baggage car for want of seating accommodation. I gave the minister the names of individuals who had been so affected, and I am sure that proper apologies have been proffered. But that does not alter the central question I raised. What are the government's plans to save the railways as a vital means of passenger transportation in an age dominated by jets and big airports?
Transportation is the lifeline of western Canada and improved transportation is essential for its continued development. Unfortunately, rail transportation has become an unwanted stepchild and it is time for the Minister of Transport and the railway companies to listen
(Mr. Nystrom.]
to the protests of western Canadians who want, and need, the kind of service the railways were subsidized by government to provide. As an example, a fast and efficient passenger train between Edmonton and Calgary is not a luxury but a necessity. The return air fare between the two cities is beyond the reach of the ordinary traveller or businessman. As Art Evans, a columnist for the Edmonton Journal, put it in a recent article:
The air fare between Alberta's two major cities is now $18 one way. On a round trip, taking one taxi fare at each end, you're now looking at $40, a fair bite and one that only an expense account can handle regularly without wincing.
Mr. Evans feels, as I do, that one fast train making daily runs between Edmonton and Calgary would have no truble attracting passengers, especially if the round trip fare were lowered to $10. It is not just lack of seating on the Edmonton-Calgary line that is involved; it is the generally haphazard way the Dayliner is operated. For example, no businessman is going to take the train to Calgary if it makes four stops. Why could we not have a daily fast train, non-stop or with only one stop at Red Deer? This would bring travellers to downtown Calgary from the heart of Edmonton in two or two and a half hours. Increased efforts should also be made to provide clean cars and food.
The railway committee of the Canadian Transport Committee has asked for a study of passenger service throughout the country. Well, let the voice of Albertans who have been deprived of efficient and economical rail transportation be heard. Let the voice of Edmontonians who are fed up with the lack of action in getting rid of the level crossing on Whyte Avenue, the main street of south Edmonton, be heard.
Obviously, a piecemeal approach is not the solution. What is needed is a comprehensive program to improve service, serve passengers and lower freight rates. Why has the minister refused to set out a transportation policy which would serve the total transportation needs of western Canada? We know now that only such an all-embracing policy will broaden the industrial base of Alberta.
The facts are clear. The railways have discontinued rail passenger service at a number of Alberta communities. This adversely affects their social and economic development as well as the development of the province as a whole. Such communities are crippled in trying to attract industry. In other words, lack of federal concern about the needs of Alberta's communities hampers the economic and social wellbeing of the province. The cost to the public is one of those hidden expenses that is smothered by the excessive layers of bureaucracy in Canada. I believe that where rail service is discontinued for perhaps valid reasons, the federal government should give a commitment to provide passenger service by alternate means. The Western Conference on Economic Opportunities is fast approaching. Albertans want action on transportation. The passengers who had to stand on the Edmonton-Calgary Dayliner are just the tip of a very large iceberg of protest.
I understand the Minister of Transport is out of the country attending a conference. I hope the absence of his parliamentary secretary, who is a western Canadian, is
May 24, 1973

not to be construed as further evidence of lack or real concern on the part of this government in solving the transportation problems of western Canada.


Gilles Marceau: The hon. member for Edmonton-Strathcona (Mr. Roche) has referred to the first question he had asked and he forgot, probably by mistake, to indicate that the minister had personally answered him in a letter dated March 16, providing him with all the explanations he had obtained about matters that the hon. member had raised.
To the second part of the hon. member's question, I will answer in six points. First of all, many passenger train services are now being subsidized through the Canadian Transport Commission. In its 1972 annual report, the CTC indicates that $56,636,787 was paid on claims for passenger train services in 1971. The claims for 1971 exceeded $87 million.
Second, the government is subsidizing the development of so-called light rapid comfort or LRC trains. These would operate on existing tracks but at higher speeds due to improved suspension systems. A three-company consortium has been working on the development of these trains, and so far has been subsidized through the PAIT program, that is the Program for the Advancement of Industrial
Adjournmen t Deba te
Technology of the Department of Industry, Trade and Commerce. The consortium is preparing to test the cars and engines and further financial support is possible.
Third, the turbo train developed by the Canadian National and United Aircraft of Canada Limited will be retested this summer.
Fourth, the CTC has been funding various studies designed to improve railway passenger service, especially for high density areas.
Fifth, the Canadian Institute for Guided Ground Transport at Queen's University is doing studies for the government on magnetic levitation systems. They have received $380,000 from the Transportation Development Agency and $133,000 from the National Research Council, these sums totalling over half a million dollars. They are to build a test facility.
Sixth, the University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies has been granted $20,000 by the Transportation Development Agency to study dynamic tracked air-cushion suspension systems.
I note the suggestions of the hon. member. I shall convey them to the minister who is now abroad; I shall try to find out whether he will make a statement on motions should he feel one is warranted.

Motion agreed to and the House adjourned at 10.28 p.m.

Friday, May 25, 1973